A Brand New Week

Well, happy Monday to everyone. Mine has been good so far... first thing in the morning I went to the HTL to see if I could finally figure out my schedule there. I found my contact teacher, but she said she didn't have the time she thought she would because of the new schedule and the fact that she had 5 minutes to make a 10 minute walk to the other building rented by the school. She explained that they had too many students and not enough classrooms, so they rent another building elsewhere in the city. I walked with her for a ways, and we got to chat and she seems extremely friendly. She told me to come back again tomorrow at 10:35 and meet her in the teachers' lounge. After that I had plenty of free time, so I decided to walk up to the Gymnasium and continue my love affair with the coffee machine and prepare some things for my afternoon lessons. I gave two lessons today, one to a 4th level (12-13 year olds) and one to a 7th level (16-17 year olds). I kept the young ones busy by drawing my family tree on the board, explaining about everyone's professions and hobbies, and then asking them to write their own family tree. This prompted lots of good vocabulary questions, so I think it was quite useful. This was a particularly rowdy bunch, so I'm glad I had Andrea with me to keep them under control! The 7th level class was a bit calmer and more advanced, so I divided them into groups and made them read different sections of the Wikipedia entry on Athens, Ohio, and report back to the class. They were a lot of fun and a very bright bunch of students.
This Thursday I am supposed to do a lesson on Ireland and another on drugs. I was planning to use an A-News article about the Alexander School District drug testing policy. I spoke to the teacher about it, and she informed me that one of the students that had graduated last year had been found dead of an overdose in Vienna, and that one of his siblings was in the class. Jesus christ. What am I supposed to say to that? Is this silly drug testing thing even an appropriate topic? I'm not quite sure how to handle this one... But I will come up with something. As far as Ireland goes... I'll just have to do a bit of research.