the teaching chronicles - first day madness!
My first day went very well! I'm just still abit overwhelmed by the sheer load of work I have i) to do, ii) to prepare, iii) to digest, (iv) to learn and (v) to teach. I had alot going for the first day - even the teachers felt so sorry for me they kept saying, "Oh you poor thing!!", which I responded with a hearty laugh. For one, I had back-to-back lessons first thing in the morning, and I only had 15 mins before class started to get briefed. Another new class at 2 plus where you know students take-in rate is no more than 10% (plus they had a test after my period!) So I had to keep the conversation (or rather monologue) going for an hour about racism in 1950s and 60s America. Thank God I know my Rosa Parks, Dr MLK Jr, 1963 speech etc.
Lots of info to take in, but I did well enough to get through the day! :)
When my day FINALLY ended at 245pm, I had to sit down, take 10 deep breaths, before I can reply my slew of messages (and well-wishes thanks so much!!), sort out tomorrow's to-do list, and gather stuff to bring home to read and prepare for tomorrow's lesson.
DEEP BREATH.
The kids are generally - I stress generally - okay. You get the usual lians who are hiao like anything, and the usual pai kias who tend to spout Hokkien metaphrases here and there in their speech. And of course the usual class jokes who seem to be able to turn anything serious I say into the joke of the century, prompting a, "Which part of that was funny?", from me. Must be firm mah. But they are generally harmless. They are rowdy, lively and basically just boisterous in class, whether I'm talking or not, and to stop them, I simply just stop talking, stop smiling, stand with my arms akimbo, and tada! They shut up immediately. Awesome!
There was this girl who's the typical lian and gang leader who tried to kb me today. She came in 10 mins late for class, strutted in with a gait of a sumo wrestler, plonked her ass down, shouted "Good Morning Teacher!", and continued yakking away. I wasn't pissed or anything, because I know she's just testing waters. She got the hint when I decided to kb her back - intelligently of course - and then she became less disruptive. Later in the afternoon, she saw me in the corridor, and she greeted me happily, "Eh! You Miss Tan right? See you tomorrow hor!" I just smiled back at her and said yes.
HOW typical, but how harmless :)
Other than that, I can't believe I would ever catch myself saying this, but PRC scholars are an absolute JOY to teach. They are so responsive, hardworking, driven, conscientious - they just make me feel so proud of them. One example why. I played a little introduction activity with them and asked them to use 3 adjectives to describe themselves using the 1st letter of each part of their name. (ie: I would use T, Y and L to form 3 words to describe myself.)
And as you know, Chinese names tend to have many words beginning with letters Z, Y and even X. They can come up with words like, zealous, zany, zestful. OMG! Even words beginning with A, this girl said, "ardent". Shocking anot! And our dear local kids went, 'nice', 'happy', 'good', 'kind'.
I like viewing things from a different point of view all the time. I am beginning to do so, and I really like my perspective this time! I regurgitate things that teachers used to nag us about (Read: "You respect me I respect you", "Tardiness is disallowed", "When I'm talking, don't do other things" blahblahblah), and it's really payback time. For all the times that I bullied my relief teachers and didn't give an arse about what they said, I'm SORRY. No karma please :)
Okay, time to prepare tomorrow's lesson! Taking my job seriously eh.
Miss Tan, out! :)
Lots of info to take in, but I did well enough to get through the day! :)
When my day FINALLY ended at 245pm, I had to sit down, take 10 deep breaths, before I can reply my slew of messages (and well-wishes thanks so much!!), sort out tomorrow's to-do list, and gather stuff to bring home to read and prepare for tomorrow's lesson.
DEEP BREATH.
The kids are generally - I stress generally - okay. You get the usual lians who are hiao like anything, and the usual pai kias who tend to spout Hokkien metaphrases here and there in their speech. And of course the usual class jokes who seem to be able to turn anything serious I say into the joke of the century, prompting a, "Which part of that was funny?", from me. Must be firm mah. But they are generally harmless. They are rowdy, lively and basically just boisterous in class, whether I'm talking or not, and to stop them, I simply just stop talking, stop smiling, stand with my arms akimbo, and tada! They shut up immediately. Awesome!
There was this girl who's the typical lian and gang leader who tried to kb me today. She came in 10 mins late for class, strutted in with a gait of a sumo wrestler, plonked her ass down, shouted "Good Morning Teacher!", and continued yakking away. I wasn't pissed or anything, because I know she's just testing waters. She got the hint when I decided to kb her back - intelligently of course - and then she became less disruptive. Later in the afternoon, she saw me in the corridor, and she greeted me happily, "Eh! You Miss Tan right? See you tomorrow hor!" I just smiled back at her and said yes.
HOW typical, but how harmless :)
Other than that, I can't believe I would ever catch myself saying this, but PRC scholars are an absolute JOY to teach. They are so responsive, hardworking, driven, conscientious - they just make me feel so proud of them. One example why. I played a little introduction activity with them and asked them to use 3 adjectives to describe themselves using the 1st letter of each part of their name. (ie: I would use T, Y and L to form 3 words to describe myself.)
And as you know, Chinese names tend to have many words beginning with letters Z, Y and even X. They can come up with words like, zealous, zany, zestful. OMG! Even words beginning with A, this girl said, "ardent". Shocking anot! And our dear local kids went, 'nice', 'happy', 'good', 'kind'.
I like viewing things from a different point of view all the time. I am beginning to do so, and I really like my perspective this time! I regurgitate things that teachers used to nag us about (Read: "You respect me I respect you", "Tardiness is disallowed", "When I'm talking, don't do other things" blahblahblah), and it's really payback time. For all the times that I bullied my relief teachers and didn't give an arse about what they said, I'm SORRY. No karma please :)
Okay, time to prepare tomorrow's lesson! Taking my job seriously eh.
Miss Tan, out! :)