I Ragazzini (the kids)

One of my volunteer jobs here in Bologna is an after school program with middle school students. The schedule is from 2:00 to 4:00 in the afternoon at a library near the horse race track (ippodromo – hippodrome). Unfortunately the schedule has been a bit erratic due to holidays (Pasqua and now Mayday) and one teacher’s inability to come regularly on Thursday due to some family obligation. That’s too bad because I really like the kids. I’ve really had little experience with this age group of kids (13 and 14) but am enjoying it. I have learned the italian word for rambunctious (turbolento) which best describes boys of this age. The girls are much less boisterous. Naturally I am there to help with English so the number I work with goes up and down depending on their interest in both English and me and their currently most pressing homework assignment – sometimes it’s math so I have only one to work with.

My most regular student is Giuseppe who is 14 and clearly likes working with me. I’ve had him one-on-one a couple of times and that works well because I can get him to settle down and now he’s actually working at it rather than goofing off. The timing for this program is good since school finishes the week before I leave so I’ll see them through the end of the year. So here are the students that I have worked some with to date along with their ages and where they were born. All obviously now live in Bologna.

Matteo 14 – From Bologna (Bolognese) – not much of student, only wants to learn “bad words” (parolaccie)

Giuseppe 14 – Bolognese, father is a pizzaiolo

Alessio 13 – Treviso

Charles 13 – Philipines (good english so only worked with him once)

Livio 14 – Bolognese but parents are both from China.

Farah 14 – Palestine (the only girl I’ve worked with – very good student)

Dante 14 – Capo Verdi

As is my unfortunate persistent habit I keep forgetting to take enough pictures. I may do another post with more photos before this job comes to an end.

 

 

 

 

 

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 1st, 2014 at 2:14 am and is filed under Culture, Language. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.