 Hello! My name is Natalya Bazaliiskaya. I am from Kazakhstan. I live in the very North of Kazakhstan in the town of Petropavlovsk. I have been teaching English for 29 years already and I think that mine is a great profession. I am lucky and I want change, that is why I have experienced working in different types of schools – such as gymnasia, lyceum and now I am struggling a challenge of co- teaching with a PC Volunteer from the USA in my school and learning new ideas about American Educational System here in the United States.

 I work in a school- lyceum named after a great Kazakh poet and writer Magzhan Zhumabaev. The school is small – there are about 280 students. We don’t have a primary school, students come to study in our lyceum from the 5 th to 11 th grade. The very specific feature of the school that it has bilingval instruction: teachers speak Kazakh in A grades and speak Russian in B grades. And they speak English in all grades when they teach English

The specific features of English lessons in our school are:  We can use alternative textbooks within the government educational standards;  We can have optional courses for students due to their interests and abilities. For example, we have a course of American Studies.  We participate in the program that gives us a unique opportunity to team teach with an authentic speaker- a Peace Corps Volunteer, that makes learning English really motivating and effective

There are 4 English teachers in our school. They all are good professionals:  Two of them have the 1st professional category, and two of them- the high category  All of us teach with alternative textbooks, choose adequate methods of learning and managing the class, implement new ideas and strategies  Every year we tutor students from the local University English Department, who come to have practice in methodology of teaching English

 We have developed two authorized programs for optional courses that are being successfully implemented in the school curriculum.  We all have an experience of team-teaching with the P.C. Volunteers  We are very lucky- because the principal of our school is an English teacher!!!!