Teaching Trials, Tribulations and Triumph! (10/4)

Today I was asked to substitute teach an English class for the first year students studying Tourism. I was given no information the size of the class or what they were learning, I was simply instructed to have them practice dialogue. The class was 2 hours and 15 minutes and I had no idea how I would fill all that time! I have never taught a class in my life, and now I, a person who knows very little Tetum, was being asked to teach a 2 hour English class to students who knew very little English. This was going to be interesting.

One of the Sisters escorted me to my room and introduced me to the class (a group of 22 16 year olds). As we walked into the class, all the students stood up and loudly said, “Bondia Hermana!!” After a 2 sentence or so introduction, she smiled and nodded goodbye to me. As she left she told me if I had any problems, I could contact the secretary in the next room. Only slightly relieved, I half smiled and waved goodbye. I turned to face the class.

 “Bondia. Hau nia naran Keelan. Mai husi América.” Good morning. My name is Keelan. I am from America. I knew the girls in the class knew who I was, but there were 4 boys who probably didn’t and it is always good to be polite and introduce yourself to a class, even if they might know who you are.

After this I blanked and glanced at my “cheat sheet” for help with the Tetum words. I said, “Today we are going to learn English, but we will start with a game.” At this, everyone smiled. “Bring your chairs and make a circle.” The kids eagerly complied and shortly there was a nice big circle in the middle of the room, with the chairs pushed to the side of the class.  I explained the game as best as I could in English. Basically 1 person is “it”. I was “it” first so I stood in the middle of the circle and said something true about myself. For example: My favorite color is green. I then told them if THEIR favorite color was green then they must stand up and move to another chair. I repeated the sentence, my favorite color is green. In English I asked if anybody else’s favorite color was green. Blank stares. “Ok,” I said, slightly panicking. This wasn’t supposed to happen. “My favorite color is red.” Still no movement. Plus, I just contradicted myself. I looked a girl in the eye and asked her her favorite color. She replied, “roza” (pink). “Ok, MY favorite color is roza,” I said exasperatedly. She was the only one who stood up and we traded places.

 I am sure the kids were a little apprehensive, but I could see that they didn’t understand the game, and I didn’t know how to explain it to them. Each time a student would get up, they would politely introduce themselves and say a fact about them (their age, where they were born, their favorite color), but after stating their fact everyone else would just stare at them. Eventually somebody else would get up (out of courtesy perhaps?), but ONLY 1 other person. I tried to say that EVERYONE who agreed with this statement had to get up, but they just didn’t get it. I made several vain attempts to explain, but finally, after 12 or so agonizing minutes, I gave up and had them return their chairs to their desks. At this point I thought they must think I am a complete idiot and don’t know what a “game” is. A game is supposed to be fun. There is no way they could have thought that was fun.

Once they returned to their seats I explained the next assignment. I told them they would be working with an amigu (I couldn’t find the word for partner, but “friend” didn’t seem right, either) on a dialogue. One person would be the customer and the other would be a receptionist at a hotel. The customer calls the receptionist to get more information about the hotel. I then wrote things on the board that I wanted them to include in their conversation. Some of the things I listed that they must include in their conversation was the hotel name, customer name, hotel location (city, country, is it close to anything), smoking/non-smoking, room rate, entertainment, pool, date of reservation, and how many nights they would stay. I asked them to write down their dialog to present in front of the class.

I was met with blank stares (as I expected, but was still not really prepared for). I decided to match up the students myself, thinking that might help things along. Finally, a boy in the back politely asked me to explain again. I did so, speaking slowly, but knowing it wouldn’t matter how slowly I spoke if they didn’t know the words I was using. They seemed to understand and soon they were hard at work. I went to each individual group to make sure they understood (only to be met with more blank stares). When I got to the boys in the back of the class, I saw that they had their journals open to a page with this activity already in their notebooks. There was dialogue for the receptionist and customer. “Oh great,” I thought, “They have already done this before. Now they are going to think this is pointless and this activity will only take 10 minutes, tops. Plus, they will all have the exact same dialog because no one will actually write a new one.” I went around to each group and explained that I wanted them to do something LIKE what was already in their journals, but to write a NEW one. I doubted anyone would heed my instructions.

 At the front of the class again, I began to frantically think of another activity to occupy their time. The only other activity I had planned was Pictionary, but there was no way we could play that for an hour and half. I could assign them a different scenario-maybe at a restaurant? No, I bet they have already done that, too. Then, a spark of enlightenment from God himself. I could pair them up again and tell them that one of them had just returned from a vacation to Australia and was telling their friend all the details of their trip. They must include in their dialogue who they went with, when they went, how long they stayed, what they brought, what they wore, how they got there, what they saw, what food they ate, where they stayed, what souvenirs they bought and what they did. I was sure this would take more time than the activity I planned because I bet they had never done this before. Plus, it would be good practice for them to speak in past tense. I felt a wave of relief sweep over me.

Surprisingly, however, my back-up plan was not needed. The students worked diligently and quietly on this assignment for an hour and half before the first groups finished. I was shocked and relieved. At first, I saw the pair of boys in the back working separately, and I thought they surely must be planning to just read the old dialog. Should I reproach them or just let it slide? But to my surprise, they DID write a new dialog, and for some reason their game plan was to initially work separately.

The entire right side of the room seemed to finish at the same time (around 9:30), while the left side of the room continued working? “Now what should I do? Would the ones who were finished be rowdy and out of hand, and distract those still working?” Again, I was surprised to find that they remained quiet, even though I didn’t have something else for them to do. What was I supposed to do-give them extra work? Instead, I walked around to each of the groups and read their dialogues. I fixed the few punctuation and grammar mistakes they made, and they were pleasant and acted grateful to meFinally at 9:45 I asked the groups that were still working to please finish up within the next few minutes. I didn’t even have to call a group up to start off the presentations. They voluntarily walked up and began themselves. I KNEW I should have gone in order, because there were 11 groups total, and I couldn’t remember who had gone and who hadn’t gone yet. I kept asking this one group right in front of me if they were ready, even motioned with my hands for them to come up, but they just stared blankly at me. Had they already gone? Why couldn’t I remember?

For the most part, the class was very well behaved while each pair presented. A couple times it got loud when I could see there were some groups talking among themselves because they hadn’t finished. Once all the groups had performed (1 girl didn’t even use her notes, I was so proud!), there was still 8 minutes of class left. I decided to play a revised game of Pictionary. I asked for a volunteer. Everyone just stared. Then the boy who had asked the question earlier raised his hand. I told him to come to the front of the class and draw the word I would show him. The rest of the class had to “siik” (guess). This game was easy enough to explain, so I didn’t foresee many problems-except that maybe the people wouldn’t know the word they were asked to draw.

Sure enough, I showed the boy the word “GRAPES”. He moaned and then, after thinking for a minute, he proceeded to draw a (very nice) umbrella. The class guessed umbrella and he kept drawing. I was confused. They were confused. We were all confused. He finally stopped drawing and admitted it was an umbrella. I had the person who guessed the word umbrella come up to draw the next picture. I gave her the word airplane. She drew a flower. Someone guessed flower early, but she proceeded to draw the whole thing. In her defense, it was a very pretty flower. The next girl who came up was shown the word pig and she drew a glass. I couldn’t understand what was going on. This game wasn’t difficult. All they had to do was draw the word that I gave them. If they didn’t know the word, wouldn’t they just say, “I don’t know or la hatene?” Instead, they were creative enough to come up with their own word and draw that instead.

I showed the next girl that came up the word “candle”, and she said, “Oh, candle”, loudly enough (but by accident of course) that the first row could hear her. I was going to stop her and give her another word, but she was set on drawing it. She did draw a very lovely candle. I gave another girl the word rainbow, and before she had even started drawing, several people in the class had guessed the word. I was thoroughly confused. Had she mouthed the word or somehow signed what the word was when I wasn’t looking? How did everyone know? There was no way they had seen the word I showed her. Finally, a girl came up and I gave her the word pig. She made several futile attempts to draw it, each time erasing whatever she had created. Finally, I decided to help her out. I drew my best rendition of a pig (it was pretty terrible, but it got the point across). When I drew the snout as the finishing touch, the whole class laughed. I didn’t hear anyone say pig, but maybe they all knew the word, so I wrote PIG in big letters across its stomach. Maybe that did the trick, because the next girl who came up was shown the word 2 o’clock. She nodded and drew a lovely clock, but made the hands of the clock show 6 o’clock instead of 2 o’clock. The kids laughed when she was numbering the clock because she wrote 18 in the place where 6 should go. I gave the word coffee to the last kid who came up. She drew a nice mug, and I helped add the finishing touches with steam and a coffee bean. The kids guessed it!

I looked at my clock and it was already 10:08. Surprised, I asked what time the class ended, thinking maybe I had gotten the time wrong and the class didn’t really end at 10 after all. They told me the class ended at 10 and I apologized for going over time. The boy who had asked the questions and volunteered to draw the first picture then said, “Usually, this class I very kole (tired), but you made it interesting. You are funny.” I was so surprised and flattered by this very unexpected comment. I thanked him and looked around to see the whole class smiling. Even though the ENTIRE class had not gone as planned, the students had still enjoyed it! I was so surprised! I laughed to myself as I left class, thinking how much MORE they could have enjoyed it if they had understood the games I had tried to show them. I told them I had really enjoyed it too and that I hoped to come back and teach them in the future. Then I told them they were free to go and that I didn’t want to make them late for their next class. No one moved. I asked where their next class was, and they replied HERE. “Oh!” I said, finally understanding what was going on, “so the TEACHERS move classes?” They nodded in agreement. I erased the board, opened the door (it was stuck so a girl helped me) and left.

I had felt awkward, clumsy and unsure the whole class, and I am sure the students could sense I didn’t know what I was doing, but I stayed positive and upbeat the whole time, encouraging the students while they worked and applauding and saying “Serbisu Diak” (good work) or “Excelente” or “fantastico” after each presentation to let them know how much I appreciated their work. I was really grateful for such a nice and unexpected compliment from that boy (during the entire class I thought he must think I am a complete idiot and that this class was pointless). He didn’t have to say what he did, but it was so nice that he did say it. He didn’t say it to suck up or to lie, he said it genuinely and I really appreciated it. Of course, I had never really meant to be “funny”, but coming across as funny is much better than coming across as too serious or harsh. I am sure I came across as funny because I was so clueless and nothing happened according to plan. Still, I remained composed, and often the best times occur without any planning. The students all said they were excited to see me next week, and I didn’t want to break it to them that I wouldn’t be back. Who knows, maybe I will get the chance to teach them again.

I couldn’t help but smile as I left the class, thanking God for such an “interesting” first class. No, it had not gone according to plan, but I still had a great time, and more importantly, the kids had fun and hopefully learned something too.