Birthday in Spain

Today I celebrated my 24th birthday. This is the second birthday I have spent in Spain and my coworkers really made it special. I had my first "real" day of work today too. I started at 9:30 am by helping bring the kids into their classrooms. Each day I will work with a few of the classrooms for 30 minutes at a time. Today I worked with three classes of 3 year olds and one class of 5 year olds.

The three year olds are so young and it will definitely be a challenge. Luckily I have a teacher there with me and its pretty easy. I start of by singing a song with them. "Good Morning, Hello! Good Morning, Hello!.. and so on" then I hold up different pieces of colored paper and say the color and have them repeat it. After that I did a number song with them and then a good bye song. It is super easy stuff and mainly repitition of the same things. This is really the first time they are being exposed to english so it's interesting to see how they react. Some are excited and really interested in learning; others just sit and cry the whole time asking for their mom and dad. haha

The 5 year olds that I worked with are a lot easier to deal with and actually are excited to answer questions in English. With them I use flash cards of various topics like fruits and vegetables, animals and body parts. All in all it's the same kind of work with the kids, just at different levels and more vocabulary.

At their break time I was out on the play ground area with them when my teachers surprised me with a birthday cake! I was surprised they remembered and it really made me happy to see that they all cared and were excited to have me at their school. Here are a few pictures that one of the teachers took.

Carlos and a few other teachers bringing out my cake

Jose Ignacio (left) is the English teacher at the school and the main guy I work with. Carlos on the right is the schools principal.

After work I came back to Sevilla and rested for a while and my housemates made lunch and I had some of that. I think it was the first time in a long time if not ever I had fish with the skin head and tail still attached. I wish I would have taken a picture but I was so tired from just waking up and so hungry that I didn't have time. I went downtown later in the night with another guy doing the same job I am and got a beer. Now I am back at my place and getting ready for bed. Another day of work tomorrow then I am off until Tuesday!