Perseverance. I’ve been toying with finding one word– the right word– to best describe my 2017. As a teacher, I sometimes have the tendency to start my “new year” in September, but looking back, I realize that literally SO MUCH happened over the last 365 days, both on a personal and worldwide level.. Last year, I rang in 2017 with two of my oldest and … Continue reading 2018: What’s Past, and What’s to Come.
I may not remember much about the first half of September through December of last year, but I do remember this day perfectly. It was a few days after hosting Thanksgiving. I had just finished grading 47 essays. I had seven preps. I was having doubts about my teaching abilities. I was exhausted and I was stressed. I spent little time sleeping and a lot … Continue reading Confessions of a First Year Teacher
I started college in 2008– in the peak of the economic recession, and just two years before Scott Walker would be elected as Governor of Wisconsin and proceed to reform teachers’ unions. Throughout my college career, the subject of teaching was politically charged. Each semester I was faced with comments and “advice” from professors, academic advisors, and fellow teachers about the hardships of teaching– I … Continue reading The Biggest Differences Between Teaching In France and Teaching in the USA
In my last post, I tried to explained the ins and outs of the French Baccalauréat (Bac Général). Now, seeing as the English Baccalauréat is tomorrow, I am going to explain specifically how the English Baccalauréat is structured for non-OIB students. The English exam has four parts: Compréhension orale (listening comprehension) Expression orale (oral expression) Compréhension écrite (reading comprehension) Expression écrite (writing comprehension) For ES … Continue reading The English (LV1 / LVA) Baccalauréat
June is a very stressful time in France, because it’s Baccalauréat time. Although I’ve been living in France since 2013 and spent a year working as an assistante de langue in a French high school, I never really got a firm grasp on the ins and outs of the French education system, and more specifically, the French Baccalauréat exam until I actually started teaching high … Continue reading Everything You Need to Know About the French Baccalauréat
When I started blogging consistently four years ago, I promised myself that I would not become one of those (well-intended) TAPIF blogs that starts off really strong, and then tapers off somewhere after Christmas. I wanted to create the blog that hadn’t yet existed- an ordinary TAPIFer who gave valuable information about bureaucracy, teaching, traveling, everyday insight into life in France, and was there until … Continue reading “Take the Sourest Lemon that Life has to offer, and Turn it into Something Resembling Lemonade.”
A few weeks ago, I was sitting with my roommates in the salon and reflecting on my first six months of teaching at the international bilingual school. I reluctantly expressed the frustrations I was having with myself– the difficulties I was having aligning standards / objectives, finding my niche with classroom management, time management and giving quality homework, planning a solid unit and curriculum, amongst other … Continue reading The Downside of TAPIF- Losing My Teaching Skills
