school + madrid - day 2

This morning we went to the school we'll be teaching at for the first time. We were shown around by Andrew, whose class we'll be teaching. The school actually used to be a really big house before it was converted into a school which I think is really cool, because it looks nothing like a school. It's got a much more relaxed feelings to it than schools in Ireland which can feel like prisons at times. Only downside in my opinion is that the school is a little bit like a maze, but it's made up for by the fact that Andrew is really nice and showed us around, and there's also a mini golf course out in the yard??? How cool is that??? Irish schools could never.

After being shown around the school, Reece, Colin and I went into Madrid for the day. On the way in, our bus turned a corner too early and crashed into a street sign and one of the windows smashed, so we had to get off and wait for the next bus. Very exciting journey if you ask me. 

Colin gave us a mini tour and explained their metro and bus transport system to us for when we go in again on our own. I've never been to Madrid before, and it was so lovely to see it finally. It's such a beautiful city to walk around and just explore. We got really lucky with the weather too, it was clear skies and about 15/16 degrees while we were there. We didn't do any shopping or anything, but I made a list of places I want to go to when I go back. Here's some pictures of Madrid below:









(technically this photo is a little bit of a cheat because we hadn't left for madrid yet but shhhh)





It was really really nice to just walk around the city and take in all the pretty streets and the architecture. I'm not great with the names of all the streets but I'll try to keep a better record of them when I go back again so I can keep this blog as factual and informative as I can.

It's almost 8pm now, and we're meeting with Colin, Laura, Eloah and Ava for half to go for dinner together which I'm very excited for because I feel like I haven't eaten properly since I got here. Anyway, that's my cue to sign off for tonight. Tomorrow's entry will be about our first proper day at the school and what our plans are for teaching etc.. Until then, hasta luego cocodrilo!

Ciara

Saludos Desde Alpedrete! - day 1

Hola amigos... Cómo estás? Bien? Bien. It's 7:20pm on our first day here, and it's already been quite a day. Our flight out was at 6:25 so we're still pretty tired from the 4am start to our day, not to mention the lack of sleep on the plane because the turbulence was crazy. It felt like we were still on the ground driving over potholes in a car with no suspension. Still, we defied the odds and made it over in one piece. Here's a picture of me, Reece, Laura and Eloah when we landed in Madrid.



The subway from Nuevos Ministerios to Alpedrete was actually a really nice journey. It did take the better part of an hour but the scenery was enjoyable and Ava, the lady we're renting our rooms from, came to the station to pick us up - which I'm really thankful for because the wheels to my suitcase are broken :))) Our apartment is really nice and my bed is really comfortable so I'm gonna find it hard to leave here in the mornings to go to school. 

We're going tomorrow to meet with the students and be introduced to the teachers and be filled in on the run of things there. Reece and I will make lesson plans for the kids based around the graphic novel The Arrival by Shaun Tan. I've never taught any classes before, especially not to Spanish kids so I am kind of nervous to see how it goes but I'm sure we'll be grand. I'm using this teaching opportunity as my work experience as well so I have to keep that in mind when I'm making up plans etc.. to count towards hours.

After school tomorrow we might go into Madrid for a little while. I'd love to see some galleries or museums in the centre, Madrid is a huge culture hub that I can't wait to explore. I'll update you on my adventures tomorrow as they unfold.

Signing off, Senorita Reenan :)

Ciara and Reece Prepare for Erasmus+

Day 21- Last Day(s)

For our last full day we wandered around Alpedrete for the last time, taking in the sights. We headed over to Villalba in the evening for dinner and once again another last look before heading home at about 10ish to finish packing (it was a late night).

Our last last morning was spent tidying and packing and panicking and packing again. About two minutes before we were meant to leave we finished double checking everything and waited for Ava. Ava very kindly brought us to the Villalba train station where we got the C10 direct to the Airport-Terminal 4. She even brought us to our platform (platform 1) and stayed with us to make sure it was the right one. From there it was about an hour and twenty minutes to the airport, where we went through terminal 4 and out to the taxi and bus ranks where we got a free shuttle bus to terminal 1 and began to check in.

Our last day started off a bit hectic but we had everything so well planned and organised that from the train onwards everything was smooth sailing or flying as it were.

We've truly had a great time these last twenty-one days, a large part of which was writing this blog. We'll miss it and each other. Adiós.

Day 20 - Finishing School and Reflection

Today was officially our last day teaching the students. It was really strange because it has been the quickest few weeks of our lives, it seems like only yesterday we met the students and now we're already finished.
We had Year Nines to start off with first thing, and for this class, we wanted to focus on theatre. With our project we wanted to focus on different aspects of Creative Writing, so we decided o focus on:

• Characters
• Writing a Story
• Adapting a Story

They all made their characters and wrote their stories using their characters (but for this exercise Year Nines would be using the story they made up yesterday as they got through work and exercises a lot faster than we anticipated). 

For this exercise, we firstly explained what they were going to do, and we told them to imagine that they were watching the story they wrote on stage; how could they imagine it looking? Where were their characters standing? What were they wearing? What did the stage look like?

We put a list on the board of what they should think about;

• Set
• Props
• Costumes
• Lighting
• Sound

We asked them to go through this list and to write what they would need or how they would imagine each of these items would look on stage.

The students all got really into it really fast, they discussed in their groups together and the seemed to find the exercise really interesting and they all put a good bit of effort into it. 

When they finished, they all read out their lists and explained it. 

After everyone had read out their list, Jass and I walked around the room and gave every student (and their teacher) a booklet we typed, printed, and stapled together, that had all the work they done over the past few weeks. In the booklet, there was all the characters they created, the prompts they used, and all the stories they wrote. Everyone was really happy to get this, they genuinely seemed to like it and they seemed excited to see their own stories written typed up inside of it.

Jass and I then thanked the students for being a great class, we said goodbye, and we headed off to Year Sevens. 

For Year Sevens, we done the same thing again, we asked them to think of how they would put their stories on stage, and how the points above would be.

Like Year Nines, they got straight into their work, discussing excitedly how they would imagine it looking.

Once they were done, we got them to read them out, and like before, once again, we gave out booklets with all their work inside if it. 

Again, the students really loved it, they opened them instantly to look for their own stories, and they were really excited about it (one student even came up to correct us on a spelling mistake in a characters name). 

Like before, we thanked them and said our final goodbyes before heading to our very last class as teachers.

Year Eights class ended up being different than the other two, since their classroom is connected to the stage, and since the theatre was empty, we decided to bring them in so they could use the stage to imagine their play. However, some students asked if they could perform their story on stage for the rest of the class to see, we didn't have any problems with that, so rehearsals officially began. They split into their groups and went around to separate parts of the hall to start practicing. From every corner, there was laughter and talking and shouting as they excitingly rehearsed. 

 Nearing the end of class, they all went up group by group to perform their story. Each one was entertaining and quite funny, and both Jass and I (and even their teacher) were amazed about how quickly they were able to come up with a performance for their story in such a short period of time, and how they managed to make them so entertaining and well done.

We all applauded as the last group finished, and as with the other groups, we gave out their booklet with the collection of their work inside. As like before, the students were all really happy to be getting a memento of all the work they've done over the past few weeks. 

Jass and I said our last goodbye to the students and the teachers and we left the school, officially finished our few weeks of being teachers. 

As we walked home from the school, we reflected on the past few weeks teaching in the school. It has honestly been a once in a lifetime opportunity, we've gotten so much great experience from teaching the kids, and learning from the kids also. As well as gaining new writing ideas and experience from them.  All of the teachers told us that the work we've done was really great and that all the students have been really enthusiastic about the project as it went along. While there were so many positives from this experience, there were also many challenges. One of the biggest challenges we have faced has definitely been the language barrier. While the students all spoke really good English, at times it was still hard to understand them, and sometimes they didn't know how to word things correctly. Although we weren't the only ones with some difficulty understand, the students sometimes didn't understand what we were saying, we had to get into the habit of speaking slower and pronouncing our words more clearly. These are all challenges we overcame throughout the few weeks (well, apart from the last day as I lost my voice and once again, I was hard to understand, whoops.) Teaching in the school was probably the best opportunity either of us has ever gotten, we are so grateful that we got to experience something so wonderful and that we got to be apart of these students creative journey. It has made both me and Jass think if teaching is something we would actually want to pursue in our futures. 

We both came over expecting to learn a little bit of Spanish, a few phrases here and there, but that proved to be wrong. Neither of us learned any new phrases, we learned a handful of words (the word for credit card, and perhaps) the only Spanish words or phrases we do know are the ones we learned previous to coming over. However, we did become very good at interpreting what people were saying when we didn' understand them, this happened especially when we were ordering food and whatnot. 

Being over here has been a real culture shock. We had to get used to the way of life over here, which is much different than in Ireland. One thing we never really did get used to is the Siesta, having shops close from three to five daily was strange, I can't count how many time we tried to go buy something just to find all the shops closed. A good cultural difference that we came to enjoy is Tapas, whenever you order a drink over here, you're giving a little plate of food (although we didn't really order much drink apart from the first three days). While not really a cultural difference, we both were shocked by the way roads worked over here, in Alpedrete, there was not one traffic light anywhere, and zebra crossings don't seem to work the same way as in Ireland, and when we did find traffic lights in Madrid, there were no buttons to press on them, weird. 

Through all these language barriers and cultural differences, we've learned a lot about this country and ourselves. We were given this great opportunity to teach and explore and whilst we done all of that we also learned a lot about ourselves and each other. We both feel that getting to take part in Erasmus and getting to come over here to Spain, has been the best experience of our lives. We are so grateful that we were chosen and trusted to do the work and make sure that we did a good project for the students. 

We are both going to miss being over here, we've gotten very accustomed to our way of life, and we really are going to miss the amazing times and the amazing experiences we had. 

We are now looking forward to enjoying our last day in Alpedrete before we say goodbye. 

Day 19- Back To School (Year 8's stories included)

Thursday we were back into the school again ready to continue on with our projects. We had Year 9's first, a class that has so far excelled at every task we've given them and completed them quicker than we could come up with new ones. Our original plan was to use their stories from the prompts (posted in Day 17) for our last class using them to show the kids how to adapt it to a stage setting, but we still had a class to fill until then. Having used all of our previous plans and then some already we simply placed them into groups again and got them to completely invent their own story, no prompts from us or characters made in another class. This worked quite well, and with it being Year 9's it was all finished within the hour so we had something to work with the following day.

We had to give up our Year 7 Class as they had drama so instead we spent the hour printing off the completed works (which in hindsight we did not realise quite how much work and time was involved in printing alone).

Afterwards we had Year 8's who finished their stories within the hour that we later went home to type up.



Year 8 Stories done in Groups, typed up word-for-word:

The Story of Jardel Roosvelt and his Magic Book

Jardel lives in a poor house with his mom and is very lonely. Jardel was a little boy and he didn't have any mouth, he also had white eyes but he could see perfectly. Jardel couldn't talk but he could write.

One day Jardel finds out that on the beach of his village there was a rock in the water that was like 30 metres away from the sand, so he decided to go swimming. Jardel was going to the gigantic rock and when he was about 10 meters away he found that the rock had a cave that went under the water. When he got to the cave he saw a gigantic hole that went down under water so he decided to go down when he got to the part that was on the ending he found a person dead that had a book and a pencil with a rubber. Jardel got the book and the pencil with the rubber to see what was that. On the front part of the book put "The Book of the Wishes". Jardel opened the book and saw that the book was blank so there he noticed that "the book of the wishes" meant that what you write on the book became real. Jardel tried writing these words "I wish to have a mouth and two beautiful and bright blue eyes". So, magically, Jardel now had a mouth and two beautiful eyes. So he decided to go back to his house and show it to his mom.

The next day…

Jardel wakes up and shows the book to his mom. Jardel's mom noticed that he had now a mouth and blue eyes and was very happy. But she didn't know how so Jardel showed the book to his mom and she was fascinated. Jardel's mom had the idea of writing that they had a beautiful and enormous house to told Jardel to write it and the magically they were in an enormous house with lots of food and lots of expensive things. His mom was now very happy. Jardel already used two wishes but what he didn't know is that each wish would take away ten years of his life.

Jardel made another three wishes that were:

1. One billion dollars
2. An expensive car
3. Expensive clothes

These three wishes made Jardel die so his mom got very sad.

After a week his mom was still very sad so she committed suicide and their family buried her next to her son.

18th October 1973

Today, I saw that man again. He was there, looking at the door of the arrivals in the airport. Him, as always, with his pink shirt, blue trousers, pink socks and his black loafers. This time he came earlier, at six am. I saw him because I was organising the next flight to israel. I am going to pass the next two weeks there, if when I come I see him again, I will need to talk with him.

I went to Israel, and when I came back that man was still there. I asked him who was he waiting for. He said he was waiting for Rick Williams. The man looked serious. I told him I'm Rick Williams. He told me that he needs to speak to me, he knows something about my past.

I thought it was all a joke, so I told him to go home and never come back. He insisted. "Who are you?" I asked.

"You have to come with me".

"I'm not going with you"

"But you have to," he insisted.

"Let's go," I accepted.

20th October 1973

That man took me to my house, the house where my parents were murdered.

"Why are we here?"

"This is where you were born"

"I know, but how do you know? Who are you?

"Rick, I am…"

"Who? Tell me!"

"I am...your father."

Once, I woke up on a Tuesday morning, I looked out the window and it seemed like I was the only person on the Earth. As I walked down down town road in California. I saw lots of dead bodies on the floor. I was scared since I was all alone. So, then I thought to myself, “What should I do now?” After couple minutes of crying, I ran back to my house, grabbed the phone and called the police. Nobody responded. Suddenly, I knew I was getting very nervous. So, I didn't know what to do. I was like if I didn't learn nothing, or as if I was blocked.

The time was going really, really slow.

    A month later, it came the day for me to turn 17 years old, I didn't know how to celebrate it, seeing as nobody was in McDonald's, I decided to go there on my own, and eat a Big Mac on my own. Ten minutes after eating I started to cry, thinking that all my friends could have celebrated it with me on this special occasion.

    I was alone, and also was really scared because lots and lots of spiders, and not only that, also lots of different animals. I could only see some as monkeys, elephants, snakes, mouse, horse, makako, baboon and turtles.

Maricarmen finds herself in a bookshop searching a book for a class project. Suddenly, a book caught her eye, a strange attracted her to it. As she reached to grab it, she noticed a soft leather material decorated it, and yet it gave an impression of an ancient book, dust covered it. A tiny voice whispered “Buy it, buy it.” Without thinking it twice, she grabbed the book, took out her purse, and bought it.

Once she arrived home, she was determined to open it and start the project. When, surprisingly, she was shocked to find all the pages blank, except one. The first page was marked in black ink, 'Maricarmen, whatever you write in this book will become true.' and written underneath were the initials 'J.P'. She immediately threw the book, as she felt the frustration running through her veins. What kind of a prank was that? Hate invaded her, as she thought about it even more. As soon as she read the message she immediately knew it was a prank.  She decided she would take advantage and give it use by using it as her diary, since she had recently finished her last one.

That night, as always, she started to write every one of her wishes on the first page, as she had done in most of her diaries. The next morning, the sun shined brighter, she awoke with the smile of her mother and father back from foreign countries. This was extremely unusual, since her father only visited them once a year at Christmas.

Once she arrived at school and found, surprisingly, Miguel waiting for her in the entrance, he greeted her. The next few months she became very popular, but she became more distant with Pablo, her best friend. Everything seemed perfect. But, it all seemed false. The laughs, the cries, all seemed to be false. She preferred her other life, she had to get rid of the cursed book that had changed her entire life.

She was determined to discover the truth as she walked into the same book shop she entered a few months ago. She asked how to get rid of the cursed life that the book gave her. The last attending her didn't understand a clue. But, out of nowhere,an old, experienced woman said “Write what you wish for now and throw it out of a window.” She ran home and did everything that the woman had said. The next morning, Pablo was waiting at school for her. Happiness filled her.

This was her life.

Day 18 - Museum and "Markets"

We were finally able to proceed with the plans that we had planned for Monday. We were able to book our tickets for the 'Museo Nacional Thyssen - Bornemisza' and we headed off into Madrid to see some art.
We got into the museum and walked around looking at all the amazing artwork. Some paintings took our breath away with how spectacular how were.
Since coming to Madrid we've noticed many differences between Ireland and Spain, e.g Siestas, rules of the road, how people talk (not just talking about language), etc, but, there are also similarities, for example, in both Irish and Spanish museums, the vast majority of people there are tourists, while walking around, we heard more English speaking people than any other language, it was quite surreal and comforting, as for the past three weeks, we've heard very little English apart from in the school, and while we didn't get into conversation with any English speaking people in the museum, it was nice to just hear it as we walked around.

By far though, the best part of the museum and the part we enjoyed the most was, of course, the Vincent Van Gogh paintings. Van Gogh is my favourite painter ever, and Jass really enjoys his artwork too. There were three of his paintings on display and we were both awestruck by the sheer magnificence and beauty of them.

I was overjoyed to be able to see these paintings in person. It officially makes it five of Van Gogh's paintings that I have seen in my life. This is another reason why I am so grateful that I got the opportunity to do Erasmus and go to Madrid, getting to teach Creative Writing to students in another country is just incredible, being able to see their talent and helping them write their own stories and create their own characters is incredible, and something I'm so grateful to do, but, as well as that, I'm so grateful to come to another country and see all these amazing things, from castles, to zoos, to museums, getting to see them all is just indescribable, and I am so grateful I have gotten to see them.

After wandering around the museum for longer, and admiring more paintings (We even got great story ideas from some of the paintings!) we decided to finish up in the museum and head off to the market by Retiro Park. We were at the market on one of our first days in Madrid, we didn't pick much up though. We wanted to go back today to get presents and whatnot for our families. Markets are a huge cultural thing in Madrid, there are always loads on throughout the year, when Googling what things we should do in Marid, half of what came in was in regards to Markets.
 However, when we got to Retiro Park,  we found that the only part of the market that was open was the book market. Last time, there had been many stalls selling clothes, and jewellery and assorted items. We were disappointed but just went on to look around the shops in Madrid instead.