Vindication! (Marcus)

I think that yesterday I turned the corner and actually became a teacher...or an asshole, either way, it was great!

The lesson I put together this week for our Senior 1 students(the 17-18 yr olds) has been quite difficult to actually teach. On paper it looked great. It was mostly pilfered from the web-site I joined and adapted slightly. It's tricky with our students(and i suppose all students) as we have to make what we teach them relevant to their cultural perspective or situation.

The subject of the lesson was Recreation, and well, this I think was a mistake from the beginning. In my mind it was an important topic to touch on as it lead to many western examples - western culture supposedly being interesting to most of the students(So the teachers keep telling us). When we tried to lead class discussions, it didn't work out well.

The problem here is these guys are really, really missing out on an important part of their lives. The amount of time they are in class or being forced to study is positively ridiculous. I don't have their exact schedule, but they're basically up at 6am every day, have to then do excercises, eat then it's basically off to class. Some days have things like sport and yay cleaning the school grounds amongst the lessons to mix it up a bit. Each day they dont actually finish till 9pm, and I think that lights out for bed is about 9:30pm. Their actual classes finish about 6pm I believe, when dinner is(5:50pm precisely from memory), and then they have to do 'self-study', which is sit in the class room and do homework and things like that. Now I don't know about you, but to me, it's ridiculous.

When do these kids actually get to be kids? They don't. They have to squeeze in their 'recreation' when they can. They only get approximately 4 days off a month as actual weekend time. They have all the same interests as western kids. They like to read, watch movies, play sports, play computer games, shop, listen to music - it's just that they're not actually given any time to do it - or basically minimal time weekly, tops.

I know this is a product of what you would have to call over-population. These kids have a great chance to really succeed in the future, whereas litterally millions don't have any chances. But either way, it's a raw deal when you look at it. And you can see why my lesson on HEHE Recreation didn't go over particularly well. It wasn't _bad_, it just didn't get the response I would have liked. One of the activities which involved matching words into their relevant Sport, Movie or Music category was quite successful.

Anyhow - and I feel like a bit of a prick now recounting my tale after that little description above!

Each class has the 'typical' students. The one's who are..well, the ones who are basically me back in school. The one's reluctant to do work. The one's sitting in the back corner chatting and outright refusing to do any of the things asked of them unless forced. The ones who speak in Chinese until you patrol near them in which case it's suddenly, "What is the most popular sport in China?" then reverts back to "Ni hao! blah blah blah"

Whenever I deal with these kids I try to remind myself, yeah, they're at that age...the age I was once at, they're teens. They have teen attitude. Although infinitely easier to deal with than what Western teens would be like(anyone watch Summer Heights High?!), they're still a handful and difficult to find the right activities and spoken things for them to actually get involved and participate.

So anyway yesterday I had two classes with the usual suspects up the back, doing their thing. It makes it very difficult for me as it's hard to ignore them and continue on with the class when they so blatantly are choosing not to do anything I tell them. In something that involves writing, I walk up to them and say - Guys...write it down...and they hurry to it. 3 paces away and they're bullshitting around again.

So yesterday I took the power back and I think somehow turned into a teacher(or a prick :)). Usually when people are asked to read things out(which is every class), they do so at their desk. But today? That all changed. Today a new Marcus rule came into place.

We did what was previously an unsuccessful activity. Getting them to go through a long list of questions in boxes and fill them out about their peers. What sport do they like to play/watch, what movies, what books etc etc. Half the class always did it, the handful at the back...naaah.

New rule - you come out and stand IN FRONT of the class on the teachers platform and read it out. But who did I pick? Firstly someone I knew who had done it - then I picked two who had written absolutely nothing. I couldn't keep the grin off my face, it felt wonderful. They came out, read - what i assume they made up on the spot - hands nice and shakey, then I clapped them along with the class - ahh encouragement.

Class number 2? 2 who had done it, and 3 specifically who had done absolutely jackshit after being asked twice in my rounds. It was priceless.

I am pretty sure they got the message, and if they didn't, it doesn't really matter as no matter what the activity is next time, they will be up there again, and again, and again and again until they actually DO SOME GODDAMN WORK!!)(($!)(*%&