Today is my third day of classes here are ESDES and (basically) my one week anniversary of being here! Yesterday, Monday we had classes all day. The schedule is set up so that the most classes are held on Monday, then one less on Tuesday, and so on. It's not the same for everyone but it looks like generally people have the most classes on Mondays and then by Friday we are all done by noon.
Anyway, yesterday was the long day and it was very hard. I went to a total of five classes which was completely overwhelming when all of them were in Spanish. Sometimes even days like that at Union can be overwhelming when you have back-to-back classes all day. After so long, I was SO tired of hearing Spanish and trying to figure out what was going on. While feeling pretty low, I skyped my mom and [in short] she encouraged me to have autoconfianza (self-confidence). She said that she had total faith in my that I could do everything I came here to do, but that I had to believe in myself. She also told me to look up the word in Spanish and learn it. Turns out, I didn't have to.
This morning I woke up feeling refreshed and ready for my challenge. My day was much better, I had only three classes and even though they were full of rapid Spanish-speaking and confusing homework, I felt better overall. After talking with Justin and Seth I realized that we are all in the same boat and even if I think others are WAY ahead of me, chances are I'm still doing ok.
While working on some homework, I had to fill in the blanks of a paragraph called Razones para aprender un idioma (Reasons for learning another language). As I looked over the sentences telling about how learning another language will benefit your life, I came to a sentence that translates roughly to "Learning another language will help enhance your self-confidence." Since it was in Spanish I had to read it a few times to understand what it was saying, but one word I did NOT have to type into google translate was autoconfianza. It's exactly what I need to get me through the year, and when I AM bilingual (and I will be!) I will have the experience to say "I did that" and I will have the confidence to know that I can do anything I put my mind to.
Anyway, that's how autoconfianza made the vocab list today. Today's list comes from words I heard or read in class that I had to look up or review. Here they are:
anfitriones- host
invitado- guest
apoyar- to support or to lean (on)
aulas- classrooms
fijar- to fix, set, fastin, determine
mantener- to keep
reforzar- to strengthen
autoconfianza- self-confidence
servir- to serve
extranjero- foreigner
Anyway, yesterday was the long day and it was very hard. I went to a total of five classes which was completely overwhelming when all of them were in Spanish. Sometimes even days like that at Union can be overwhelming when you have back-to-back classes all day. After so long, I was SO tired of hearing Spanish and trying to figure out what was going on. While feeling pretty low, I skyped my mom and [in short] she encouraged me to have autoconfianza (self-confidence). She said that she had total faith in my that I could do everything I came here to do, but that I had to believe in myself. She also told me to look up the word in Spanish and learn it. Turns out, I didn't have to.
This morning I woke up feeling refreshed and ready for my challenge. My day was much better, I had only three classes and even though they were full of rapid Spanish-speaking and confusing homework, I felt better overall. After talking with Justin and Seth I realized that we are all in the same boat and even if I think others are WAY ahead of me, chances are I'm still doing ok.
While working on some homework, I had to fill in the blanks of a paragraph called Razones para aprender un idioma (Reasons for learning another language). As I looked over the sentences telling about how learning another language will benefit your life, I came to a sentence that translates roughly to "Learning another language will help enhance your self-confidence." Since it was in Spanish I had to read it a few times to understand what it was saying, but one word I did NOT have to type into google translate was autoconfianza. It's exactly what I need to get me through the year, and when I AM bilingual (and I will be!) I will have the experience to say "I did that" and I will have the confidence to know that I can do anything I put my mind to.
Anyway, that's how autoconfianza made the vocab list today. Today's list comes from words I heard or read in class that I had to look up or review. Here they are:
anfitriones- host
invitado- guest
apoyar- to support or to lean (on)
aulas- classrooms
fijar- to fix, set, fastin, determine
mantener- to keep
reforzar- to strengthen
autoconfianza- self-confidence
servir- to serve
extranjero- foreigner
seguir- to follow
que tipo- what kind
So there's my list. I'm not sure if I'll have it down pat before bed tonight, but we'll see. Tomorrow is a school excursion into Sagunto so we don't have any class! I'll be sure to take pictures and tell you all about it. Sometime I'll also try to tell about each of my classes and my teachers. Oh, and here's a couple pictures from the beach this Sunday
Hotels on the Mediterranean. If you, yes YOU, came to visit me, you could stay here!
