Job Discussion Forums

[Phillip Schofield]

I think it's time for a light hearted thread.

I thought I'd share some of the strangest things I have heard from students in my ESL career.

1. A 12 year old Chinese student once told me; "People are like sharks. Their teeth grow back many times, even when they are old."
She had recently had several teeth removed and she was apparently told this information by her dentist. I suspect he was trying to divert attention away from the fact that he'd needlessly pulled out a young girl's teeth.

2. A colleague's student recently informed him that he had visited 3 different Russian cities over the week and the weather was bad in all of them. This was proof that the US are using their weather machine to make all of Russia's weather bad. This is part of a nefarious scheme to make Russians depressed by denying them sun (and potentially causing a Maidan style protest to occur)

3. Whilst voicing my doubt that face masks really protect you from sickness, my Japanese student told me that they must work since he doesn't get sick when he wears them. I countered that I don't wear them and I also don't get sick. He was genuinely amazed that it was possible to escape sickness without the use of a face mask. He suggested that I must have a super human immune system.

4. A Japanese student, who was obsessed with all things Irish, once told me that all Japanese were descended from Irish settlers. He went into great detail explaining how the Irish traveled through northern Russia until they eventually reached Japan and settled. He didn't mention how long this supposedly took and I didn't want to ask.

[spiral78]

Since you haven't confined this to Russian students:
we once took a cohort of Saudi technical university instructors to a dinosaur museum in Western Canada (don't ask why!). They were entirely convinced it was all concocted by Disney to entertain children. A good laugh for them, anyway!

[Gamajorba]

I once had a Kazakh student who was convinced Russia is the source of all evil. Even more awkward is that he even expressed this motion in front of a Russian student in the same class...

Many Saudis have told me ridiculous things like fresh and salt water NEVER mixes (even though it's supposedly only ONE area in the world, no idea where, that this actually happens), and women driving is bad for their ovaries.

Oh, and several students inadvertedly referring to themselves or other students as gay without knowing what a word meant or mispronoucing something

[Unrung School Bell]

I had a female Japanese student who referred to a harmonica as a mouth piano.

USB

[Phillip Schofield]

I was once trying to teach a couple of middle aged Japanese women how to politely disagree with statements.
From my experience, Japanese students don't like to disagree with anything the teacher says, even if they know you're wrong. It's just not in their culture to do so.

I had boarded the expressions and we had practiced saying them. I then decided to give them some statements to disagree with.

First, I said, "It's snowing today" (it was summer and the weather was hot)
They awkwardly paused and replied with, "Maybe it is".

I repeated that they were supposed to disagree with me and to use one of the phrases we had practiced. They smiled and nodded and said OK.

I decided to try and make it more difficult for them to agree with me, so I said, "The Japanese Prime-minister is evil and wants to go to war with England".

They looked at me and said, "Yes, he is a bad man. He has a lot of money and is corrupt..." and continued to find reasons why my stupid statement could be correct. I desperately tried to think of a statement which they couldn't help but disagree with.

I finally (rather frustrated by this point) came up with, "Rice should be banned and anyone who eats it should be put in prison".

They looked at me with bemused expressions on their faces and asked, "Why don't you like rice?"

I gave up. It was my first year of teaching and perhaps the issue lay in my teaching or the way I set up the exercise. But I suspect that it was more of a cultural issue and that I would still have the same problems even now.

[Gamajorba]

[Deats]

A 9 year old Chinese girl found out how humans were created at school and told my wife this story:

God made the form of man and put him in the oven to finish the procedure, much like when you make bread etc. He didn't know how long to cook the man for and left him in too long. A horrible black man came out and God was very sad, so he put him in the worst place on Earth - Africa. God tried again and this time he was determined to do better. Unfortunately he didn't cook this man for long enough and he came out white. He sent him to Europe. Thankfully at the third attempt, God had learned from his mistakes. This time he cooked the man for just the right amount of time and he came out golden brown. For his best creation, he chose the best place to put him - China.

In South Korea they believe in 'fan death'. You can read about it online. They think if you sleep with a fan on, you will die. I know some FT's who would call in sick as they were hungover and told the school they had fallen asleep with the fan on. The school would be so relieved that they hadn't died that they would get the day off and be told to rest and recover... oh dear.

http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-11-04/why-every-korean-kid-knows-not-keep-fan-over-night

One kid in Russia insisted that the Russian army was not only better than the American army, but also that the Russian military spent way more on weapons etc. He saw it on the news. Must be true.

Another Russian student told me Russia liberated Poland at the START of WW2 and that all Poles love Russians. Oh dear.

A Russian teacher also told me that all Georgians love Russians. This was because he spoke to a few Russian-Georgians who obviously still like Russia. He wouldn't believe me that normal ethnic Georgians would rather be a part of Europe.

[Unrung School Bell]

Your first story I know as an Amerindian legend, with the '"red people" being the ones who came out just right.

USB

[Sashadroogie]

And isn't it all true, Deats?

[Deats]

For sure Sasha, I got rid of my fan and tried to jump in the oven to brown up a bit before heading back to China

[Sashadroogie]

I am sure all liberated Poles will be happy to hear that.

[Phillip Schofield]

[spiral78]

[Sashadroogie]

I think I have heard far weirder things from the staff room than ever from the students...

[spiral78]

Do tell