It’s nearing midnight and I’m too excited to sleep. Tomorrow is our first day of practice teaching, in a real classroom, with actual tiny humans. Tara and I have prepared a delightful lesson for our group of three-year-olds (!!!) but I cannot get my brain to stop thinking about every potential failure and also squeeing over how freaking adorable the babies will be. 

I’m nervous, but I’m also very excited about the prospect of teaching. The other day at the mall I had an encounter with a Thai boy that got me very psyched up for teaching. Maura and I were walking in the mall when a small human called out to us: “Hello!” In passing, we responded “Hello!” He persisted, with encouragement from his nearby mother, “What is your name?” Recognizing the format of dialogue we had been learning in class, I stopped, turned around, and approached the child. “My name is LeeAnn,” I responded, “what is your name?” His name was muffled by his shyness and rendered incomprehensible by my lack of knowledge of the Thai language, but I nodded my head, took his tiny hand in mine, shook it, and said “nice to meet you!” He broke out in a grin and said “Nice to meet you too!” “Your English is very good!” I said with a smile. His face widened to produce a grin bigger than I would have thought it capable, his mother beamed, and he chirped “Thank you!”

It was a brief interaction, but the pride that child had regarding his successful communication in English was enough to make me excited to the journey ahead. 

Alright. Back to the fruitless struggle to quiet my brain long enough to fall asleep. 

  Speaking of fruit, here’s a picture of me using an unnecessarily large knife to cut a poster board cutout of some grapes for class tomorrow.