After a long year of delayed visas, false starts, and anxious waiting, Americans assistants are back in Deauville! My name is Kelly, I’m a 2020 graduate of the University of Kentucky with a master’s degree in French and francophone studies and I couldn’t be happier to finally be in Deauville alongside my fellow teaching assistant, Kira, after accepting a position with the sister cities program in February 2020.
I arrived to Deauville last week after almost 24 hours of travel featuring planes, trains, and automobiles. My first week was spent shadowing Ivan, who has been teaching English at all levels with the 18 month absence of assistants, and getting the lay of the land at the elementary school in Deauville, along with brief visits to the schools in St. Arnoult and Tourgéville. It’s so cool to see how young English lessons start in the city. Our visit to the crèche (nursery school) was particularly fun; I loved singing the itsy-bitsy spider with French toddlers!
Of course, it’s October, and no English lesson could be complete without an in-depth discussion of Halloween. We practiced Halloween vocabulary and sang Halloween songs. I discussed my perspective on how Halloween is celebrated in America, including the logistics of trick-or-treating (and that in the U.S., the emphasis is really on the treat!). We also discussed what the students were going to be for Halloween, with witches, vampires, and superheroes being the most popular choices.
On Friday, October 22nd, Kira and I helped at the city Halloween party. Staff from the elementary school turned the Villa Strassburger (a historic mansion close to the racetrack in Deauville) into a haunted house with a psychiatric hospital theme for the city’s children. Kira and I were given the assignment of scaring visitors to the below-ground bunker built by the Germans when they occupied the villa during World War II. As firm believers in the cute, whimsical side of Halloween over the scary, Kira and I were a little hesitant, but we gamely embraced the role of haunted doctor and nurse. We got a few scares in but also quite a few “C’est les américaines! Hello, Kira! Hello, Kelly! You didn’t scare me!”
We are now on les vacances de la Toussaint and don’t have school for the next two weeks. We will work with Ivan during the break to plan out our lessons for after the break and to get a better understanding of the French school system in general. I’m looking forward to exploring Deauville and the surrounding area during the vacation, as well as going to my first practice with the local women’s soccer team. I can’t wait to see what these next 10 months in Normandy have in store!
À la prochaine,
Kelly
