IES ANTARES
IES ANTARES
I am currently working at the IES Antares which participates in the Programa Bilingüe, the immersive English-Spanish language learning program of the Comunidad de Madrid. I am one of seven different Auxiliares de conversación that help to incorporate this program into the classroom. Rivas-Vaciamadrid is a relatively affluent suburban municipality located close to the capital city of Madrid.
According to the website El Confidencial, Rivas-Vaciamadrid was, according to 2014 figures, the municipality with the 7th highest monthly household income in Spain. More information about the municipality and its history is available on Wikipedia with other external links. Around where my school is located, it is a rather residential region with mainly semi-detached houses and multiple story flat buildings. It is generally calm and quiet, very much removed from the hustle and bustle of center city Madrid.
I am teaching a few different classes of three different age levels. The majority of my classes are Physical Education, also English language and two classes of Music. I mainly teach fourth year of ESO, with all of the six sections in P.E. (A/B/C/D/E/F) and two in English (A/B). I teach third years in P.E. (C/D), English (A) and Music (D). I teach only one class of second years (2ºF) in Music. The language levels generally range from A2 to B1 to B2 with a considerable amount of variation in each class.
The classes are quite large. There are usually about 30 some-odd students in each class. My smallest is my older age Music with about 17 students and some of my largest classes have about 32. There student population is also a bit different than I was used to, compared to my high school, university and previous teaching experience. It has been interesting getting to know the students, getting a feel of the community and working with the school population everyday. There are also a lot more auxiliares. In my last school, we only had 3 different Language and Culture Assistants, one for Infantil, one for Primaria and one for Secundaria. In my last school I only taught English language courses. That allowed me to focus on teaching English as a second language and to hone my skills in that respect.
Teaching different courses, and to higher age groups, has allowed for me to teach the language in different ways, teaching English through the subject in question and not just how to learn the language. Most of the language assistants in my school teach a variety of different school subjects and different levels, from 1º (first year) of ESO to 2º (second year) of Bachillerato. Being as such, we all have very different experiences even though many of us overlap with the same classes in different subjects.
Further Information:
I.E.S. Antares' website - Homepage
https://ies.antares.rivas.educa.madrid.org/
Wikipedia - Rivas-Vaciamadrid
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivas-Vaciamadrid
El Confidencial - article:
"Boadilla del Monte encabeza la lista de municipios más ricos de España"