Graduation day

This day has finally come...

Mr A-Z

Scottish square sausage

This is what I'm going to eat late July! Soo looking forward to it ;)

A hard day's something...

Sooo. This morning I was interviewing for a position at József Attila gimnázium. It took 5 minutes... Seriously... The head of the school has forgotten that we had an appointment. But I found out that she is willing to give me a full-time job as both an English and a Hungarian teacher form September. She also asked if I had sent my CV anywhere else. I said yes. She told me that she gives me 2 weeks to decide whether I want the job... Two more interviews to go: Radnóti and Móricz. We shall see!
To be contintubed...

"It's OK with me, I'm unemployed."

This line seems to be my motto this week.
Head of department: "Are you sure you want to teach here next semester (for free) too?"
My esteemed colleague: "Are you sure you don't have anything better to do than stapling exam-papers together?"
My esteemed colleague again: "Are you sure you want to invigilate at the Proficiency exam?"
My esteemed boyfriend: "Is Wednesday fine for Indy?"

Guess what the answers were...

Down Under

Yesterday I met an Australian lad for the very first time :) I had him visit one of my classes in the evening. In fact, he's going to lead that group from now on. He's a nice litte chap, eats kangaroo-steak, though...

Little something on group-dynamics

So I was thinkng... what do you do with a group of youngsters who absulutely hate another member, who is older, who is a manager (probably the only IT person with whom I don't get on well...) and who is simply annoying... This is my second semester with this group, the guy is a newcomer. The main problem, I reckon, is that we had agreed to start at 5 pm. He didn't turn up for at least 2 weeks and when he eventually did, he started a big fuss about it: he wanted to start at 5.15 because this was the advertised time slot... (btw. I don't really understand why I was not informed about it, but that's on my boss...). So, anyway, the whole group seemed to develop this angry attitude towards him. On top of all, he's always late ... (they hate him even more :). Kind of a big issue now: the other members of the group refuse to work with him in pairs on in groups, they laugh at him when he arrives and starts to pack his things, fidding with this cell, etc.
My first idea: use the 15 minutes when he's not yet there for having a small-talk with the group.
My second idea: start 5 min earlier so that everybody will be satisfied (maybe...).
My third idea: ignore the whole issue (that would be neary imopssible).
My fourth idea: the combination of the 1st and 2nd ...
It's impressive how fast learners can improve such a massive, innate negative feeling towards another group-member. And it's spreading like a virus :) totally contagious. I think the dynamo is a very nice young 16 year-old lad ...
Any suggestions are welcome :)

When the English teacher goes shoe-shopping...

Sorry guys out there, but this is a MUST...



Shoes = my 2nd major thesis has been graded 5.



There's nothing else to say, really....

(Not so) little catch up

Since my last entry: I got hired, I had my second msn class, I got unhired...
Apparently, the teacher wanted to get salary for the summer as well, so he returned to the school and that meant my grand exit. But it's ok, I have shiny new namecards and a shiny new CV and some fancy (not shiny but new) envelopes. Did you know that there are 320 secondary schools in Budapest? I really hope that at least one needs a very well experienced English teacher :)
The other thing, (probably the biggest succes of mine ever :) the msn lesson 2.0 was even better than the first one. New and improved. Just for the record, I'm still dealing with 3-4 people at a time...never managed to have all 6 of them in front of ther PCs/Macs... I doubt that it would work as nice and smooth as it worked with this little number of people. Note to self: solve the probs:)
Linktime: these were the things I found to be serious stuffz out there on the net...
http://szotar.mokk.bme.hu/hunglish/search/corpus - this is funny like hell. You enter a word and it'll give you dozens of variations (lierature, subtitles etc.) of the required language (Ok, English and Hungarian). Check out! God bless you Nyelvtudományi Intézet.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/podcasts/docarchive/ - everybody fancy BBC. BBC related any materials are nice and highly recommended to use in-class :) That was what I did. You can listen to the programmes online, download them on your PCs/Macs or on your iPods/iAnythings as podcasts! Niiice.....
Later on I'll share some of my doubts concerning group-dynamics in one of my language school groups but it's time for me to get prepared for my next advernture, namely finding out my thesis grade! :)

Strange as it may sound...

So, about my "job interview" earlier today... Firstly, I could manage to get lost in Budaörs (got on the wrong bus). Then I met my colleague(s) to be. And then a chain of funny, unexpected things happened :) I visited two classes in the moring. Then I was basically introduced to the majority of the staff. In the meanitime, I got many really tasty snacks couse in this school the teachers celebrate namedays and birthdays. So, what I got in a 15-minute long break were loads of names, apple juice, bread with some topping, tiramisu and some kind of cherry-cake. Normally I don't eat that amount of food till about 2 pm :) Then I was asked if I could go and teach in two classes :):) Ok, this was the weirdest:) A very nice German teacher came with me, introduced me to both classes and left:) Funnily enough, at the end of my second class a bunch of girls came up to me askinging whether I was their new teacher. If I was not, they want me, couse I was by far the best substitute teacher they've got:) Wow, that's a complement, is it not? I told them to write a wishlist and forward it to the head teacher. So, this is how it happened. Oh, I almost forgot to mention that I also met the dean! Just a quick handshake, nothing else, he seemed nice though. It seems, I'll start on Saturday (working day) and from next week on (after Wed) I have 3 groups :) Funny. Let's do some math... I entered the school in order to visit one group in the morning. I left the school at 1 pm having tought 2 classes and will have 2 groups in the future :) Greater than ever! And as I had predicted, no interview:)
I might even dare quote from one of my favourites (How I met your mother)
"I've just awsomed all over the place. True story...."
Stay tuned for the upcoming events of my saga!
Cheers

What would the teacher do?

Today is another big step for Orsi - probably a rather small step for the World. I'm kind of interviewing for a job in I. Gy. Gimnázium on Thursday. Kind of... I don't exactly know what will happen. OK, I go there to see 'my future' students in action in the morning and then in the 'nagyszünet' I'll get forwarded to the dean (???) and then somebody gets to decide something. :) Weird. As a matter of fact, I've never ever had a real job interview. Probably this thingy 'Job Interview' doesn't exest in the world of teaching. I got my very first job in a language school ON THE PHONE without saying a word in English. No probs, I was teaching the week after. As for my second job... I think I've asked for getting the job, but no, I clearly don't remeber any interviews. But I had an interview at ELTE DELP indeed. On the other hand, it turned out I was presumably the only person who took all the requirements (i.e. CV, cover letter, copy of my index-book, tutors who might recommend you, etc.) seriously. I still have a day to figure something out about this 'undefineble mystery', namely a teacher's job interview.

First entry

Hi, and welcome to my world :)
So, here I am 24, teaching English as a foreign language mostly in a language school, 'lessly' at ELTE University, Department of English Language Pedagogy. Last week I made a new invention - at least I thought it was my invention - the unexplored opportunities in online language teaching. About the 'not my invention' later...
There I was with 6 very devoted university students in the middle of the strike when the public transport died in our beloved hometown. Here's what I thought we might be able to do! Why don't we gather up on msn messenger and have an online session in a chatroom? Wow, how cool is that - did I think. So on Friday morning I woke up with great expectations. I started to figure out what to do. After like 10 minutes or so, ideas started to come up (stream of consciouseness as you might now) and I had a good collection of online activites in 30 minutes. Nice. So, vocabulary-wise these websites cought my attention: http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/ and http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/phrasaldictionary.html . Very impressive, very handy. Listening-wise, obviously youtube... Let me present the tasks:
1. How many accents does he mime? Name some interesting characteristics about the different accents (vocabulary, pronunciation, whatever you find interesting).
http://youtube.com/watch?v=xq9Iy1k9yRc&feature=related
2. Write down as many conditional sentences as possible that you hear in this song. (Please don’t search the lyrics on the web :)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=x25F3-sR2Yo&feature=related
3. How does Jason Mraz describe his new album? Note down as many details as possible.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=S1nd0HmXouk

So, this was it. Hope you guys out there find these useful.
About my magnifiscent plans later on, unfortunately I have to go and make actual money, not just deaming of it. This was more than enough for a very first entry.
Cheers,
Orsi