A New Chapter

 

When I started out teaching German at the (then) German Language School of Marin I had no idea what was in store for me (you can read here how I got the job). At that time, in 2015, the campus in Santa Rosa had opened only the year before and there were only two classes - one kindergarten class and one adult class. I was the new teacher for the adult class whose "old" teacher had quit on very short notice. The big campus was (and still is) in Novato in Marin County.

The level of German skills in my class was all over the place and it was a real challenge to create lessons that were interesting for all of them. With this constellation it is pretty clear that there are always students who are either bored or overwhelmed. It's a bit like a tiny one-room schoolhouse.

Things became easier in the second semester when another teacher was found and we could split the class. From that moment on I really enjoyed what I was doing. Our little campus grew - we added more children's classes as well as classes for adults. In our peak time we had eight classes on our once very small campus. We changed our name from German Language School of Marin to German Language School of the North Bay since Santa Rosa is not in Marin County but in Sonoma County. I became first Lead Teacher and then Head Teacher which brought with it a whole set of new tasks and the questionable pleasure of being a member on the Board.

Then the pandemic hit, and it hit us hard. Within two weeks we converted to online teaching, and when the new school year started in September we had to downsize since we couldn't offer two classes online for the same level. Some older teachers who struggled with the technology took the opportunity to leave the school, and the rest of us took up the challenge and taught via Zoom for the entire school year. Teaching a foreign language online is not something I necessarily recommend.

When we returned to in-person classes at the start of the 2021/2022 school year, the Santa Rosa campus had shrunk to just two classes for adults. Enrollment was way down - a difficulty we not only shared with the other German Schools in the Bay Area, but with public schools as well. We are a non-profit organization and we finance our school through tuition and money we get from the Ministry of Education of Germany. That money from Germany depends on how many of our young students pass the German language diploma (DSD I and DSD II). Thankfully we always have had a good number of teenagers who passed these exams (including my own daughter, before I was a teacher there). The years following the pandemic have been challenging, but very fulfilling at the same time. Most classes were in Novato and the teacher of the other class in Santa Rosa and I enjoyed the freedom we had here.

Over the years I had wonderful students who worked hard to learn the "awful German language" (according to Mark Twain).

In those nine years I created reams of worksheets, trying to explain German grammar. Here's an example about the relative pronoun in the dative case:

They fought their own battles with German spelling and some unknown letters like ü, ö, ä and ß.

We read poems by Rainer Maria Rilke und Christian Morgenstern, short stories by Wolfgang Borchert, a Krimi (mystery novel), wrote our own pieces, listened to German music and also tried our own singing voices by singing a German birthday song whenever one of us had a birthday.

When we still had the kids classes in Santa Rosa we had some events like Karneval/Fasching, Laternenfest and of course a Winterfest and Abschlussfest (at the end of the school year).

Twice a year there was a book fair with - you guessed it - German books.

And in the summer I invited my class to my home where we enjoyed a traditional Erdbeerbowle (drunk strawberries). Everybody brought a dish to share and we spent a few wonderful hours in my garden, chatting and laughing. If you want to know how to make Erdbeerbowle, you can find the "recipe" here.

In December of our first post-pandemic in-person school year I invited my class again and we had Glühwein (mulled wine). It was cold, we were outside, everybody in their warm clothes - just like in Germany when we drink Glühwein (usually at the Christmas market).

But last fall, after the new school year had started, I had my first thoughts of leaving the school. It's not that I didn't like my students anymore or that I had lost my enthusiasm for teaching. But I was tired - tired of being dependent on school holidays and not having the opportunity to spend a long weekend away with my husband or just go away spontaneously for a couple days. Both the Geek and I like to travel, but we deeply dislike doing that in the summer. It was nagging at me - first more like a whisper, but it eventually became louder and louder. The Geek and I talked about it and then I finally decided to retire after this school year.

It was a very bittersweet decision. I will miss teaching and I will miss my students, some of whom have been with me for several years, but the boring board meetings and all the "school stuff" not so much. I have met some wonderful people through the school and I hope we will keep in touch (there certainly will be another Erdbeerbowle get-together this summer). 

Saturday a week ago was my last day. We had our Abschlussfest in the courtyard of the church where we have rented the rooms for our classes (over all these years they have been a great landlord). The Geek had helped to set up, we had pretzel sandwiches (fitting for a German school) and he was assigned to cut the Bienenstich, a very German cake. We all sat together - it was only a small group since some people couldn't make it - and had a good time.

My students had written cards for me and they brought tears to my eyes when I read them at home. The biggest compliment came from my "longest" student (she was with me the entire nine years) who called me an "authentic human".

I had made little cards for my class with a quote by the great German philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment, Immanuel Kant - Ich kann, weil ich will, was ich muss (I can do what I have to because I want to). I know how much they sometimes struggled to learn this difficult (but beautiful) language and that sometimes it must have been hard to give up their Saturday morning for sitting in school, and I do hope they will go on learning with a new teacher.

How Quickly Things Can Change

Dear me! Last week was one of those times where you wonder whether all of this is really happening.

But let me start from the beginning - always a good idea.

I was lazily lying on our red couch when the phone rang in the early evening of Labor Day - a week ago today. Only. The call came from a woman I had known about 10 years ago, but we had lost touch. She told me that the German Language School was urgently looking for a teacher for their adult intermediate class on their campus in my town. Their teacher had just quit that weekend, and classes were supposed to start the following Saturday (which was last Saturday). Since I used to teach German she thought she give it a shot asking me whether I was interested.

Heck yea!!! I immediately called the Head Teacher and already had a meeting with the staff the following evening. I had a good feeling about that, and two days later had my interview. I got the job - and had a day and a half to prepare for my first class. I had no idea how many students would be in the class, I was warned that the level of German was very different - from really good to more mediocre - and I didn't really know what they had done up to that point.

Talk about jumping into cold water and swim!

So I did what I thought would be interesting for a first class and marched in on Saturday morning. The class is pretty full - I had 12 students, but it appears that not everybody was there, so I might have one or two more students. Everybody was really nice, and after I got over my nervousness  (yes, I was very nervous) the class turned out to be fun. We laughed a lot, and while it is true that the German skills are quite varied I have faith that we can handle that. I signed the contract and am now teaching German every Saturday morning.

Ain't I the lucky one?

I never got a job as quickly as this one! From nothing to a job I like in less than four days.

I also want to say thank you to all of you who came up with a name for the little hand knitted dachshund. I had also asked for a name on my personal and my business Facebook page. In the end, the dog decided Dax was his name - thank you, Elephant's Child for the suggestion. It was the mischievousness you mentioned that made it!

Dax is now up for adoption in my Etsy store.

You probably have heard about the terrible Valley Fire in Lake County. Middletown is only about 30 miles from here over the mountains. We sometimes go there to one of our favorite breakfast places, the Cowpoke Cafe, of which I don't know whether it has burned to the ground or is still there. There is huge devastation in Middletown and the surrounding areas. The fire is huge and incredibly fast and something most firefighters say they have never experienced before. I heard that about 1000 homes are already lost, and thousands of people have been evacuated. It is dreadful. The fire has spread into Napa and Sonoma County as well. We are hoping for rain, but so far we only have grey skies. There is some moisture in the air which I hope will slow down the fire.

And while we have stunning sunsets due to the fire, the devastation goes on.

Put a Bird on it!

This week has been another creative one - it feels so good to create again. In two weeks I'll sell at my first holiday fair of the season, and I'm working like a crazy woman for that - painting wooden ornaments, knitting hats and scarves for wood snowmen, making journals, knitting small winter outfits for dolls, adhering photos to cards. There are thousands of things that still need to be done, and my list seems to get longer and longer.

Last Saturday I was supposed to teach a mixed media class, but it was cancelled due to low enrollment. However, one of the ladies who wanted to take the class called me and asked whether I would do a one-on-one class with her. I agreed and we met last Monday morning. It was such a wonderful class - more like a get together with a friend. She was a lovely lady, and we spent a few hours creating a bird canvas. A canvas board, actually.

I usually have a sample in class, but my students can create whatever they like, the sample is just a very loose guideline. I create along with them, because that is the best way to show some techniques. My bird turned out completely different from my sample (I'm still working on my sample, so I am not showing it here).

It's a happy bird - I felt happy that Monday morning, teaching my class. I only added a few things after the class, like the little rhinestones at the banner, and the bird's feet.

I'm joining Paint Party Friday, one of the most wonderful painting parties in blogland!

WOYWW 101

Hello WOYWWers, it's 101, only three more weeks to the anniversary and the PiF. I can't wait...

Nothing to show you this week what's on my work desk since I'm mainly working in the garden, watching owls and preparing the last of my German lessons that I will teach tonight. After that I'm done with teaching for the season until October. I'm ready for a break!

Last Thursday I taught the "Tag It" class and these are the tags we made that evening. I actually had six tags, but somehow one has disappeared and since I didn't take a picture of it before class I cannot show you that one.

The "warm-up tag", the owl tag, of course, was inspired by the wonderful owl family I'm currently following. Last Sunday, while in Mendocino for Mother's Day, we bought a spotting scope and now it's even more fun to view the little owlet and its parents. If you're interested to see pictures of the owl family - they're Great Horned owls - there are several posts of them below. For the seastar tag I used a watercolor crayon - I love the ones by Caran d'Ache. This technique was completely new for the participants, and I'm always happy when I can teach them something they haven't tried before.

Here are two pictures that show what it looks like during those classes - the creative chaos!

If you're interested how the canvas turned out that I showed last WOYWW, "the girl who loved dogs" - you can find the finished project here.

If you actually want to see real work desks full of creativity, hop on over to Julia's blog who has an entire list of wonderful creative people and enjoy your visit to them.

WOYWW 99

One more week and we'll have the 100th WOYWW - thanks to our wonderful Julia who every Wednesday motivates people to show their desk to the world and let each other find inspiration by visiting work desks around the globe.

Nothing much on my desk. I have started a new canvas for a girl, this one will be a dog lover - at least that's the plan. I never know where it will take me the further I get along with the work. I actually should work on tags since I'm teaching a tag-making class next week and it's still not completely designed. I have sort of lost my energy for these classes... I am so much enjoying teaching the German class at the moment that there doesn't seem to be much room left for the other classes. Perhaps it's also getting "old" and I'm looking for something new to teach. The problem is that I have to give in my class proposals extremely early, when I really don't know what I would love to teach six to nine month in the future. Or perhaps I'm just a bit burned out and simply need a break. I know that in the end I will enjoy teaching this class just as I did all the others.

Enjoy hopping around the world and visiting so many different desks. Until next Wednesday.

WOYWW 95

Hello dear WOYWWers, how are you today? The last two days we had lovely weather and I'm hoping that it will keep like this since I am a bit tired of all the rain. I know that I have no real reason to complain, we're living in a wonderful place with great weather most of the year - I actually sound like a spoilt Californian, and I don't like that at all!!!

Perhaps some of you feel like I do - I can't get Japan out of my mind. This triple disaster has touched me in a way that is quite new to me. Perhaps it is the dignity of the Japanese people; perhaps it is me getting older. I don't know and the why really is not that important. I have these feelings; and finally I took out my watercolors and just put to paper what I felt - a big wave that got angrier with every single stroke.

During the past few days I have prepared my German class that I'm starting to teach tomorrow evening. It's called "Survival German" and is a six-weeks-course for people who want to travel to Germany (or German speaking countries) and learn some expressions, sentences, useful words, small conversations and lots of information about the country and the culture. I have been teaching this class since 2003 and am constantly changing it, learning from my students. Most of all, it's a lot of fun.

Now I guess you want to go on and see other interesting and creative desks around the world. Thanks to the wonderful Julia we come together every Wednesday and visit each other - please join us.


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