Sunday, October 31, 2010

Pronounciation and another observation

Long time no see, mostly because I've been busy teaching in London, teaching in Hull, finding another job in London, finding a place to live in London, trying to find more work...
LSA4 - reload, is coming soon. Having said that, I have no idea of when it will be, as far as I'm aware it may well be tomorrow, since my tutor only appears when he needs money or admin info from me, and seems to be in another country/world/planet any other time...
Anyway, I am working on an assignment on pronunciation and stress in connected speech, having been convinced that discourse is a suicidal decision (it did feel like that, but pronunciation is so scary). I have spent most of yesterday and today working on notes, preparing a provisional lesson plan, thinkink of resources. My weekly plan involves an equal amount of time spent on the assignment, on preparing the materials, the class profile (of a class I don't even have, this being my last week at the school and probably my last too, by the looks of it), and all that jazz.
The school I am working for is not exactly the best I have worked for...Week three of four, they take a picture of me to put on the teachers' wall, which makes me feel they are serious about keeping me on. They plan to observe me on Thursday, that is, the day before my last day of contract, which is either promising or really bad planning. They haven't given me a contract because the DOS is the only one who prepares them, and she's back on week four, which means I may as well have a contract on my last day of the contract, which somehow is hilarious. They say it will be no problem to find me a class for the observation, but they can't tell me if there will be work after November 5th (presumably because of some Guy Fawkes-like attack on the school that they have foreseen but which may not happen...). They have been giving me lots of work, which on the one hand is pretty cool as I am paid by the hour, and on the other hand it makes me feel that it's so that by the end of week four they will have their complete 12-week course for EAP and they can send me away, no longer needing my services. Clearly not good.
But enough complaining: I've been working 7 hours already and I feel that some distraction is well deserved... Miss Marple here I come.