Students

This particular entry makes more thematic than chronological sense (not that anyone else but myself would care.)  Here's an conglomeration of student pictures from the end of February.

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02.18.2012

All of my 2's had some kind of Halloween-esque art project where they stripped the room of desks, chairs, and other normal classroomy things and then made is look more or less like a haunted house.  They dressed up in all sorts of face paint, fake blood, zombie-ish wounds and the like, and maybe did some kind of theatrical performance.  I happened upon my 2/2 class right when they finished the assignment.

Gift and Olive

Joobjang was photobombed by a pointy witch nail!

Praew

This was the art teacher's Facebook profile picture.  Brilliant.

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I was also asked to take part in a couple graduation ceremonies for the students.

Each individual class has a separate ceremony that is about an hour long and presided by four teachers who taught the class.  The students enter the class to see four of their teachers holding lit candles.  If there are enough candles to go around, the students are each be issued one and the teachers light them using their already-lit candles.  The students then sit in a large circle on the floor in the room with the teachers in the middle.  Singing a Thai graduation song at this point is optional.  Then the teachers each take about a minute to tell the students how much they love teaching them and wish them good luck for the future.  My mini-speeches were sometimes translated.  After that the teachers take a large handful of white thread bracelets and sit on one four chairs that are set up in the middle of the circle facing outwards.  The students get up and form lines in front of each of the teachers.  Each teacher gives a kind of good luck blessing (usually Buddhist, but I just made mine up) to each student while putting the white bracelet on them.  The ceremony ends when each student has gotten blessings from all 4 teachers. 

My only picture from the first ceremony (2/1) I participated in was taken by the art teacher and boy, does she love to photoshop!

This is some Buddhist proverb that I apparently know.

I was smart and had my camera with me for the second ceremony I took part in.  This is 2/2 (shown earlier in this post.)

Set up

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And now for a small montage of photos students have posted of me on my teacher Facebook account...

Ice from 2/8

Tua from 4/9

Nongmint from 2/11.  It's all too easy to do a peace sign in every picture!

Mink from 4/10