Hello !! :)

I have spent one month in Leuven and the only difficulties I encountered were the organisation of our planning and the delays of the trains of course. J

I didn’t really know which lessons I was going to follow because as I told you before the first two weeks I took part in the project. I only had one week with courses as we have at the I.S.P.G. because after this week, I went on teaching practice in Lycée Mater Dei (Stockel) during two weeks. Those two weeks were followed by a week holiday. I didn’t have time to relax and to recuperate because during this week I worked with children in Enghien.J

This week I was finally back in Leuven with my two classmates, Sarah and Romain. We discovered

new courses because the last time we went to the courses the students received their exams and had the opportunity to ask questions about their mistakes. That’s why we hadn’t a lot to say about the subjects.

Now that I have spent more 10 hours in Groep T, I can tell you more about my expectations. I was expecting that the Flemish students were good English speakers but I’m really overawed. You could confuse them with native speakers. In one hand I don’t feel really comfortable when I have to speak in front of the class because they all have a better level than I, on the other hand I think that it is something good for me because I know that thanks to them I’ll be able to improve my language skills.

They also speak English together; it seems so easy for them to speak English. But if you remember we discovered last year that most of them study English and another subject which most of the time isn’t a language; because in Flanders you can choose to teach History and English or Geography and English, and that’s why I think they can be more focused on the English language. (We can’t! We have English and Dutch!J)

In this school I have a course which is meant for international students. I wasn’t expecting to work with people from all over the world before coming to Groep T. I thought that I was going to meet Flemish people but not people from China or Nigeria; and that’s great! I like it! The group of the international people is up to now the most welcoming group we met! You have a lot of different cultures, they are interested in everything! I’m pleased to work with those people and to learn more about their experiences. In this group you don’t have students who intend to go into teaching; I think Sarah, Romain and I are the only one.

The international students aren’t the only one we met. Yesterday we met students who are following the same lessons as us in English. (That’s when I discovered that Flemish people were good English speakers) Those students seem to be nice and friendly.

We wanted to buy all the documents (syllabi, books) we need for the courses but we couldn’t because the shop was already closed at 6.00 p.m. In this school you have to buy your syllabi in a shop called “Alpha Copy”. It’s quite different than our school in Brussels. J

I almost forgot to speak about another group of students we met today! We’re with this group for

“Communicatieve vaardigheid 2” I spoke a lot with some of them and they were really friendly! One of them wanted to show us the way to go to the shop I spoke about; it was on the way to his student accommodation, but we hadn’t time to follow him because we only had thirty minutes break and we needed more then thirty minutes to get to the shop.

I’m looking forward to discover more about those people, the courses and Leuven City!

I’ll also be pleased when I’ll read your articles!

I hope you’re all doing well!

Lots of love,

Céline