Teaching Experiences

Bonjour Trish! 

So to begin with I'll describe my teaching situation.  I'm currently teaching in France in the city of Nantes, which has roughly about 300,000 people...so definitely a bigger city than Bellingham but not overwhelming in any way.  I'm teaching with an assistantship program through the french ministry of education.  the program allows me to teach in France for one year (with the possibility of a second), and while the pay is not very large, this is one of the easiest ways to work in France as I technically work for the French government so I don't have to deal with a lot of the red tape with visas and other bureaucratic issues.  I would definitely recommend this program to anyone interested in teaching in France.  It gives great experience and I'm really feeling like I have a better idea about what it means to teach now.

I'm teaching English to about 8 different classes among 5 different primary schools (students ages 8-10), so what that means is that I don't have my own classroom, but rather I go to the homerooms at each school to teach.  I go to each class twice a week, and my total "in class" time ranges around 12 hours per week.  Now that doesn't at first sound like a lot, but when you have 8 different classes (and among those classes I have 3 different levels of English), I find that I spend a good deal of time outside of class in prep time.  So all in all it feels like a full-time job.  Also I have two classes that I switch on and off with the professor (I teach one day, the french prof teaches the next day), so that require a bit of work collaborating with the professor. 

I've found that I really love teaching to elementary school kids because they are basically starting fresh with me, so I can immediately see if they are learning because their only exposure to English in the classroom is with me.  Also with little kids you can play a bunch of games with them and be silly and they love it, so it's a fun atmosphere.  I'm also finding it's fun because the little kids are immediately impressed with your foreign accent so they (most of the time) pay attention to you.  I also really enjoy teaching in France as their academic calender has about 7 weeks worth of paid vacation, so I have plenty of time to travel around France and Europe.

Well, let me know if you have anymore questions about the program or if any students are interested in it because I'd be more than happy to go into further detail. 

-Phil Dierking