Teaching Evolves

As they say, you learn as much from your students (and at times more) than you are able to teach them. Gone are such thoughts of O'Henry or Edgar Allen Poe, enter Harry Potter and Soprano's new song about the Japanese time traveler Hiro. But enter as well Martin Luther King's speech I Have a Dream (which they all found on the net in translation and handed in with nary a spelling nor translation error to be found... impressive eh?). This bit of translating cheating did however enable them to follow the spoken text (on my Iphone and played on my portable speakers) remarkably well, and they adored his Southern accented, "Dooooowwwwwn in Mississippi...", not to mention my rendition a capella of My Country T'is of Thee. Thankfully I've a decent singing voice.

I've learned my lessons: don't give a popular English song to them to translate as homework, only on a test. As in the first situation, they are all smart enough (and only 3 of the 18 honest enough to resist) to copy it off a professional translation web site. However, a popular and brand new French song (as mentioned above) is a definite hit, and a remarkable way to work on the Past Conditional -- If I had had I would have... etc.,

So, taking this new information into account, I thought I'd throw another American accent at them, and another well-spoken speech, the last 6 minutes of the 1961 John F Kennedy Inaugural Address. And I told them that it would be easy to find on the net, so go and read it in translation, absorb it a bit, and I will play it for them with the English in front of them tomorrow as a bit of Listening Comprehension practice.

In place of Edgar Allen Poe's Raven/Nevermore, I've given them the far shorter text of Invictus -- a favorite poem of Nelson Mandela, and the source of his biopic movie's title. Great fun getting them to work their tongues around 'Unconquerable' and 'bludgeoning'.

I'm not the kind of teacher who puts a thousand 'mots dans leur carnet'-- a discipline technique for our school. Generally it is a 'mot dans le carnet' (note to the parents basically) each time they don't do their homework, get out of hand in class, are rude, etc., It's one way to control them. But, I just can't quite glom to this way of disciplining, etc., Rather, I try to speak to their better natures (they are in there somewhere) and question them as to their lack of mutual respect, their inability to hold themselves quiet when another speaks, etc., Where they want to go in their lives, what this education is for, etc., And, I've decided to come down hard on cheating on tests, etc., No excuses, Zeros for both the cheater and the assister. And no, I don't need to argue about proof, etc., I just give them back with their notes, or, I refuse to take a homework that is clearly copied from the Net. Honor Code anyone? Is this such a far-fetched notion?

I've discussed my fierce attitude towards cheating with my colleagues, and they are of mixed minds. I describe the Princeton University Honor Code (you won't cheat and you will turn in anyone you see cheating, signed, agreed to, or out you go, no diploma, no entry onto that hallowed Ivy campus), and I get back looks of shock and horror. That just wouldn't go over here in this world where your class notes are all that count for getting ahead, so do whatever is necessary, and if that is cheating, so be it. Gulp. I come from another planet.

I've started giving work in-class on the so-called easier elements of English that they did poorly on as a whole on the mid-terms. And in this way I've a bit of calm during my two hours Friday afternoon, and I can go to each student to help them with their answers, answer questions, personally advise and be alongside. And when clearly the vocabulary hasn't been learned (quickly seen on the vocab tests) it is now my rule that they take class time (or go into another class for that time) and write the vocab words 4x each -- as clearly they didn't do so at home.

My connections to the individual students are improving. The girls I had difficulties with in the beginning are now warming up to me, and me to them. But I'm losing a couple of the boys -- bright ones too. From frustration, from annoyance that I do not as yet have the perfect quiet class, from boredom. It's not easy. I'm relatively able to handle the class when I do a 'teacher talks and kids listen' session. But, I lose them when I ask them to speak individually, or when I ask for questions about the homework etc., planning on working with their questions for at least 10-15 minutes of the class. Once there is dispersion of any sort, they nearly all (but for perhaps 2 of them?) start talking to their neighbor(s).

And so, I pile on the homework. My thinking is that there is a good half of the class that actually wants to learn (maybe even a bit more) and at least by doing lots of homework, as long as it is useful and interesting, they will absorb some English this year. I'm working to get back the bright kids who are losing interest, going to them individually, checking in, letting them know what I'm seeing and interpreting, encouraging.

Tomorrow will be interesting. I've already given them vocabulary (over the past 2-3 weeks) to learn from the first 4 pages of the first Harry Potter. I've asked them to read 4 more pages, and to underline, list and translate all new words, to show me this list, and to answer some very easy questions whose answers are directly in the text. Thus forcing them to actually read, think, use a dictionary.

Meantime, with Soprano's song, we'll be discussing more English speaking world heroes (Malcome X, Gandhi, Mandela...) and exchanging on cultural issues.

Perhaps, just maybe, I'll succeed in bringing them somewhat up to speed in English this year. I hope so. In the meantime, I received a dear and very earnest compliment from one of my harder-working students, "Madame, merci pour ton courage et ta patience."

Teaching English

For most of my ex-pat life, wherever it has been, I've either had 'normal' jobs, i.e. worked with the locals, or been my own boss. Whereas so many ex-pats go through some period of English teaching in their lives, in seventeen years of living abroad I've mostly managed not to. And this with two professor parents and a professor brother.

I did a short English teaching stint last fall as a desperate effort to earn a bit more during the tourism off-season, but didn't particularly relish the effort of teaching demoralized, depressed and not always particularly bright adults who were out of work. Sorry! I'm not the best of teachers, given a three hour stretch, for encouraging such a 'publique' to learn something they've been told to do but don't truly want to do.

Yet here I am, quite excited about my new activity. It is meagerly remunerated -- as much is at the Steiner school here -- but it is a fun and interesting challenge. I am the new English teacher to the 9th grade class, aka 17 fifteen year olds, at my kids' school. I actually really enjoy adolescents, and at least half the class is quite bright, and though there are a very small handful of seriously not-interested kids, the majority seem eager for me to be there and give them some intellectual nourishment.

I'm filling in for a teacher who left early on maternity leave, and at this time, it's just a 6 month assignment. With the end of May I will return to my tourism activity full-time. And during April and May I will juggle tourism clients in-between the 3 weekly classes I have.

And so, as per my contract, I have an hour Monday, 3/4 hour on Tuesday and 2 hours on Friday of teaching time. They had a good teacher last year, poor teaching the two years prior and a mixed bag before that. In addition, more than half the class has been in the school but one to two years. As such, the Steiner style is still new to them.

I was told I needed to review as much grammar as possible with them, and that I could focus on American Literature and Culture. (Last year was focused on British lit and culture). And so I dug into my brain for ideas of my favorite American authors, remembered what I'd loved reading in 5th grade, considered, checked the internet, ordered books from Amazon... and prepped away.

I've now 5 books of English grammar for foreigners on my desk (I had never taught the préterite before), copies of O Henry and Edgar Allen Poe short stories, and--downloaded from the internet--the complete texts of Lincoln's Gettysburg address , JFK's inaugural address, this latter plus MLK's I have a Dream speech I will play for the kids with my IPhone and speakers.

With tons of prepping, discussing with colleagues to get a reality check, observing my most gifted colleague (a Brit who is truly a fantastic teacher and happily is Leo's English teacher at school. She also makes a mean mince-meat pie!) etc., I went into class Monday afternoon all ready to conquer the hill of "WILL, WON'T, ..."

I was able to present one element of grammar: "I am 30 years old. I will be 31 years old on the 15th of July." Yes, from simple present to simple future. And I discovered that they need revision on numbers, all those "st; nd; th; etc," on our numbers are just completely baffling to these kids. OK, note taken.

I then switched to the poem we're reading and memorizing together, Twas the Night Before Christmas. In good Steiner fashion I put a short bio of the author with it, though the time was too short to discuss him. We played the game of what Christmas and winter words they already know, and then began reading through the poem to recognize words they knew, and then attacked the new vocabulary. We read but two stanzas. But in there you've :'kerchief, snug, nestle, stockings, stirring... Some good words, don't you agree?

Homework -- two short exercises for the grammar, memorize the first 4 lines of the poem, learn the vocab.

Next day -- one child had done his. Ah well, t'is quite likely I spoke too quickly (a tendency of mine) and yes, the class time was pretty much up when I gave them their assignments, etc., So, I said alright. A day of Grace. I accept the possibility of my requests not having been clear. So, here is the work for Friday, let there be no mistake!

And then we started our Tuesday class-- a far more brief 45 minutes, so I was less ambitious. We began by reading the irregular verb past tense list -- yes, boring you might say, but our school's technique is simply to read it aloud every day as if it were a poem, and then over time, they've got them down pat, without the pain and boredom of 10 per night, etc., I put it at the beginning of the class when we're all standing for the 'partie rhythmique', a brilliant element of the Steiner school.

Thus, I will be beginning each class standing and reciting our poem altogether (having them memorize a stanza per class) followed by the verbs, and perhaps I'll get my list of vocab words out and let them sit down one by one as they successfully give the correct answer, and /or speak the lines of the poem from memory as I'd requested for their homework.

I am hugely inspired by my colleague and her bag of tricks -- never let them get bored, every game is a source of learning, keep them present and interested. As such, no individual lesson element goes longer than 10-15 minutes, and there is as much participation and positive reinforcement as I can muster "what words do you know in this paragraph? what words can you hear as I read the poem." and only after we've established what they already know, do we attack the new.

hmmm t'is a very interesting challenge. Shall we get through The Gift of the Magi? We shall see.