AKA: AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!
As of Monday, I have taught at least two classes in every grade at the middle school. It has been an experience. Most of this is summed up in classroom behavior.
When it comes to English class, the main thing that defines how a student will behave is their level of motivation to learn English:
- The third years, who have their (horrendously scary) entrance exams coming up，are very motivated to learn English, as it is a significant part of their exam. For them, the main problem is staying awake in class – as they are usually attending juku, or cram school, after class and studying late into the night, they are often unable to stay awake in class. If I act goofy, they wake up a bit, and it’s easier for everyone. For example, my teacher asked the students in a third year class if they had any questions for me. When no one said anything, I looked at the ground, shuffled my feet, and acted very sad in general. My teacher belted out, “She looks so sad!!” and I instantly got three questions. Lesson learned: be entertaining for the third years.
- The first years are just hyper. They have a hard time paying attention because they are 13 years old and crammed into a classroom with 32 of their peers. The fact that a boring teacher is in the front of the class does not stop them from chatting with everyone around them. But, if you give them an outlet for their energy, they pay attention fairly well. We played a game called “Typhoon” for my self introduction. Basically, you answer questions for points, which equate into houses in your team’s “village.” To make this fun, you can occasionally get a TYPHOON card, which lets you select another team’s “village” to wipe out with a typhoon. The team with the most houses at the end wins. One of my students really won my heart because he was SO INTO this game. He would lean over to other teams and telling them wrong answers. He would JUMP out of his seat whenever it was his team’s turn to answer a question. In fact, he went nuts when he found out we were going to be playing Typhoon, pumping a thumbs-up in the air. He’s not even that good at English – he’s just excitable. (He went nuts when I said I liked
- The second years…well, around the staff room, there is a general consensus that they are Satan’s Little Helpers. The problem is that they have no motivation to learn English (or any other subject, for that matter). They are bored with it, annoyed that they have to study it, and are starting to wonder why it is required when they don’t see a need to use it … ever. “My dad doesn’t know how to speak English – why should I?” This makes them the most difficult group with which I must work. To give you a better idea, this is what happened in one of my 2nd year classes on Friday: three kids were asleep the entire class, despite being woken up by the teacher at least once. One kid was reading a comic book in class, and tried to steal it back from the teacher after it was confiscated. And then, of course, there was the Bad Kid – he spent the entire class mocking whatever I or the other teacher said, throwing things at other students, getting up and walking around, and so forth. (It was…fun.) Still, “every obstacle is an opportunity in disguise.” Because I am not the primary teacher, I can be friends with my students, which will earn me a lot of leeway. The fortunate thing is that my main goal is not to win over everyone, but the worst kid in the class – usually he or she will be the ‘leader’ of all of the bad kids, so winning one will win a number of them.
In short, it’s been a challenging week. I have learned that there are many things I have to do, and it’s hard to be energetic all of the time, especially if you’re getting negative results.
2. One girl watched me with a dreamy look when I sang “Georgia On My Mind” (something I do to get the attention of the 2nd years in my self-introduction lesson), which was better than all of the verbal comments about my singing made to date.
3. Two of my teachers were telling me yesterday that I was so nice and friendly, and that everyone thinks I must have a wonderful family to be such a nice person.
4. One teacher told me she was surprised at how polite I was, because I bow when I say “thank you.”
5. As I was leaving school yesterday, the whole soccer team stopped their cool-down stretch to say “goodbye” to me.
… And, of course, a lot of caffeine.
A. Typhoon sounds awesome. Like, seriously. Up there with Settlers of Catan. And how culturally appropriate at that!
ReplyDeleteB. Orange Range? Avril LaVigne? Oh, how far our standards fall... i mean, i had to pretend to like the classical Iranian music my prof played me this summer when all i was thinking was "shoot me now."
C. i find the image of the dreamy-eyed girl almost as funny as how you labeled that the best response to your singing. Not that i ever found it particularly bad, of course. It's just a good thing that neither of us were in choir.
Oh dear, the second years sound tough!! Our 10th graders tend to be the same way, more and more so as we get further into the year (bomb threat, anyone?) My mentor just sent me some classroom management stuff. Let me read through it, and if it's any good I'll pass it along to you. We can definitely brainstorm together about classroom management - definitely a weak point for me!! ^_^ I'm glad the fun times are outnumbering the not-so-fun times!
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