I'm sorry, are you from the past?!
It's an overwhelming feeling of disappointment when you greet one of the more able student in your class while walking around campus after lunch, and he casually drops the line: “By the way, I didn't understand anything you said in yesterday's lecture.”
Despite numerous attempts to coax some - nay - any sort of feedback from students during the lectures, they still find it daunting to raise their hand in class, never mind uttering something face-losing like “I'm not sure I understand, could you please explain that part again?”
When challenged they always come back with the standard “Well, Chinese students are usually rather shy…” Testicles. I'm aware that it's considered ‘embarassing’ to ‘lose-face’ in front of others, but until you're willing to admit there's something you don't understand, you're not going to learn anything new, especially seeing as you're going to be stuck in the UK for the next two years. Dammit. Get over it. Suck it up and learn.
I suggested that we - and any of his other friends who didn't understand anything I said during yesterday's lecture - can go over the slides again in tomorrow's labs (not my labs; only if they've already finished their assigned coursework and Paul doesn't mind.) Let's see if anyone else owns up…
Which somehow brings me to the final note for today. Best ever excuse for not doing your coursework in labs: “I can't log on because my password has capital letters in it, and the Caps Lock key is broken on this computer.”
“I'm sorry, are you from the past?!”