Hip Hip Hurray for All of Us!

On this Earth there are some seas,
And the forests filled with trees.
There are mountains up so high.
Above it all is the blue sky.
Different people everywhere;
Different voice, face, clothes, and hair.

And over in Africa having fun,
There lives a hippo that weighs a ton!
Hip-hip-hippopotamus
hip hip hurray for all of us!
hip hip hippopotamus
hip hip hurray for all of us!


After a few minor adjustments, this church camp favorite about God creating all of us, turns into a fun song about diversity. It fits nicely into a lesson on 'Animate Nature' right after you ask the kids' names and favorite animals, making sure to spend some time acting like each animal that gets mentioned.

On Thursday I went to the Prague, where I gave a demo lesson at Bumble Bee School of Creative Children. It's an English speaking preschool. The position they can offer me is that of a 'Free Time Specialist'. But in order to get the job, I had to do a demo lesson. Meaning I came into the school and did the theme lesson of the day. The entire month of March is focused on 'Animate Nature', so after the above mentioned acting like animals followed by hippo song, I then got out a map of the world and clip out pictures of animals that I had printed out from the internet, which probably violated some sort of copyright law. We went around talking about the different animals they had and where they lived, and then glued them on the map. Then they colored the map with the animals. Then we acted like trees and did the 'Goin' on a Bear Hunt' song/chant.

The entire time the head teacher and the director of the school were sitting in the back of the room silently watching (and judging) so of course, I'm simultaneously teaching and criticizing myself on how things are going. If you look at the website, it mentions often how they are a school that uses 'non-directive teaching' meaning, teachers are just there to give suggestions and let the full creative potential of the students blossom and blah blah blah. So I was trying not to be too directive, but at the same time, not lose control of these 10 screaming 5 year olds. At the end of the bear hunt song, I looked at my watch. I had been instructed to give about a 30 minute lesson. It had been about 30 minutes, but I also had two other things I could do if I needed to keep going. I then asked the director, "is that ok?" or something to that affect, I don't remember now, and she responded, "sure, just finish up however you want to". Well I didn't exactly have some sort of grand finale planned, so I just reviewed the two animals whose names they didn't know in English and said my goodbyes.

Off I went into a room with the director. "So, how do you think it went?" This woman is the queen of showing no emotion. I had no idea what she was thinking, so I began spewing all of the things that I had noticed were going wrong. Finally she stopped me and asked for positive remarks. And then said "I think it went great; a little long, but great." She was super impressed with my organizational skills and ability to control some of the out of control boys in the class. And was impressed with how quickly I picked up some of their names. (Of course the only ones I could pick up were David and Victor and the other ones that weren't ridiculously Czech sounding). But I apparently gave one of the best demo lessons she has ever seen. She seemed the most worried that I wasn't interested anymore (because some of those boys were really unruly).

The next step was taking 3 Psychological Assessment Tests to make sure I'm a good fit for the job. I finished those last night, so hopefully my motivation and priorities are a good fit to be a free time specialist. If all goes well, I'll have a job in Prague for next year, and can begin the long, tedious, Czech work visa process. Hip Hip Hurray!

Halloween, German style

I'll be honest, I almost forgot about Halloween. There are very few stores that bombarb you with displays of jack-o-lanterns and black cats and those chunks of stretched out cotton balls that are supposed to be cobwebs. In fact, Germany may have America beat on the jump-the-gun Christmas decorations. Seeing as Germany doesn't really have Halloween and definitely doesn't have Thanksgiving, Christmas is really all the department stores have right now. But I had enough poeple asking me questions about Halloween the day before at work, that I did remember to acknowledge its exsistance. It was actully really cute on Friday. I was invited to dinner at my host parents' house and on the way, I had to stop by the post office to mail my ballot (I had already faxed it in so it would count, I just had to back it up with the real thing). I saw a couple of groups of kids dressed as ghosts and witches and goblins and other scary things. In Germany they like the scary costumes, not the recognizable characters costumes that populate US college campuses. So as I was leaving die Post (the post office), a troop of costumed youngsters entered die Post and said 'Süß and something I didn't quite catch because they said it really sing-songy and in unison'. Süß means sweet. So they were giving their targeted trick-or-treatee the option of sweets or I'm assuming, a trick of some sort. I saw the same thing in one of the U-Bahn Station shops. I think that's an adorable idea. And great for these businesses. Maybe this is how trick or treating is always done in big cities but it was the first time I heard of kids going store to store in addition to door to door.