The Teaching Rollercoaster

I have a lot to say for my experiences over the past week. As I mentioned in my previous blog entry, I took part in my school’s English speaking competition as a judge. To say the very least, it was very entertaining and enjoying. I was surprised by the speaking abilities of some of the contests. Actually, I feel that they all could, more or less, carry on a conversation. Of course, they still need work with their pronunciation in much the same way that I need more work with my tones.

What the contest highlighted for me once more is the influence the West has had all over the world. It is an understatement to simply say that the West has been important in the last century. The fact that all Chinese, since primary school, have had English as a compulsory course reflects the role of the West in business, development and international relations.

However, I wonder what language might be the next important? Brian and I had talked about this once before. All other countries’ people are expected to learn English in school. Well, what about English-speaking countries such as the U.S., England and Australia? What language should we be expected to study and learn? Spanish? Chinese?

I thought this would be a good question to ask one of the contestants in the competition. Well, the result wasn’t so profound or intellectually stimulating; I’m not sure if this is due to the limits of speaking English, or if most students in China lack critical thinking (this is what Ryan, Sean and Mr. Brown assume). As for me, I know no question has a simple answer (pun unintended), and I’m sure that some students are bright, whereas other students still need development in their thinking. Of course, the contestant said Chinese should be the language for English-speakers to study, but I don’t really remember what else she had to say (it was either spoken to slowly or in chopped-up thoughts that I could not follow).

It’s not that I have a negative attitude or disinterest in my or other students at school, but I’ve noticed that lately, my mind has been wandering. For example, yesterday in class, my students gave a presentation on technology and development. I have to say, I was really ecstatic to see the first class’ performance; one group even made a PowerPoint presentation with pictures! However, the remaining two classes sort of just trailed downhill, reaching the bottom of no creativity. At that point, I remember sort of just gazing into “no man’s land.” I was asking myself if I have failed as a teacher, as well as evaluating my first semester’s performance. I wanted to know what I had done wrong and what I could do to improve my teaching for the next term.

I think I need to completely change the structure of my class, and have it more presentation-based. Although the presentations were mixed in their success, they did force the students to stand in front of the class and speak English.

1. My classes can have 10 presentations, which will be their grade

I don’t think I will give exams or writing assignments like I did this semester.

1. With exams, some students will only come to class on exam day

2. I lack a T.A., so I am stuck doing all the grading myself (it really sucks!)

I think I was a little ambitious with the mid-term. I had my students not only do an oral exam, but I also had them answer 10 reading/listening questions. In hindsight, emphasizing writing was a poor move on my part. After all, my classes are “Oral English” and the students already have other classes that focus on writing. However, my decision came after discovering my students’ reluctance to speak English in class. I also figured that, if their writing were to improve out of continuous practice, it would somehow enhance their ability to speak as well. Well, I’m not so sure that this was such great thinking…

As Liu lao shi said, teaching is one of the most (well, I think he said the most) challenging professions. I believe this, given the human dynamic of teaching. After all, you are not working with inanimate objects, but students who are complex individual thinkers. These students have different needs; their motivations are different. With that, you still need to find a method to encourage/motivate them all, and have some kind of meaningful impact on their lives.