Practice Makes Perfect

The first situation is when I was the monitor, I had to deliver a message to a teacher.

In class

Me: (knock on the door)Hello. Excuse me, there is a message. It is for a student named Ghislane. Her mother is here to see her.
Teacher: (Takes the paper, read it) Tell the secretary that she can come up in class.
Me: Okay.

What I would say in the future

Me: (knock on the door) Hello. Excuse me, it is a message from the secretary. (Hand over the message)
Teacher: (Takes the paper, read it) Tell the secretary that she can come up in class.
Me: Okay.

I should have just said that there is a message and hand it over to the teacher without saying anything else, because after I delivered the message, I found out that Ghislane was the teacher, not a student. It is weird to say in front of the whole class that her mother is here downstairs waiting for her. I was thinking, what did she think after I said it?

Overall Reflection

Goals
Some goals were achieved like: acquire new vocabularies, get across the meaning of messages and to gain personal and practical work. For most of the time, I learned new vocabularies among the students as they get very expressive with theirs words. I get to say some little comments with gestures and descriptions that helped me get through the message.I gained some personal and practical work by attending to school activities, for example, cooking class; how to bake a cheesecake, hairdressing activity; how to dye hair and learned some techniques, charity event; I helped to prepare the tables, served spaghetti and move things and to be the messenger for the employees.

Some goals were not completely achieved like improving my fluency and to build confidence. They have certainly improved, but not enormously. I need to have more practice. As the session is coming to an end, the less hours there are left, but it is necessary as it is the period of exams for everyone.

Strategies
I have used all the strategies I mentioned in the first blog post: to make guesses, to practice in whichever way possible, talks to myself and to repeat. I will continue to use them as I always have.

Language 
I don't know for my level of English, but I can be sure that I hesitate less when I am talking to someone and it was the most challenging. Most of the time, especially for the secretaries in the office who are often busy, I don't talk to them if it is not needed because I don't want to disturb them while they are working. They receive a lot of calls, paperwork and have to take care of students who come to ask favors.

Growth
Through the experience, it helped me to understand that you absolutely have to practice on the field. Not to be just in class, but you will learn a lot more about yourself.

My perception of anglophone culture is that it is in the same world as us, but it has its own little world where regroups a little community. It is where everyone knows each other without exception and they are very comfortable that they are very honest and warm.

I will take away with me the beautiful memories encountered with the students, the teachers and the rest of the employees. I will try to use the new words and experiences I have learned on my next adventures. I will never forget the high school where I had my first internship.

The Internship
If I had to do it again, I would go two times a week so I could be comfortable more faster with the environment and I would hesitate less faster. The other things; the activities, I would never change and arrange it differently.

Gratitude
The last day is this week's Friday. I will give to the students in hairdressing club and my host some mini Chinese pastry. I wrote a card for my host that I am thankful that she is my host, for all the generosity and patience she has for me. I will never, ever forget the time that I have passed in the high school where she organized the meetings with me and the students in class and in after school activities.

The placement
I would recommend this internship placement to another student. The students and the employees are very welcoming and they would embrace you if you come their way. They are easy to talk and a good place to listening for your observations.

Breaking it Down

Listening Comprehension
Compared to the first days of my internship, my listening comprehension improved a little bit. I am more used to the speed and the way students and the employees speak; familiar and formal speech. At the beginning, sometimes, I tried to remember the important keywords and guessed in the end the subject of the conversation. Now, I can understand most of the sentences, even still, there are times when they talk too fast that I have to ask them to repeat.

Accent
I don't think my English accent has changed much, if yes, I think the people around me would notice it and would have told me. I still have some French accent when I speak with the adults and the students.

Fluency
There were some times that I think I was fluent and some times not fluent enough. The subject which is easier for me to talk about would be school and about me. In general, I have hesitation because I think in French and it just takes time to make through to the other person.

Humour
I don't remember all the jokes and funny situations, but the anglophone sometimes uses the same jokes or riddles as the francophone, for example, how do you get an elephant into the fridge. First, you open the door. Second, you put the elephant in and last, you close the door. After that, it is the turn of the giraffe.

On the other hand, it is not always funny when you translate into the other language because sometimes, it doesn't make sense or the sound just doesn't fit when translated.

Accuracy
I have made an attempt to speak more accurately in the last days of internship. I thought, now that I am used to the environment and the people in school, I should be aware of the grammar, sentence structure and some verb tenses when I am speaking. It is not easy because right after I spoke, it is then that I correct myself in my head.

New words
One day on a Friday morning, the host said that I was going to be ''the monitor'', but I had no idea what role and specific responsibilities it came with, except to play the messenger in the school ground. From what I have heard from Joannie, the other internship, I have to bring students to the office or to give messages to the teachers. Then, the vice-president came to me and explained that I had to pick up something from the teachers. He said it a bit too fast, but I understood a ''late slips'', a new word that I never heard of in my entire life. I asked him to repeat and he replied that he will have my host explained it to me with more details.

However, I already had an idea of what I am supposed to do, but just in case, I waited for my host to clarify. As I have guessed, ''late-slips'' means a paper note written with the name of the student who is late or absent from class with the reason on it.

In hairdressing class, I learned new words: ''tease'',''foil'', ''scalp'' and ''loop and lock'' while the person in charge who is former student of the high school and just graduated from a professional school taught us how to put fake hair on the mannequin's head.