February

Just realised that I haven't updated this thing in absolutely ages- well, since before Christmas. So it's definitely about time I did update it!

January was fairly uneventful, and mostly taken up with oral exams. I did very little actual teaching as most of the things I was doing finished just before Christmas. The school was then off for a half term at the start of February, and now we're in the second week back.

This time, my timetable is much nicer- I have Mondays off, and don't start until 15.30 on a Tuesday, meaning my weekend is much longer! On Wednesdays I only have one lesson as well, later on in the afternoon, so this new timetable certainly allows me more lie-ins than before.. my earliest start is 08.10, and that's only once a week.. bliss.

Most of my classes are in the 1st and 3rd year this time, whereas last term they were mostly in the 2nd and 4th year. We're focusing mostly on reading projects which is also nice because the classes are enjoyable and give all the students plenty of opportunities to speak and use the language. All in all I'm enjoying teaching these classes very much, although I still have to meet a few classes, so hopefully they'll be similarly pleasant.

Today I'm finishing at about 4pm, then it'll be straight home for dinner, I'm absolutely starving because I was too lazy to make breakfast or proper lunch, and instead brought a few clementines and a cereal bar with me to work- been here since 10am so by the time I get back I'll be ready to eat the entire contents of the fridge!

I'm also very excited as on Saturday morning I'll be going to Berlin! I'm staying until Monday afternoon, in a hostel (it's nice and cheap that way) that I stayed in when I went to Berlin with school a few years ago. So far I don't really have any concrete plans- I'm hoping to do a bike tour of the city on Saturday morning, so I can get lots of touristy photographs- and at some point I'll definitely go to the Jewish museum and possibly the Anne Frank museum too, if I get a chance. There's a few people from my German class at uni there, so it'll be nice to meet up with them and see how they're getting on.

Finally... hmm, I don't think I have anything else to report! Well, I went to Zürich last night for a "German conversation practice" group thing, it was just a group of 6 others and me who want the opportunity to speak standard German (the Swiss generally converse in their own funny little dialects) and it was really good fun. There was a native German speaker there too, to help us and correct our mistakes, and all the people there were very pleasant, so all in all it was very good fun, and I'll definitely go again next time. Most of the others haven't studied German to the same level as me so it was a nice wee ego boost for them to comment on it, and the Swiss guy who was there didn't have to correct toooooo much. So I'm really glad that my German hasn't gone totally down the pan. He also said (there was also an Irish guy there) that people from NI and the Republic tend to speak German with a better accent than English people, or something to that effect. Hoorah!

Anyway, time to go and teach class 1bSW about Sherlock Holmes.. ooooerrr.