Cubes!

Today we had an open day in Grade One.  The school had planned to have the open day in January, but then Ili broke her hand and it was delayed until today.  The lesson today was for the parents of next year's prospective students so although there were a few familiar faces they were mostly new to me.  I have heard that next Wednesday we are having an open day for the parents of the current students, but when I asked the Grade Fours they knew nothing about it.  (Other than Ili, my Grade Four class is my main source of information about school events).

Regardless, my open lesson in Grade One today went well. We were learning some new Easter words that they had only met yesterday, so they had to concentrate very hard on remembering them in addition to dealing with the stress of having 20 strangers staring at their every move.

I think the kids did awesomely.  They were able to play all the games, sing a few songs, and do all the actions.  Grade One can be hella fun when they're all well behaved.  Actually, I tend to find that the open lessons are more fun than normal lessons because the 'bad' kids are less likely to be crazy when in the presence of the 20 strangers, plus Ili, plus their Hungarian form teacher, and last but not least: the principal.  It really means that we can get a lot done and have a lot of fun doing it.  *Sigh* If only they could be that way every day.

In other news, Amanda did a cool art project today involving the kids constructing a framework cube made from paper.   It involved carefully decorating 12 strips of paper and then gluing them into shape so it was interesting watching who was good at decorating and who was good at the construction.  There was one boy who made three cubes in the time that it took others to complete only one.

Lastly, Amanda discovered that her school in the nearby city of Mátészalka had put up a video advertising their English program!  It's quite long and there are a lot of people speaking Hungarian, but if you click through it you'll find sequences of Amanda teaching.  Find it on YouTube here!

- Daniel.