Sunday 26

This was a really interesting Sunday. First I went with Angie to a Quaker ceremony, thay call themselves "Friends" but althogh they are no longer called offically quakers they try to keep to their traditions and principles, justice, simplicity, respect, uhhh I don't remember, it was Sunday and I didn't take my notebook. Of course all the principles were really the best ones. No se menciona la solidaridad como principio. A veces algunos de ellos (en general, no los amigos en especial) mencionaron el compartir como importante. En la familia que me hospeda el compartir y ayudar a otros es uno de sus fundamentos, eso los hace muy diferentes a los demas.
I must say that this was one of the most interesting experiences I have lived.
We

Saturday 24

It's North Cross, Cross country meet in Harrisonburg, we left at about 9:30 and arrived there at quarter to 12 on time for Nick's race. It was raining heavily so we had to take raincoats and umbrellas. Suzie lent me a pair of warm boots so I was very comfortable in spite of the rain. Nick did a good job.
Back home we went shopping some wine for dinner at some friends' and all the seafood and other things we needed for a paella. I would cook on Sunday.
Dinner at Churchil and Lee's home was really fine, I met new people, I had fun talking to them especially because I realised that my English is even good for socializing. So far English has been just a tool for my work, and now it has become a real mean of communication. They have a very nice house and an awesome basement, made up especially for meeting people. The food was delicious and I enjoyed a lot the Malbec from Mendoza. -gusto ropa

Viernes 24

It has been planned a visit to Roanoke Catholic, which is another Private school, but this is a religious one. It failed because the teacher who would host me there got ill.
So I stayed in Angie's class, the students have asked a lot of questions for me, as the level is beginner I had to make a big effort in Spanish to make myself understood.
The next group prepares different classroom projects for Fridays, one of them showed how to prepare ice tea, he showed how to follow all the steps to make a good tea. The next student talked about his guitar, a solid wood guitar made of mahogany. (Tuve que explicar que la Cites protege los arboles de caoba como especies en extincion) The presentation finished with beautiful songs in Spanish played on this wonderful and very expensive guitar.
After that I went to pilates with Suzie, and came back just in time for lunch.
In the afternoon, finally, I finished my search for material for Phyllis class. Everything is ready, the students got their copy of the short story.
At home we had dinner and after that we watched a movie, Suzie and Dave were not expecting me to understand the movie, I guess.

Viernes 24

Thursday 23

It's my brother's birthday. I sent him a message and I'm glad he was able to get it.
In the morning I went swimming, then I went to Angie's classes, the students have prepared some questions specially for me and I have to answer them, what's difficult about it is to speak clearly and slowly enough so they can understand me. It's an odd feeling, to see that if you want people to understand you, you have to speak English though they are learning Spanish. I even don't speak much Spanish with Angie, and she is a Spanish teacher. Conclusion if I want to make sure that they are getting the right ideas I must speak English, with Spanish they can misunderstand me. My English is better than my Spanish.
After lunch we had a Faculty council meeting, they had to discuss a problem they had with a student and decide if they will accept the honor council recommendation or not. It was very interesting to see how they deal with behaviour problems and what they consider a serious fault or not.
I'm still trying to get material for Phyllis lesson, I've picked up some pictures to show where Borges used to live and things he used lo like. I'm planning a Power Point presentation and having the students read The immortal in advance, so then in class we can just discuss a short paragraph about immortality, mortality or how frail may life may be.
In the afternoon, we had a special activity, some police officers from Roanoke PD came to speak about the dangers of internet, what may happen to you if you upload photographs to blogs like facebook or those things. When I was there I had the impression that it was OK, but then I asked Nick his opinion, and he said it was just the same presentation they had done last year, that they haven't brought anything new, it was boring and useless.
On the way home, Nick told her mum that he had a problem at school because he didn't bring his homework for Drama. (para recordar como reaccionaron sobre la falta)

Wednesday 22

This was a very different day. At school they had parents' conference day, so parents go and have meetings with their children teachers, the meetings are scheduled in advance, all parents are kept informed via e mail.
Parents prepare a special lunch for teachers that day because there is no buffet service.
I stayed longer at school, while Nick was in his Cross country training looking for material about Borges for my literature class with Phyllis. It's quite difficult to get good translations fo Borges in internet.
For dinner, we went to a restaurant, very chic???

Tuesday In North Cross

I started my day very well, I had a yoga lesson and then went swimming with Suzan, Then I went to school, at around 10. I visited Phyllis class, she had a difficult time there because, though she had only 5 students they looked uninterested and sometimes argumentative with her. One of them said he had never read a book translated where there were dialogues or dialects shown as they are in the original versions. Phyllis invited me to give my opinion. And it seemed she liked it so much that then she asked me to give a lesson on Argentine literature, in which I'm not a specialist, but I said yes.

Later I went to see Mr Douglas a spanish teacher, he was asked his age and he managed not to answer the questions playing a game to see who could guess, in the end he said who was the winner but never his age. He's 66.

At lunch I was in Faculty meeting where they discussed the programme for the next 2/3 months of Thursday's special activities. They have some special things every Thursday prepared for all the students in Middle and Upper School.

It was Nick's birthday so I was able to see how American celebrate their birthdays, it was very intimate , very familiar, Nick opened all his presents. And we had dinner, then he went to the cinema with his friends, later I accompanied Suzan to pick him up.

First day in Roanoke

The waiting hours at the Dulles airport were awful, then I had a pleasant short flight to Roanoke, I got there at 13:30 Angie and her family were there waiting for me, we went to lunch and after that we bought pumpkins to make our Jack-o-larterns. It was a very nice experience because I've never imagined the enthusiasm people have for this festivity.
As I hadn't brought a present for the family that is hosting me (I didn't know in advance), I gave them my Jack-o-lartern, and I was also able to buy them a Luigi Bosca Malbec right in one the supermarkets around. In the evening we went to a coffee shop and had pizza with Tim, the head of the school. When I got to my hosts home I had time to organize my things and then I showed them on the Google Earth where Luigi Bosca is.
They are wonderful, a great family, I cannot tell who is best, but the boy is absolutely excellent. He's very kind and nice really.
I'm very comfortable with them and they make me feel at ease.
I've spent the whole day at school in Angies classes, except for a two hour break. I went to Pilates with Susan, my host.
I'm having a great time.

Last outing in Washington

Sherly recommended us to go to the Old Post Office, thank God we heard her. It was a wonderful afternoon, we took awesome pictures of Washington. We also went to the National Art Gallery. You won't believe it, we saw a collection by Pablo Picasso and some paitings by Matisse. It's a lifetime opportunity. There was a compositon by Diego Rivera which you cannot explain with words, you have to see it to believe your eyes. I felt a bit troubled because I couldn't share this with Mariana, who would have loved to see all this.
After that, we went to Georgetown. What a beautiful place, how evident it was that it is a classy place. So beautiful shops, cafes, bars, restaurants. Even more, the women in this area were very elegant. Of course everything was very expensive, as it is Palermo in BA, or Chacras in Mza.

Final presentations in Maryland.

Today we showed the results of our work here in Maryland. All the presentatiosn were very creative, funny and clearly demonstrated that we are really very good when we have to make a synthesis, and we can be very funny too. I hope Sherly has been able to follow all the small details that were implicit in all the cases. The idea of implicit knowledge and subliminal messages was always present and made each of the works richer and more interesting. In all the cases there were signs that we have not only read the material assigned but we have also profited a lot from the input sessions. Multiple intelligences were given the oportunity to feel at ease with each of the shows. Teachers showed that they may have some flaws in their language use, but they know very well how to teach it. I felt really very proud of my collegues.

Murals and the White House

Ramona took us on a kind of tour to Columbia Heights. This was the first time that I felt I was in the real world since I arrived. So far we had always been at the University of Maryland or at the hotel or shopping at the Mall where most people are on holiday or just going around.
We happened to

Cognitivism vs Sociolinguistics

Eric introduced us into the theories of second language learning and second language acquisition.
Something really interesting about this section of the course was that he expressed his concern about certain practices that are still very common at the university with which he did not completely agree.
We had the chance to have a lot of discussion about the implications of teaching a foreign language, for learning it or to acquire it.
He also offered us to contact him to run a project which is a simulation of real situations in cooperation . I'll take this into account when I'm back to Argentina.

Collaborative learning

Kim Brown introduced the topic of collaborative learning projects while teaching diversity. We were introduced into the world of Wikispaces to create our own websites to share with our students. The idea is to use the technology available to motivate students, make them learn how to use it, and encourage collaborative learning projects through these means.
It was really difficult to follow the procedures to create a wikispace, so Kim has prepared a wikispace in which we can find a Power Point presentation with all the steps to follow. We'll be able to check how to do it when we come back home and have computers available.
The next topic was teaching diversity. We were shown some murals that are painted in some neighborhoods.

Multiple intelligences

This morning has been a really productive one, we've learned the meaning of accelerated learning experiencing it. We got to know Multiple intelligences, what this means, why it is dramatically important for the times coming, the implications of applying these concepts to teaching and some interesting techniques.
There was one thing we've not heard about before. The Peg system, it had a strong impact on us.

Blog in the US

This is my first blog from Maryland University, It's like being in an American film, everything looks the same as in A Brilliant Mind