Why did I come to Berkeley in the first place? Well, to teach Finnish. And now I notice that to learn Finnish as well. What I thought in the beginning, has been proven true quite a few times here: my expertise in languages doesn't really cover Finnish. But I've been busy learning and teaching and I must admit (a bit reluctantly, since I'm still unsure of my future plans, and don't necessarily want to admit that my career might be in teaching after all) it's been great fun!
UC Berkeley
My main "job" for the year is to work as a TA (Teaching Assistant) for Sirpa, the Finnish lecturer here at UC Berkeley. She has been living here in the area for about 30 years and knows the Bay Area extremely well. She has been an enormous help and support in every way during these first six months: she's a great tour guide, has the best hints of places to see and restaurants to eat in, knows where to go to buy cheap jeans and she knows pretty much everything one needs to know about local history and of course of all the Finns and Finnish things in the area.
Sirpa has been teaching at UC Berkeley, or Cal, for the last twelve years or so.
This year we've had two groups in the fall and two groups in the spring (1st year and 2nd year Finnish), which both meet twice a week for two hours. In addition to that I organize a Finnish Café once a week. There we gather for an hour to talk (or try to talk) in Finnish and read horoscopes and all kinds of articles on current issues, which can include anything from the Finnish communal elections to women's confessions on sex addictions; practically anything that MeNaiset decides to tell us about. Today however, I had to print out the horoscopes from the internet, since my last two magazines haven't arrived for some reason...
I must say it has been very interesting to work with Sirpa. Her approach is a lot different from anything I have been exposed to as a student and her teaching is a lot more communicative than the "traditional" grammar oriented teaching that is still pretty prevalent in many class rooms in Finland. It is true of course, that it is a very different thing to teach a group of three or ten people than a big group of 25 or 45 students, which unfortunately often is the case back home. In any case, I've already got a lot of good ideas and inspiration from our classes and I just hope I will remember even half of the things we have/she has come up with during these two semesters.
Evening class
In addition to teaching at UC Berkeley, Sirpa teaches in quite a few other places as well, including her own house. So even today, after I finish writing this, I'll go to her house for our "Winter
Finnish". This spring we have groups on three different levels: beginners, advanced beginners and superadvanced Finnish speakers (this is my personal interpretation on their level of Finnish). Sirpa is very involved in her teaching and with her students, and she always tries to get her students involved with the Finnish community here in the Bay Area. For example for Kalevalanpäivä ("the Day of Kalevala, the Finnish national epic) , the Finnish American Heritage Association (FAHA) organized a Kalevalanpäivä/Shrovetide Day celebration in Sonoma, where almost all of our evening students went and performed great skits based on different scenes from Kalevala. They were a huge success!
Also, last fall, we organised a Finnish evening at the Finnish Hall in Berkeley where we invited all our students, both from Cal and evening class, as well as
all the Finns from the Bay Area. We were expecting to spend the evening with a dozen people and were very surprised when the turn out of people was closer to fifty! It was a really fun evening with lots of good food and music, thanks to our great students who were almost as talented in karjalanpiirakka-baking as in their excellent kantele-playing skills. It was a great way to spend my birthday!
Suomi-koulu/Finnish School
During this year I have also ended up helping out the Finnish School here in Berkeley. On Sundays, a couple of times a month, children of (half) Finnish families from the Bay Area gather at the Finnish Brotherhood Hall here in Berkeley. This year we have two teachers: Kati and me. Kati has lived in Berkeley for quite some time now with her Finnish-American family and has taught at Suomi-koulu for at least a couple of years already. Most of the children who come to Finnish School are under eight years old, so when Kati and the other Finnish School organizers heard last semester that Sirpa had a new TA, they asked if I would be interested in joining their "Sunday school" and organize program for the older kids.
I must say I was surprised how nice it was to work with kids again. After my au pair year in France eight years ago, I was ready to abandon all ideas of ever working with kids again. This far I have quite succesfully avoided any such activities where I would have been in contact with school age children, but I must admit that I have actually enjoyed my time with the kids in
Suomi-koulu. Also professionally speaking, it has been very good to notice how complicated the question of bilingualism is and that Finnish isn't always as easy to write as we grown up Finns sometimes like to think. It is interesting to notice how many "degrees of bilingualism" there can be and I believe it is always good to be reminded, that everyone is different: everyone has their strong points and weaknesses when it comes to learning a second language. The nice thing with Suomi-koulu is though, that it doesn't really matter how much or little one knows about the language; it is just nice that they come and get to spend some time in a surrounding where their second language can be put in use outside their home.
Sirpa has been teaching at UC Berkeley, or Cal, for the last twelve years or so.
This year we've had two groups in the fall and two groups in the spring (1st year and 2nd year Finnish), which both meet twice a week for two hours. In addition to that I organize a Finnish Café once a week. There we gather for an hour to talk (or try to talk) in Finnish and read horoscopes and all kinds of articles on current issues, which can include anything from the Finnish communal elections to women's confessions on sex addictions; practically anything that MeNaiset decides to tell us about. Today however, I had to print out the horoscopes from the internet, since my last two magazines haven't arrived for some reason...I must say it has been very interesting to work with Sirpa. Her approach is a lot different from anything I have been exposed to as a student and her teaching is a lot more communicative than the "traditional" grammar oriented teaching that is still pretty prevalent in many class rooms in Finland. It is true of course, that it is a very different thing to teach a group of three or ten people than a big group of 25 or 45 students, which unfortunately often is the case back home. In any case, I've already got a lot of good ideas and inspiration from our classes and I just hope I will remember even half of the things we have/she has come up with during these two semesters.
Evening class
In addition to teaching at UC Berkeley, Sirpa teaches in quite a few other places as well, including her own house. So even today, after I finish writing this, I'll go to her house for our "Winter
Finnish". This spring we have groups on three different levels: beginners, advanced beginners and superadvanced Finnish speakers (this is my personal interpretation on their level of Finnish). Sirpa is very involved in her teaching and with her students, and she always tries to get her students involved with the Finnish community here in the Bay Area. For example for Kalevalanpäivä ("the Day of Kalevala, the Finnish national epic) , the Finnish American Heritage Association (FAHA) organized a Kalevalanpäivä/Shrovetide Day celebration in Sonoma, where almost all of our evening students went and performed great skits based on different scenes from Kalevala. They were a huge success!Also, last fall, we organised a Finnish evening at the Finnish Hall in Berkeley where we invited all our students, both from Cal and evening class, as well as
all the Finns from the Bay Area. We were expecting to spend the evening with a dozen people and were very surprised when the turn out of people was closer to fifty! It was a really fun evening with lots of good food and music, thanks to our great students who were almost as talented in karjalanpiirakka-baking as in their excellent kantele-playing skills. It was a great way to spend my birthday!Suomi-koulu/Finnish School
During this year I have also ended up helping out the Finnish School here in Berkeley. On Sundays, a couple of times a month, children of (half) Finnish families from the Bay Area gather at the Finnish Brotherhood Hall here in Berkeley. This year we have two teachers: Kati and me. Kati has lived in Berkeley for quite some time now with her Finnish-American family and has taught at Suomi-koulu for at least a couple of years already. Most of the children who come to Finnish School are under eight years old, so when Kati and the other Finnish School organizers heard last semester that Sirpa had a new TA, they asked if I would be interested in joining their "Sunday school" and organize program for the older kids.
I must say I was surprised how nice it was to work with kids again. After my au pair year in France eight years ago, I was ready to abandon all ideas of ever working with kids again. This far I have quite succesfully avoided any such activities where I would have been in contact with school age children, but I must admit that I have actually enjoyed my time with the kids in
Suomi-koulu. Also professionally speaking, it has been very good to notice how complicated the question of bilingualism is and that Finnish isn't always as easy to write as we grown up Finns sometimes like to think. It is interesting to notice how many "degrees of bilingualism" there can be and I believe it is always good to be reminded, that everyone is different: everyone has their strong points and weaknesses when it comes to learning a second language. The nice thing with Suomi-koulu is though, that it doesn't really matter how much or little one knows about the language; it is just nice that they come and get to spend some time in a surrounding where their second language can be put in use outside their home.
Ei kommentteja:
Lähetä kommentti