Professor de Inglês!

  Here in Mariana, for the kids classes we still do not have a book or brochure to use with our students. Last year we had, but in 2022 not yet. But even if we had, I do not think it would be ok to use it in the first week. So I watched some youtube videos to give me some ideas of games or songs to use in the first week, to get to know each other. As I was expected to have 23 different groups of kids, I decided to have the same class plan for all of them, making small changes according to age. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prXvhy8hvFk The first two days and a half of classes were really good and they seem to receive my approach well. In almost all groups they asked me where I was from or if I was from Brazil. One of them thought I was from China. It is funny how the very young look at me around the corridors or the canteen, like I was an E.T. I am trying to keep this magic, so, every time I need to talk to another teacher (in Portuguese, of course) I do it in a very low voice...

  I want to figure something out: Is it possible to make myself understood even if I speak English full time while teaching kids? I have seen so many people saying so, but I wanted to test it by myself, so I decided to make my students guinea pigs of my experiment, no matter how old they are. The beginning of the class in February 2022 was a good moment to start as most of the kids do not know me, so they could believe I really do not speak Portuguese. Last year, as I was teaching online almost the whole year and was my first time teaching English in a public school, I was afraid of trying that. And as everybody – students, teachers, directors – were learning  how to deal with technology, was not an option not using Portuguese during class. Also, I only started the post graduation course in English Teaching to Kids on July, so little by little the texts I read, the videos I watched and the classes I attended made me more confident to try new things in the classroom and have...