Scotland and my first whole group lesson!

June 22-26, 2012

Hello Scotland! And sadly goodbye the next day :(

Brittany and I headed off for Scotland Friday night. We took an overnight bus and arrived in Edinburgh at about 7:50 a.m. and then had our Rabbies Highland lochs and castle day tour at 8:15. Let me tell you Brittany and I now feel like we could run the amazing race. We came out of the bus station asked someone if they knew where the place was but all they were able to do was point us in the general direction. So we ran in that direction and then asked another person who was able to give us awesome directions! We literally ran down the road, over a small bridge, made a right where she told us and found it in plenty of time to go to Starbucks for a quick breakfast. (Mind you, we were doing all of this with our weekend back packs on our backs, definitely amazing race style.) We had an amazing tour guide Shelby and only about 12 people total on the tour. Shelby was hilarious and would play us Scottish music that was appropriate to the mood of the tour. It was quite funny because she explained she was driver, tour guide and dj. She frequently had Brittany and me on the edge of our seats when telling us the stories of the history of Scotland. We first began our adventure in Stirling, where we saw Stirling Castle and the William Wallace monument; however, we only saw them and did not get to actually go in them. However, we were able to make a quick picture stop on the way back :) This is where William Wallace defeated the English in 1297. Pretty awesome. (we were jumping out of the way of a bus, haha we just wanted the picture!)

Our next stop was Doune Castle :) (This castle was featured in Monty Python and the Holy Grail)

We then went to Callander, which is a little town just before we get into the highlands. We really just went into a few shops and some of the others on the tour tried the food in this area. 

Then, Kilchurn Castle which is in ruins and in the middle of Lock Awe; however, we were able to wander about. It was a long wet trek out there but well worth it. If you go to Scotland take your wellies and rainproofs because it is very wet. Luckily I did. We were able to climb some narrow stairs to the very top of the castle and over look a part of the loch. It was absolutely gorgeous.

Afterwards, we headed towards another little town in the highlands, Inverary. They had a few cute little restaurants, shops, and another castle. Brittany and I chose to not go into this castle because we wouldn’t have enough time to fully explore everything we wanted. Fun fact: The Campbell clan still occupies this residence. A common Scottish soup is called cullen skink (like a clam chowder with fish instead of clams). I tried some of Brittanys and it wasn’t bad. 

Somehow Brittany and I lost track of time or had the wrong time on our clocks and were a few minutes late getting back to our bus. Shelby decided to come looking for us when we were searching for the bus where we had seen it. Well we quickly became frantic and spotted the bus through the trees and took off sprinting again to flag down the bus. Luckily they weren’t leaving us like we thought but searching for us. Here are some photos of this area...

                                   

The road the tour normally takes was closed so we had to take this lovely detour with the gorgeous view of Loch Lomond outside of our window the entire time, what a shame. We stopped at what I thought was sort of a rest stop with a few shops and a wonderful view of part of the loch (lake). I found some pretty cute souvenir books for a few special kids I know and bought tablet. Shelby described tablet as something that the Scottish make for dessert or a treat and she actually bought all of us some to try. It is quite delicious and melts in your mouth. This time Brittany and I were back to the bus extra early because we did not want to be the late ones again.

We then had about a two hour ride back to Edinburgh and let me tell you, I have never seen so many sheep! Sheep are to Scotland as lizards are to Tampa. That’s the only thing I could think of that are there all the time and not too bothersome. Anyways I couldn’t get a non-blurry picture of sheep but I may have a few blurry ones. 

Shelby also recommended a few places to eat and I tried “A wee bit of haggis”! It was sheep, potatoes and turnips. I wasn’t a huge fan but it had flavor and I could see why people liked to eat it. Afterwards we decided to call it a day and take a cab to where we were staying, which was actually a dorm. It reminded me of a typical dorm I would see at USF, not the best but not the worst either. We also were surprised to hear that we had free breakfast in the morning! A few things I have noticed a lot at breakfast are tomatoes, mushrooms, and bacon (ham).

For Sunday we decided to see Edinburgh Castle and the Royal Mile and anything extra we were able to see was a bonus. Edinburgh Castle was beautiful. We were greeted in the morning with the playing of the bagpipes and I bought myself a book on Edinburgh Castle describing a lot of the areas inside so I would have something to look back at. Brittany and I were able to look all throughout the Castle and saw the crown jewels of Scotland. Fun fact: these crown jewels are actually older than England’s crown jewels from what I have read. 

Pictures in front of Edinburgh Castle...  

This is a picture with metal replicas of the crown jewels

And then this is the guy who was playing the bagpipes as we were walking up and we later found him posing for pictures :)

We then walked down the royal mile and went in several shops and walked past several market stands. I treated myself and bought this and love it for its uniqueness :) One of the swirly rings on the top

Unfortunately we were unable to go into the cathedral because it was Sunday and there was Sunday mass. Eventually we decided to start looking for the train station just in case and somehow stumbled upon it on accident, I honestly thought it was a mall. It took us about 5 hours to travel by train back to Cambridge but it wasn’t that bad, I just took plenty of naps.

Today I taught my first whole group lesson. I thought it went pretty well, of course I found things I could improve on but received nothing but positive feedback from my teacher. I also felt that students met their goals and that they learned from the lesson. My teacher actually modeled the lesson for me with the previous class and then I was able to really observe exactly what I needed to do. I will also be doing the same thing (my teacher models and then I teach) a few more times this week. I was extremely nervous for this lesson because I was afraid the students wouldn’t see me in a teacher role and that their behavior would be poor; however, the students really surprised me and were very respectful. I only hope it lasts! I told my teacher my goal for this program is to be ready for my level 3 of fully teaching all day and writing most of my own lessons. However, I am worried that I will not be able to reach this goal because as of tomorrow I have 11 days left in the classroom and that does not seem like enough! Of course I was very proud of myself for making it through the lesson even though I did need to pause a few times to gather my thoughts or make sure I was staying on track and give myself a pat on the back for today :)

Off to Scotland for the weekend!

Well Brittany and I are going to Scotland this weekend! I am stoked! Check out my wellies (rainboots) that I am taking... if you come here you need to bring these, they are a must! Sorry, I tried 4 times turning the picture and just gave up.

Anyways we will arrive in Edinburgh tomorrow  morning and we are going on a tour within the hour we arrive to the west highlands and seeing a few castles and then spending Sunday in Edinburgh. We will hopefully see the castle and the royal mile are at the top of our list.

Anyways check back late Sunday night for an update! Have a great weekend!

June 18-20, 2012

Monday, June 18^th, 2012

Back to school!

Today I taught a small group lesson (about 8 kids) about using commas and how we take a sentence and then use the commas to add more information either in the beginning, middle, or end. The great thing about the class I teach in is I have a chance to do everything twice! I can try out the lesson on the first group of students and find out what works and doesn’t work or if I need to word things differently, and then try to teach the lesson even better with the next class. So the first time around most of my students got it and they were even having fun making the parts of the sentences rhyme but I was trying to keep them focused on adding in details. Meanwhile many of them were writing sentences like “Maisy, maisy, with a face like a daisy, but she is so lazy!” Something like that I can’t quite remember. However, we were trying to teacher them that without the extra details surrounded by the commas the sentence should still make sense. That’s when their rhyming sentences would fall apart.

The teacher also teaches P.E. and they divide the two classes (60 kids) into three different ability groups each learning about a different sport. I watched the students learn to bowl. Not like bowling but bowl for cricket which I think of as pitching in baseball, except the ball bounces once and is aimed towards three tubes close together. Another group was practicing hitting a cricket ball with a cricket bat and the last group was balancing and bouncing tennis balls with a racket. Of course I really loved helping out in this part because it is what I do most days at home, except we more play games rather than develop the techniques. I think we should start though.

This is the day we also found an express bus from Cambourne to Cambridge! We get back to our house in about 45 minutes rather than the hour fifteen and it drops us off right at the top of our street!!!

That night we ate at revolution because it was half off everything! YUM! However, I wasn’t feeling well and have been missing some vegetables so I just had a salad but it was still delicious. I’m thinking this will become out Monday night tradition while were here because the prices are decent. 

Tuesday, June 19^th, 2012

Mini Olympics!

First of all let me start off by saying I was so excited for this day, we all know how sportsy I am :) but my bus was late! (Don’t worry I made it) You should see how these bus drivers are, first of all the citi bus is a double decker, so it’s huge and the bicyclists are crazy here! They will run you right over and the buses will run them right over! Every time we are on the bus we are cringing because the bicyclist are literally inches away from the bus on the street, I would never ride a bike here. Anyways I made it to the school just before out bus was about to leave and was able to gave have this amazing experience.

There were over 1,000 year 4 students in attendance to this event. I have to say it was very well organized for the amount of people there. The students had about 10 minutes to try on many different sports: football (soccer), hockey, golf, tennis, problem solving, hurdles, long jump, Olympic dance, tug o’ war, shot put, relay race and there may be a few more I am forgetting about. Also, it was students about 14 years old who were teaching our kids how to do these different sports. But because I have worked in recreation for several years I kept telling my teacher how the students teaching kids should have done things and little tips. My teacher loved this and said I should start helping her plan and teach P.E. as she is not all that into sports. I am very excited to do this because my kids have never played kickball, foursquare, a game of basketball, and baseball. There are just so many games I could teach them!

Anyways we were outside at the Olympics from 10-2 and I, even though I have lived in Florida all my life, come to England and get sun burnt! <<< That is the type of sentence they should have been writing on Monday and many of them did.

Mom you will love these- we found this great burger place, Gourmet Burger Kitchen, and they make the best onion rings! You know I don’t even like onion rings but they are big and so crispy. I am sure I will have them again before I leave and will show a picture. They are absolutely delicious! Also, they have a pound store here, like a dollar store, except you can get a lot more for a pound. A six pack of canned sodas and more…

And a kid and I were talking about cars and he was telling me his favorite was some type of Lamborghini and then asked me if I had a car. I responded yes and he said is it a Lamborghini? I laughed and said no it’s a Toyota and he made an odd face and said he didn’t know what that was. I thought this was hilarious because kids never understand the cost of items, but one day kid…. One day.

So these are a few words I can think of at the moment that are different between the two cultures:

Suncream- sunscreen

Shattered- exhausted

Waterproofs- raingear

Trainers- sneakers

Tiddly- tiny (this is one I heard from the kids so I'm not sure if it is just slang)

Rubber- eraser

Toilet- bathroom

Biscuits- cookies

And they also spell a lot of words differently like: visualise, analyse, colour…

Also, a bunch of the college students around here (11^th and 12^th grade) are passing there exams and graduating so there has been a ball every night including fireworks, almost as good as Disney’s except nothing will ever match that. But my friends and I were having a good ole time watching the fireworks and laughing and giggling about it. 

Wednesday June 20^th, 2012

Uhg, its only Wednesday… :(

I am so ready for this weekend so we can go see Scotland, the Highlands and castles! But today at school went pretty well. I taught another small group lesson on informational text features and of course the students tried to get away with things that they normally wouldn’t with their teachers. However, I thought both times I taught the lesson were successful. I am hoping that I am asking enough higher order thinking questions because my teacher doesn’t like to ask yes or no questions. She likes the students to have a reason for every answer.

Education here is so interesting because the students are expected to achieve and think at a much higher level, but I don’t see a lot of teaching going on in the classroom. Today the schedule was literacy for about an hour, math and science together for about an hour and then they drew self portraits for an hour which they do every year, and art for an hour. The rest of the time there was a break for twenty minutes, lunch for twenty minutes, assembly (every day) for about 30 minutes. I am not sure but somehow that fills up the whole day.

Anyways, tomorrow my teacher is modeling a lesson for me to the whole group and then I am teaching the same lesson afterwards to the students. But I am turning in early tonight as I am exhausted and want to stay healthy. Night!

and on the river in Cambridge (take by Kimmy, at least taken off her Facebook page :))

 

Paris :) and more

Wednesday June 13, 2012

First official day of school

Today was my first official day of school! We leave the house at 8 and arrive at our school around 9:00-9:10. The school is a religious school so the students are in assembly every morning until around 9:30. When they are released the students walk through the halls to their classes without any teacher observation and are not required to walk in a line. We did science all day. I found this odd because they did not have a set time for reading, writing and the other subjects. Well apparently the teachers chose to do a thematic unit of science for a few days because they did not want the students to forget the information over multiple days. I went outside for the students 20 minute play break and the teacher tea break in which students of all ages are playing together anywhere. I asked my teacher about this because in the states they do not play like this at all. Instead there are the separate playgrounds for separate age groups. Also most of the playground equipment they use is deemed unsafe. The teachers also get an hour lunch break. Another fact I found out about the school is that the lunch meals are made fresh daily using the ingredients from their garden and a snack is provided for a student and is normally an apple. A few of the unique names of the students that I have learned are Poppy, Eleanor, and Oliver.

We also had a meet and greet at a local college (well it took us about 30 minutes to walk there). My teacher attended and it was really more of a meet and greet for our instructors and interning teachers. I was hoping for some hot food but that didn’t happen!

Friday, June 15, 2012

Headed off to Paris!

Today at school the students were busy busy busy! They began with a science lesson on habitats and discussed how different organisms live in habitats and what not. Then we were off to swimming! The students more learn how to build up stamina and swim safely. As soon as we got back to the school we had about 25 minutes left for lunch. After lunch the school had organized an end or beginning version of the Olympic ceremony where the students went out front and three students from each year ran a relay and passed hand-made torches to each other. Then everyone gathered around the new flag pole as they watched a new flag raised by the principal. This was all scheduled last minute and all of the teachers just dropped what they were doing. As you can tell there was not a lot of teaching going on in my classroom.

The students also have golden time which is part of the discipline system in which the whole school participates in. This is when my teacher and I were able to sit down and plan a bit. I will be teaching two small group lessons and co-teaching a lesson with my teacher next week. Hopefully I will also be able to do a bit more but that is just what we have scheduled.

Well we found a decent deal to get to Paris and back. It leaves in about 40 minutes, luckily its leaving from a bus stop literally a 2 minute walk away. Somehow the boat goes over the channel and to Paris by tomorrow morning around 7. Then we will be taking the chunnel back Sunday night! Can you say busy!?!

Anyways you can read all about it Monday night-ish :)

Sunday, June 17, 2012

Oh Paris...

What an interesting city Paris was. Our transportation over was um... odd? We took a bus to a bus station in London, I think it was Victoria station where we lost track of time (like always) and ran to get our actual tickets and somehow got on the bus in time. Then we had to get off the bus at like midnight to go through customs, then back on the bus to drive onto the ferry, then off the bus to board the ferry, where we slept with ours heads on tables and bags close by. We somehow made it to Paris by bus the next morning and bought two day metro passes for 15 euros. We were also met with the lovely urine smell upon entering the metro of Paris and that made frequent visits throughout our trip. We immediately headed off to find our hotel, going to two wrong ones before finding ours. After throwing our stuff down we headed off to see the Eiffel Tower! This is when I first saw it, the view from our hotel balcony/window. 

And then when we were close and rounded a corner and it was so big!

I honestly was not up to going up it, all the stairs here in Europe are not fairing well with my knees and none of the other people seemed to be interested in going up so we just enjoyed taking pictures of it.

We then wandered because we were trying to find Notre Dame or the metro I think and came across the Pont Alexandre III

After walking across this and taking tons of photos we saw a few museums and made our way by the hidden metro to Notre Dame!

It was gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous and so gothic looking. This is my favorite part of visiting all of these places, the architecture. We also saw a bride and groom taking pictures outside of the Notre Dame.

While we were searching for a Metro to take back to our hotel I spotted a bookstore Brittany had been looking for the entire time, Shakespeare and Company. They were also having a live reading.

So we went back to our hotel to nap because 4 cranky girls in a city that speaks little English is not a good mix. We woke up around 9 and decided to go out and look at the Eiffel Tower lit up! It was gorgeous and we ate dinner where we could see it sparkle (which it does every hour for 5 minutes).

By the way, I ate crepes for breakfast, dinner and breakfast. I also shared a ham and cheese sandwich on a bagette with a friend :)

This morning we had to wake up early and check out and go to the Gare Du Nord because somehow we ended up with tickets going from London to Paris and needed tickets from Paris to London. Luckily they were nice enough to refund us our money and book us new ones. Therefore we only had 3 hours to explore the rest of Paris. We ate again and I tried my friends french onion soup which I thought was really good, surprisingly! Then wandered our way over to the Louvre but didn’t have enough time to go in :(

I am a little disappointed in our Paris trip because I wasn’t able to do anywhere near the amount of things I wanted to do in basically the day and a half we had. This obviously makes me nervous about my next two weekend trips but hopefully we will be able to organize/ plan these much better now that we have a general idea of our traveling abilities.

Here are a bunch of pictures and I need to go over a few lessons that I will be teaching this upcoming week! Wish me luck :)

June 11-12, 2012

June 11, 2012

GO ENGLAND!

My traditional English breakfast today was served with eggs, bacon (which is a small piece of bacon connected to a small piece of ham), half a tomato and sausage. Then we can choose from tons of other things and eat whatever we want. There is a fresh fruit salad, Activia, granola, fruit/nut mixes, cereal, orange juice, apple juice, coffee, milk, toast, and croissant. We have a very healthy selection here :) Also, breakfast is served from 7-8:15, this isn’t the normal hours for breakfast but we are the only ones staying in this bed and breakfast so they are nice enough to accommodate our needs.

After breakfast we had a seminar which we received emergency contact cards and our bus passes for almost the remaining time we are here. (They are only good for four weeks so the last two days of our interning is not covered but we get some “milk money” to cover those two days.)

Afterwards we went to a nearby convenient store and bought a few snacks for our rooms, and I found Kinder Eggs!

I am also going to try several new chocolate candies I found.

 After returning our groceries to our rooms we continued exploring and found a mall, in the middle of a building… it is so conspicuous.

After we all did a little shopping we decided to come back to where we are staying and relax, which turned into everyone hanging out in our room, listening to music, and me braiding everyone’s hair! You know I loved that and I learned the new waterfall braid :)

June 12, 2012

This will be the best experience of my life!

Today was my first day of school and we (the other two girls at my school and I) navigated our way on the bus to our stop then walked about a mile through the community to our school. Upon entering we were greeted by several receptionists and were asked to sign in and then we met the principle. One quirky descriptor is that she has a purple pixie cut. She explained our classes to us that there are two classes for each year that work together and they believe in full inclusion. We then met our teachers, who proceeded to show us around the school and introduce us to everyone. My teacher seems awesome and she was very welcoming and approachable. I am in a fourth year class which in the US is considered third grade. She introduced me to the class telling them I was from Florida; however I am not sure how many of them knew where that was because later they didn’t know I lived in North America. The teacher also explained to me a lot about what the students are currently working on a project to be presented on Thursday to other students who are coming from other schools. Their projects focus on North and South America as well as the Olympics. I was asked to help a few students on researching their topic, which happened to be pop music. They chose to research Justin Beiber, Hannah Montana and I later told them that was a stage name when she was younger and her real name was Miley Cyrus, and Shakira. Other students chose to research: basketball, Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt, Native Americans, baseball, volleyball, American Football, the culture, and the food. I am not sure if the students researched this or made assumptions because they told me Canadians love maple syrup and bacon, Americans love PB&J’s and Mexicans love burritos. The students also could choose to display their information in any style or format and were asked to get creative. I also noticed before the students begin their work the teacher writes on the only section of white board they have the focus of the lesson and reminders to achieve the focus. And yes I did observe all of this within an hour.

All of the teachers also have their own aid and students who have special needs are assigned their own aid. So there are 30 students and now 4 adults in the room.

I feel so in awe of what I think I am going to be able to learn in this internship. I see myself exceeding my own expectations and the students. I think teaching is also going to be completely different because the students are ahead of the students back in the states. The students are expected to begin school at age 4 (called reception) and then at age 5 they are in Year 1, which we call kindergarten. My friend is in Year 1 and her students write and read cursive, work on adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing (of course nothing to complex), and are learning about the Greek culture. The expectations of the students here are much higher than the schools I have seen.

After interning today a few of us were back so we decided to go exploring so I took a few pictures for you to see what I live around.

This is Parkers Piece which is right across from where we are staying, there are always people out here lounging or playing some sort of sport (thus far I have seen soccer, rugby and cricket).

This is a really tall church just to the left upper corner of Parkers Piece

And then some things we saw while exploring and I bought a few chocolates from a chocolate shop. I have had one and it was yummy!

^^^ 9 pounds but such a delicious dinner! I will definitely be going back for a cheaper lunch!

Shotty WIFI

Sorry that I haven't been able to post a lot but I have not had a decent WIFI connection up until now. But here's everything :) Also with being so busy I haven't had time to download my pictures but once I do expect to see them here!

June 9, 2012

Our chance to see everything left on the list!

Out list consisted of Trafalger Square, Shakespeare Globe Theater, British Museum, Covent Garden, Kensington Garden, Hyde Park, Harrods, & Leceister Square…. However, we ended up doing Leceister Square, Trafalger Square, The National Gallery, Covent Garden (we ate lunch near here), St. Paul’s Cathedral, Millenium Bridge, Shakespeare’s Globe, PUB!, Bourough Market, Harrods, and then Caligula (an Opera) 

In the last two days, we have seen and done so much! I honestly cannot leave London thinking there was something that I REALLY wanted to see and didn’t get to see it. This is why we made a list of things we wanted to see before we left Sunday. 

We started out our day going to Leceister Square and went to the TKTS booth because they have discounted show tickets. We knew it was a good deal when we saw a long line. We ended up getting Opera tickets (oh just wait ‘til you here this) for about 20 pounds each. There was a gorgeous fountain and statue in the center. Then we wandered on over towards Trafalger Square. It was beautiful! We got a picture in front of the lions and also went inside the National Gallery. However, the National Gallery was so big we were only able to see a few rooms of artwork. We did get to see pieces by Monet and Van Gogh. Then we went to Covent Garden to meet up with a few locals one of my friends knew and they took us to this great Italian restaurant and answered so many of our questions. They then took us on a wonderful walk towards St. Paul’s Cathedral; we went part of the way in and saw amazing architecture and details everywhere. Then we headed towards Millenium Bridge and walked across that to Shakespeare’s Globe. It looked cool and interesting but instead of going in we went to a nearby pub to have a drink and plan where we wanted to go next. We chose Harrods! On the way we passed through Bourough market but it was shutting down and looked really cool. The food there smelled delicious and I would recommend at least trying it or wandering over there for lunch or a meal. We finally arrived at Harrod’s which they appeared to still be in the Queens Jubilee mode and there were gorgeous crowns made out of cake, food, sprinkles, chocolate and more. Harrod’s was huge! You could absolutely get lost and then spend all day in there! Afterwards we headed to the Opera… Oh the opera. I thought this would be a cool experience because I have never been to any type of show like this, Broadway, opera, nothing.  But it was weird… haha.

                  A funny piece of art we saw on our way from Leicester Square to Trafalger Square

                                                                  Trafalger Square

                                                      The market within Covent Garden

                                                                St. Paul's Cathedral

                                                           More of St. Paul's Cathedral

                                     Shakespeare's Globe in the distance from Millenium Bridge

                                                  Millenium Bridge and St. Paul's Cathedral

                                         A delicious cider in a pub near Shakespeare's Globe

                                            A memorial for Princess Diana inside of Harrods

                                                                   Inside the Opera

So to avoid lugging those 50 lb suitcases back up and down multiple flights of stairs, we found an awesome route to King’s Cross Station, which has a lift (elevator). We are really hoping this works out a lot better than when we arrived in London.

June 10, 2012

We have arrived…

 

We woke up and had our American/English buffet breakfast. I find this funny because tomorrow we will be having a traditional English breakfast at the Warkworth house and I am expecting it to be completely different. We made our way to King’s Cross by cab, we were talking to a bell man at the hotel and he suggested a cab instead of the underground and said it would be much. This man saved our sanity! All 5 of us paid 20 pounds so this was by far the easiest mode of transport (especially with 9 suitcases). We arrived at King’s Cross and bought our tickets and you get a better deal for 4 people so we paid like 13 pounds each rather than 23 pounds. Then we headed straight over for a great photo opportunity!

Once we arrived in Cambridge we had about a mile walk from the train station to the Warkworth house… it was so long. But we finally arrived! A few others were heading out to grab a bite to eat so we quickly went with them and found this cute little pub down an ally. We had Sunday roast which two other girls and I split and am so glad we did, it was so much! But delicious. Then we had a bit to unpack and settle into our rooms and everyone met for pizza at a local restaurant in which we were then given a scavenger hunt. A few of the things we looked for were where DNA was first announced, a punting boat, King’s College, a football jersey and a bunch of other things. It was a lot of fun and great way for us to start to meet the locals and explore. The ending point was the free press pub (a place I’m sure we will be seeing a lot of) where we had the option of staying or finding something else to do. I chose to go with two others to a local Irish pub and watch the Ireland and Croatia game. I drank a cider but it just made me super tired.

I am rooming with another girl and we get along great, the room is a bit small but what place in England isn’t. Tomorrow we are having a seminar and then are free to explore the town.