New Jay-oOo-Bee, Visitors and What Not

I have been training at the Wall Street Institute all week and to my surprise I got paid yesterday as well, and it was a lot more than I expected, and I found out that I can cash my checks at the bank right next door and don’t have to go through the hassle of opening an account. The job is going really well. It's a lot different waking up every day and having something to do.

It is not a traditional school, it is very different. I will be doing a class at a business three days a week with about 10 students which is a traditional type of class but when I work in the center it is a different story. For instance, the students are introduced with the new material on a computer in a lab, once finished they book what we call an “encounter.” An encounter is when the teacher checks the students work and goes over exercises with them to practice what they learned, there can be up to 4 students in an encounter (each encounter is a specific level) but mostly there are only one or two. So it is more like tutoring than teaching a class. There are two other types of classes as well, a conversational class and a social class. The CC (conversational class) is a informal class where you pretty much talk all hour but it stresses the vocabulary and grammar that the students learned recently. The (SC) social class is really informal and you just pick a random topic and talk about it or you do things like word games. Those two classes are the most fun because you can really get to know the students.

Next week I will start planning and teaching classes on my own, I am pretty nervous about it because I really don’t know many of the specifics about the grammar if a student asks a question. I am studying a book with all the verb tenses so I can answer those questions. That is the most thing I worry about doing well, all the other stuff I am comfortable with (interaction with the students and keeping things interesting).

I picked up my friend Heidi from the airport last Wednesday and Karin’s boyfriend Pat came in yesterday. It won’t be as cool as I hoped (‘cause I have to work) but we have some cool things planned for the weekend. Last night I worked late but we bought a couple beers from a drive through place that was in the shape of a beer can, then we played a couple games of “scene it,” had a couple more beers and went to bed. Today we went out for lunch to watch the World Cup game between Mexico and Angolia. It was a very exciting game but it ended in a draw. Mexico pretty much was kicking their ass the Angolia’s goalie was playing out of his mind. I’ve found out that futbol is actually a very exciting game now that I have watched a couple from start to finish. USA plays tomorrow but they got their asses handed to them last game by Croatia 3-0.

We got plans to go to the club, downtown Toluca, and a hot springs park a couple hours away on Sunday.

We’ll see what’s up.