As I continue to become more comfortable in my place here, I am finding it easier to loose track of time. It is easier to appreciate how much I am learning and how I would not be able to learn these lessons any other way.
This weekend I was contemplating the effectiveness of placing American student teachers in a Norwegian school. I can immediately see the benefits for the teachers and students of the school. It is always helpful to have a native speaker when trying to learn a language. But what about for the student teacher? The lessons I am learning here are not how to best incorporate the standards into my teaching, how to prepare the most elaborate lesson, how to show my classroom management skills, or even how well I can give a lesson. I have practiced these things for years in my study, and these are not the skills I am practicing here. On that hand, it looks like I am not getting a very good student teaching experience.
But on the other hand I am learning how difficult it is for a someone, child or adult, to be surrounded by people who speak a different language. I know first hand how an English language learner feels. I am immersed in a different culture, and though people explain some parts to me, there is much that I have to discover on my own. I am experiencing a way of life that is deceptively similar to my life at home. This is an experience I could get in no other way. I am learning how another country runs their education system.
While I may not be practicing all of the things I have been pounding into my head for 5 years, I am learning how to open my eyes to new possibilities. Education here is different in good and bad ways. But I can take the good ways and incorporate them into my teaching in America. My experience here will be another tool in my toolbox, one that not many teachers have access to.
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