Thrown into the deep end but still treading water...

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?"  - Matthew 6: 25-27

This is what I kept repeating to myself all of last week...

Apparently most teachers start with slow schedules, maybe teaching 10 to 15 hours their first week.  You would not guess it from James and my stories.  This will only be my experience as James has promised to blog his own. 

I taught 22 hours last week.  Mind you, the 22 hours does not include lesson planning, breaks between classes, etc.  I covered all of the classes for a teacher who has been at the school for 4 or 5 years who has left on holiday to visit home.  

After a peaceful weekend of scooter shopping, church, Sunday lunch at an awesomely cheap college dining hall with new church friends, and catching up on sleep from our crazy week in Taipei, I felt ready to work.  I showed up when the school opened at noon, 2 hours before my first class started.  I sat down to lesson plan.  The 2 hours were disappearing rapidly and I had 3 classes to plan.  Every teacher and TA that walked in the room wanted to say hello and ask about my weekend.  I wanted everyone either ignore me or help me.  There was no time for chit-chat people!

Note:  At Shane English School, we are given exactly what to teach for each lesson of each class.  We have the 5 million different books used in each class (seriously I was so confused by all the different books for all the different levels and the 2 to 4 different books used within each class).  The flashcards are already created.  You just have to find them in the huge mess of binders in the teacher's room.  So, basically our job as teachers is to decide how to teach what needs to be taught for the day.  What approach do we take?  What games do we incorporate?  How do we make learning English fun after the students have been in school all day long?  We also have a Taiwanese TA in the classroom.  The TA does most of the grading.  She explains things like the homework to the students in Chinese either before of after the English teacher does his/her lesson.  

I walked up the 2 flights of stairs to my classroom with a lesson plan in hand.  I realized my heart was racing and not from the walk up the stairs.  I was about to enter my first class and had no idea what to expect!  What were the kids like?  What age were they going to be?  How would they react to me?  

Well, the class went ok.  They seemed pretty bored at times, but at least I got through what I needed to and no one misbehaved.  I learned one important lesson though: I can't just start talking to explain anything from what a word means, a grammar concept, or the rules of a game.  The whole classroom stops and stares at me with a blank, almost frightened expression.  It's like being in a classroom in America and the teacher starts explaining directions in Chinese!

The second class went MUCH better.  The students were lively and fun!  They seemed to like anything I had planned.  I was receiving so much joy watching them play the games and understanding the English I had just taught.  

I survived the third class.  They were so lazy with no energy.  Ohh well.  I did not let it bother me.  

At the end of the night, I realized that the day had been so busy I forgot about being hungry, thirsty, tired, using the bathroom, etc.  It was pretty intense having all these little eyes on you.  I had just directed classrooms for 5.5 hours.  The students do what I tell them to do - sometimes enthusiastically and other times not, but they did it.  Weird!

Afterwards, my manager sat down with me to talk about the day.  She was happy I was not crying.  Apparently, one of the male teachers had cried at the end of his first day.  One of the other male teachers in the room at that time said he waited until he got home to cry.  I still giggle about that.  I did not cry when I got home but James and I had a lot to talk about!

On Tuesday, I had a required morning training at our school.  If you get a bunch of teachers together that work until 9pm, they are not lively at 10am.  I now understand this one!  Lesson planning went much better.  I only had 2 classes.  I planned much faster and more organized.  I even had time to grab a sweet potato from Family Mart next door.  To my surprise, the class I was dreading went ok.  The students are around 13 to 14 years old.  There is one guy in the class that is quite a bit larger than me named Jimmy.  I got some "you are lame-o" looks but they seemed to enjoy my games.  I left the school that evening elated from the day!

By the way, everyone in Taiwan has an English name that they go by.  It makes it MUCH easier to memorize student's names.  

On Wednesday, I had the same 3 classes again as on Monday.  They went much better!  I am amazed at how happy it makes me to see the students having fun speaking English.  Jimmy even said hello to me!  I guess he was much more intimidating to me than I to him.  The TAs complimented me for how much better I did compared to Monday.  I was feeling pretty good about things.  

Another by the way, I have sooooooooo much respect for teachers that must make up every lesson from scratch.  It's a no wonder it is hard to have good teachers (which I have a few in my family and a few friends who are incredible).  With all the time you have to spend lesson planning and preparing, it would be much easier just to teach straight from the book.

Thursday started off awesome.  James I went exploring in the hills.  We went to a lake James had found earlier in the week heading towards the mountains.  We found a bridge a trail around the lake.  The lake looked so blue and perfect.  I really wanted to jump in it and swim around!  We made some new friends with 2 locals who were taking some pictures.  They took a few pictures of us.  As they were riding off on their scooters, one of them frantically hopped off his scooter and starting shaking a tree branch in the woods.  He had these 2 monster bugs called rhinoceros beetles!!!!!  He wanted to show them to us.  He spoke very limited English but I think we all bonded that morning :) 

View near the lake

Trail to go fishing on the lake

Runner's World shot on the bridge

Picture taken by new friends

Rhino Beetles (male and female) held by our new friend

Good thing the start to my day rocked.  My classes that were the same ones on Tuesday went terrible.  There was no energy in the class.  I could not take the lame-o, bored looks much longer.  Jimmy was removed from that class and taken to another class due to a personal scheduling conflict.  Another teacher told me that there is often an alpha student of the class that controls the mood each day.  I think he was my alpha student and the teenagers felt lost without him.  I could barely hold back the tears by the end of the class.  I was fighting so hard.  I managed to get out without crying.  When I went back to the teacher's room, the TAs gave me my schedule for next week.  I have 27 hours of classes!!!!  What?!!!  They start "summer camp classes" next week and added to my schedule.  I am also taking over a few classes of the teacher I am replacing.  I can't wait for the other teacher to return on July 22nd.  That day can not come soon enough. I felt so overwhelmed.  I talked to my mom on skype that night.  It added some relief.  She said there is no way to motivate teenagers :)  You can always count on mom to make you feel better even from 8,000 miles away!

Friday was the longest day yet.  I was at the school from noon to 9:20 pm.  I thought I was supposed to work less hours in Taiwan than my corporate America jobs?!  The day flew by.  My classes went well.  One of my classes that was new for me had much younger students.  They were probably 6 to 8 years old.  Explaining games is a challenge with the limited English they know!  All they really wanted me to do was throw a ball at them to pick the next student to speak English.  A bit odd but it worked.  None of my games worked so we kept resorting back to the ball game.  This class could be difficult later.  There are 2 TAs.  There are 20 students and only 5 of them are girls.  I have been told the boys are quite naughty but they are at least cute, too.  I finished the day with a Private Tutoring class.  The 17 year old girl speaks a lot of English and I really enjoyed the class.  In fact, we ran over the designated hour because we were chatting so much.  Typical girls! 

All of the experienced teachers keep telling us after a month or so, lesson planning becomes much easier and faster.  You learn the students in each class and know what they like and don't like.  I hope that month comes fast for me....  Of course my schedule will change again in 3 weeks after the teacher returns from vacation.  Then, it will change again at the end of August when school is back in session and there are no more summer classes and another teacher at my school leaves/is replaced....  Hopefully, it will be become easier and more second-nature soon!

This week James and I have seen a big turn in our regular schedules.  As most of you know we are typically early to bed and early to rise.  Well, not any more.  Every night we managed to get in the bed later.  It was so hard to wake up each morning.  7 am felt way too early.  9 am felt much better!  We aren't eating dinner until 10 pm so we aren't going asleep until midnight.  We would love to figure out a way to get in the bed earlier so we can wake up earlier to beat the horrendous summer heat but we have not found a solution yet...

The much needed weekend has been awesome.  We finally got into those mountains we have been looking at from our apartment window!!!  We rode a bus to Lion's Head Mountain on Saturday morning.  We hiked up the mountain into the jungle...well...kind of a jungle.  There are an endless amount of Buddhist temples on the hike.  Some are actually built into the mountains.  They all have a great view!  I wouldn't mind worshiping with a view like that!  

We are amazed by the never ending amount of food everywhere here.  We did not bother to bring any food with us for the day.  We bought mini-bananas at the top of a mountain for the same price we can get them at the market down the street from our apartment.  The food is not more expensive when there is a captive audience (with the one exception we have found at Kenting beach).  We held out for lunch to eat at the largest of the Buddhist temples.  We ate a Buddhist lunch and were served by monks!  The food was the same as what we have been eating everyday - brown rice, veggies and tofu.  We weren't sure how to pay because they did not ask for any money.  James tried to give them money and they accepted it.  We think it may have been by donation only....or perhaps we weren't even supposed to eat there...haha.  It was a very cool experience!  

Hiking up the path

View from the top

Massive spider.  Neither of us willing to stick a hand in the picture for the size comparison. 

Buddhist monk garden

Our new favorite lunch spot on a hike at the temple

Possibly the largest worm on earth.  Gross!

Hiking around the top

We're just so cute :)

Temple built into the mountain

View from the temple...we're taking baby steps to get into those big mountains.

Another temple in the green!

Always more stairs on these hikes...

The elephant ear plant (the the right) has some huge leaves. 

The seven star tree 

As soon as got on the bus to head home after a long day of exploring, we passed out!  We were so exhausted!!!!!!!

The luxury bus to Lion's Head Mountain.  1.5 hours each way, $3 USD roundtrip.  We watched a Bruce Lee movie while riding. 

We spent Sunday (today) doing a run at 18 peaks, church, lunch at the ridiculously cheap dining hall, blogging and .........lesson planning is yet to come.  I have to get ahead for next week.  I am a bit nervous.  But God takes care of the birds, so I should not worry about tomorrow.  That is my new motto with teaching and life in general.  I can't always be thinking to the classes for the next day.  I just need to do what I need to do today.  But, in this case I need to get ready for classes tomorrow because I won't have time at school to plan because James and I start Chinese lessons in the morning.  Finally!!!!!!  We need to know some Chinese very very very very badly.  I don't know how we have survived this long here. 

Lunch at the college dining hall - less than $2 and includes all you can eat brown rice, soup and tea.  James and I spent the meal discussing why it is significantly cheaper to eat out in Taiwan compared to cooking yourself.  We never came up with a firm answer.  By the way, I left here today more full than I've been since arriving in Taiwan I think!

I do have one fear of learning Chinese.  We have already starting speaking a somewhat broken English to everyone here except each other.  Between having to speak clearly, slowly, loudly and limited simple words in class and speaking to Taiwanese people with limited English skills, we are now speaking funny to native English speakers!  I've noticed that native English speakers that have lived here a while and know some Chinese seem to talk a bit funny themselves.  

Last thing, I want to give props to Buckhead Church.  Wow...how could any pastor speak to you directly as Andy Stanley, one of the best public speakers in America, or how could the music ever compare to basically attending a concert every week?  Although I like going to church here, it always makes me homesick for Buckhead Church and all the wonderful friends we had/still have there.  However, I am grateful that we have found a supportive group on the other side of the world. 

Random pictures - Here are some great pictures from our apartment rooftop on a clear day taken by photographer James.  

Grad School in a week

We have now completed our week of grad school for teaching so we're ready to become teachers on Monday.  Right?!

First of all, I cannot say enough how much we like Taipei.  It is truly the coolest city I have ever visited when all factors are included into the mix.  Too bad we were training all and did not have much time to visit the sights.

Picture of Taipei.  City in the forest and mountains with a river and coastline plus a population of 2.6 million...is that possible?

Our training was held at the headquarters for our school.  Our training session included 13 other teachers who will be teaching in various cities around Taiwan.  We had quite the mix of teachers.  The nationalities included American, British, South African, Canadian, Australian, and Irish.  A few of the teachers had taught in other countries included China, Siberia and Arabia.  It was a fun group of people with a lot of different personalities.  Two of the teachers will be in Hsinchu City at a different branch than us.

From going through training weeks with corporate America companies, I must say this was the best training I have been through for several reasons.

1.  All of the instructors were British.  We picked up on some new fun British words to start using including rubbish, nappy (diaper), brilliant (used like Americans use great), and just using "quite" more often.  Seriously, the instructors were all previous teachers who know work in HR.  They know how to capture an audience, present a lesson in an interesting manner, and keep their students involved.  The lessons were constructed much like how our classes will be.  We were constantly playing games, being called on, asked to volunteer to assist in the learning process, divided into competitive teams, etc.  For those of you who know about the teacher Ron Clark, I believe Ron would like the classrooms here!  The classes are active.  Everyone must pay attention at all times.  The students are driven and motivated by team points.  Somehow, teaching in these schools could remind me of my camp counseling days....
2.  I really felt like I was learning useful information that will be directly applied to my new job.  Although I have no great expectations that I will be a brilliant teacher in my first month (hopefully not too much longer than that), I feel prepared that I have learned a lot.  James and I agree that there were a few key points missing but overall a lot was covered.  You can tell that I had to stay involved and ready to respond at all times because there are NO doodles in my notes!  I have a doodling addiction as soon as a pen enters my hand in most cases...
3. We observed four classes in Taipei.  Although we had observed classes at our respective schools in Hsinchu, it was nice to see other teachers, too.  I got to observe a Kindy (Kindergarten) class.  It made me a bit sad I do not have any Kindy classes, but I am sure I will get over it :)  We also met another married couple who has been in Taipei teaching English for 9 months!  It was cool to met another married couple doing the same thing as us.
4.  One of the example lessons was conducted in Chinese.  Somehow, we were in a freak group of teachers who all already knew some Chinese.  James and I were so lost.  We know how a student would feel who could not understand what the heck was going on in English class.  We felt like total fools not knowing how to say our nationality and other country names.  However, in the end with a good lesson, we can say a few other countries and "I am American."  I actually got to use this at the market the other day to the cashier.  It was exciting to speak Chinese correctly!
5.  One reason why this training was not so brilliant, we sat at the students' desks from 9:45am to 8:30pm for two of the days and 9:45am to 4pm for the other three days.  Rubbish!

In the meantime we managed to see a little bit more of Taipei during our small amount of free-time.

Monday Run - Da'an Forest Park
This was a 10 minute run from our hostel.  The park is pretty big and full of trees with a dirt track around the exterior.

Tuesday Run - River Park
This park/path lines the river on both sides and was a 5 minute run from the hostel.  The river runs straight (or rather curvy) through Taipei.  I believe it is about 25 miles one way.  The path is for cyclists and pedestrians only!  Basically you see green on both sides of you, a river, city and mountains all at once.  Incredible!

Wednesday Run - Botanical Gardens
Gorgeous gardens about a 10 minute run from the hostel again.  Unfortunately, we were there too early to go into a lot of the gardens but nonetheless very cool.

Thursday Run - National Taiwan Normal University
Sorry...no pictures.  This was very close to our hostel and nothing too special.  Just a college campus with lots of trees and a track.

Friday Run - Back to the river going the opposite direction

On Thursday evening, we had a bit more time given we had completed our observations and our homework (writing our own lesson plan).  We rode the MRT south to the Taipei Zoo.  From there, we hopped straight on a gondola that took us over green mountains.  The ride lasted about 20 minutes and cost $2.66 US each way.  Not too shabby!  We tried to hike some of the trails at the top but unfortunately the sun was already starting to set.  That meant the bugs were coming out!!!!  The ride down was pretty awesome with the city and Taipei 101 lit up.  We will definitely go back there for a full day's trip of hiking and learning to make our own tea.  The spot is famous for making your own tea and apparently delicious.

View from the top with Taipei 101

Biggest snails ever!

Link to the gondola ride movie - http://youtu.be/QnwZVIzFDKs 

Other highlights of Taipei were:

• The hostel -  Thank you Eight Elephants hostel!  There were no cockroaches in our rooms!  We enjoyed flushing our toilet paper because they supposedly have piping made for that.  Either that or the staff doesn't like to take out stinky toilet paper.  They also had a filter drinking water faucet connected to the kitchen sink.  Finally it was simple and easy to drink water again.  Also, we enjoyed having a real kitchen for the first time since arriving in Taiwan.  We made our own dinner every night!  We also met a lot of neat people at the hostel.  I feel like we were at grandma's house getting spoiled all week. 
• The Vegetarian Restaurant by our school and hostel -  We did not have high hopes for this place but it exceeded our exceptions.  Steamed veggie dumplings rock our world!
• Public trashcans - There are no public trashcans in Hsinchu.  I do not know the reason for this.  However, there are trashcans in Taipei.  Maybe there are no trashcans in Hsinchu since there are no sidewalks to put them on.  Who was the city planner for this place?  :) 
• Foreigners are everywhere - Locals did not stare at me in Taipei.  They are used to seeing blonde, blue-eyed females.  They are also used to seeing women running!  We saw a couple of tough Taiwanese athletes.  By the way, today in Hsinchu a high school girl came up to James and I and asked to have her picture taken with us.  James was right, we are the celebrities now we were always meant to be.  I bet that picture is on facebook now :)
• Family Mart Sweet Potatoes - We learned that Family Mart, a convenient store similar to 711, sells baked Japanese sweet potatoes by weight.  Fortunately or possibly unfortunately, we have a Family Mart directly across the street from our apartment.  You literally take the potato off the coals in the cooker, put it in a bag, buy it, and eat it walking down the street.  So delicious!
• MRT - There is no need for a scooter of car in Taipei.  The MRT is incredible.  It can take you to the mountains north of Taipei, the mountains south of Taipei, the coast west of Taipei and everywhere in between.  The bus system is great too for reaching the spots beyond the MRT.  The MRT also has shopping malls at the stops.  Most stops also sell food and drink.  There is a food court at the main station. 
• The people are just as friendly and helpful - Even in the major world city, the people are just as friendly and helpful (and a lot of people speak English).  One local insisted on walking us to the train we needed to ride at the MRT even though we understood where to do.  He missed his train to do that!  Can you imagine someone doing that at Marta?! 
• Cooler weather - Although the weather was still extremely hot and humid, it rained for a short time everyday which kept the temperatures down.  Speaking of temperatures, we have heard that the weather is about to get a lot hotter and more humid for July and August.  For the first time in my life, I will be looking forward to the cooler weather in the fall. 

Upon returning to Hsinchu, we went to my school's Welcome and Farewell Teacher party at a local restaurant.  I had to make it back for my own party!  The staff at my school is pretty darn cool.  Good news for James...a second teacher will be at his school starting in August!!!!!!

Well, James is currently busting his brain cells doing lesson planning for his 4 back-to-back classes on Monday :(  I am literally subbing for all of a teacher's classes next week while he is on holiday.  We are both starting with heavy schedules (James a lot more so than me).  Pollyanna would say - More hours mean a bigger paycheck.  Just as we were starting to adjust to living in Taiwan, now we start a new career.  The challenges of moving to a new country are endless!  Starting in July, we will have summer classes for the next two months so the structure will be different.  Basically the goal of next week is survival.  That simple!

The University across the street from us is having beginner Chinese classes for 1.5 hours every Monday and Wednesday morning over the summer for less than $7/person.  Ready or not...the Rockwells will be learning Chinese!  Classes start in one week.

Our goals for the weekend are - scooter shopping, getting me a cell phone, James doing his lesson plans for Monday and church.  The Rockwells never stop....

Random picture of the post - James refilling our water bottles at the refill station.  It's quite the workout walking home with those jugs!

On an extremely sad note, we were faced with our first bad news from home.  I believe the hardest times for our homesickness at this point will be when something causing great sorrow or celebration happens at home and we are not there to be with the ones we love.  James' Auntie Laurie faced a painful battle with cancer over the last several months.  God took her to His kingdom on Friday evening and ended her suffering.  She was one of the sweetest people in the world.  She will be missed by many.

Ready or Not...

James here.  It's time to write about my experience being thrown in the deep end of the pool, er, school.  And sorry, no pictures this time  ;-)

Last week (June 10 - 14) I was scheduled to observe classes at my and another school, to see how the teacher(s) go through there lesson, how they keep class fun, etc.  I sat in on Dom's class at my school on Monday and Tuesday.  Wednesday was going to be a day off as it was the Dragon Boat Festival in Taiwan.

After class on Tuesday Rachel and I were having dinner at our favorite vegan restaurant when my phone rang.  It was my manager.  She was calling to let me know Dom had a medical emergency and would not be able to teach his classes on Thursday and Friday (he is the only teacher at my school and the person I was going to be replacing) and she was asking if I could cover his classes.  My only reply was "I don't know that I am capable of doing that yet".  I say this because the standard procedure is to 1) observe classes, 2) go through a week of training, 3) slowly ease in to teaching classes on your own.  At this point I had only observed two classes and training was scheduled for the next week.  I was really looking for some way to say "no" but there really wasn't any good way to do that.  My manager assured me she would have me ready to teach the classes and I felt I had no other option than to say "ok".  The phone call ended and I experienced a brief moment of terror.  I will have 2 classes on Thursday and 3 classes on Friday, each being 1.5 - 2.0 hours each.  Yikes!  Luckily tomorrow (Wednesday) was a national holiday so I didn't have to panic just yet.  That could wait till Thursday.

Thursday came quickly.  The first class was 5:00 - 6:30 pm and the second was 6:30 - 8:00 pm.  A manager from a different school met me at my school at 3:00 to help prepare.  I was nervous.  The manager from the other school is a native Taiwanese and although her English is good, the communication was difficult.  Her trying to teach me what to do, like specifically what to do, was not easy.  I don't know what happened from 3:00 - 4:00 but that hour went extremely quick and I still had no idea what to do for the class.  Panic was setting in.  Just after 4:00pm I started gaining some understanding about what I was to do for the first class.  But only some.  My eyes kept seeing the minutes keep clicking away on the clock, getting me ever closer to 5:00pm go time.  I felt sick.

Around 4:15 I realized everything was going to be fine.  I thought what a worst-case scenario would look like and it dawned on me that it wouldn't be too bad.  There was no risk of death, no risk of limb-loss, no risk of financial ruin.  So why was I being so nervous?  The worst-case scenario would be extremely bored or extremely naughty children for an hour and a half.  And by this time I can at least keep them busy for 45 minutes, so the worst-case scenario isn't all that bad.  I felt much better after realizing all this.  Back to class preparation!  Also, I was lucky enough to be teaching the same class for both the 5:00pm and the 6:30 so really only needed to plan for one.

5:00pm came and everything went fine.  I was able to go through my choppy lesson plan without looking too disheveled.  I don't think the lesson was all that great, but the kids seemed to be ok with it.  Oh - and the children are all 8-10 years old FYI.  The class went by way faster than I anticipated as did the 6:30-8:00 class.  I survived!!!  I stayed after with my manager to discuss what just happened (she said I did ok!) and talk about the next day.  I will be teaching 3 classes on Friday, from 1:00 - 6:30 pm.  She will be meeting me to make lesson plans at 11:00 am that day.

I changed my clothes and headed home.  Oh yeah, I live about a 40 minute walk from my school.  The bus system is super lame-o and walking is the best option if you don't have a scooter.  I will have a scooter soon.  But anyways, I ran home this day.  I was feeling very elated and looked forward to sharing my story with RayRay.  It took me 18:30 to run home carrying a bag (will get faster when I have a backpack...).  I figure it to be about a 4k route.  Ray was excited I survived the day.

Friday wasn't as fun or exciting as Thursday, but I did make it through all 3 classes.  I was now really looking forward to going through the training next week in Taipei as I have real classroom experience to learn from.  I know getting thrown in the deep end is not the most fun way to begin, but it will most likely help to make me a better teacher more quickly.  I will be able to relate everything in training to my personal experience, focusing on areas I already know I need to improve.  We will write more about the training and Taipei in the next posting.  That's all for now!