One month till departure…

View Over Assisi, Italy

One month from today, I will be arriving in Assisi, Italy to begin my orientation as a tutor for The English Camp Company. I am beyond elated about this amazing opportunity. I applied months ago, and when I the position was offered to me a week ago, it caught me off guard. My summer plans for employment and leisure were all in place, but I was more than willing to rearrange them for this once in a lifetime opportunity. Not only do I get to travel in Europe, but I’m also going to gain experience working with students and learning strategies and methods I can take and adapt for my own future classroom. 

I am very much looking forward to this summer and the immense amount of knowledge I’ll gain, not only about teaching, but also about Italian and Austrian culture. Each week, we will travel to a different city in either country, and instead of staying in hotels, each tutor will be placed with a host family. I cannot think of a better way to learn about a culture! Another exciting element is that the host families provide meals! I am very excited about eating some amazingly delicious, homemade, authentic Italian cuisine! By the end of the summer, I also hope to be speaking a little bit of Italian.

Working with students will also be a highlight of the trip. I am very curious to learn more about the specific strategies used to teach the kids. It is a camp environment, so games and songs will be a big part of the learning. It will be interesting to witness the types of errors students make while learning English as a second language and compare those to errors made by native English speaking students. I will also try to find out about the attitudes students have about school and education. This is something I will also discuss with my host families to attempt to gain an understanding of how Italians and Austrians view education and its importance in society. I discussed this topic with many people on my trip to Tanzania last year, and it is fascinating to observe the similarities and differences between views on education across cultures.

Please follow my journey through this blog! I will try to make another update as the trip get closer, and once I am in Europe, you can expect regular updates and pictures!

Ciao!