Week Twenty-one

Personal

It's hard to believe as I sit here in my living room watching television in English and drinking a good cup of tea that I am home and have been for a week. I left Nijmegen very early in the morning last Friday and didn't process the transition as much as I should have, the last week felt like a blur with a lot of tears shed and a lot of goodbyes said. It's hard to believe that the Erasmus experience is actually over, the five months have flown in with a mix of different feelings and experiences, I think it will take awhile to process properly everything I experienced and learned from my time in the Netherlands.

The last week was a mix of bitter sweet memories, we had a lot of good times together, spending every moment we could together , there were a lot of nights we had parties and nights that we sat around talking or listening to music. We said goodbye to a lot of things, our bikes, the canal, our rooms, the centre of Nijmegen and the hardest part, saying goodbye to our friends. I met a lot of wonderful people on Erasmus and made a lot of wonderful memories to look back upon whether it be sitting in class laughing about the night before , laying out beside the canal basking in the sunshine, having a snowball fight and hot chocolate after, climbing up onto the roof and looking at the stars or sharing a plate of frites and mayo in the centre. It was very hard to say goodbye to everyone and there were a lot of tears shed, "Somehow I know we'll meet again. Not sure quite where and I don't know just when. You're in my heart, so until then it's time for saying goodbye." Jim Henderson’s Muppet's.

I am glad that I had the opportunity to have this experience, to meet all the people I have met and to see education in a different country, i am so happy that i got to travel to Berlin and Bruges and Amsterdam, I learnt a lot about the dutch culture and also the different cultures of the people we spent these five months with. I also learnt a bit more about myself and how much I am able to do and handle, it certainly has inspired me to do things and to learn more. I am lucky to have the friends that I have made as I know how much support and care they can give, I would recommend Erasmus to anyone and encourage them to travel and see slightly more of the world, I know now that I would have regretted not going, it’s a experience and one that i will remember for the rest of my life.'The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.' St. Augustine

Week Twenty

Professional

“Some people live in a dream world and others see the reality. There are also people who realise their dreams.” Desiderius Erasmus

This week was the end of classes for all of us , it was a mix of emotions because not only were we saying goodbye to the pabo and our class groups on a professional level, but we had to finish and had in a lot of work, our final assignment was to present a group project about teaching children different ways to deal with diversity, of course myself Darren and Eimear just used our skills from teaching PDMU for the past two years and came up with some fun and interactive lessons using resources and materials that we had taught before. We listened to the rest of the class and their presentations on the topics and delivered group evaluations, some of the presentations were more interactive than others but it was clear to see that a lot of work had been put into each one.  I liked the idea of learning from each other and using each other’s ideas to aid our own teaching in the future, the best way to learn professional skills is to learn from other professionals and a lot of the classes we took gave us the opportunity to do so and also to pass on our own knowledge to other people.

Before our last tutoring class we had to read a letter which we had written to ourselves at the start of our Erasmus with the goals and expectations for our time in Nijmegen, my letter contained a lot of goals that were both professional and personal, it was nice to see how my feelings had changed from the start of Erasmus to the end and how many goals that I had

achieved.  While reading the letter I saw how much I had learnt and what perceptions that I had about how my time in the Netherlands was going to be, I thought that I was going to injure myself cycling but I became quite a good cyclist. It reminded me of how much I had achieved in classes and on placement, I definitely will have more of an understanding of EAL pupils and have a greater respect for classroom assistants as I saw how much they are needed in a classroom as I saw teachers in a classroom without them.

I feel that the other wonderful people have helped me grow in a professional level, by forming new relationships and allowing myself to see things from a different point of view I can have a more diverse attitude to education and can use what I have learnt from other countries educational systems as an example to improve my own methods. I liked this quote from Carl Rogers as it explains partially what I have learnt ‘In my early professional years I was asking the question: How can I treat, or cure, or change this person? Now I would phrase the question in this way: How can I provide a relationship which this person may use for his own personal growth?’  

Quote found at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/c/carlrogers202206.html#ApB5mI8Gb4fbhK2H.99