Day 136: 16/5/13
Up again this morning! Working more than three days in a row shouldn't be allowed!!
I had to photocopy a few things and get a few bits ready on the board so I was I early. It was raining so the kids were in early too. We had reading groups first. They don't have an aide on Thursday so luckily there was a parent helper because its hard to watch all the groups without someone else being in the room! There's one child that cries over everything- he couldn't get one of the colours out or the tub today and there were major tears!! It seemed to be a bad day for him! Afterwards we had to write out instructions for how to make the mask they made yesterday. We did it together and I typed it on the board so they jus needed to write it down. Still some of them didn't get finished!! They very much work at their own pace!
After break we did some Maths. They were doing time so we did some activities on the interactive whiteboard and then they had to draw some times. Some knew them, some hadnt a clue! Then they had library, so I had a bit of time to sort out what were doing tomorrow. I'd no yard duty today either so that was nice!! An hour for lunch though is really long without hard duty!
They did show and tell for a few minutes and then they had golden time with the class next door where different activities and games are left around both classrooms and they can choose what they want to do- a great doss for the last hour!
With all time I had after school I didn't have to get anything ready really for tomorrow, but somehow I still didn't get an earlier train! Maybe tomorrow I mightn't have to arrive as early- we'll see if there's another train option!
When I got back to the hostel I checked the tracking on the visa and passport. It sounds like it's waiting at the post office but it never says it attempted delivery. Maybe it means the post office are waiting to receive it first, I don't know. Of course, by the time I got home the phone line for the post office was closed so I will have to try to ring tomorrow to see where it is.
I had the famous Skype call anyway this evening. The connection was really bad at first and kept cutting out. It was telling me that Eimhin was offline and be said that the weather was really bad so it might be that. We got into the PowerPoint as best we could, but then my computer put me offline! It was so annoying because yesterday I skyped Mam, Mike and Eimhin and it worked fine for all three!! I skyped back on my phone then and this time it worked fine. Eimhin had the PowerPoint so he could click through it while I was talking. They all had a question for me then. They were mostly about school so I could answer most of them!! They were funny- one guy wanted to know if there were fights in the playground and I said no. In the background I heard someone saying- you're glad you're in Australia so!! They were all really interested- they seemed like a lovely class! After all the questions we did a count of who would like to go to school in Australia and about 21 of the 27 kids or something thought it would be better! I made it all sound too good- the specialist subjects, assemblies, climbing frames on the yard, long lunchtimes...!! It's pretty true though, they don't do half of the work we do!! Today my kids read a little, wrote a bit that they copied off the board and drew a few clocks! That was it!! You'd have all that done by 11am in Ireland!!
At the end of the Skype session, they read out a poem that they had written! I don't know who was in charge of organising that but it was brilliant!! The first part was thanking me for taking the time to do it. Then they went on to saying that I probably miss home but that I wouldn't miss the cold, the coats and having the sniffles!! The last verse then said something about how my own school must miss me and they'll be looking forward to getting me back. I don't know if that last bit is true but the poem itself was excellent!! So sweet!!
I was all excited after the Skype call and couldn't go to sleep for ages! I'm worse than the kids!! I was talking to some of the girls in the room- they had heard the whole call- I'm sure they think I'm demented!! But the room was going to be the quietest place to do the call so I couldn't help it! I read a book for a while then before going to bed!