See! It's Official!

Only six months after I graduate, and I finally get to set eyes on my Masters diploma. Or at least, on a scanned copy of it. I really do wish QUT would make their certificates a nice, portable A4 size, like my UQ undergrad one. The table-sized QUT ones (I now have two!) are just impractical!
But anyway, let me just say, in my most professional manner: YayYayYayYay!

ADoS, and a Masters, all in one day.

The stars must have been good for my professional life last Tuesday. First of all, my contract was officially upgraded here at my regular english language school. Since I arrived, I found myself more or less filling a bit of a gap - there was so much to be done, setting up the new campus of the school, and I found myself doing a lot of things above and beyond my lowly teacher's contract, that I was offered (after only slightly heavy hints...) an ADoS contract instead, which is rather nice. Nice because I think I would be doing the work anyway, and this way I get some recognition for it, though only a token more in salary (although I worked out that it sounds a lot better in AU$ than in pounds!).
On the same day, I realised it was probably about time for uni results to come out, so I thought to check, and they were! I'm finished for real and proper! And I got a 7 for the assessment subject! Which I am rather pleased about. And a 6 for the other subject that I did such a crap assignment for, so that's not too bad.
And now I'm off to celebrate surviving the first week here (which has frequently resembled a soap opera, it seems) with a Professional Understanding and Bonding session in the garden at the nearest pub, which is only 20 minutes walk away!

AAAArrrrggghhh

So it turns out I'm one of those people who needs peace, quiet and SOLITUDE to work. I'm utterly desperate to do this assignment, and my brother, who was supposed to be here for 1 week and leave for Darwin YESTERDAY, is still here, taking up space. Watching TV. Asking questions. Not being absent. It's not him, particularly. The same would apply to anyone who was here. Hanging around all day. And now he says he'll be leaving NEXT Tuesday. The same day my final final assignment is due. The stupid thing is, after that, I wouldn't mind him being here! Until then, it's a serious problem.
So today I have achieved nothing work related. Although I got my glasses adjusted and thus can now see without turning my head sideways, which is nice, and, one could argue, work related...
And now it's time to go to my LAST EVER MEd (TESOL) CLASS. At least, it will be the last if I can get this assignment written. And I was going to take popcorn. But my brother has eaten my entire supply of popcorn. So now I have to find something else.
AAARRRRGGGGhhh

One Down

I'm done! I think. My first major assignment for the semester was submitted by email mere minutes ago, a mere 4 hours overdue (I had permission, as long as it was submitted sometime this evening). It was a test design. And when I look at it, it is actually worth exactly the same percentage as the last piece of assessment I handed in for my other subject, which I think I spent a total of about 5 hours on, and failed to get stressed about at all. This has taken me hours and hours, and raised my stress levels unreasonably. It's my fault though. I made it worth more by actually wanting it to be able to be considered for use in real life. The school I work for is in the process of adding speaking, reading and listening tests to their regular testing program, so I thought I could submit the speaking test I made as a possible, along with the criteria I worked out for it.
I should also have taken more notice of my stars today. According to the "Should I get out of bed tomorrow?" section of MX yesterday, the horoscope for scorpio reads:
"A quest for perfection sees you setting the bar a little too high for comfort. Avoid putting unnecessary stress on yourself and others, bearing in mind that near enough is probably good enough"
Advice I wish I'd taken... But it's done now, so all good. Now I just have to work on all the other bit of assessment I have hanging over my head.

Egads.

And I thought I'd been slack on my non-travel blog, having not updated much this year. It's been months and months since I've written anything here.
So, I left Japan at the end of my contract to spend four days in Seoul, before arriving back in Australia. My plane touched down at 7am on the last day the universities were open before the three week Christmas holidays. So the only time possible for my interview at QUT International College was 10am the same morning. One of my lecturers from last semester had recommended that I apply there (thanks Marion!) So I had a quick breakfast at home (thanks Pam!), scraped together some cleanish, vaguely professional clothes, and found myself having an interview for a university job on a total of 15 minutes aeroplane-sleep. After about 15 minutes of the usual sorts of questions, the Director of English Language Programs, Ian, said he'd like to
offer me the job, and said "let me just see what hours you'll be working", and pulled out a printed shedule with my name all over it! I was so surprised, I didn't say anything when he said "you'll have 23 teaching hours a week. Usually 19 is full time, but it's a busy session". I had intended to declare myself available maybe three days a week, in order to leave myself some free time for The Life I had planned in Brisbane. But it turned out ok. I had 5 weeks of too much work - I worked out I was at school 50 hours in that first week, and only a bit less for the weeks after that - but I survived, and it's been a great experience. I'm now doing three days a week, plus relief when I fail to say no, and I may drop to 2 days when uni starts getting more stressful. Although it's similar to other teaching I've done around the world, it's definitely a step up. I'm using the same books I was using in Turkey (actually the newer editions, which are even better) but I have about twice as much time to get through them, meaning I have time for things like using Wallace and Gromit videos (and accompanying text books) and we have a computer session every week, and, now, a session in the brand new computer-language lab, which is a steep learning curve in itself. The lab was installed about 3 or 4 weeks ago, and for most people, it's a struggle to master the new technology. I have few problems with the technology (although the program looks dated and is a bit clunky to use, despite being cutting-edge), but as I've never used a language lab before, either as teacher or student, I'm learning a whole lot of new ideas and techniques for it. I'm also finding other interesting things, like the use of readers in class - in fact, I have a Professional Development session on it tomorrow - which is now today. I also taught my first IELTS preparation lesson today - thankfully prepared by someone else, as I was doing relief, but it was an interesting experience, and I think I learnt almost as much from the students as they did from me - they've spent much longer studying the formats and question types than I have, that's for sure.
And of course uni started this week, meaning I'm on campus at QUT 5 days a week. I'm very grateful to be teaching at the same plac eI'm studying - I have a desk on campus, which is very nice. Next session (after next week) I hope to be scheduled to work on Thursdays instead of Fridays, which might mean I'm only on campus 4 days a week, which would be nice.
I'm doing two subjects at uni - the last two I need to finish my masters, which is nice. I've chosen "From Theory to Practice" which has an excellent reputation, and is the most practical subject on offer (I was waiting for this semester when I knew I would be working to take it, as I wanted a class to practice on!). I'm also doing "Language Assessment and Program Evaluation" (or something like that) which sounds dry, but actually looks Extremely Useful. I hope I don't regret it. The advantage of these two is that they are the only ones on offer this semester that I haven't already done that have regular weekly classes. I nearly chose "Personalised Language development", which would allow me to use my french classes (I'm taking french classes with Sean every Friday now) along with a whole lot of research, reflection and assignment writing, towards the masters course. It seemed really good, but I know me, and I know I work far better when I have a weekly class that I have to have read things for.
So that's my life at the moment. Well, my professional life. The rest is, or will be, on the other blogs.