"Adolescence is just one big walking pimple" -Carol Burnett

Work is fantastic....with the exception of the homo sapiens between the ages of 12 and 18.
My 1°ESO, the equivalent of 7th grade in the States, have no concept of respect, responsibility, or the reason why they're in school.  (I'll give you a hint guys, it's EDUCATION...not SOCIALIZATION).  I think the reason they're so badly behaved comes down to two factors.

1. They are 11-14 years old.
2. They are Spanish.

Firstly, I started off with my ESO class on the wrong foot.  Their English teacher was aloof and made it clear that the middle school was totally not on board with this whole "auxiliares" idea. It was worded in the form of, "No one has told us anything. We thought you were coming in October.  We really don't know how to coordinate giving you half our class twice a week" because in Spanish schools no one is ever culpable.  Everything is always someone else's responsibility. 

It's also the first year they've had foreign English teachers in the middle school, which means the students have to pay an extra fee (that comes to less than 10 Euros a month).  My school is concertado, meaning the parents pay a small portion of fees (like in private schools) and the government pays another portion (like in public schools).  When some of the parents found out that the extra euros they paid in August/September were for BEDA, they pulled their kids out of my class so they could get a refund.  Of course, the four kids who pulled out are in "the clique" as I like to call it.  What a coincidence, right???  The teachers told me it could be for one of three reasons.
     
a) the family can't afford the program fee
b) they already pay for their child to go to an afterschool academia and don't want to pay even more
c) two parents gave their kid whatever they wanted and then word spread    


Those problems were like so last month.  Now we've moved on to behavioral problems (with the 23 kids that I have left).  From a cultural point of view, Spaniards can be much "ruder" than North Americans.  If you will, imagine how obnoxious your average 7th grader is....now multiply that by the cultural factor, and there you have it: they are culturally programed to be assholes.  There's one boy in my class who must be older than everyone else. (He's either already had his growth spurt or he's been left back a year.  I'm 90% sure that he's been left back.)  He sits in class like he's Kanye West at the Grammy's, with his Justin Beiber hair cut, and doodling graffiti in his notebook (which this past Monday I confiscated because it's not even a school notebook. It's purely for graffiti practice).  He answers every question I ask with attitude and disgust.  I think he is actually so disillusional that he thinks its okay to talk to other human beings, on top of that his TEACHERS, like they are idiots.  It's actually impressive how much hatred he can convey with just his eyes.  I've come to the conclusion that he hates me because I'm probably the only person that doesn't let him get away with his behaviour.  The other teachers have already coined him as a lost cause.  Don't get me wrong, I won't be championing this kid and trying to help him become a better person in life.  I'm just going to teach him how to respect people who are busting their ass for his sake. 

To think, I only have ESO twice a week for 55 minutes each, and this is the effect they have on me.

Today, one of the teachers went out to his car at lunch and someone had thrown 2 bricks through his back windshield.  He just bought the car in September.  It was a brand new black and white Puegot sports car...super chulo.  Everybody in the school knows that it's his car.  Even when the parents come in for tutoria they notice it outside and ask, "Is that really your car?"  Yes, it's possible that some random Alcorcon kids could've done it, but who are we kidding?  In all likelihood, it was one of our lovely delinquents. 

And this is why my boss parks her car 3 blocks away from the school.