Stretching an analogy [Mowgli]
School is like a factory. A factory to which my fellow teachers bring me the raw material of stupidity for conversion into anger and frustration, intended for export. Here is a double shipment, because today was very productive.
Santosh, the other math teacher, brought up an issue before the 9th standard class. He had a set of photocopies of some basic problems on matrices. Unfortunately, he said, the first problem on the reverse had been photocopied badly and was too light to make out; we'd have to explain the question in class. Upon looking at the page, I was able to suggest a simple and elegant solution to this dilemma. The problem in question was quite visible, about 2 inches further down on the page than in the original.
One of the teachers there is an older woman named Claire. An American whose family was in the diplomatic corps, she was raised in France. She teaches a class called "English for Science", or EFS. I've only interacted with her once, a month or so ago. She was trying to get one of the kids to stop writing on one of the learning aids. The conversation went roughly as follows:
Her: Please stop writing on that.
Him: (Mumble mumble)
Her: How would you like it if I drew on your car?
Him: I'd get it repainted.
Her: (Can't think of a response, leaves)
Later on, he's still drawing. He's filling out the grid to write part of his IM name.
She comes back.
Her: Please don't draw on that.
Her: How would you like it if I drew on your car?
Him: I'd get it repainted.
Her: (Can't think of a response, leaves)
Afterward she said something to the effect that kids' rotten behaviour is a message to us to let us know that we are failing them as teachers. Hmmm.
Since then I haven't talked to her, but the kids constantly complain that her EFS class is terrible. When asked for suggestions on "How to make our school #1", they all suggested removing it and said it was their worst class. I took this with a grain of salt - maybe the don't like it because it's hard, or because they don't like being forced to use only English. Then I found the quality of her English when she put the following question on a blackboard for them:
----------------------------------
On a scale of one to ten, what was the most
Interesting
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Useful
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
(Some other similar category)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
thing that you learned in this class?
---------------------------------
What does she expect for an answer? A number? An activity? I'll bet she doesn't know. This is an American woman whose father was a diplomat, teaches English, and she can't even write a coherent survey question. Sometimes I hate people.
Santosh, the other math teacher, brought up an issue before the 9th standard class. He had a set of photocopies of some basic problems on matrices. Unfortunately, he said, the first problem on the reverse had been photocopied badly and was too light to make out; we'd have to explain the question in class. Upon looking at the page, I was able to suggest a simple and elegant solution to this dilemma. The problem in question was quite visible, about 2 inches further down on the page than in the original.
One of the teachers there is an older woman named Claire. An American whose family was in the diplomatic corps, she was raised in France. She teaches a class called "English for Science", or EFS. I've only interacted with her once, a month or so ago. She was trying to get one of the kids to stop writing on one of the learning aids. The conversation went roughly as follows:
Her: Please stop writing on that.
Him: (Mumble mumble)
Her: How would you like it if I drew on your car?
Him: I'd get it repainted.
Her: (Can't think of a response, leaves)
Later on, he's still drawing. He's filling out the grid to write part of his IM name.
She comes back.
Her: Please don't draw on that.
Her: How would you like it if I drew on your car?
Him: I'd get it repainted.
Her: (Can't think of a response, leaves)
Afterward she said something to the effect that kids' rotten behaviour is a message to us to let us know that we are failing them as teachers. Hmmm.
Since then I haven't talked to her, but the kids constantly complain that her EFS class is terrible. When asked for suggestions on "How to make our school #1", they all suggested removing it and said it was their worst class. I took this with a grain of salt - maybe the don't like it because it's hard, or because they don't like being forced to use only English. Then I found the quality of her English when she put the following question on a blackboard for them:
----------------------------------
On a scale of one to ten, what was the most
Interesting
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Useful
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
(Some other similar category)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
thing that you learned in this class?
---------------------------------
What does she expect for an answer? A number? An activity? I'll bet she doesn't know. This is an American woman whose father was a diplomat, teaches English, and she can't even write a coherent survey question. Sometimes I hate people.
1 Comments:
Hahah.
Eight!
She reminds me of girls I knew in high school who'd say things like "I want to be a pediatrician because babies are cute." Though that at least had some strain of logic to it.
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