home sweet hawalli

It seems surreal that we have been living and teaching in the Middle East for over a month now. We have settled into our apartment in Hawalli. We have gotten used to the almost 24 hour construction that is happening to the building next to us and are almost accustomed to waking up at 5:30 every morning for school, the almost still seems to generous to me. We have really started to explore the area surrounding our apartment. We found a little bakery that sells naan bread right from the oven, it's been the best find so far. Across Beirut St. is a little shopping mall that has all the trinkets and gadgets you'd never need but always want. Yesterday, Cale and I found a Muppets onesie. Needless to say, I bought it. We have been looking after a cat for the holidays. Dori's owners are traveling to Australia for their three week holiday. We had four days off for Christmas and New Years and we get a two week holiday at the end of January. It's unreal to think we only work eight days total in the month of January. We have been on lots of adventures with Amanda and Mason. Many involving trying out the local eateries. Kuwait definitely has some gems. Over Christmas, we traveled to Dubai. It was such a fabulous trip. We got to see the beautiful buildings and architecture, experience the lavish lifestyle and soak in some relaxation. With Kuwait being a dry country, we even indulged in a few alcoholic beverages on the plane ride over. Upon landing we headed straight for the Irish Village. It was like walking into Christmas. It was Christmas eve and the village had decorated beautifully. We sat down front row at a restaurant and listened to some live music while enjoying some delicious pizza and fancy drinks. We slowly migrated over to another pub and ended up checking into the hotel around 3:30am that night. Such a good way to ring in Christmas morning. Christmas day, we headed to the beach. We found a nice little spot on the beach that had beds for laying down. We drank some ciders and even got to indulge in a glass of champagne- thanks Mason! The following day is a day I will never forget. It is the day we got to go to Atlantis. Mason & Amanda were participating in a dolphin adventure while Cale & I were going to wander through the aquarium. After we were done, we all got to enjoy the best water park I have ever experienced. We lazed down the lazy river, until the rapids of course. We took a leap of faith and slid down the tomb drop slide, we tubed through a shark tank, and party tubed our day away. I still think it is one of the best days of my life. We ended the evening with dinner at Trader Vics. This restaurant specialized in fancy drinks and we all found something delicious to eat. The next day, we all ventured to the Burj Khalifa. With it's record height, Cale wanted to take me to the top, but we will have to wait until next time- all the tours were sold out for the day! We did get to see the fabulous fountain show- which was simply amazing. We left the mall, grabbed our luggage from the hotel and spent the rest of the day before our flight sipping drinks at the Irish Village. It was such a great holiday. It seems I have skipped the main reason we came here: the teaching. Each and every day, I am learning so much and falling in love with my class. Grade five has been such a wonderful surprise. Originally, I was quite intimidated, but its turned out to be a great experience so far. The curriculum is very different from Canada and there are more behavioural issues, but it has been a great opportunity to see what your made of as an educator. I love the challenge. Everyday, I am coming up with new behavioural management techniques and ways to motivate my students. Most of my students come from families that are quite wealthy. The students are either overstimulated at home or lacking attention from loved ones. It has definitely been an interesting experience to try to understand where each of my students are coming from. All of the students have nannies and most have tutors outside of school. They are well supported in some ways but still working below grade level. Most are functioning at grade four or below. I am in the middle of doing reading testing and so far I've been impressed with their reading ability but surprised at their low ability to retell what they've read. Comprehension is turning into a major focus in 5C. Every day there are moments that encourage me and remind me why I choose teaching. My girls couldn't be sweeter and are so appreciative to have me. Often I will feel one of their hands slip into mine, just wanting to walk and talk. Cale has had a challenging experience. His class has some behavioural concerns, but Cale has worked hard to establish structure and routine in the class. He is teaching grade three and says most are well below grade level. Special education is not really acknowledged within the main stream school system in Kuwait. I know of one school that is designated the Spec Ed school, but other then that services and diagnosis's are really frowned upon. It is difficult to see students struggle with the course work, when it is obvious they are struggling with something bigger like an undiagnosed learning disability. If the students are not successful in passing their classes, they are simply dismissed from the school. This creates an atmosphere of students that are obsessed with their grades and being successful. The amount of testing my grade fives go through blows my mind. The students write the same test three times per year to assess their academic growth. It will be interesting to see the last results, an good gauge of the students retention I suppose. The school is extremely relaxed in terms of controlling the teaching content, besides the censored material, it is up to the teachers discretion of the manner in which they teach and the order. I have enjoyed the flexibility but also see the additional work it adds to have all the planning on your shoulders. Cale and I are gearing up for our two week holiday in January. We are hoping to explore Thailand. I couldn't be more excited. We are booking our tickets in the next couple days. I hope to go trekking, island hoping and beachlaxing. It should be an adventure. As we plan an experience more, I hope to keep up better with the blog. 

It is amazing to see where life will take you, if you only learn to let it.