Realizations of myself.

I finally decided to start on my biggest assignment of the year, where my teachers here allowed me to write in English, which is a darn pitty because my English is a bit rusty. ( You'll be able to tell as you continue to read this, I am sure.) I wanted this to be a master piece to give to my teachers here, and I thought it really would be one. But I also thought this was going to be one of those easy
"this is what I did the two weeks I was interning at the school" essays, which by the way is completely false.

This is a folder of many different essays, including where my personal role was, how the kids/employers took my being there, there is one where I have to explain the entire school system, and how this particular school is run in comparision to other schools and so on. I am now working on something similar to a research paper that is also another part of this big assignment. Since I worked at a school, I decided to write about "Teaching Foreign Languages: The Earlier the Better", and I am very much interested in this subject. There are many fascinating articles, and interesting facts about the human mind, and how we as adults use to learn as children.

But here I am also learning many things about myself. I see that as an advanced student from America, how far behind as a student I am here. Maybe that is partly on a different system to blame, but maybe that also is to be blamed on myself. There are things that I should have and honestly could have asked for help in, such as Math. My Math skills here in Germany are very hindering to my education.

This thought that "grades don't matter for exchange students" doesn't help either because even when I want to understand, it makes no sense to ask for help because the grades don't matter in the end. This week I found out that I will not have to take my Math test, which is actually a bit unfair for many of the other students who also don't understand the subject.

But the thing that I see in myself, the thing that is good, is that I want to go back, and really sit down, and learn the things that in the past frustrated me. Things that I said were "too hard" and then gave up. I want to sit down, and learn how to study, and really apply myself to my school work. Not worship it, but really push myself to make an effort to catch myself up, and relearn things that I never "got".

I am ready for that challenge, and excited to sit down, and really learn how to learn.
Finding myself.
Michelle