Job Discussion Forums

[sheeba]

First guys may I just thank you for your input. It's good to see valuable members appearing on the forum with constructive and sensible advice .

[Outsida]

TW, I understand completely! I HATE cleaning up after other teachers. The missionaries who alienated the students and made them distrust foreign teachers, the useless teachers who just did nothing and didn't give a damn, and the ones who created false expectations of games, songs and movies instead of learning.

Some of my best classes have been with freshmen. They are bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Second-years are the worst. An inflated sense of their own importance and intelligence combined with a poseur's cynicism. Hate them. By 3rd year, they're usually okay again.

[xinpu]

..by third year they are beginning to start sh***ing their pants about getting a job on graduation. For some reason this seems to focus their minds...

[tw]

[englishgibson]

After 5 years in China, I am still learning the ropes here. I've been having a tough time fighting the expectations of being an entertainer or promoter of English language as oppose to the educator or teacher of English lanugage.

Students complain when they don't like the teacher. Often, it's not about goals or expectations from the course, but about "how nice the teacher is".
The first couple of classes often set the tone. If the first two don't work out, it'll be an uphill battle. Clear goals of our courses should be set on the beginning, although that's sometimes difficult due to the Chinese management techniques.
I always want to know the number of lessons, the number of students and the goal of the course before I start, but I often get this "ohh we don't know how many lessons", "ohh there'll be about 20, 30 or 40 .... students in", and "just make them speak English". Then, the resources are often in question there.
Well, learning how to work this gig in China is more like learning how to persuade the Chinese that what we do is right and that they need to believe in it.

CET is a well respected (in China) Chinese exam of English language and it consists of questions with multiple choice answers as far as I know. It includes listening. If one passes on 85 %, he/she may participate in a CET oral exam as I've been told. In any case, CETs are made in China.

It's a tough job in a public school depending on the number of students in the classroom as well as their interests. A private mill should give a better service to a lower number of students in.....comes down to money there.

Recently, I had a student complaining that she didn't get enough time to "speak", so I followed up. When I gave her chances to speak, I couldn't understand what she was saying (even after prompts), never mind her stuttering and blah, blah, blah..... I took my time listening to her (wasn't enough). I gave her a writing home work then. It took me half an hour to decode her writing, when I was correcting it a couple of days later.

Students in China need a lot of prompting and it's quite necessary to "glow" with their interests (that aren't so many), in my opinion. Once that's established our chances of success are higher then.

Cheers and beers to the hard working FTs in China

_____________________________________________________________
Can 40 students speak English at the same time
Do Chinese students like speaking English with each other

[Outsida]

Yep, you gotta find out their likes and hobbies, then try to incorporate them into your lessons. Sleeping and watching TV are difficult to base an entire lesson around, though.

I always suggest potatoes as an alternative energy source, since rice contains no energy and actually makes your body more tired digesting it. Naturally, they laugh at the stupid foreigner and his crazy ideas - right before they faint and their heads crash onto the desks.

If only they'd take my advice... they might have the energy to do something on weekends.

[Outsida]

There is, in Wuhan, a chain of New Oriental language centres that incorporate oral English, children's classes and test prep. The kids' classes actually seem well run - the children are disciplined, there is plenty of supplementary material and a curriculum and the teachers are relatively competent. The only problem is when they hire foreign teachers at random and throw them into classes. There is no chance to build a rapport with the kids, as they are one-off classes, and so the kids are total brats and the rich parents frown on disciplining their little darlings.

Worked there for 2 months, did a professional job, prepared well, got along with the staff... then called in sick once and they didn't want anything to do with me again. They're happy to keep no-showers, sleazebags and alcoholics on the payroll, though. Sometimes, Chinese logic defies belief.

The oral English classes seem to consist of cramming 300-500 people into a lecture hall and getting some CT with "amazing energy and personality" to "teach" them English... it's a lecture about English in Chinese, basically, but the people lap it up because they are convinced that therein lies the magic key to becoming fluent in English in one hour without any effort.

Don't know anything about the test prep centre. Another branch offered me a job in the IELTS area, but when I turned up for my interview, there was suddenly no job (I'm not black or Asian, by the way). Chinese organisation - in this case, a recruitment girl not even knowing she doesn't have any vacancies - strikes again!

[China.Pete]

"The major problem here seems to be that a new approach called 'communicative teaching' has been grafted onto the old-fashioned teach-to-exam rote-learning style so popular in China. There is a conflict between the goals of these two approaches - your goal is situation-orientated, theirs is examination-orientated." - Steppenwolf

Steppenwolf has succinctly pointed out the fundamental conflict between what WE do and what is otherwise done in China. I like to tell my students right up front that what we do in my class will probably be different from what they've done before (eliciting examples of and attitudes toward past learning experiences). I suggest to them that they might like what we're going to do in my class, they might learn something from it, etc. Or they may just find they prefer their traditional learning approaches. But, I say encouragingly, MOST students find my class to be a great addition to their learning experience. Acknowledge the differences, without atually throwing yourself in front of the CET4 train.

Others have noted that some of the students' dissent may stem from having a vested interest in the status quo ante. Their English is badly deficient because they were not able to learn successefully in the over-stuffed high school English classes; or they WERE able to learn and are afraid their duller classmates may now have an opportunity to catch up with them; or it has begun to dawn on them just how much they may have missed out on in their previous game-playing FT's classes. Whatever, it's easier to snipe at what a serious teacher is doing than deal with all that past history. Here is where I am inclined to just press on, and hope the administration will give me enough time to prove my point.

[NathanRahl]

My word, this all sounds so familiar. I had a meeting with some english teachers (chinese who can't speak good english) and 10 of my students. The students took turns telling me what they thought I could do better. It was ludicrous of course, I know how to teach english, and their ideas were very strange to boot. One girl said she felt I was too disciplined because I actually wanted students to raise their hands before they answered a question, imagine that. She further went on to say that friends, which she wanted us to be, should not have to raise their hands in class.

I found this disturbing, along with all the other clownish things they wished me to do. I do not mind games, but I want them to be relevant to the lesson. I do not mind being lax, but not to the point where the is zero order. I want to know what the students think, but not about how I teach, I am the teacher, and I know how to teach them, there mustbe boundaries.

I agree with what someone else said. You can not defend yourself to 16 and 17 year old know it alls. They may be chinese, but one thing all teens have in common, they think they know everything. Give them a voice to actually control their own classroom, and eventually you will get nothing done, and they will be in charge.

I often have refered to the ESL's job as that of a dancing bear. I am there to entertain, not to teach, only "seem" to teach. That is what the students are used to, and they seem to think my class is a study hall. Worse yet, the school is not grading them on my class at all.

This irks me, why not just tell the kids straight out "this class does not mean much, if it did, we would grade you on it"

It is very frustrating and disheartening to both try and get these kids to take the class seriously, while at the same time have "kid's" tell me what they think would be best. On top of that I am supposed to have sing alongs, not have any real discipline, which just makes them taking the class seriuosly and working to learn anything in it even harder still.

I agree with another poster, what they want is not always what is best for them, and given the chance to do hard work, or play silly games and fart around with the teachers dog or cat, which will they choose?

You shouldnot have to defend yourself, the chinese don't actually know how to teach very well, not the ones at my school anyways. They are overly stern and strict, tend to lecture, and are not given to abstract thought, or being empathetic. Therefore the students expect, and want this class to be the exact opposite.

Be sterner, and weather to complaints. Nod your head, say, yes, yes, and then do it your way. They may not like it, but honestly, if you keep listening to them, they will keep giving you input. Once they see their input has zero effect, they won't bother you much anymore. Basically, don't feed the beast, starve it.

In the meantime, be patient. Do your job the best way "you" know how. Do not let a few brat packs of kids run your class. You run the class, and if they complain, boo hoo, so what. Don't be overly strict, but don't be their buddy, or pal either. There has to be some order, and discipline is not the death of fun.

Oh, and as for cleaning up after other teachers, yeah, got that going on right now. The former teacher did all of the above, sang songs and played silly games which had nothing to do with learning new words, or the lesson at hand. Once you start ondering to your students, instead of adressing their needs, they run the show Joe

[cj750]

If you taught English back on the block..why torture yourself with these kinds of classes..why not take your teaching licence and work in legit international school or for one of the foreign universities..they pay better and you do not have to put up with this ESL crap...

[Steppenwolf]

I made a remarkable discovery this past summer in a town famous for its congenial atmosphere supposedly conducive to actively using English: lots of adults flock there and pay good money to attend practical English conversation training classes.

But the students aged 14 to 44 or higher bring along their cultural baggage, i.e. habits formed at elementary school:
I saw a gaggle of young women - and maybe 2 men among them - memorising whole passages from a Li Yang English textbook; the text in question was "Women in Our Time" if I remember well.

I was roped in to give some feedback to a few of those girls, so that's why I know what was going on. It really came as an eye-opening surprise!

They told me they would RECITE that 180 word text!

If that is what they expect you to do with them - good night!

I put tsome of the girls through their reciting motions; one girl could actually reproduce the whole text without major omission.

But she had such a horrible pronunciation I had to repeatedly ask her to say a phrase again.
Then I also noticed her grammar was botched; she seldom used the appropriate past tenses - she would use the present tense; occasionally she would drop a preposition or article in front of a noun - the typical mistakes of most Chinglish speakers.

How come she produced a Chinglish version of a relatively pure English text she had supposedly memorised?

The answer - tentatively put - might be that for COMPREHENSION she referred to the CHINESE version of the text, and for SPEAKING she would read the ENGLISH one.

I suspect our students do not speak English - they recite what they have learnt by heart. That cannot be the goal of any meaningful oral English class! IT could be meaningful - if the goal was to improve their pronuncation and enunciation!

[cj750]

The students I m involved with must learn English for academic purposes as they plan to attend foreign English, Australian or NZ universities...they are tested on physics and engineering as well as English.

Some programs go beyond the goal to improve their pronunciation and enunciation but also includes being able to write research papers and make presentations.

[poopsicola]

That sounds confusing - but I'm not at all confused. I regarded the now-defunct Roger as a God of Pedagogy, God rest his soul. I heard he was done in on a hillside in Yunnan by a couple of vagabond monks. Such a pity. He had so much to offer. He used to promote memorization and recitation of all sorts of things - verses from the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, Tom Paine's work, King Lear and, amazingly, Ouida. Why, I even recall him advocating memorization and recitation of Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management. He was particularly fond of "Planning a picnic for 50" and "Cure for the toothache", which was to be found in the "Home Hints" section. Anyway, I am a convert. My students have just been required to memorize in preparation for recitation a series of editorials from Der Spiegel International. Memorization and recitation has worked wonders and I will always be indebted to the master for his insights.

This newcomer, Steppenwolf, doesn't know what he is talking about. A teaching Johnny-come-lately I would think. I wonder who he is.

[hesterprynne]

I wish I could just write on the board. Chinese teaching methods don't work. That is why I am here. I will give you a test. If you score 95 percent or above, you have earned the right to comment on my teaching. Everyone else, keep your errors to yourself.

[latefordinner]

hesterprynne: