Thursday, January 27, 2011
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
On "Teaching"
First, I'd like to mention that looking young while working at a high school definitely has its disadvantages. Like today for example, I spent half an hour looking for the class I was supposed to be working with because they weren't where they were supposed to be then gave up and started walking back to my room, only to be stopped by a stern old man who asked me "mademoiselle, vous allez ou la?" in a rather rude fashion. And when I told him that I was the English assistant, he just said "oh" and walked away. No apology, just a haughty "oh." Rude, especially considering that it's culturally unacceptable to not say hello before asking for directions.
But anyway, teaching! Or rather, not teaching. Before I came here, I was worried that I wouldn't have enough topics to cover, that I would be terrible at planning lessons and would run out of things to talk about in class, or that students wouldn't be interested in what I had to say. Fortunately that has not been the case. Unfortunately, it is not for reasons that you might expect.
My official job title here is "English language assistant." From that, our orientations, and the job description provided in the application, I gathered that my responsibilities should - and would - include working with small groups of students and helping them improve their accents, getting them motivated and excited about learning a foreign language, sharing a little bit of American culture with them, and teaching them about American society. Basically, teaching them English in small groups of 4-6 while facilitating cross-cultural exchange and speaking about my own experiences in the US. What I do instead is give mock oral exams on one-on-one situations. Lots of mock oral exams. I definitely understand why the teachers ask this of me, since most of my classes are with BTS students (students who have finished high school and are doing vocational training) or with terminales (students in their last year of high school) preparing for their bac. Both groups of students have an oral exam that they need to pass before they graduate, and in theory it's a good opportunity for them to have a "practice session" with a native English speaker. The problem is that most BTS students are not at all interested in learning another language, and from what I've seen, not all that interested in formal education in general. Not all BTS students are like that and I've met quite a few who struggle but make a good effort to talk anyway, but I've also seen far too many students who don't understand the most basic phrases, like "how are you," and who spend almost the entire 15 minutes in painful silence broken only by the occasional "bah, je ne comprends rien" ("uhh, i don't understand anything"). And I'll be the first to admit that it does sometimes get frustrating to work with students who simply refuse to try. At the very least, you could tell me that you don't understand in English! Terminales are generally better, so it's usually a lot more pleasant working with them in these kinds of situations.
But the fact remains that I'm not in France to be a mock examiner for the entire year. We were told explicitly that we should not be working regularly with students on an individual basis, and that we should be talking about cultural and societal differences between the two countries. (Ha. There is obviously a lack of communication between the rectorat and the schools.) But more importantly, I have so much unrecognized skill and potential just going to waste. I can share so much more with the students here, do activities with them that will get them genuinely interested and excited about learning a language that, quite honestly, can be extremely useful. I can do more than hand out documents or images that are selected for this task by the teacher and ask students for their opinions. I can talk about things that literally no one else at this school can. I may not be a licensed teacher, but I do have a lot of experience tutoring and working with students, and understand the challenges involved in learning a foreign language since I myself chose to study one for the past four years. I can and want to do something useful!
Moreover, it makes so little sense for me to do this kind of work and evaluate students (people who, in most cases, I've never seen before) on their performance. I was educated in the States, which means that I don't really understand the standards and expectations for the different levels of students here. I've never taken the bac or even observed one, and have no idea what the criteria for a passing grade are. I don't know what the grades are. I don't know how much I can fairly expect from which students since I do not know them. Yes, I can give them helpful feedback on pronunciation and grammar, but since I'm not familiar with the exam, I don't know which mistakes are actually important and which you can just brush over. So I write down all the mistakes that they make (and the corrections) in my comments, but I'm concerned that this serves to discourage rather than to instruct. I'd certainly be discouraged if I thought that I had done a good job but was given a sheet detailing 20 mistakes I didn't even realize I had made. It would be so much more useful for me to talk about things that I'm interested in and knowledgeable about, no? I can talk about race and gender, class, immigration policies, the education system, healthcare, American politics, hell, pop culture or even football for all I care, so long as I feel qualified or prepared enough to do so. And I can guarantee that it would be more interesting for students than mock exams that they've clearly already done a number of times. (Ever met someone who can't understand/answer "how are you" but can describe a picture? I have, far too many times to count.)
And so I'm left feeling as though I work a lot, but accomplish little to nothing. I have little freedom in deciding what to do, and in most cases am expected to do exactly what the teacher tells me to do. I'm seldom asked for my opinion or for ideas that I have, and if I am asked to do something, it's to look for documents that can be used in the mock exams. In essence, busy work that I really have no interest in doing. I've resigned myself to it for the most part, but what I do here is not at all what I expected. My job is not yet one that I absolutely can't stand, but it's certainly not one that I enjoy either.
If there's anything I've learned this year, it's just how important job satisfaction is to me. I know that I can come off as too serious and not very optimistic at times, but in truth I'm extremely idealistic. My problem is that I have high expectations - both for myself and for others - and expect to make an impact in everything that I do. I need to feel useful, to accomplish something. If I don't, I become unhappy, and if I'm unhappy, I don't do my work well. I think that I expected to somehow "save the world" or at least improve it a little bit by teaching French adolescents English (really not sure how or why anymore), but I don't know if my being here has improved even one student's language abilities. And the possibility that I may have wasted the past four months of my life is not one that I like to think about.
But anyway, teaching! Or rather, not teaching. Before I came here, I was worried that I wouldn't have enough topics to cover, that I would be terrible at planning lessons and would run out of things to talk about in class, or that students wouldn't be interested in what I had to say. Fortunately that has not been the case. Unfortunately, it is not for reasons that you might expect.
My official job title here is "English language assistant." From that, our orientations, and the job description provided in the application, I gathered that my responsibilities should - and would - include working with small groups of students and helping them improve their accents, getting them motivated and excited about learning a foreign language, sharing a little bit of American culture with them, and teaching them about American society. Basically, teaching them English in small groups of 4-6 while facilitating cross-cultural exchange and speaking about my own experiences in the US. What I do instead is give mock oral exams on one-on-one situations. Lots of mock oral exams. I definitely understand why the teachers ask this of me, since most of my classes are with BTS students (students who have finished high school and are doing vocational training) or with terminales (students in their last year of high school) preparing for their bac. Both groups of students have an oral exam that they need to pass before they graduate, and in theory it's a good opportunity for them to have a "practice session" with a native English speaker. The problem is that most BTS students are not at all interested in learning another language, and from what I've seen, not all that interested in formal education in general. Not all BTS students are like that and I've met quite a few who struggle but make a good effort to talk anyway, but I've also seen far too many students who don't understand the most basic phrases, like "how are you," and who spend almost the entire 15 minutes in painful silence broken only by the occasional "bah, je ne comprends rien" ("uhh, i don't understand anything"). And I'll be the first to admit that it does sometimes get frustrating to work with students who simply refuse to try. At the very least, you could tell me that you don't understand in English! Terminales are generally better, so it's usually a lot more pleasant working with them in these kinds of situations.
But the fact remains that I'm not in France to be a mock examiner for the entire year. We were told explicitly that we should not be working regularly with students on an individual basis, and that we should be talking about cultural and societal differences between the two countries. (Ha. There is obviously a lack of communication between the rectorat and the schools.) But more importantly, I have so much unrecognized skill and potential just going to waste. I can share so much more with the students here, do activities with them that will get them genuinely interested and excited about learning a language that, quite honestly, can be extremely useful. I can do more than hand out documents or images that are selected for this task by the teacher and ask students for their opinions. I can talk about things that literally no one else at this school can. I may not be a licensed teacher, but I do have a lot of experience tutoring and working with students, and understand the challenges involved in learning a foreign language since I myself chose to study one for the past four years. I can and want to do something useful!
Moreover, it makes so little sense for me to do this kind of work and evaluate students (people who, in most cases, I've never seen before) on their performance. I was educated in the States, which means that I don't really understand the standards and expectations for the different levels of students here. I've never taken the bac or even observed one, and have no idea what the criteria for a passing grade are. I don't know what the grades are. I don't know how much I can fairly expect from which students since I do not know them. Yes, I can give them helpful feedback on pronunciation and grammar, but since I'm not familiar with the exam, I don't know which mistakes are actually important and which you can just brush over. So I write down all the mistakes that they make (and the corrections) in my comments, but I'm concerned that this serves to discourage rather than to instruct. I'd certainly be discouraged if I thought that I had done a good job but was given a sheet detailing 20 mistakes I didn't even realize I had made. It would be so much more useful for me to talk about things that I'm interested in and knowledgeable about, no? I can talk about race and gender, class, immigration policies, the education system, healthcare, American politics, hell, pop culture or even football for all I care, so long as I feel qualified or prepared enough to do so. And I can guarantee that it would be more interesting for students than mock exams that they've clearly already done a number of times. (Ever met someone who can't understand/answer "how are you" but can describe a picture? I have, far too many times to count.)
And so I'm left feeling as though I work a lot, but accomplish little to nothing. I have little freedom in deciding what to do, and in most cases am expected to do exactly what the teacher tells me to do. I'm seldom asked for my opinion or for ideas that I have, and if I am asked to do something, it's to look for documents that can be used in the mock exams. In essence, busy work that I really have no interest in doing. I've resigned myself to it for the most part, but what I do here is not at all what I expected. My job is not yet one that I absolutely can't stand, but it's certainly not one that I enjoy either.
If there's anything I've learned this year, it's just how important job satisfaction is to me. I know that I can come off as too serious and not very optimistic at times, but in truth I'm extremely idealistic. My problem is that I have high expectations - both for myself and for others - and expect to make an impact in everything that I do. I need to feel useful, to accomplish something. If I don't, I become unhappy, and if I'm unhappy, I don't do my work well. I think that I expected to somehow "save the world" or at least improve it a little bit by teaching French adolescents English (really not sure how or why anymore), but I don't know if my being here has improved even one student's language abilities. And the possibility that I may have wasted the past four months of my life is not one that I like to think about.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
I just got back from buying plane/train/bus tickets for the upcoming break - called winter break even though it goes from late Feb to early March - and am so excited! Lisbon, followed by Granada and Sevilla (I've been to both before but Andalucia is beautiful and I get to see Jeff again!), and hopefully Cadiz for Carnaval, then Marrakech. Which translates to warm weather and a lot of sunlight. Mmm can't wait!
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Joyeux Noel & Frohes Neues Jahr
I had to look up the German spelling for Happy New Year, and it is totally not what I was expecting.
Moving on.
I had to spend the holidays away from home this year - another first - but luckily I didn't have to be alone. I met up with Jeff and Megan in Paris for Christmas, where we basically ate our way around the city and watched BBC specials on Chechnya and other places. (In our defense, a lot of things were closed while we were there.) We did walk around the city quite a bit though, and managed to go to the Musee d'Orsay on our last day there. We also went to the Sacre Coeur, Laduree, and the Christmas market on the Champs Elysees, and saw many a drunk SDF shouting vulgarities on the metro. Christmas dinner was a little bit pricey but delicious - there was no turkey or ham involved, but foie gras, kir, tartiflette, profiteroles, and wine aren't a bad alternative.
After our short three day stay, we went to Germany to see friends who used to be German teaching assistants at Amherst. Jeff and I flew out first to Dusseldorf, where Helene picked us up at the airport and gave us a little tour of the city before taking us to a restaurant to eat an insane amount of food (I had a huge ham hock, mashed potatoes, and sauerkraut) and try German beers while we waited for Megan to arrive. After a not so successful attempt to go see a pink castle nearby, we picked Megan up from the airport and drove to Gottingen, a cute university town in the center of Germany. Again, we spent most of our time just hanging out and talking or watching movies, but it was easily the best week I've had since I've gotten to Europe. After the frustration I experienced in France, it was refreshing to get away for a bit and see friends in a place where things actually get done. Though I haven't spent too much time in Germany, from what I saw it is generally much cleaner, better organized, friendlier, and cheaper than France. I absolutely adore it, as our German friends heard approximately 10 times a day, and can't wait to head back there. Really, what is there not to love about a place where you can spend 20 minutes looking at all of the different Haribo candies, roads are cleared in a timely manner when it snows, and beer is 2 euros for 2 pints instead of 3 euros for half a pint?! Not to mention the guys, who are super tall and good looking, and somehow all speak English.
New Year's Eve was a little bit more exciting than the rest of our time in Gottingen, though the ice skating and trying out newly learned German phrases on servers in restaurants were also extremely entertaining. We dressed up in typical American fashion then had raclette (potatoes, meat, veggies, and bread with a lot of melted cheese) and sparkling wine before doing the bleigiesen thing, a German NYE tradition. Bleigeisen is where you melt metal shapes - we had a heart, money bag, coin, crown, and some others - over a candle then throw it into a bowl of cold water so that it takes a new form, then interpret the shape to find out your fortune. We had dessert afterward and hung out at the house for a little bit longer before heading out and counting down to the new year outside. We set off fireworks and lit sparklers (and by that I mean other people set off fireworks as I watched and played with sparklers instead) at midnight, when I accidentally texted people with "bonne anniversaire" instead of "bonne annee," then continued to ring in the new year until around 4 am. All in all a good night, though a far cry from what I usually do at home.
Moving on.
I had to spend the holidays away from home this year - another first - but luckily I didn't have to be alone. I met up with Jeff and Megan in Paris for Christmas, where we basically ate our way around the city and watched BBC specials on Chechnya and other places. (In our defense, a lot of things were closed while we were there.) We did walk around the city quite a bit though, and managed to go to the Musee d'Orsay on our last day there. We also went to the Sacre Coeur, Laduree, and the Christmas market on the Champs Elysees, and saw many a drunk SDF shouting vulgarities on the metro. Christmas dinner was a little bit pricey but delicious - there was no turkey or ham involved, but foie gras, kir, tartiflette, profiteroles, and wine aren't a bad alternative.
After our short three day stay, we went to Germany to see friends who used to be German teaching assistants at Amherst. Jeff and I flew out first to Dusseldorf, where Helene picked us up at the airport and gave us a little tour of the city before taking us to a restaurant to eat an insane amount of food (I had a huge ham hock, mashed potatoes, and sauerkraut) and try German beers while we waited for Megan to arrive. After a not so successful attempt to go see a pink castle nearby, we picked Megan up from the airport and drove to Gottingen, a cute university town in the center of Germany. Again, we spent most of our time just hanging out and talking or watching movies, but it was easily the best week I've had since I've gotten to Europe. After the frustration I experienced in France, it was refreshing to get away for a bit and see friends in a place where things actually get done. Though I haven't spent too much time in Germany, from what I saw it is generally much cleaner, better organized, friendlier, and cheaper than France. I absolutely adore it, as our German friends heard approximately 10 times a day, and can't wait to head back there. Really, what is there not to love about a place where you can spend 20 minutes looking at all of the different Haribo candies, roads are cleared in a timely manner when it snows, and beer is 2 euros for 2 pints instead of 3 euros for half a pint?! Not to mention the guys, who are super tall and good looking, and somehow all speak English.
New Year's Eve was a little bit more exciting than the rest of our time in Gottingen, though the ice skating and trying out newly learned German phrases on servers in restaurants were also extremely entertaining. We dressed up in typical American fashion then had raclette (potatoes, meat, veggies, and bread with a lot of melted cheese) and sparkling wine before doing the bleigiesen thing, a German NYE tradition. Bleigeisen is where you melt metal shapes - we had a heart, money bag, coin, crown, and some others - over a candle then throw it into a bowl of cold water so that it takes a new form, then interpret the shape to find out your fortune. We had dessert afterward and hung out at the house for a little bit longer before heading out and counting down to the new year outside. We set off fireworks and lit sparklers (and by that I mean other people set off fireworks as I watched and played with sparklers instead) at midnight, when I accidentally texted people with "bonne anniversaire" instead of "bonne annee," then continued to ring in the new year until around 4 am. All in all a good night, though a far cry from what I usually do at home.
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| Christmas in Paris |
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| Dusseldorf and its awesome clock tower |
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| The most kissed girl in the world, Gottingen |
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| Amherst friends! |
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| New Year's Eve |
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| Bleigiesen |
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| Setting off fireworks! |
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| Post-countdown! Frohes Neues Jahr! |
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| Things I bought in Germany. You'd think I live in a third world country, but things are just a lot more expensive (and jalapenos don't exist) here. |
Monday, December 20, 2010
This has been a fantastic week
I've seen blues skies (and even some sun!) for 5 days in a row, I had a conversation in French with one of the students here and was able to connect with him, another student told me he didn't want to go to French class because he liked talking to me better, I made 2 of my classes sing Christmas songs and they actually enjoyed it, 4 of my 12 classes got canceled, 3 of those 4 were on Friday so I got the day off, I made crab cakes for an English dept potluck and had teachers tell me (in a very surprised tone, of course, since all we Americans eat is McDonald's) that they were really good, managed to bust my outlets again while making said crab cakes but in a truly not French fashion got them fixed 3 hours later, finally found cheap winter boots, and am now on break. What a great end to the first semester.
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