The Post Where I Finally Talk About Teaching (Part 2)

(The songs that are featured in these posts are on my I-Pod, which I listen to everyday during my commute to and from school.)

Morning Ceremony

Although I arrive in Bang Pa-In around 6:45, school doesn't actually begin until 7:45, so I kill an hour eating breakfast, reveling in my celebrity status as I walk along the school's campus, brushing my teeth, and spinning around in circles in my swivel chair. At 7:45, morning ceremony begins. The students (all 2,000) gather on the football (soccer, for the unenlightened) pitch. The students form perfect lines, exactly an arm's length apart. The real teachers prowl about the students, making sure that they are forming lines while the phrang teachers (Stuart, Kristin, and I) sit at one of the lunch benches. The band then plays the three mandatory songs: the national anthem, the school song, and the national song for schoolchildren. After the songs are finished, the students will then kneel on the grass and begin their morning prayers. Afterwards, a Thai teacher (usually the guy we've dubbed the Nazi) will take over the microphone and begin a morning talk. I don't know what the other teachers say, but the Nazi essentially berates the students for 10 minutes. Around the 10-minute mark he begins what we've dubbed freestylin', which means that he turns the mic off and he screams on his own lung power. Ironically enough, as he does this all the students are fidgeting, cleaning their nails, etc.

The highlight of morning assemblies are on Tuesday mornings. Every week, one of the phrang teachers is responsible for "Word of the Day." We pick a word and one of our classes to perform the word. We read the definition and have the students spell it out with giant cardboard letters. Then we give an example of usage and the students act it out. My first word, naturally, was "entourage." My example: "Britney Spears' entourage got into a fight with Michael Jackson's entourage." As I was preparing for this, there was never any doubt in my mind that the class lady-boy would fill the role of Britney Spears, which he performed admirably. However, as awesome as "entourage" was, it didn't compare to Stuart's "negotiation," as in "to negotiate with a terrorist, or with a suicide jumper." Even though I'm not due up again for another 2 weeks, I already have my next word planned--"miscommunication"--as in, "every day of work in a Thai school features at least one miscommunication." I think only Stuart and Kristin will find it funny, but then again, that's the whole point of "Word of the Day."

My Students

I have about 900 students total, 400 of which I see twice a week. It seems like there are a lot more girls than boys, though I haven't actually tried counting and have no explanation for this. In general, Thai's tend to be very laid back academically. That's a polite way of saying that they are very lazy. This is not true of the 1's and 2's, and about half of the 3's and 4's, but for everyone else, minus the token good student in each classroom, it's true. Teaching in Thailand has made me realize how many basic features of school we take for granted in the United States. For instance, there is apparently no rule against cell phones, so the students will have them out during class and be blatantly texting, sometimes even talking on the phone. More often than not, the students won't bother taking notes, or even pulling out their notebooks, or really even pretend to take notes. Danielle, who I replaced, had taught in Korea before coming to Thailand. In Korea, the students are very serious and very self-motivated so it was a shock coming into Thailand. Apparently, she was told by the Thai teachers that she was too boring and too difficult.

That being said, the Thai students are incredibly fun to teach. They respond really well to any kind of humor, especially facial gestures and acting out concepts in a silly way. Without a doubt, it's a blessing that I have more girls than boys, because the girls are better behaved and generally more likable. I'm not sure whether they're all actually as sweet as they seem to be or if they just pretend to be, but I don't really care. The boys are more of a handful. The lower-level boys will constantly be getting up, hitting each other, and (to use my old Catholic school's terminology) grabassing. I think the huge difference in behavior comes from the fact that traditional gender roles are alive and well in Thailand. Girls are taught to be (mostly) quiet, respectful, and obedient, whereas it's thought that "boys will be boys." The lady-boys are a lot of fun because they combine the best of both worlds. They're loud--usually the lady-boys are the loudest in the classroom--like the boys, but are respectful and pay attention like the girls. I won't even begin to deny that I prefer the girls to the boys, although the best boys are usually more fun than the best girls. I think the best teaching job would be to a teacher at an all-girls school; however, you would miss out on the lady-boys and that would be a damn shame.

The other day Kristin and I would talking about the couples, and I said that I didn't want any of my girls to date any of my boys because I wanted them to idolize me constantly. I added that none of the boys were good enough for the girls anyway, and Kristin strongly agreed with this sentiment. After having thought about it some more, I'd be willing to slightly retract that statement and say that there are about 10 of my boys who I would allow to date my girls, but no more 10 of my boys are deserving of even the worst of my girls.

My Emotional Girlfriends

A question that I get asked often is, "Do you have any favorites?" I can say "yes" to this without the slightest hesitation. There are 4 girls in my 4/3 and 4/4 (2 in each) that are my absolute favorites. I'll even go as far to say that there's roughly a 70% chance that I'll someday marry one of these girls. I realize it may be tedious and borderline-creepy to read about my infatuation with some of my students, but when you're in love you want to proclaim it from a mountain. This blog is my proverbial mountain, so let me tell you why I love these girls.

For the first three weeks of my 4/3 and 4/4 classes, I was without a Thai teacher because she was out with surgery. I try not rely on the Thai teacher anyway, so this wouldn't have been a big deal except that I was charged with teaching my students about job interviews, including vocabulary such as "qualifications" and "work experience." Every day of these classes was an exercise in absolute failure. I would try to explain everything in the simplest terms possible and none of my students would understand. I'd explain over and over again in different ways and still nothing. Granted, this is partially because the 4/3's and 4/4's are clever, but are slackers and only about half of them actually pay attention, but the majority of the blame falls on my shoulders. The silver lining of these classes were the four girls who would sit in the front, listen with rapt attention, and take immaculate notes. They were not unique in this regard, but they were very unique in that they would ask questions and ask me for clarification (even the good Thai students never do this and it pisses me off because I know that 60% of what I say doesn't make sense to native English-speakers, much less to Thai students). It wasn't very long before they understood and without any prompting on my part, they explained everything to their classmates in Thai.

Students like these are the reason why I come to class everyday optimistic and in a good mood, and why I never let myself half-ass a lesson. I have other students who speak better English than these girls, but none of my students has a better attitude. My 4/3 and 4/4 classes are my favorites because of these girls. One of the girls asked me for my email address so she could practice English; anyone else I would have told to fuck off, but I was more than happy to give it to her.

Adam told me about his "emotional boyfriend," who he's never dated or even been with, but they pretty much function as a couple anyway. When I told him about these girls, we decided that they were my emotional girlfriends. I'll probably end up dating some other Thai girl (who hopefully isn't one of my students), but my heart will always belong to them.

My Teaching Style

I've been working with children in some fashion or another for the past 6 years, so I can say that I'm comfortable with them and fairly knowledgeable. One of my jobs was as a summer camp counselor, and I've used all of my tricks from two summers to teach English to Thai's. As a counselor, my philosophy was, "I don't keep up with my students, they keep up with me." I apply this same idea to teaching and it works wonderfully.

Thai students are used to listening to their teachers drone on in a monotonous voice into a microphone for 50 minutes, so when their teacher comes in running around and screaming their interest is immediately peaked. If I can, I always try to shout at (not yell at, there's a distinction) my students. Thai's have an undeserved reputation as quiet; it's really the exact opposite. Thai's are fucking loud, and when I shout at them, it essentially gives them permission to shout back at me. I also exaggerate the English sounds, which they are entertained by to no end. Finally, I draw lots of funny pictures on the board and act out them out in the silliest way possible. On my first day, Kristin told me that Thai students don't want a teacher, they want a clown. I'm more than happy to be their clown and they respond to it.

Reading this you probably get the impression that I'm a really good, really effective teacher. That is far from the case. In reality, I'm an absolutely shitty teacher. Thai students generally don't understand me because I talk too fast (I'm getting better, but for me this is hand-in-hand with high energy) and I don't always explain things very well. I constantly feel guilty because I'm not a better teacher, but I also understand that I have a difficult job that I was completely unprepared for, and that I get better every day. I think that I'll probably be a pretty good teacher by the end of the semester, just in time to leave back to the States. Unfortunately, I'll be replaced by someone who is also brand-new and therefore a shitty teacher so I feel bad for my students. They really deserve some kind of recognition for the crap they have to put up with.

The Teacher's Conundrum (Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Exploit the System to Give my Good Students Good Grades)

One of the more unique aspects of my school is that I'm expected to give a test every two weeks. There are many of my friends who are not expected to give a test all semester, and most are only expected to give a midterm and a final. I don't particularly mind giving tests so frequently, as they kill a week's worth of lesson plans (one day of test review, one day for tests), but grading the tests is incredibly difficult. The teacher's conundrum is this: if one of your good students makes a bad grade, do you find a way to change the grade to a good one and risk setting a precedent? I always answer yes to this question.

More often than not, I find that my good students make a mistake because they tried to do too much, get too creative, or think outside the box. Whereas the majority of the students will simply regurgitate the boring and simple examples that I gave them during the test review. Last week I gave my 4/1-4/4's a test on job interviews. One of the questions asked them to pick a dream job and list their qualifications for that job. When I explained it, I tried to make it fairly simple, so the qualifications were things like "I'm patient," "I'm honest," "I like working with children." Naturally these were the majority of my answers. However, many of my good students got very creative. One of my boys in 4/1 wanted to be a computer programmer. He listed one of his qualifications as "I can design security sistems for intel companies." Teacher's conundrum: do I count off because he misspelled "systems" (an easy mistake for a non native English speaker), or do I find a way to give him credit? My students compare their tests when they get them back, so I know that I have to be consistent, otherwise they'll call me on it. Thus, I have to get creative and exploit flaws in my own test to make sure that this kid gets a good grade (this is the same kid who told me his favorite after school activity was "illegally downloading music on the Internet"....there's no way he doesn't make an A in my class); after all I can't award points for "awesomeness" even though I'd like to.

Fun Anecdotes (I'll add more as I think of them)

• One of my students came into class wearing a hoodie that read "Real Men Use Viagra." It took all my willpower not to burst into laughter.
• When I taught "swagger" to my 2/9's, I had the class lady-boy come to the front to demonstrate. He didn't swagger so much as he strutted like he was on the runway. He even did the spin.
• On Friday I accidentally taught my 3/8's "fuck." I was trying to teach them "funk," but as it would happen, Thai's can't make the "nt" sound. However, they are quite adept at the "ck" sound. Thus I was treated to a chorus of fuck's. Out of curiosity, I had them say "monk"; they said, "muck." At least they don't know what they're saying.