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JISHOU, HUNAN — I suppose I should not be surprised that Chinese adolescents can be as catty and mean-spirited as Americans are, but two incidents this week still bug me. I need to vent, so if you want to skip all this drama, go ahead.
To set up incident number 1, I need to explain my oral English examination format. Modeling the Cambridge Business English Certificate exams, I meet two (sometimes three) students at a time for about 20 minutes. I test them on vocabulary and pronunciation, then give them a topic on the spot to talk about between themselves for a few minutes. There is usually time left for me to ask them a few questions to verify listening comprehension and coach them on pronunciation issues.
Students sign up for these sessions in class about two to three weeks in advance. With more than 200 students to evaluate, I’m booked pretty tight.
A couple of days ago, I was scheduled to meet three girls — roommates, as it turns out — who I will call A, B, and C. And B are among my best students in their class; their spoken English is not perfect, but they can chatter away at fairly high speed in English. C is a less motivated student, and much quieter in class. If students had been picking members for softball teams, I suspect she would have been one of the last ones that one team would have reluctantly picked. You know what I mean. I certainly do.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — More personal horn tooting here — I wrote a longish diary for Daily Kos about my experiences here after three years, and it made the Community Spotlight.
 I made the Community Spotlight at dKos! As of right now (1:30 am EST), it’s had 58 comments since I posted it yesterday. And its plea for foreign teachers has netted three responses so far. Not bad for a couple hours of work.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — I realized over this winter holiday how much I don’t know about teaching English. Despite accolades from my students and my fellow teachers, I’m not so satisfied with my work so far. I get better at it every term, but I have a long ways to go as a language teacher.
Last term, my workload was relatively easy: two periods of Western Culture and six periods of Oral English a week. Nevertheless, a lot of my time was spent prepping for the Culture class. I felt somewhat guilty that I was not putting in more time prepping for the Oral English classes, especially for the freshmen, but I had organized the classes well enough that things pretty much took care of themselves.
This term, I have more work to do. The juniors have me for two subjects: British Literature and Academic Writing. Needless to say, I’ve got several months of hardcore reading and writing ahead of me. The sophomores will still meet me twice a week for Oral English, and I hope to try some new activities to enliven the classes even more. The freshmen will have a different foreign teacher, since we each typically teach eight periods (16 classes) a week.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — This test is what I inflicted on my Western Culture students this morning. How well can you do on it? No looking at your textbooks, cell phones, or the Internet.
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Western Culture and Civilization
NAME_______________________________
Student ID ____________________________
2008 G1 and G2
First test, Ancient Greece, 22 October 2010
IDENTIFY THE FOLLOWING PEOPLE AND PLACES:
1. Athens
2. Sparta
3. Troy
4. Achilles
5. Odysseus
6. Aristotle
7. Plato
8. Eratosthenes
9. Sophocles
10. Aristophanes
TEST CONTINUES ON THE NEXT PAGE
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS (Use your own paper for these, please):
11. Ancient Greece fostered the first known republic and the first known democracy in the world. Where were these political experiments, exactly? Give a brief description of how each system of government was organized.
12. Socrates was one of the earliest and most influential of the ancient philosophers. What were his core beliefs?
13. Give two examples of the Greeks’ contributions to mathematics and science. Discuss each one briefly.
14. What was the basic story or theme of Homer’s Iliad? Of Homer’s Odyssey?
15. Why is the civilization and culture of the ancient Greeks so important to the West?
BONUS POINTS: Match the Greek god or goddess to his or her attributes.(10 points maximum)
| 1 _____ |
Ares |
A |
The first woman |
| 2______ |
Aphrodite |
B |
Creator of the first man, bringer of fire |
| 3______ |
Zeus |
C |
The god of war |
| 4 _____ |
Hades |
D |
The goddess of the harvest |
| 5 _____ |
Poseidon |
E |
The messenger god |
| 6 _____ |
Herakles (Hercules) |
F |
The king of the gods | Possibly related posts:
[Cross-posted at the Daily Kos, where it was just rescued from diary oblivion.]
JISHOU, HUNAN — Classes have been in session for two weeks now. It’s taken me a while to build a head of steam for blogging. Been a little busy, as you will see.
As was the case last year, I am teaching 16 classes a week (that’s eight groups of students for 100 minutes at a go), but with some changes in subjects and students. This term, I am teaching oral English to the freshman and sophomore undergraduates majoring in Business English, and Western Culture and Civilization to the juniors in Business English.
None of the juniors have oral English classes anymore, which befuddles me, but apparently It’s the Way Things Are Done Here™, according to fellow foreign teachers at other schools. The Business English students have a course in public speaking, but the English education majors — who will presumably be teaching English — have no more English language classes. More about that later.
Previously, my writing classes were the biggest consumer of my prep time, what with reading essays and diaries and plotting more ways to get my students to write English. This term, it’s the Civ class that takes the prize.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — So, I’m staying another year here. As it was last year, the decision was an easy one to make.
Logically speaking, it doesn’t make too much sense. Jishou is a small city, with few (Western-style) amenities. It takes at least two hours to get to the nearest airport. And Jishou University is an also-ran in the rankings of China’s institutions of higher learning.
My friends in bigger cities in China have encouraged me to look elsewhere for teaching jobs in China. One said, “The pay will be better, and the students will be more excellent.”
Yes, and no.
No question about the pay. If I moved to Beijing, or even Changsha, I could probably double my pay pretty easily. Of course, my expenses would also increase, and I’d have the hassles of dealing with big-city life. (Changsha has 5 million people. Beijing has 22 million, making NYC look like a small town.) Big cities have higher costs of living, so it’s questionable whether moving would increase my net income to make moving worth it.
I’ve lived in small cities for the last 32 years, two that were minuscule (60,000 population each), one just a bit bigger than Jishou (800,000) and another of 2.3 million. While it is generally true that living in a small community means a small salary, the trade-offs compensate for the comparative lack of dollars, or yuan.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — I am in the midst of reading the first drafts of about 70 term papers, but I wanted to take time out to write about a couple of cool things that happened today.
One of my former students here in China is getting married next week. This was no big surprise, since she told me it was going to happen sometime this year. Today, when we went to lunch, T. threw me a couple of curve balls.
First, she’s pregnant — one of those happy little accidents that sometimes proceed marriage. Despite the conservative culture of China, being pregnant just before marriage is no big deal, as long as the husband-to-be is still in the picture. The funny thing was, when I accidentally ran into the two of them downtown yesterday, I thought to myself, “T. looks pregnant.”
Now, she’s only three months along, and not showing yet. (T. is very petite, and has not gained weight, so her size was not the reason for my hunch.) But, she was walking a little like a pregnant woman — her shoes were the problem there, she says — and her dress was similar in design to a maternity dress, gathered under her boobs. Purely accidental, T. says; it was a summer dress, and anyway she still has a tiny waist. Despite being wrong about all the obvious visual clues, I was still pretty impressed I had guessed correctly.
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