Evacuate!!!

I started out my day with breakfast, of course.  I got dressed, and was excited to wear my wool socks.  This meant that my feet were MUCH warmer; much cozier!  

First up was Patrizia’s class.  We had a “debate” about life in the south.  I had them get in groups to do the pros and cons.  The girls in the class have shown such an increased interest in English, and so they were really great at this activity.  The boys, they are still getting there, but we are working on it!  It is once again interesting to find consistencies between classes when asking questions such as this!  See the pictures for more details!  They didn’t do too much debating, but they did discuss a few points.  They talked about the job situation in Italy, and it makes it a little more clear as to why some students do not find much motivation in school.  This makes me sad for them, and yet gives me a better understanding of them!  

 

For my hour break, I went to get coffee at the place near school that Rosina took me a few weeks ago.  It was cheaper than the other place, and frankly, I thought the cappuccino was better.  Then I went to the school to print some resumes, write April an email because today is her dissertation defense, and then I talked to Patrizia about some things.  We talked about how there is no competition between students for getting into universities, etc.  We talked about how there is little external motivation offered to the students, and thus there is very little to increase internal motivation.  Nick and I had this discussion earlier.  It was interesting to get Patrizia’s input.  She was pretty convinced that there needed to be more incentive, but did not know the solution.  We talked about how much cheating goes on in the classroom, and I told her about my boys making cheat sheets the other day!  She said that it is up to each individual teacher whether there is punishment or not for cheating in school.  Umm…WHAT?!?!? I feel like it is a blanket rule in the U.S. that if you are caught cheating you get in trouble.  The severity of the punishment may vary depending on the teacher, principal, or student even; however, there is always punishment.  Then we talked a little bit about the US system. It was an eye opening conversation, and it gave me some insight that was much needed.  It was nice to talk to a teacher about these things.  Then I showed her the mid-term report for Fulbright so that she would be informed about what I was going to be saying in Rome.    

Next up was Linda’s class, and I was a little late.  However, it did not matter because we were having an evacuation drill instead of me teaching.  This was um…interesting.  A student from our class was chosen to be the “lost victim” and so when the bells started going off we left her to be found by the evac. people.  Holy cow this was a LOUD process.  The students were SCREAMING, PUSHING, SQUEALING, RUNNING, YELLING, etc. etc. in the stairwells and in the hallways.  This was utter chaos.  This was NOT helping the headache that I had developed.  Once we got outside it was warm and wonderful.  The students were all standing out in the large median on a “busy” road.

 

 

This was very different from a U.S. drill.  Some of my students kept telling me that if this had been real, then there would be MORE chaos and all hope would be lost.  They said it…When the “victim” student came out, all of my students were yelling and chanting!  This was so strange to me.  The students were just walking around visiting students from other classes, etc.  There was a lady walking around with a megaphone which was not helping at all.  We eventually got to go back in.  

We had time to do some of the lesson.  We had about 25ish minutes, and so we started talking about how Southerners use food, and this class agreed that they too take food to families who have just had a death in the family or a family with a new baby.  They said they do not do it very much, but in the small villages it is more common.  This class is so much fun!  They were answering questions, asking questions, laughing, and we had the best time.  I had to quit before we got to talk about language, but I did give them their homework about similarities and differences between “our Souths”, and I was glad that they have 2 ½ weeks to do it because I think it will be a great assignment for them.  I got hugs from most of them, and then stayed late with MG to give her all of the scholarship info.  This class is EXACTLY what I think Fulbright is about.  I love this group of students, and I can see them becoming more involved in their education, and this is one of my goals for my students!  

For my last one hour break I went to H&M to get another pair of wool socks.  I talked to Nick, sat in the computer lab, but the computer was not really working, and then I helped the Spanish teacher with her English stuff a bit!  

Rosina's class took a few minutes to get started, but when we did, we talked about how Southerners use food, and they said that the Italians NEVER take food for funerals or new babies.  Interesting, because the others said that you do.  Hmm..perhaps it depends on where you live and who your friends/family are.  They said that they sometimes take food to neighbors if they have cooked something special, and any time that you are going to someone's house for the first time, you should take wine, sweets, or something.  The thing that REALLY shocked me was that these students did not feel like food is a way of showing love in the Italian culture!     I asked if they felt like their moms/grandmothers cooking big meals for them was not a way of showing their love, and/or the way these same women insist on them eating the good food.  They still said no; they said that food was not an expression of love.  Rosina disagreed with them, and I agreed with her.  I thought this concept originated in Italy...they did say that if you do not eat EVERYTHING, your mom/nonna will think that you didn't like it; i've definitely experienced that one here! We then had a lot of fun with the guessing game of word usage between the North and the South in the U.S.  I explained that while we may have different "dialects", most of the common "dialects" are still ENglish, and people are going to recognize them as English words, even if they do not understand how you are using them.  This is not true in Italian and Italian dialects.  Italian dialect words may not even be recognizable as a word to those who do not understand that particular dialect.  This was an interesting way of looking at this.  Anyway, it was fun to have them guessing the words.  Their favorite was toboggan (in the South is a hat/beanie...in the North there are many names...but they found it funny that it is also a sled!). Anyway, it was a great way to end my week before traveling and being gone.  Sweet Rosina gave me hugs and said that she would miss me and hoped that I would have fun!  I do love her! 




Bruna
Tomato
Nick; lunch; momma; packing; blogs;
APRIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ; emailed; called; SHE PASSED!!
Out to get hairdryer; no grocery; electronics store; walk back; Nick whole time
talked to NIck; Maria; Bible study
Dinner-run to get eggs because mine was frozen
Macelleria next to apartment practically; made pancakes/fried egg
talked to Dr. April-1 hour
Packed; heavy; downsized a bit
Shower; dried hair
Blogs