Monday, December 12, 2005
FREEDOM, TEACHING ENGRISH, LEARNING CHINESE
Friday, after 15 hours of partying to celebrate the end of the program, I went to sleep around 4am. The next morning, I went over to Summit Langage School where I'll be teaching (and maybe doing some private Chinese study) to observe a class and learn how to teach it. It seemed easy enough. I was told to come back Tuesday to watch another class.
Sunday morning, I recieve a call from Maggie, the Chinese owner of Summit who asked me if I could stop by around 4. I said sure. I came in at 3:45 and was told my class had already arrived. Oops, an oversight on Maggies part. "Ben can you stop by," "Ben can you teach a class with no advance warning," same thing. Right? My class was 4-11 year olds and the book had us learning musical instruments. Ok, easy enough. I walk in and an 11 year old says, "ta you huang se tou fa (he has yellow hair)" to another kid then they both start laughing. I look at him and say "yes, I do. Wo ye hui shuo zhongwen (I also speak Chinese.)" This scared the crap out of him because I guess their last teacher coundn't speak any Chinese and they would crack jokes all class. They were mostly good after that. They were quite enthusiastic too, with all 12 kids shouting, "let me try, let me try" when they wanted to speak (at least they raised their hands.) We then began learning instruments. Why anyone needs to learn "xylophone," let alone a person just learning English is beyond me. It took them a long time but by the end of the class they could all say "xylophone." Everyone knew "piano" since 10 of the 12 played it. The only word none of them could get, no matter how hard I tried was "saxophone." Go figure. My next class is Tuesday evening.
This morning I started at the Kunming College of Eastern Languages. There are 4 people in my class - an Israeli, an Brit, a girl from somewhere in Europe and Me. Class is interesting. A bit difficult and I don't know about the teacher, so I'm not sure if I'll continue there. If nothing else, it was the cheapest place to get a student visa. I move into my appartiment in 2 days and am very excited about it. More to come.
Friday, after 15 hours of partying to celebrate the end of the program, I went to sleep around 4am. The next morning, I went over to Summit Langage School where I'll be teaching (and maybe doing some private Chinese study) to observe a class and learn how to teach it. It seemed easy enough. I was told to come back Tuesday to watch another class.
Sunday morning, I recieve a call from Maggie, the Chinese owner of Summit who asked me if I could stop by around 4. I said sure. I came in at 3:45 and was told my class had already arrived. Oops, an oversight on Maggies part. "Ben can you stop by," "Ben can you teach a class with no advance warning," same thing. Right? My class was 4-11 year olds and the book had us learning musical instruments. Ok, easy enough. I walk in and an 11 year old says, "ta you huang se tou fa (he has yellow hair)" to another kid then they both start laughing. I look at him and say "yes, I do. Wo ye hui shuo zhongwen (I also speak Chinese.)" This scared the crap out of him because I guess their last teacher coundn't speak any Chinese and they would crack jokes all class. They were mostly good after that. They were quite enthusiastic too, with all 12 kids shouting, "let me try, let me try" when they wanted to speak (at least they raised their hands.) We then began learning instruments. Why anyone needs to learn "xylophone," let alone a person just learning English is beyond me. It took them a long time but by the end of the class they could all say "xylophone." Everyone knew "piano" since 10 of the 12 played it. The only word none of them could get, no matter how hard I tried was "saxophone." Go figure. My next class is Tuesday evening.
This morning I started at the Kunming College of Eastern Languages. There are 4 people in my class - an Israeli, an Brit, a girl from somewhere in Europe and Me. Class is interesting. A bit difficult and I don't know about the teacher, so I'm not sure if I'll continue there. If nothing else, it was the cheapest place to get a student visa. I move into my appartiment in 2 days and am very excited about it. More to come.
