Being a Teacher is Hard
When I left the CRD dorms, I told the administration that I had lived there for free, using their water and eating their food, for about 2 months, so in exchange, I will give two months of free classes.
They obviously wouldn't be happy, but I never signed a contract, and it sounds fair to me.
They had left a folder with four sheets of paper on my desk in my room while I was out. On each paper was a list of names: my new students. I was told that I would be giving two lessons per week to earn my keep, but I was given four lists of names, meaning I was giving twice as many classes as I had originally agreed to (not to sound like I'm complaining about giving a strenuous extra four hours of work to do each week, I just would have liked to know the truth from the beginning). The girls' classes were to be on Thursdays, from 4:00 to 5:00, and from 5:00 to 6:00. The boys' classes were in an undisclosed location at a mystery time.
So Tuesday, not knowing where to go or when to go there, I went to the administrative office at about 3:30 to ask if they knew where I needed to go (rightly assuming that class might be at 4:00). Unfortunately, the woman who organized all of my classes was out of the office. No one knew anything about the classes, so I shrugged my shoulders, and they shrugged their shoulders, and I walked back to my room. On the way, I ran into a guy who is in the class, and I asked him if he knew anything about it. He simply looked confused and it became clear that he didn't even know he was in the English class. At least I wasn't the only uninformed one.
The next day at work, Rosa asked if I would come join her in her office to talk. I felt a distinct sense of foreboding as I wondered what I could be in trouble for, and then she said, "Benito called me this morning and said you weren't in class yesterday." Oh, great. Now I'm in trouble for missing a class that no one told me about. I was honest and told her that I had been given a list of names but not been told anything about a classroom or a time, and when I went to go ask about it, no one in the office knew either, so we just didn't have class. Rosa told me that my students had been waiting for me, but I never showed, and I responded by telling her that I had run into a student who knew nothing about the class either. She still seemed irked, but told me to explain the situation to Benito.
I saw him later that day, and he didn't seem angry. I made sure to show him the piece of paper I'd been given, and point out that no time or place was written. He had someone show me where the classroom was, and told me "no pasa nada."
On Thursday, I went to the residence for my first classes with the girls. I was sitting alone at lunch, like I do, when a girl approached me and asked if she could sit with me. Of course, I said. She asked if I was the "lectora de ingles" and if that meant she had to speak English to sit with me. No, I said she didn't have to speak English if she didn't want to. I asked if she was in my class and she said she thought she might be. I gave her my two papers and said she could look for her name, and she found herself in the second class, and it was apparent that this was a bit of a surprise. "Nadie me ha avisado que tenemos clase hoy..." she said. ("No one told me we have class today...") Yeah, well, me neither.
I was a little bit nervous, but I felt better about these classes because they're my own. I can do what I want, speak as much Spanish as I need to, and not have a teacher watching my every move. I had prepared a bit of a speech to start the class off, an introduction of myself and what my expectations were. Then I had them go around the room and introduce themselves in English, and I made the effort to memorize all their names (admittedly, this kills a lotta time). Then we all went over how you introduce yourself, describe yourself, and some questions that you ask when you're getting to know someone new.
The next Tuesday, I went to my first classes with the boys. The first hour was smaller, and a lot quieter, but better "behaved," you might say. There was one boy who speaks fairly good English, and he ran the show. I'm still new at this teaching thing, but it's hard for me to not favor the ones who participate more than the others. They call my attention, and I get frustrated with the quiet ones because it's like pulling teeth trying to get them to talk sometimes.
The second class was larger and a bit more rowdy, but I tried not to let it intimidate me. At least they were a bit more talkative (and in the case of a language class, that's what you want).
The hour dragged on. I was told by some that the class was an hour, and by others that the class was 45 minutes. At the 40 minute mark, I said that that was enough for today. But apparently it's not within my authority to make that kind of call, because they insisted that we still had time, fearing that if they left early they would get in trouble. One of the other teachers (she directs a sort of guided study type class) was sitting in on the class, and she pushed us on until 5:55, even though I clearly didn't have anymore material.
My first sets of classes didn't go all that smoothly. They were clumsy, but after some self-evaluation, I realized that I wasn't being a leader. I wasn't leading the class, but getting frustrated when the students weren't contributing as much as I needed them to. Live and learn.
After my even clumsier second hour, I went up to the admin office to tell them I wanted to call it quits. Call it luck, good or bad, but of course the director wasn't in the office. The woman who was there asked me if I was getting ready for my next class. That's right...I had another class. "There are students waiting for you downstairs right now." Ugh. Just ugh.
I was so frustrated at this point. I wouldn't mind if someone had told me, to begin with, that I had five hours of English classes per week. I'm not complaining about the volume of work, understand. I fully appreciate that five hours a week is nothing. I'm just annoyed that I was never even told about this class. If I hadn't, by chance, gone to the office, I wouldn't have even known about the fifth hour because no one had told me about it or even included it in my folder with the other lists of names.
Annoyed, I went back downstairs to the room. As I walked past, I saw Alex, who asked me how I was. "Pretty annoyed," I said. "I have another class right now that no one told me about." Someone walking past stopped and said, his face a bit stricken, "You didn't know you have another class?" Ah, shit. I felt so bad. "Well, no," I said. Then I faked some enthusiasm and went in to teach some more English.
This last hour is the voluntary class. These are the students who volunteered to take my English class. They want to be here voluntarily. I had them do the same-introduce themselves in English and say one thing about themselves. One girl said, "I want to learn a lot this year." And suddenly I felt really awful about trying to quit.
I really hate the way the administration have treated me. I was never given any resources, and no one ever told me what I was expected to do apart from "giving an English class for an hour," and even then, no one could seem to agree on the duration of the class. Some said an hour, some said 45 minutes. I haven't been given any materials, and the "classroom" I'm in on Tuesdays is really just a sitting area of the common area, which shares the room with the TV watching area and the pool table. No computer, no projector, no black board. No way to print off materials or worksheets. And I'm supposed to carry on like that for 3 hours every Tuesday and 2 hours every Thursday.
My roommate, who by pure luck is also a teacher, gave me a book of English lessons for classes structured like mine. That is to say, very unstructured. Ones with beginners who might be a little shy and don't have access to materials. I woke up early Thursday morning and spent some time with the book, and actually planned some activities that got the students involved but also guided them along the way. My second day was a great success. I made it all the way through the whole 45 minutes, and all my students were participating. Well, maybe not "all," but it was a great improvement. It seems obvious, but planning and preparing make a helluva difference, don't they?
Speaking of, I'm gonna go plan a lesson about Thanksgiving so that I can be sufficiently depressed about not eating my mom's food.
El mundo es un libro, y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página.
They obviously wouldn't be happy, but I never signed a contract, and it sounds fair to me.
They had left a folder with four sheets of paper on my desk in my room while I was out. On each paper was a list of names: my new students. I was told that I would be giving two lessons per week to earn my keep, but I was given four lists of names, meaning I was giving twice as many classes as I had originally agreed to (not to sound like I'm complaining about giving a strenuous extra four hours of work to do each week, I just would have liked to know the truth from the beginning). The girls' classes were to be on Thursdays, from 4:00 to 5:00, and from 5:00 to 6:00. The boys' classes were in an undisclosed location at a mystery time.
So Tuesday, not knowing where to go or when to go there, I went to the administrative office at about 3:30 to ask if they knew where I needed to go (rightly assuming that class might be at 4:00). Unfortunately, the woman who organized all of my classes was out of the office. No one knew anything about the classes, so I shrugged my shoulders, and they shrugged their shoulders, and I walked back to my room. On the way, I ran into a guy who is in the class, and I asked him if he knew anything about it. He simply looked confused and it became clear that he didn't even know he was in the English class. At least I wasn't the only uninformed one.
The next day at work, Rosa asked if I would come join her in her office to talk. I felt a distinct sense of foreboding as I wondered what I could be in trouble for, and then she said, "Benito called me this morning and said you weren't in class yesterday." Oh, great. Now I'm in trouble for missing a class that no one told me about. I was honest and told her that I had been given a list of names but not been told anything about a classroom or a time, and when I went to go ask about it, no one in the office knew either, so we just didn't have class. Rosa told me that my students had been waiting for me, but I never showed, and I responded by telling her that I had run into a student who knew nothing about the class either. She still seemed irked, but told me to explain the situation to Benito.
I saw him later that day, and he didn't seem angry. I made sure to show him the piece of paper I'd been given, and point out that no time or place was written. He had someone show me where the classroom was, and told me "no pasa nada."
On Thursday, I went to the residence for my first classes with the girls. I was sitting alone at lunch, like I do, when a girl approached me and asked if she could sit with me. Of course, I said. She asked if I was the "lectora de ingles" and if that meant she had to speak English to sit with me. No, I said she didn't have to speak English if she didn't want to. I asked if she was in my class and she said she thought she might be. I gave her my two papers and said she could look for her name, and she found herself in the second class, and it was apparent that this was a bit of a surprise. "Nadie me ha avisado que tenemos clase hoy..." she said. ("No one told me we have class today...") Yeah, well, me neither.
I was a little bit nervous, but I felt better about these classes because they're my own. I can do what I want, speak as much Spanish as I need to, and not have a teacher watching my every move. I had prepared a bit of a speech to start the class off, an introduction of myself and what my expectations were. Then I had them go around the room and introduce themselves in English, and I made the effort to memorize all their names (admittedly, this kills a lotta time). Then we all went over how you introduce yourself, describe yourself, and some questions that you ask when you're getting to know someone new.
The next Tuesday, I went to my first classes with the boys. The first hour was smaller, and a lot quieter, but better "behaved," you might say. There was one boy who speaks fairly good English, and he ran the show. I'm still new at this teaching thing, but it's hard for me to not favor the ones who participate more than the others. They call my attention, and I get frustrated with the quiet ones because it's like pulling teeth trying to get them to talk sometimes.
The second class was larger and a bit more rowdy, but I tried not to let it intimidate me. At least they were a bit more talkative (and in the case of a language class, that's what you want).
The hour dragged on. I was told by some that the class was an hour, and by others that the class was 45 minutes. At the 40 minute mark, I said that that was enough for today. But apparently it's not within my authority to make that kind of call, because they insisted that we still had time, fearing that if they left early they would get in trouble. One of the other teachers (she directs a sort of guided study type class) was sitting in on the class, and she pushed us on until 5:55, even though I clearly didn't have anymore material.
My first sets of classes didn't go all that smoothly. They were clumsy, but after some self-evaluation, I realized that I wasn't being a leader. I wasn't leading the class, but getting frustrated when the students weren't contributing as much as I needed them to. Live and learn.
After my even clumsier second hour, I went up to the admin office to tell them I wanted to call it quits. Call it luck, good or bad, but of course the director wasn't in the office. The woman who was there asked me if I was getting ready for my next class. That's right...I had another class. "There are students waiting for you downstairs right now." Ugh. Just ugh.
I was so frustrated at this point. I wouldn't mind if someone had told me, to begin with, that I had five hours of English classes per week. I'm not complaining about the volume of work, understand. I fully appreciate that five hours a week is nothing. I'm just annoyed that I was never even told about this class. If I hadn't, by chance, gone to the office, I wouldn't have even known about the fifth hour because no one had told me about it or even included it in my folder with the other lists of names.
Annoyed, I went back downstairs to the room. As I walked past, I saw Alex, who asked me how I was. "Pretty annoyed," I said. "I have another class right now that no one told me about." Someone walking past stopped and said, his face a bit stricken, "You didn't know you have another class?" Ah, shit. I felt so bad. "Well, no," I said. Then I faked some enthusiasm and went in to teach some more English.
This last hour is the voluntary class. These are the students who volunteered to take my English class. They want to be here voluntarily. I had them do the same-introduce themselves in English and say one thing about themselves. One girl said, "I want to learn a lot this year." And suddenly I felt really awful about trying to quit.
I really hate the way the administration have treated me. I was never given any resources, and no one ever told me what I was expected to do apart from "giving an English class for an hour," and even then, no one could seem to agree on the duration of the class. Some said an hour, some said 45 minutes. I haven't been given any materials, and the "classroom" I'm in on Tuesdays is really just a sitting area of the common area, which shares the room with the TV watching area and the pool table. No computer, no projector, no black board. No way to print off materials or worksheets. And I'm supposed to carry on like that for 3 hours every Tuesday and 2 hours every Thursday.
My roommate, who by pure luck is also a teacher, gave me a book of English lessons for classes structured like mine. That is to say, very unstructured. Ones with beginners who might be a little shy and don't have access to materials. I woke up early Thursday morning and spent some time with the book, and actually planned some activities that got the students involved but also guided them along the way. My second day was a great success. I made it all the way through the whole 45 minutes, and all my students were participating. Well, maybe not "all," but it was a great improvement. It seems obvious, but planning and preparing make a helluva difference, don't they?
Speaking of, I'm gonna go plan a lesson about Thanksgiving so that I can be sufficiently depressed about not eating my mom's food.
El mundo es un libro, y ellos que no viajan leen solo una página.
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