Further life and times of *liltayinchina*

It is a new term, and with this new term, new regulations for the teachers have come as well. In fact, it appears that the school is tightening the screws on its foreign department even further. Mr. Ye told us at the meeting prior to the beginning of this term that there would be random drop-ins on foreign teachers by him and the English department principal, Mrs. Li, each month. We were also told that the amount of show-lessons would increase and that a super teacher would be called in to survey our work and give us critiques.

My initial reaction to these changes was a mild concern that I would be found out to be a teacher lacking in many capabilities. Then a more practical, yet pessimistic, reaction occurred which reminded me that I had only four more months of teaching at the school to look “forward” to and thus should not be too worried at the outcome of critiques of my teaching abilities.

Two Mondays ago, Julia informed me that I’d be having a show lesson that Friday. She told me that Matthew and Lisa would also have a show-lesson that day and that a super teacher would be sitting in on our lessons along with Mr. Ye and Mrs. Li. At first, Julia seemed to care very little about this show-lesson. Then, after a meeting of the Chinese co-teachers, she held meeting upon meeting with me to discuss the lesson in detail. At one point, she had me writing down, to the word, what she wanted me to say at each point. I was conflicted, on the one hand, I knew that what she was orchestrating was too formal and not like my usual teaching style. I knew that she wanted to look good and probably had my interests in mind as well, but to me, it seemed that I would learn nothing from this sort of method. If the super teachers had anything critical to say, they’d be critiquing Julia’s thought process and not my own. Yet, on the other hand, I kept thinking, I can add elements of my own style into her script and be happy with that compromise. It was frustrating and I was busy that week with Grade 1 as well, not to mention I’d come down with a sinus infection, so I let Julia dictate the organization of the lesson and the way in which things would flow, but I stopped at having her write an actual script for me. It was too ridiculous and so far from my usual teaching methods.

On the day of the lesson, I had prepared a lively assortment of teaching aides and we practiced the lesson in Class 2A, to see what worked well and what didn’t. To my amazement, Class 2A was responsive and easy to work with. Usually, they are the more unruly of the two classes, not to mention that as a whole, they seem to know less English than Class 2B.

The time came for my lesson. It was held in the classroom and the observers were late so I began without them. Any nervousness I’d felt before starting evaporated as I dug into my choreographed performance. After about seven minutes of class, a man and woman I’d never seen before entered the back of the classroom and sat down. Along with them, Mr. Ye, Mrs. Li, Sandra (Ellie’s mother and Matthew’s co-teacher), and several of the other Chinese co-teachers entered the room and sat down. Class was going well but we weren’t having much fun. I was so busy making sure I followed each of Julia’s steps that a couple of times, I failed to joke with the children or test their memory as I usually do in class. It was frustrating to be so concerned with a plan and to not focus on the CHILDREN. Somewhere in the middle of class, I became disillusioned with the plan and with Julia’s intentions and lost my way. Earlier in the day, I’d thought that it would be an interesting, though mildly traumatizing lesson, to throw a teacher into a classroom without his or her teaching aides, the plan or any other supplements and see how they would do stripped bare of all the flashy accoutrements that the Chinese teachers seem to hold in such high regard.

I’d done a good job in my performance, but there were still about five minutes of class time left. I asked the students to take out their books and walked to the back of the classroom to play the cassette so I could be out from under the microscope for a few minutes. When I got to the back of the classroom, I saw that the woman in charge of handing out lunch to the children had moved the tape player and it was nowhere to be seen. I returned to the front of class and was about to play a game with the students when Julia gave me a knowing look that said, “NO GAMES!” So I fumbled with the text on the page and asked some questions that made little sense to the children. I noticed that the observers had long stopped paying attention to me and were writing up notes or glancing at their watches wondering when class would be over. At that point the bell rang and I sighed with relief. I went up to the board to remove my teaching aides and the children dashed to the same spot and played with the various pictures while waiting for lunch to be served.

The man I’d never seen before came up and introduced himself as the son of the super teacher. He was very handsome and his English was easy and without accent. He asked if it was “Miss” or “Mrs.” Taylor and then proceeded to give me some notes from his observations. He said I had beautiful handwriting and that I was extremely organized and confident in front of the children. He also liked my teaching aides. Yet, he felt my lesson was too much “by the book” and that I should use my strength as a native speaker to help the students create dialogs with each other. He also felt that too much had been presented and that more practice was needed. I thanked him for his time and we parted ways.

It was encouraging to have positive reinforcement of my strengths, but I felt that I couldn’t take his critiques of my teaching to heart because the methods had not been my own. I thought this was the end of the matter and then this past Thursday we had a meeting.

All of the foreign teachers and all of the Chinese co-teachers were convened in the auditorium and the super teacher and her son were introduced to us. It was made clear that the super teacher would give a summary of her findings from the three foreign classes she had attended and that her son would translate. It was odd. She began by telling us that the foreign language books that we taught from were difficult and poorly planned whereas the English language books written by Chinese and taught by our Chinese co-teachers were much better for the teaching of a foreign language. And this information was no news to us but especially useless since we were not the ones who had any say in which teaching materials the school chose to use. In fact, several teachers in the past have urged the school to choose different materials because Chatterbox is so poorly laid out. After that awkward introduction to her “super-ness”, the super teacher critiqued the three lessons she’s seen. She felt that Lisa was vibrant and fun in her class, yet didn’t teach enough material in the 40 minutes during which she hammed it up with her fifth graders. The super teacher liked Matthew’s easy style with the children and the various games he employed during class but felt that the information was too difficult for his third graders and that easier examples of the language points should have been taught as well. Mine was her least favorite of the three lessons she’d seen, though she commented on my “graceful youth” and looked as if she would have liked to squeeze my cheek. She said that I was too rigid and should speak “normally” – I’m assuming she meant, “informally” – with my students and try harder to drill key grammar points using fresh approaches. Outwardly, I nodded and thanked her for her thoughts, inwardly, I was fuming that I’d been so passive when Julia dictated the lesson to me.

An entertaining interaction with the super teacher’s son occurred just after his mother's presentation of our faults during our classes. When it was time for the foreign teachers to leave the meeting so that the super teacher could critique our Chinese counterparts in her own language, the super teacher’s son pulled me aside and said, “I will come to Seattle to teach Chinese.” I smiled, surprised, and said, “Okay!” Later, it was mentioned to me that this might have been a “come-on”. Of course, I’ve been out of practice this past year and have no idea what a come-on is anymore, let alone a better word for "come-on". I just thought he was telling me that he’d be in Seattle at some point in the future. In any case, the co-teachers, especially Christy, like to joke with me now about how I have a Chinese suitor in the form of a super teacher’s son.

Now, you may be wondering, “Wait, when did all of this happen?” and I’ll tell you. This was all prior to my meltdown with Julia. In fact, right after the super teacher’s comments, classes with Julia went well because I felt confident as a teacher, having been chosen to “perform” for the super teacher in the first place and having been critiqued on Julia’s style and not my own.

And then everything fell apart. Since the attempted confrontation and the tea talk, Julia has been saddled with a student teacher and has had to shape up considerably in class. She translates my major lesson points almost on cue now and helps me as I’ve seen other co-teachers do, not to mention as Christy has always done since becoming my co-teacher. I wouldn’t say that everything is golden again, but it’s on the mend and since the meltdown, I’ve gained a confidence and a fearlessness around Julia which, if not positively affecting my relationship with her, has certainly improved classes and reduced the anxiety of “going it alone”.

And, since I began writing this entry on March 24th, and am now finishing it almost a month later, I feel I should amend some earlier statements. The portended tightening of the screws in regards to the foreign department appears to have been a fearsome bark with no chance of a bite. Not only have two months gone by without one look at our lesson plans, but also the drop-ins have been limited to once for some of us and never for others. Also, Christy told me some big news that impacts the future of the foreign department. I wanted to write about my talks with Christy in another entry so I’ll save that big news for later…since, after all, it doesn’t affect me…a one-time foreign teacher for the school. Oh how the co-teacher’s loathe this attitude…and, of course, for good reason. The ones who end up suffering the most, as usual, are the children. I just hope that my dedication to them during this one school year has been more helpful than harmful. I’m a firm believer in warmth and support overriding all obstacles, and so, at least, I can convince myself that I’ve done them little harm.

There’s a beetle banging around in the bathroom and I believe his suicidal flight is a perfect segue into my next entry.