Nothing worthwhile comes easy

It is difficult to explain the experiences I have had so far at SPDY School whilst teaching English as I have had so many. My first couple of days here were overwhelming to say the least – the heat, the rubbish, the food, the tuk tuk rides, the children!!! The children – they came in packs of 50 in one classroom - this means I was asked 50 separate times my name, my mother’s name, my favorite colour..the list goes on. Trying to teach English as a second language already has its challenges so for me who has never taught ESL before I was out of my depth! It got to the stage where one class was complete crowd control and I was constantly dodging chalk thrown at my head.
Alas, I am making it sound much catastrophic than it really is. I have been teaching at SPDY for 4 weeks now and although it took me a while to find my feet I am very sad to leave. The children may come across as hooligans but really if you get to know them they are just the same as I was at that age – adventurous, energetic and enthusiastic. Once I understood this and put myself in their shoes, I was able to make lessons a bit of fun whilst maintaining learning progression.
Out of the classroom I also taught children in one on one sessions. These children were a little bit behind and all very keen to learn. This is where my real teaching took place – I was able to identify what these kids needed help with and how to individually cater to their needs. I saw progression everyday with these children and the more they understood what they were learning the more they enjoyed our sessions – I think this may have had something to do with my over the top excitement when they got an answer correct on their own. With one child in particular – he went from one day where he completely did not know how to add or subtract to the next day where he could do it off the top off his head and using his fingers – a truly miraculous break through to witness. All in all the children made my experience here in India a challenging, fun, worthwhile and rewarding one. I will never forget them and only wish I could stay with them a bit longer.

Nothing worthwhile comes easy