Fieldtrip
education and teaching
Gingerbread Houses
Random Memory
Seven years ago almost to the day, I took the GRE. Living in rural Poland, I had to get up at five in the morning to take a bus to Krakow in order to take the blasted test. Arriving, I had to wait about two hours to take the test.
Not the best start.
I scored decently -- over 1800 -- but found my analytical score to be about 100 points below what I’d been making in practice tests at home.
One of those silly dress rehearsals I had a perfect score in the analytical section. With a catch: I ignored the time limit and simply worked the problem.
I’ve never understood the point of putting a time limit on a test like the GRE. It means that the exam measures how well you do on silly riddles, geometry problems, and the like under severe time pressure.
And given all the courses and books designed to “help performance,” the whole test is a ridiculous joke.
The Scream
If you’ve never heard the scream of an autistic child, count your blessings. It’s inconceivable how a single, shrill sound could convey so much pain, confusion, and anger. The scream comes from so deep inside them it sounds more animal than human. And yet, it’s so shrill and hollow that it’s ethereal.
Often words are woven into the scream -- “I hate you!” or “Get away from me!” -- to produce a genderless voice. Add the repetitive nature of what they’re screaming and it’s not difficult to see how this could have once been labeled “demon possession.”
Autism, in the time of a rage, wipes away all differences between afflicted children -- gender, intelligence, everything -- and replaces it with a screech. The rage contorts the face, flails the limbs, and lashes out at anything in the vicinity. The scream fills whatever space you’re in, seeming at times almost like another entity, hovering around the child as you try to isolate her so that so can calm herself.
If it happens around children who are not accustomed to it, the bewilderment and pity in their eyes is striking. And it’s impossible to deny the spark of fear as well.
Often the screaming subsides as quickly as it comes on. A raging child might notice there’s an echo in the room where he is, and that will be enough to derail the rage and pacify the child.
Good morning
I’m shocked at how many times I’ve said “Good morning” to students coming into class where I’m subbing, and been ignored.
Completely ignored.
What happened to politeness? What happened to basic social skills?
First Impressions II
Back straight, chest out, shoulders square, hands folded behind the back. Greetings, warm but firm, as everyone comes in.
The Speech, highlights:
I will treat you as an adult, which means that I will respect you and speak respectfully to you. When I speak to you, I will not simply bark an order, but I will speak politely. I use “please” and “thank you.” Most importantly, it means when you speak to me, I give you my full attention. I expect the same. Is that clear? Does everyone understand?
A quick survey shows that some indeed are not listening. Time for the sergeant act.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I asked you a question, and when I ask you a question, you will answer it. When I speak to you, you will listen.”
It’s the best drill sergeant voice I can muster, and I deliver the words in a loud and firm voice.
Silence.
“Do you understand?”
Heads nod, a few “Yes sirs.” A hand up. “Were you in the military, sir?”
Sometimes it’s amazing how well I can act the role.
Français sans filet
Je ne parle pas bien français. Je me souviens très peu de ce que j’ai appris à l’université. En fait, j’ai écrit cela en anglais et je l’ai traduit à Babel Fish. Cela explique la bêtise de ce texte.
I don’t speak French well. I remember very little of what I learned in college. In fact, I wrote that in English and I translated it at Babel Fish. That explains the silliness of this text.
Not speaking French didn’t stop me from being a French teacher for the day today. Fortunately, I had two bocks of first-year French and only one block of third-year. Even more fortunately, the planning period fell between the third year and first year blocks, so I had plenty of time to do a bit of cramming.
Oh, for a real Babel Fish, though. Think of the problems that might solve — instant intelligibility. Think of all the translators and comparative literature scholars out of work.
Teaching something while not being entirely sure that you’re teaching it correctly is a little like the Engine that Could — I think this is right, I think this is right.
A few tips for those embarking on teaching a foreign language you barely remember:
- When in doubt about translation, be honest: “I don’t know.”
- When in doubt about grammar, be honest: “I don’t know.”
- When in doubt about spelling, be honest: “I don’t know.”
- When in doubt about pronunciation, mumble.
And thank the maker for an assembly that cuts half an hour off your last lesson.
ESubL
Being bilingual can really be a troublesome affair when trying to teach English – if your student’s L1 is different than your L2.
Today, while subbing, I worked with a student of Latin origins who spoke very limited English. I speak even more limited Spanish, though I’ve decided I must learn that language. At any rate, I found that while working with her it was a constant and very conscious struggle not to lapse into Polish. “She doesn’t understand what you’re saying,” a voice was screaming in my head, “So use another language.”
Unfortunately, Polish was not terribly helpful.
The world of ESL is frightful in some ways. The responsibility is enormous.
As an EFL teacher, I was teaching a foreign language, which means it’s not going to be used that often. It’s not often going to be the basis of all other learning. And teaching English as a foreign language also affects the skills stressed. My primary goal for my students was verbal communication. Writing is important, but not nearly as important as speaking.
I confess, then, that I probably didn’t spend enough time with my students working on writing, until the national testing standards changed and forced my hand.
ESL is an entirely different animal. The goal is simple: get students’ English up to a level where they use it as their primary language for instruction. Think about it: it’s re-wiring a house, re-pouring a foundation. No, wrong analogy. It’s adding a second set of wires to a house, putting a foundation within a foundation.
And what do students do in the meantime? If they have limited English, how do they learn science? The idea solution is bilingual education, with L1 gradually being phased out. But the ideal is often just that.
In Your Face
What do you say to a student when he says to you aggressively, “You don’t have to get up in my face like that!”? How do you respond when in fact all you were doing was trying to be “reasonable” and explain why you were calling him down in the first place, and doing it by squatting down to be at eye-level with him, talking to him like a man? Is this blatant disrespect, or something else?
I’m not even sure I know what it means to be “in someone’s face about something.” I’m assuming that it means the chest to chest, strutting peacock type of testosterone-laden behavior I saw myself as a student many times. Of course I wasn’t doing that when students said those lovely words to me, so what’s going on?
An invasion of someone’s personal space is the only explanation I can come up with. In trying to be respectful -- and I do believe teachers should be as respectful to their students as they expect their students to be to them -- it seems I crossed an unknown, unseen boundary and caused offense. Or perhaps he was just testing me, seeing what he could get by with?
Support from Your Principal
Erin O'Connor at Critical Mass has a fascinating and yet disturbing post about a way of dealing with student profanity...by allowing it.
An English high school has decided to cope with the problem of student profanity by tolerating it. Beginning this fall, students will be allowed to curse at their teachers, just so long as they don't say "f -- k" more than five times during a lesson. Part of the new policy involves keeping a running tally on the blackboard of how many times the word "f -- k" has been uttered during a given lesson--a practice that promises to distract students.
I for one would feel this as a complete abandonment on the part of the principal of any acknowledgment even of my authority as teacher.