I wake up at 6:30 a.m., shower and meet my team for morning think time at 7. We lift up home stuff (Monday), things at school (Tues.), other teams across China (Wed.), other countries in Asia (Thurs.) and on Friday we meet as well with Team 21 (the other teaching time on campus) to think about all that stuff again.
The office day begins at 7:50, often after I've grabbed a breakfast burrito from one of the street venders on EnjiZhuang Xijie. I'm in the office until noon, and again from 2 to 4 each day, aside from being in classes, of course. I teach 16 class periods a week, 12 of which are 40 minutes long, 4 of which only 30. Monday and Wednesday are my busiest class days, Thursday and Fridays my lightest. I have five classees of Kindergartners which I see 3 or 4 times a week (depending on whether I see them for 30 or 40 minutes). All this math does work out I swear. Much of my office time is spent preparing for class, writing lesson plans, or keeping up with folks at home and the going-ons of my not-so local Pittsburgh sports teams. The office consists of myself and my team (Matt. Ryan and Dave), three members of Team 21 (Debbie, Chante and Tamah) and then the eight Chinese English teachers in the primary school. They're all ladies and they're fun to share a workspace with.
My classes are in the Kindergarten building, a little hike across campus. The classrooms are color-coded in K, so I refer to my classes as Big Purple, Middle Pink, Big Green, Big Yellow and then the achromatic, oddly-named "Pre" class. Big refers to 5 & 6-year olds. Middle is 4 & 5-year olds. And I'm still not sure what exactly "Pre" is... they're all new to the school, so they were all new English speakers back in September.
Kindergarten works differently in China. It's more like pre-school I suppose, although I'll admit I'm a bit ignorant to the whole early childhood education stuff in the States. Anyway, you start Kindergarten often at age 3 (fortunately I don't teach those kids) and have it for three years, graduating from Little to Middle to Big. Not everyone does this, but, like in America, many parents feel the need to start 'em early. I forget what I've said in the past, but my Kindergarten is a boarding school. Maybe 60% of the kids stay there all week and some won't see their parents for the majority of the semester. This is pretty obvious in the kids.
OK, back to my day. I teach anywhere from 2-4 classes, which consist of learning letters, vocab words, singing songs, playing games, teaching simple structures, and reading books. I've gone through some goodies... a Clifford book, Where The Wild Things Are, Barenstein Bears... some others, most of which I simplify a lot. Class is my favorite part of my day, I think. That and reading the Post-Gazette sports page when it updates online in the middle of the afternoon :)
I eat lunch in the cafeteria (which makes Alex's look like a Sunday dinner). It's Chinese food and it's terrible. I'm really fond of the "second lunch," but I eat in the caf to spend time with the Chinese teachers--and because it's always an adventure.
Here's some more pictures... more about my day later:
I've mentioned before about the abundance of manual labor in China. There are always people doing stuff like this (and crazier) everywhere you look. It may not seem dangerous, but you've never been in China. This, by the way, is not on my campus, but somewhere on the streets of Beijing. I thought the words on the sign were slightly ironic.
The second is of some American kids playing in the leaves on campus. The Chinese don't do that, and these kids were all born (or at least have been raised most of their lives) in China--so this is their first time to play in leaves. Crazy, huh? My orgranization has a lot of families, especially here in Beijing, so it's interesting to see that side of overseas work.
This is a tree on campus.
And finally, this is from way back to my first day in China, at the Forbidden City. This Startbuck's is inside. When I get home, ask me about "socialism with Chinese characteristics"--the official poltical position of China--this picture sums it up pretty well.
I'm off to class... hopefully you're off to bed.
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