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JISHOU, HUNAN — I’ve been busy these last few days getting ready to close up shop for the Winter Holiday. My last exam — for the Western Civ classes — is next Friday, and I’ll have a week to read those exams and hand in grades before I jet to the USA for a three-week stay. My free time, which is not that ample to begin with, has been taken up by giving oral examinations to more than 120 freshmen and sophomores, two at a time for 15 minutes each. This year, I’m using a combination of the Cambridge IELTS and BEC speaking tests: IELTS prompts for two student partners. That way, the students can do the talking while I carefully listen and evaluate pronunciation, intonation, grammar, vocabulary, rhythm and speed. After two years, I’m finally getting a handle on this oral English stuff. I’m calculating those students’ final grades this weekend (I only have a few left to examine), so the remaining Big Tasks are (1) reading the Western Civ students’ last unit test and (2) reading their final exams. I included a short essay on the final, and I gave them the three possible essay questions earlier this month, so I expect to do a lot of reading after Jan. 7. Possibly related posts:
[Cross-posted at The Daily Kos.] JISHOU, HUNAN — It’s getting to be speechifying season here again, and my first judging gig this year was a recitation contest for non-English majors. The 29 contestants’ selections were a compendium of uplifting quotations, essays, poems, songs and miscellania that could have come from one of those never-ending paperbacks full of uplifting quotations, essays, poems, songs and miscellania. In fact, that’s where some of them came from. I think it’s an unwritten rule here that English recitation material has to be really sappy and sentimental. Having nothing better to do than marking about 100 tests (no joke), I spent a couple of hours one night checking the provenance of all these uplifting pieces about love, mom, friendship, self-worth, growing old, love, life’s setbacks, and mom. Here’s a rundown of the afternoon’s selections, to give you an idea of what I mean. Taking the prize for the oldest selection is “My luve is like a red, red rose,” from 1794, attributed to Robert Burns. He collected and preserved old songs and poems in Scots, like this one, for posterity. That’s how we still have “Auld Lang Syne.” It’s short, so here’s the poem in its entirety. Save it for Valentine’s Day, boys.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — We finished the unit on the ancient Romans with a test Friday. I made four versions, to minimize copying from neighbors (more about that some other time). Here’s one for you to test your knowledge of Western Culture. WESTERN CULTURE AND CIVILIZATION IDENTIFICATIONS. Use a few words or a sentence to identify the following people, places or things. Be specific to get full credit! (1 point each) DISCUSSION. Answer the following with at least two or three sentences. Some questions may require more explanation. (3 points each) (Use the other side of the paper if needed.) 12. What was the basic structure of the government of the Roman Republic? How was governmental power shared by those in control of the Republic? 13. The Romans “copied” some aspects of Greek culture. Name three Greek creations that the Romans basically imitated (and preserved). 14. The Romans were also innovators – they created new things for later civilizations in Europe to copy. Name three innovations of the Romans. 15. The Romans’ longest lasting and most far reaching contribution to the world was their language, Latin. How has Latin affected society since the end of the Roman Empire? Possibly related posts:
JISHOU, HUNAN — Considering my unimpressive salary (at least in US dollars), it’s really easy for me to live comfortably here. No joke. To put things in context, here are few sample prices for common food items.
I recently bought a nice black double-breasted fall-weather coat at a local men’s store, where the prices are admittedly on the expensive side. It cost me ¥600, or about $88. In the USA, I’d reckon it would cost at least twice that. The sport shoes I bought a year ago were about $44, and are still in great shape. This week, I bought a friend a pair of knee-length leather boots for $38 as a birthday present. Both items in the USA would be at least double that. (And probably also made in China.) My digital cable box with a year’s service was around $37. Of course, all I get is Chinese TV, so it’s not really comparable to cable in the US, but still way cheaper. Possibly related posts:
JISHOU, HUNAN — From my distant perch here, I’ve heard the news about the film, Waiting for Superman*, which ballyhoos the charter-school model as the solution for America’s supposedly failing public schools. Oprah, queen of fads-du-jour, had the filmmakers on her show. Bill and Melinda Gates are involved. It’s the latest “big thing” in education, which has been plagued by about a hundred “big things” in as many years, all promising to solve problem X, where stands for the Dilemma of the Moment. I haven’t seen the flick, but as they say, I’ve read the reviews. While some reviews just gush about the film, a more nuanced review is in The Nation. I encourage you to read it, as a counterpoint to the mostly mindless adulation of the film and its rather one-sided message. Today I read an article in The New York Times about a huge public high school in Boston that got results, not by adopting the education fad-du-jour, but by doing things the old-fashioned way. Instead of throwing up their hands and declaring “The public school is dead!” teachers at Brockton High School rolled up their sleeves and restructured the school’s instructional plan. Brockton was among Massachusett’s lowest performing schools, based on state language arts exam scores. A team of teachers, with the support of the principal, proposed a school-wide emphasis on teaching core concepts of reading, writing, speaking and reasoning. Students in every single class, including art and PE, had lessons in at least one of the four core concepts. The results were a dramatic increase in the students’ state test scores. 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. Possibly related posts:
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