"Hello class, my name is Teacher Rachel"

I finished my first three lessons of teaching practice at a nearby monk school. I liked it, and am glad to get the first time in front of a class room feeling out of the way...although I'm certain I'll have it again in South Korea. :)

There are 16 of us in the course, so we all cram into 2 song-taus (Thai taxis-red trucks that have benches in the back and a cover over them) and ride for about 30 minutes to the monk school. Its a very small school and has one of the most beautiful temples I've seen in Chiang Mai. Its surrounded by woods, and its so peacefully quiet. The school building is all concrete floors, white walls, huge open windows (no screens and no way to ever close them), dogs walking through the building like they own place, and all these cute monks walking around barefoot in their orange outfits. In Thailand you always take your shoes off before you enter a room (hair dresser, internet cafe, school), so we get to teach barefoot.

We are split into three rooms, and teach 30-35 minute lessons back to back. Even after 5 teachers' lessons with different topics, these kids are still so well behaved! I'm sure it will be a rude awakening when I start a government school. But even though they are monks, there are still desk drawings of girls and other normal boy things. In Thailand, almost every boy is a monk at some point in their life. It is their choice usually, and they can be a monk for a week, a month, a year, or the rest of their lives.

The first lesson I taught was a Young Learners Lesson about musical instruments. We learned piano, guitar, and drums. We then learned to say I play the piano, I strum the guitar, and I pound on the drums. I did fairly well and didn't miss any major steps. The second day I taught a Basic Lesson about jobs. This one did not go as well, but the students never knew I messed up the order. Yesterday I taught another Basic Lesson about electronics, and I felt it was much better. Even though I taught late in the day after they had sat through three other teachers with the same lesson model, they were very attentive and stayed with me the whole time. Everybody says I have that teacher look, but I still need to work on smiling more. Hopefully that will come with time when I'm less nervous.