So in addition to being incredibly blessed to be here in Mendoza, the Fulbright staff organized a mid-year conference for all of the English Teaching Assistants in Argentina, Uruguay, Costa Rica and Panama in Montevideo. We arrived on Sunday and on Monday and Tuesday we each spent ~15 minutes presenting on each of our placements, how we’ve become involved in the community, teaching strategies, struggles and successes, etc. It may sound incredibly boring, but to all of us (or at least me), it was so helpful and encouraging to hear how other people have struggled through similar situations as me and also to hear how creative and resourceful they’ve been in handling certain predicaments (i.e. try discussing Osama bin Laden, U.S. politics, etc. to someone outside of the U.S.) We also learned a lot of good teaching techniques from an ESL teacher….for anyone who is teaching ESL, check out her website:
Then came Wednesday and Thursday, the highlights of the week. Wednesday we went to a local middle school (to be honest, middle schoolers scare me so I wasn’t really looking forward to this) and it was incredibly fun. The exchange organizers gave so much energy for all the activities, it was impossible not to be excited and have fun. The students taught us how to make gnocchi (which they always eat on the 29th of every month) and we taught them how to make chocolate chip cookies (which turned out pretty bad…). We also did a “20 Aspects of American Culture” presentation and they did a “20 Aspects of Uruguay Culture.”
More on our trip to an Estancia later!
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