Internship Post #3

I can safely say that aproximately half of my interaction I've had in English were with members of the staff or volunteers at Tyndale and the other half with the kids themselves. Even though my job is to help the kids, I was unlucky enough that half the kids I helped were monolingual francophones so my interactions with English speaking kids is fairly limited. Nevertheless I have still made a few observations. In the context of the classroom, the majority of the kids keep calm and respect the rule of "raising your hand before speaking", only a few "troublemakers" disobey to that rule. The teachers often used body language when explaining activities. When the teachers adress the kids, they are usually asking a question or giving them a directive. My own interactions with the kids were mostly through questions I would ask them because when they encounter a problem I always try to make them figure out the anwser on their own by gradually taking them to the anwser. My interactions clearly make me a better language learner because when I am leading a kid to the anwser, I make links with specific vocabulary such as the cardinal points when I am referring to geography.

When I first came to Tyndale, I was told that the families whose kids were in the program are low revenue families for the most part. I have to admit that poverty is not something I noticed or even thought of during my internship. All I see is a big group of kids doing their homework and having fun during the activities. Something very interesting I noticed is a slight difference of accent between bilingual kids and bilingual teachers; when speaking french, the bilingual kids speak completely fluently with an accent that would make me swear they are francophones but on the other hand, when the teachers speak french, they are also fluent but also carry a small english accent. The difference is that the kids probably learned french and english at home making french and english both their first languages when on the other hand, the teachers probably learned english first and then english.

New words or expressions;

 "mix it down" : Used in the context of making home made clay, when mixing the clay inside a pot with her hands. I still don't know the difference with "mix it up".