Bonjour encore, et merci pour lire mon blog! (Hello again, and thank you for reading my blog)!

For checking in, here is a photo of the massive lobster that I told you about. If you look closely, you can see the tiny baby lobster in the front left of the tank, and above the huge lobster, compare it to more common ~2 lb lobsters.

Ce homard pèse vingt-deux livres! (This lobster weighs 22 lbs!)

 I met this impressive critter at a lobster shack in New Hampshire after working on a tv show at NASCAR last weekend. I also wanted to write briefly about that, for anyone who is interested.

You might not think that NASCAR is the best cultural immersion situation for a language teacher or student, and you would be mostly very correct. There is certainly a culture around the race tracks, (the track = la piste, if you remember our word of the day!) of locals, drivers and fans. It is an exhilarating experience, being in the center of the stadium and running around all day to keep up with the camera crew. When we broke for lunch, I was surrounded by a driver from Mexico, and a driver from France and their pit crew. It is still, after several years, exciting to me when I run into native speakers and can understand and converse with them. They were gone in a flash, but I learned that this event was not entirely homogenous if you look hard enough. This is true of your day to day lives too. Maine (/New England) is surely not the most diverse place you will ever live or travel, but you truly can find chances to practice French or Spanish, or many other languages if you are open to them, and even more if you seek them out. For any of my car fans in class (la voiture = the car), it was a great race. The driver my crew and I were filming wound up crashing in the last laps, but is entirely ok and in great spirits for the next race - you win some, you lose some!

Looking down on the track from the sky box (the highest point in the stadium!) during the aftermath of a small wreck.

I love working on film, for the creative nature of the business, and all of the great people I get to meet! Going to dinner with them after the shoot and meeting the biggest lobster I had ever heard of or seen was just the cherry on top.

Please let me know if you ever want resources for some good French music, movies, or community events and I would be happy to help you find something that interests you! Or, maybe you'll notice something multilingual in a daily errand or outing...

Until next time,

Miss G

Goodbye summer, hello yardsale season:

Shopping for what speaks to you in any language

Summer is nearly, officially gone. It’s ok though – no matter how many missed beach days or barbeques you’re regretting now, the early New England fall brings a final rush of opportunity: the yard sale. It is perhaps the least glamorous form of back to school shopping, with dusty furniture strewn across unkempt lawns, and torn cardboard boxes of romance novels and lonely encyclopedias – but it holds a hidden hope.  What finds lie on our neighbors folding tables and driveways?

Somewhere between the ceramic figurines and old clothes, maybe lies what you seek. Maybe it’s a record, or a beautiful painting, or an out of print book. Knowing how to find something that speaks to you, without the suggestion of flashy signs or commercials is everything in the season of yard sales.

And too, in class. I don’t expect every student to have a built in desire for language, but I hope that in my time here, I can help show just what is so great about learning it. I am interning with Mrs. Winslow in fulfillment of my teaching program's requirement, but I also enjoy coming in every day to work with her, see her teach, and get to know the students. I have been lucky to be placed with an enthusiastic teacher and such interesting, and eager students. Every student is capable, and even those that aren’t enthralled by French yet – I hope they will be soon, in some way. Maybe it will be a song, a picture, or a story – but I hope they will experience language the way I have: like a perpetual yard sale. 

Some people love them from the start and find many treasures, and some take more time and have to look really hard for what they want. Eventually, everyone can learn to love something about these yard sales, which become more and more rewarding, the better you get at sifting through it all. I think Mrs. Winslow and I are in a great place to help the students find their own niche within this expansive subject.

I’m Abbey Greslick. I majored in Spanish at the University of Maine, and minored in French. I’m in the Gorham Cohort of ETEP (the Extended Teacher Education Program) at USM.  To those of you I did not get a chance to meet at the open house or in class, I will be with Mrs. Winslow until mid December. I have been an athlete, worked on a farm, in a music booking agency and a theatre, on movies and for magazines. I have loved every language I’ve tried, but I realize not everyone is inspired from the start, and I am prepared to use all of my experiences to relate French to every student in some way. 

If you ever have any questions, ideas on how your child learns best, or want help finding an interesting resource for language, please feel free to get in touch.

Sincerely,

Miss Greslick