TravelDaze

Remember the Grey's Anatomy episode last year that took us from Thanksgiving to Christmas to New Year's all in one hour and was called Holidaze because we were really in a daze for all that time? Well, I haven't blogged in a while and so I'll get all of these various trips or observations out now and then I can expand on them in later posts with more current information.

Kate and I in Verona

Verona with the Roman Theater

Verona:
Another assistant Kate who is teaching in Mantova and I met up in Verona on Sunday, November 7th to visit the charming and historical city. We actually postponed the trip a couple of times and finally made it there for a day and luckily this was the first Sunday of the month. Almost like the national museums in Paris which are free the first Sunday of the month, Verona's museums were reduced to 1 euro. This certainly helped because everything and I mean everything has a cost in Verona. Before leaving, this is what my roommate Daniela made sure to tell me that every church, etc has a price. Verona is known as the city of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Tourist can visit their houses and stand on Giulietta's balcony overlooking a courtyard with her statue. This all it a bit strange when you think about it, because Shakespeare chose Verona as the setting for his story based on historically warring families there as in any other city in northern Italy [Guelphs and Ghibellines in a struggle for power] but there was no real Romeo or Juliet. It's really a good lesson on capitalism because this city brings in the dough with fake monuments and high prices! Regardless, Verona is a beautiful city with not only a well-intact Roman theater but also an Arena or amphitheater and many beautiful churches. It also has still has the opening arches and foundation from its time as a Roman city. You can imagine why one might create a romance out of this beauty.

Porta Borsari: Original Roman gates
from the time of Claudius

L'Arena [Amphitheater]

The Archeological Museum

I'm sure like many others in Verona that Sunday, Kate and I went to the "Casa di Giulietta" to see if the wall really exists where women write and leave letters to Juliet for help in love. In fact, I was very curious about this after I saw the film Letters to Juliet last spring because I didn't remember seeing letters in the wall two years ago when I visited Verona before. I remember walking into the courtyard and seeing the balcony and statue. This time, like before, the courtyard was full of tourists taking pictures next to the statue and touching Juliet's right breast which is supposed to bring good luck. This time I did notice that there are bars blocking visitors from touching the brick wall of the house covered with information in different languages. It says that the brick wall has been blocked for preservation since 2004 and that there is a box outside the courtyard if you would like to write a letter to the secretaries of Juliet. This made me happy at least that the wall has been out of commission for some time before they made the movie and that the movie itself did not cause the act to preserve the site. We did not tour inside the house and pay to step out onto the balcony, although we did want to go to Romeo's house. His Montague house actually plays off the powerful Veronese family the Montecchi, whose house in Verona is still a great example of Medieval architecture. Unfortunately, we could only see it from the outside. Overall it was a great trip to see the Roman history of Verona and then play off the star-crossed lover's embellishments.

The Balcony at Juliet's House

La Statua di Giulietta

Love Graffiti outside of Juliet's house since you can no longer leaves letters ...

Outside Romeo's House

Milan:
The following Wednesday, all the other assistants teaching in the region of Lombardy and I were invited to meet in Milan at one of the schools participating in the program to share our experiences. We heard from the Scholastic Office of Lombardy and from the regional representative from Rome about their goals for the program and from assistants who also taught in the region last year. We all eventually shared our own tips or strategies we have developed so far working with not-so-easy students. Overall, the meeting was beneficial and interesting if not sometimes repetitive. We heard a lot about Italy's Education Reform including the use of English as a means of instruction instead of just a foreign language. In fact, we heard a lot about the European Union's efforts to be "United in Diversity" and how Italy must respond by providing more opportunities for teachers and students to learn English and actually be mobile in the EU.

The Magnificent Duomo

 After our meeting, a few other assistants and I took our experience exchange into the center of Milan for some sightseeing.We naturally started at the magnificent Duomo, which had a bit more scaffolding than ideal at this time. Particularly the Madonnina or "Little Madonna," meaning a small, golden statue of the Virgin Mary who sits upon the highest part of the Duomo to watch over the people in Milan, was getting some work done. We walked through the beautiful Galleria outdoor shopping center where there are always tourists turning their heel three times into the crotch of a bull in the marble. Then, we went into Il Renascente. This is the Galleries LaFayettes of Milan or the large department store of many levels. The store literally sits next to the Duomo so on the seventh and top floor if you walk out onto the terrace where there are restaurants overlooking the city, you can also look directly in front of you to see the side of the Duomo and wave at the Madonnina. One of the assistants suggested that we order a "Bianca Neve" at the bar which actually translates to mean "Snow White" like the fairytale. In fact, the drink is coffee/espresso in vanilla gelato which is a fabulous combination. In the end, we finished our day at the Italian version of McDonald's. Spizzico is a fast-food pizza place with value meals of pizza with different toppings, fries and a drink. I figured that since every once and a while I do eat McDonald's in the US, I might as well have the equivalent in Italy.

Asking for Good Luck ...

On the Seventh Floor of Il Renascente before our
Bianca Neve experience

Desenzano:
I have officially visited Lake Garda!! On Wednesday in Milan, I learned that another assistant who teaches in a school 20 minutes outside of Brescia actually lives in the center of Brescia. She has a home-stay living with another teacher at her school with a 21 year old son and a 25 year old daughter. It has worked out really well so far that she really feels like a part of their family. Her host mother wanted to take a drive to Desenzano for the afternoon which is a small city/town on Lake Garda. They were so nice enough to invite me so we took the dog and headed to the lake for a couple of hours. It was a pretty cute little town and despite the infamous Lombardian fog or grayness "il grigio" that blocked stupendous views of Lake Garda, we had a nice time without seeing George Clooney and Elisabetta Canales who instead live on Lake Como.

Home:
We've all noticed how most of our products in the USA come from elsewhere ... MADE IN CHINA and other countries label our clothing. But what do we think about that? Every once in a while we hear a campaign about a store using sweatshops and might think negatively about a store for two seconds before we check out their sales. My roommates or at least one of my roommates always checks labels for MADE IN ITALY. When she describes a store to me that has a good sale, she always says good quality, you know made in Italy as if it makes it a good virtue. It's not that I prefer clothing from elsewhere, I just don't expect to see MADE IN USA in my clothing - it wouldn't be normal. Obviously, my roommates don't represent all of Italians but other Italisns share her view. Yet, what about when we bring food into the mix? We were at the grocery store in the center and different cheeses were on sale. She chose a chunk of Emmental and was deciding whether to get it. I read the name, saw the price and put it in my bag. Daniela thought about it and thought about it and then saw that it was produced in a certain region of Italy ... so she ended up getting it. We were buying meat later and she saw that the steak was from another country and immediately put it back. Sure, we like to buy local and support our local farmers for certain food ... but for cheese?! I would look specifically to buy Emmental from Switzerland as opposed to Italy because it is a Swiss cheese! It should be better from there! I would buy brie from France and parmigiano reggiano from Italy! It was really a surprise to me that it had to be Italy. No matter how globalized our markets, some just see their traditional culture as the only one they can follow.

School:
Last week, a teacher asked me if I could work from the students' textbook for the lesson instead of my own plan. She had to give them an "interrogation" next week or an oral exam and thought that maybe I could go over the material with them. I started to have the kids read the passages out loud about "New York's Main Sights" and then the teacher interrupted and had them translate each passage into Italian after they read it. Except that after every word, the teacher basically gave them the Italian translation if they hesitated for even a moment. After the class, she told me that usually she reads the text in English and they translate it together. Yet, we know now that "we translate" it really means she gives them the Italian definition word for word. The next day, I was waiting for the bus talking to one of my students when the bus drove by us without stopping because it was already full from the stop before. We started to walk to the station together which would take less time than waiting for the next bus. She is in a fifth year class and apologized for her classes' level of English. She told me that they missed a year of English because last year all their teacher did was read text to them in English and they "translated it together." Their "interrogations" were open-book and most of the class received 8s and 9s on a 1-10 scale that is really more like a 4-7 scale. Now, this year they all receive 3s and 4s instead of 8s and 9s because of their new teacher. I find it most interesting that she called this "missing" a year of English, which means that they are conscious of the fact that they learned nothing last year or at least are conscious of the fact now that they have a new teacher this year. Hopefully for these classes of listening and "translating," my lessons can wake them up and motivate some independent work so that they're not "missing a year" of EnglishDaze.

A Conversation Plateau?

Lately, I have spoken with many different people about learning English as opposed to learning Italian. Which is easier? My private lesson student asked me whether I think he could become fluent if he spent a semester or some amount of time in an English speaking country. An American that I met recently who is studying Italian asked me, putting aside how I learned both languages, which do I think is easier overall. I said the same thing to both of them. Italian has many rules. Many, many rules. If you follow them, you will be able to speak. If you learn and study the rules, there is no reason why you won't be able to put together full sentences and conversations. Every letter is pronounced in every word. English, on the other hand, we don't have many rules. Our grammar is pretty simple. We add "will" before the verb for the future, "would" before the verb for the conditional, and hardly consider the subjunctive. We don't have many complicated strict rules to memorize ... yet that just means everything is an exception! Why do we pronounce they're, their and there the same way if they are spelled differently? How come present tense read and past tense read are pronounced differently if they are spelled the same way? Without being in an English speaking country or conversing with a native English speaker ... how could you possibly learn and understand all of these rules? Instead, I can explain every part of a sentence in Italian and why it is so according to which rule.

It's easy to say when you are taking language classes in school, that you've hit a plateau. Now, you just need to go to the country and speak. I think that this is probably true for English. We have such a large vocabulary pronounced all sorts of ways and grammar that is practically only exceptions that by speaking and listening to English, you might be able to pick it up with less study. My experience with Italian has been quite a bit different. After taking French and Latin in high school, I was used to the rules. I understood how to use different tenses by conjugating a verb according to a certain system. I went on a two-week exchange to France and actually spoke a lot of French with my host family in high school. Right away I was able to pick up Italian when I took Elementary at BC. Luckily, I went to Parma for the summer after freshman year and took Intermediate in Italy, only in Italian. I had one year of grammar and I was supposed to start speaking immediately when it took 6 years of grammar to get me conversing with a host family in French? It was hard! I studied abroad for a semester in Parma and spoke with a host family at dinner every night. I wrote in a diary a couple times a week for my Italian teacher to correct - but really since freshman year I've only "reviewed" grammar while writing essays or preparing for a class. Instead, all I do is converse!

I think it is hard to say when you are fluent in a language. There are always new words and expressions to learn. So, I won't say that I am yet fluent in Italian. But, I can speak. My landlady speaks no English, one of my three roommates remembers various English words but doesn't speak it with me. Overall, I can say anything I want. I can make my point and people understand me as I understand them. Yet, I know that I make errors, I have to simplify what I say and sometimes I really have to think about the ending of a complex tense before using it. I don't want to make errors anymore! I don't want to have to simplify what I say and I want to speak in all tenses!!! One of my roommates in particular corrects me by giving me better vocabulary to say what I really intend. I always rush to my room to get out my little red notebook so I can bring it back and copy down the new phrase correctly. She likes to learn the English word equivalent so now when I go to my room she yells for me to also bring my dictionary and we look up different related Italian and English words and phrases. Every once in a while she takes my notebook and tests me on words we've talked about in the past. This is why I wanted to live with Italians. To really be exposed to the language day in and day out. Yet, I feel that I've somewhat hit a conversation plateau. I need to get back to the books! I brought an Italian grammar book and I write down all of these new words, but haven't reviewed the grammar or written my new words in contextual sentences. From now on, I've decided that I have to devote some time to studying Italian traditionally and hit the books, because speaking is not always enough ~

An Italian Halloween

The Biggest Jack-O'-Lantern we ever did see ...

 All last week, I taught my students about Halloween and our American traditions. I told the legend of Jack-O'-Lantern and started a worksheet with new vocabulary, etc. I described carving pumpkins and showed pictures of Jack-O'-Lanterns so many times, that all I wanted to do was make one myself! I wanted to watch the Halloween parade that my neighborhood throws every year with the kids following a firetruck and ending at a house with bobbing for apples and other treats. The next best thing ... to go to an amusement park! How more American can you get? Two other assistants teaching in Milan and one assistant's friend from home and I went to an amusement park near Lake Garda called "Gardaland" to have an Italian, yet really, an American Halloween.

As you can see from the picture above, there were many decorations for Halloween with pumpkins, Jack-O'-Lanterns, graveyards and ghosts in the trees. Even though it rained, we had a really fun time. There were a lot of people dressed up in costumes - but scary things with masks, dead brides, lots of witches. It made me laugh because a Halloween celebration in Italy seemed to be more true to the roots of the holiday of what I taught in class than what we see now in the USA. I did somewhat miss seeing different and interesting costumes people come up with though so I have been explaining to my classes this week that part of the fun is seeing what costumes people create. Abby is an assistant for the year in the middle of doing her masters at Boston College, Barry is also an assistant from Scotland and his friend Ashley is spending the year abroad from Scotland in Milan studying. Barry had a mask with his costume, so he let me wear it since costume shops don't exist in Brescia.

A new ride premiered last weekend at Gardaland called "Inferis." I thought that it was just a ride they made into a Haunted House but apparently it is a new attraction all year round referencing "Inferno" or "Hell." So, it's supposed to be a "trip to hell" or "face to face with fear." Once inside, we passed through the Gates of Hell [from Dante] and I couldn't help but say out loud "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here" (Professor Shepard would be proud). The trip to the amusement park and naturally, the long lines gave us assistants an opportunity to catch up and compare notes on teaching English to high school students here in Italy. It also gave us a chance to notice cultural differences between Americans, Scots, and Italians. Interestingly enough, according to Barry and Ashley, the British really separate themselves culturally from Europe and relate much more to our customs in the US than those in the rest of their continent. Then again, both Barry and Ashley have spent time in the US before on vacation or to work at summer camps, so they are more familiar with our culture. Regardless, it was fun to show them and explain parts of the American "Wild West" theme in the Fantasyland part of Gardaland which you can invariably find in all amusement parks.

Waiting in line for the Raging River in our costumes

In the end, after a full day of speaking English and barely any Italian, we felt like we had an American, yet really Italian Halloween.
Oh, except that the Saloon we ate at for lunch was a Pizzeria :)

Bad Students or Bad Teachers?

Hello everyone!

I know that it's been a while since my last post! I guess I've just been pretty busy :)

Have you ever heard the expression that "There are no bad students, only bad teachers" ? On the way to my school the first day, my adviser told me that our work is ... a difficult one because the students ... aren't well motivated. Like I've said, my role in the school is to teach "conversation" lessons. I get 16 classes for one hour each week for them to profit from my native English language skills and cultural knowledge. The idea is to interest them with lessons on American/pop culture so that they will speak and participate. I can relate to a younger generation's interests more than an older teacher can.

I realized soon after my first couple of classes that I would not be able to enter a class every week with a "discussion topic" and expect the kids to start talking. Immediately, the teachers told me that these students have a low level of English. These students are not interested. These students don't speak in class. So, are they just bad students? The teachers have difficulty doing the same thing they are asking of me. The teachers seem to not have a real curriculum or syllabus for any class and seem to be scrambling themselves to figure out how to teach kids with such low levels of English and interest. So, are they just bad teachers?

I've been teaching at the school for four weeks now and I'm no expert in education. Here's what I think: they're not all bad students and they're not all bad teachers, yet bad students tend to have bad teachers. There are students who really do want to learn and teachers who really make an effort to engage the students. Yet, it is up to the teacher to set the tone in the classroom. Behavior is the biggest battle. All students want to chatter amongst themselves instead of listen to a teacher lecture, all students have anxiety about speaking in front of a class - but a teacher who doesn't set the tone in the beginning of the year to battle bad behavior just reinforces it. Sure, there are unmotivated students in every class, but if they have a good teacher they will learn more. Unfortunately, the motivated students who have a bad teacher who won't discipline the other students won't learn as much. Some classes take my "conversation" lessons as a joke, while others really appreciate them. Interesting, how the classes who fool around the whole time are all with the same teacher ... regardless of being in the third or fifth year.

In the end, I already see myself with more energy and excitement to teach the appreciative or "better" classes and more dread to teach the misbehaved and "challenging" classes. I hope this realization helps me to give all the students the same tools and opportunity to learn and speak English regardless of what teacher they have usually by setting my own tone for my lessons and demanding good behavior!