"How do you say igneous rock in Spanish?"

Yes, I am not only helping out in the English classes at IES San Jose, but also in the bilingual program which means I'm helping teach Natural Sciences, Art and even Physical Education... talk about random?
My first day of work at the highschool was eventful, seeing as the professor whom I had two classes with did not show up - her child was sick as I found out later - so I had two upper-level classes (4o ESO and 1o Bach) with Maria-Jose Tapia where she literally explained to me what to do for the listening portion of the class 2 minutes before going into the class. She gave me the textbook and I had to fly with that. After my carefully enunciated introduction of myself - blank stares galore - and a short question and answer period I got going on the listening section and found myself greeted by more, you guessed it, blank stares. Despite having had English classes for about 6 years by 4o ESO a native speaker is still hard to understand even with questions as simple as "How are you?" or "Where are you from?". Needless to say, I have my work cut out for me.

Before I go into explaining what types of classes I have I will outline the Spanish high-school system briefly. There are of course both Private and Public schools, but unlike Argentina, the majority of children go to public schools and the "grades" are as follows into "ESO"s (Educacion Secundaria Obligatoria)

1o ESO - 11 and 12 yr olds
2o ESO - 13 and 14 yr olds
3o ESO - 14 and 15 yr olds
4o ESO - 15 - 17 yr olds
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1o Bachillerato - 16 and 17 yr olds
2o Bachillerato - 17 and 18 yr olds

Highschool education is only obligatory until the age of 16, whereby the child can then choose to continue and do her/his "Bachillerato" (or basically prep for entering university or further training at some point) or enter the job market. The bachillerato classes are much smaller as they are not obligatory, and the students still need to take English in order to pass the university entrance exam which has an English section. Hence, where I come in to help with pronunciation, reading, vocabulary etc. 

My role in each class varies, I am with about 8 different groups this term, then starting in January I will be helping in other classes... by far my favorite groups though have been the 1o and 2o ESO bilingual classes - they are VERY participative, curious and unafraid to try and pronounce tough words like "igneous" in their bilingual Science class. The older highschool students seem to be warming up to me though, the teachers have noticed because they seem to be more willing to participate and try to speak when I'm there versus when I'm not, so apparently I can keep them entertained which is great! I have to admit though, since they don't understand everything I say, I do have to be a bit of a ham to keep them following at times... which can include making noises, playing charades while speaking and thinking of simple ways to explain ideas like "What's he like?" versus "What does he look like?".

Now, my job in Don Benito still only involves sitting in on Teacher Pilar's classes with the kids (from age 5 - 15 for about 16 hrs/week) but I had my first taste of teaching them on my own this past Wednesday since she had a doctor's appointment. The first group of 10 was a nightmare, not paying attention, fighting amongst themselves, complaining about everything, not completing their work, all talking at once, and all about 7 or 8 years old. I couldn't wait for that hour to be up. The next group was perfect and I had so much fun with them reviewing how to say the time in English... When Pilar returned and we had a chance to speak after the 5 hours of lessons she said that that first group is her worst-behaving group and that I shouldn't be afraid to be stern with them as they are a cheeky group. I'm hoping over the next couple months I will get a hang of this other job and be ready by January... it'll be a challenge, but I'm chipping away at it bit by bit.

This is definately more work than I expected but I still have Friday, Saturday, Sundays off and the occasional Monday too (puentes = long weekends)! Another thing I'll have to adjust to is the noise level in the classrooms... the notion of raising your hand quietly and waiting for the teacher to acknowledge you does not happen here, everybody just seems to shout over eachother although it really depends on the teacher present as well.  I still say kudos to the kids in the bilingual program for learning about types of rock in English...