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Second day of GEOS training, whee
I actually gave a lesson today, and it didn't entirely suck. More on that in a second.
So I got up earlier despite being up later, which may be why I was totally zonked all morning. I did, however, get to the Skytrain 10 mins earlier and thus got to GEOS about 10 mins earlier -- at 8:45 -- so J said "You're late!" though I don't know if he was serious or not. Michel, the trainer, didn't come out of his office until 9, but he's requested us to come in at 8:40 for the 9am training, so it's unclear to me.
Got dress code checked again -- today, Michel said that my hair clip might be too big, despite that Tomoko said it was good yesterday. They haven't said anything about my shoes yet, so I'll try to remember to ask specifically tomorrow. I also have a plan to specifically wear this one shirt tomorrow with lace sleeves and find out if it's officially okay or not.
D and J didn't shave on purpose to find out what the boundaries were for needing to shave, and Michel was like "Uhhh... you have to go shave before afternoon classes and real students, okay?" He also made the other guys go shave, which was pretty funny. Then, I guess just to be equal, he asked me what makeup I was wearing. I said just eyeshadow and lipstick and he said that was fine, but that I should get a more noticeable lipstick color. Eh. I think I just need to put more on and not blot it so much.
Today we went over a bunch more stuff, mostly textbooks and some business stuff. I was totally zonked and trying to hide yawns all morning, especially during the prospective student interview demo, which just dragged on for 10+ minutes. I felt pretty bad and I'm going to go to sleep much earlier today I think.
We didn't have a lunch break until 1:30pm, though, which sucked. And then all the guys had to go to their hotels to shave, so I was on my own for lunch. The deal was that we had to meet up at the actual GEOS language school (we've been in the office for training) at 2:55pm, and it was uptown, about a 20 minute walk, so I just walked there and stopped in at a Tim Horton's for lunch. Had a tasty sandwich AND a maple donut AND coffee, which was a pretty good pick-me-up. I redid my lipstick, which had entirely come off on lunch, and got to the school at like 2:40pm, JUST as Michel got there, and I explained that I got abandoned due to the Shaving Escapade, so he let me come in with him and help set up the room and all. I met a few of the random Japanese students who were running in and out, too.
We did our teaching demos for three "volunteers" who came in for "free English lessons". D, C, and I went in the first round; D got the really experienced Japanese student, C got the unexperienced Japanese student with a cold, and I got a Mexican girl who spoke fairly fluent English but needed vocabulary work. As a result, my lesson itself went really smoothly; she got a lot of what we were doing and we had good discussions, BUT it went too quickly because no problems really came up. So my 30-minute lesson was done in 20-25 minutes -- BUT, fortunately she asked me all of these questions afterwards (my lesson was on probability words -- must/might/could be/maybe/definitely is/etc) about the words going with the pictures, like "what is on the cat's face? you call those... whiskers?" or "the fish has, to swim, those are fins?" She also asked me things like "When you do that with the cards, what do you call it?" "Shuffling?" "Yes shuffling, that is to mix them?" "Yeah, you can say you mix them up, or you shuffle them..." SO in the end I actually did teach her a whole bunch of useful English words and phrases! Essentially, the criticism of my lesson was that I did a good job answering questions, BUT that if that ever happens in a group lesson with like 4-5 students and one of them keeps asking things and holding everyone up, that I need to find a way to keep things moving anyway. I was also told that I need to slow down my speech. No surprise there, I'm working on it.
(I wonder if I am allowed to post stuff like this. We talked today a bit about information privacy, but that was mostly things like "don't give your students' names or phone numbers or anything out to others". I signed an NDA to not divulge GEOS teaching methods, but I don't think I've really gone into that...)
After that, I walked back towards downtown with C&J, leaving at the Skytrain station. Went to Metrotown and hunted for a belt, which I eventually got at Sears (got a men's belt because it was cheaper and fit better and was plainer). I also bought two more button-down shirts at Old Navy. I *think* they'll fit into my suitcase. I had to go grab dinner food and then find Matt and Laura after that and get a ride back here, and I guess I've been sitting around since then.
I called T-Mobile tonight to cancel my phone, and it turns out that if I can fax them proof that I'm leaving the country, they can actually waive the cancellation fee! Bonus! Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to do that...
So I got up earlier despite being up later, which may be why I was totally zonked all morning. I did, however, get to the Skytrain 10 mins earlier and thus got to GEOS about 10 mins earlier -- at 8:45 -- so J said "You're late!" though I don't know if he was serious or not. Michel, the trainer, didn't come out of his office until 9, but he's requested us to come in at 8:40 for the 9am training, so it's unclear to me.
Got dress code checked again -- today, Michel said that my hair clip might be too big, despite that Tomoko said it was good yesterday. They haven't said anything about my shoes yet, so I'll try to remember to ask specifically tomorrow. I also have a plan to specifically wear this one shirt tomorrow with lace sleeves and find out if it's officially okay or not.
D and J didn't shave on purpose to find out what the boundaries were for needing to shave, and Michel was like "Uhhh... you have to go shave before afternoon classes and real students, okay?" He also made the other guys go shave, which was pretty funny. Then, I guess just to be equal, he asked me what makeup I was wearing. I said just eyeshadow and lipstick and he said that was fine, but that I should get a more noticeable lipstick color. Eh. I think I just need to put more on and not blot it so much.
Today we went over a bunch more stuff, mostly textbooks and some business stuff. I was totally zonked and trying to hide yawns all morning, especially during the prospective student interview demo, which just dragged on for 10+ minutes. I felt pretty bad and I'm going to go to sleep much earlier today I think.
We didn't have a lunch break until 1:30pm, though, which sucked. And then all the guys had to go to their hotels to shave, so I was on my own for lunch. The deal was that we had to meet up at the actual GEOS language school (we've been in the office for training) at 2:55pm, and it was uptown, about a 20 minute walk, so I just walked there and stopped in at a Tim Horton's for lunch. Had a tasty sandwich AND a maple donut AND coffee, which was a pretty good pick-me-up. I redid my lipstick, which had entirely come off on lunch, and got to the school at like 2:40pm, JUST as Michel got there, and I explained that I got abandoned due to the Shaving Escapade, so he let me come in with him and help set up the room and all. I met a few of the random Japanese students who were running in and out, too.
We did our teaching demos for three "volunteers" who came in for "free English lessons". D, C, and I went in the first round; D got the really experienced Japanese student, C got the unexperienced Japanese student with a cold, and I got a Mexican girl who spoke fairly fluent English but needed vocabulary work. As a result, my lesson itself went really smoothly; she got a lot of what we were doing and we had good discussions, BUT it went too quickly because no problems really came up. So my 30-minute lesson was done in 20-25 minutes -- BUT, fortunately she asked me all of these questions afterwards (my lesson was on probability words -- must/might/could be/maybe/definitely is/etc) about the words going with the pictures, like "what is on the cat's face? you call those... whiskers?" or "the fish has, to swim, those are fins?" She also asked me things like "When you do that with the cards, what do you call it?" "Shuffling?" "Yes shuffling, that is to mix them?" "Yeah, you can say you mix them up, or you shuffle them..." SO in the end I actually did teach her a whole bunch of useful English words and phrases! Essentially, the criticism of my lesson was that I did a good job answering questions, BUT that if that ever happens in a group lesson with like 4-5 students and one of them keeps asking things and holding everyone up, that I need to find a way to keep things moving anyway. I was also told that I need to slow down my speech. No surprise there, I'm working on it.
(I wonder if I am allowed to post stuff like this. We talked today a bit about information privacy, but that was mostly things like "don't give your students' names or phone numbers or anything out to others". I signed an NDA to not divulge GEOS teaching methods, but I don't think I've really gone into that...)
After that, I walked back towards downtown with C&J, leaving at the Skytrain station. Went to Metrotown and hunted for a belt, which I eventually got at Sears (got a men's belt because it was cheaper and fit better and was plainer). I also bought two more button-down shirts at Old Navy. I *think* they'll fit into my suitcase. I had to go grab dinner food and then find Matt and Laura after that and get a ride back here, and I guess I've been sitting around since then.
I called T-Mobile tonight to cancel my phone, and it turns out that if I can fax them proof that I'm leaving the country, they can actually waive the cancellation fee! Bonus! Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to do that...
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Lots of email programs let you email a fax number somehow. If you have an email confirmation of your one-way airplane ticket, would that work for T-Mobile? I'm sure one of us in the US can fax it for you if need be.
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Work visa materials for Japan? Housing agreement? Job Contract?
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Kids these days. Just don't know how to plot.
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I'd really not push it in non-locked posts until you're at least there. It would suck to get fired now, and they might end up thinking 'borderline--but what else will she post in the future'.
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You could friends lock these entries if you feel like there is anything questionable in the content. I friends lock pretty much everything, but definitely everything about work. Its not that i try to say anything out of turn, but, it is an extra safeguard.
Hope the next leg goes well. Sounds like you're doing well so far.