Wednesday 15 May 2013

Maybe I'll make it!

Life is starting to stabilize!  Each day, we're able to cover more advanced topics in class and it's amazing how these kids just gobble it up.  We did some more practice with trigonometry word problems today and one of the guys is like "These are so much fun.  Can we do one every day?".  It's amazing how I can just throw things at them, watch them squirm for a few minutes then they figure it out.  Just after introducing the concept and notation of a vector, I had them doing word problems that involved adding vectors (even though they didn't know that's what they were doing).  I can't wait to see what they do with the balsa bridges- two minutes after introducing the project, one of the guys wanted to know the density of balsa wood for who-know-what-kind-of-calculation.  It's just so much fun- we built balloon rockets with straws and sent them flying down dental floss all around the classroom and I taught them the trig dance (see below) so they'd be the coolest kids at saturday's dance (unlike Amber, the biotech instructor from CTY who can dougie with the best of them, that's about where my instructional dance skills stop).  I even have a few of them calling me Katie and I've mastered most of their names (memorizing 18 new faces is tricky but pronouncing Arpitha, Ananaya, Rishwajeet, Vaibhav, Bhairavi properly adds a whole new layer of fun).
Tomorrow morning, we're going on a "field trip" with the architecture class to analyze the structural elements of the buildings around campus which relieves me of 90 minutes of class planning.  So I decided to take the plunge and check out the rooftop pool.  The office assistant joined me for an amazing swim in our "bathing costumes" in the beautiful outdoors.  And I got to catch up with Abhi and hear about his new job, working for Apple starting at the end of the month.
In general, I continue to be amused by the people around campus.  There's all these women in white coats that look like housekeepers but they have a huge badge that says "Private Eye".  The staff is still trying to figure out what they do (and sneakily take a picture because it's hilarious)- certainly, they aren't the most discreet spies, if that's what they are going for.
I think that's all I've got.  All the best!

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