Job Discussion Forums

[calsimsek]

Going throught the twice yearlly pain of having to talk to parents.
Is it me or is that only kids who's parents you don't have to speak to come in. I once had a kid who got 93 in the test and an oral mark of about 90.
The parent came in and wanted ( demanded ) to know why the kid did not get 100 %. What can you say. One parent told me her son loved me and that I had to be kinder to the class. At the same meeting another parent told me I had to be harder on the class.

When you meet the parents you can see why the kids are screwed up.


Do any have any good crazy parent stories, I hope so a pain shared is ...... you know the rest.

[ghost]

At a certain famous Kolej on the South Coast, ghost had to deal with a little monster who disrupted class constantly and hid under desks and other places in the classroom, dragging other students into his ways.

When ghost reprimanded the recalcitrant student, the parents came into the school the next day demanding to know why ghost was being so 'hard' on their precious child. When told about all the antics going on, the parents didn't want to know, and simply stated that their child was a 'good student' and it was up to the teacher to keep the class going.

What the parents didn't appreciate is that this Kolej had no system to deal with disruptive student behaviour, which saw many teachers give up or get fired before the end of their contracts.

From what ghost has heard, the nonsense continues. As the saying goes "It's all about money"

[almuze]

I had a little boy in my first grade class, and I think he was about a year younger than most other kids - so a "real" 6 year old instead of a turkish 6 year old? He had 2 much older sisters, and was just the apple of his mothers eye....of course! Trouble was, he couldn't sit still to save his life. couldn't colour in the lines, couldn't correctly answer "how old are you?" (and all those other fun questions you ask 20 times to make sure everybody gets it)
I asked his mother if she had thought about putting him any kind of sports activity, or taking him on long walks after school, or finding any kind of acceptable outlet for his engery, since my class was not it, and he really needed it, and she asked to have me sacked!
hurray! (they didn't do it, but I was told to be more respectful towards the parents) fun fun fun.

[ghost]

[justme]

Okay, not exactly 'kids' and not exactly a conference, but about a month ago, we all sent out report cards and comments for each of the (Uni) students. For the guy who just can't seem to get above a 30 on any exam, I wrote (and had translated into Turkish), 'Mehmet is not a very serious student. He often sleeps in class, and he makes no effort to either speak or understand anything in English. He rarely does any homework, and when he does, it shows very little effort. If he wants to improve his score, he must pay attention in the lessons, spend more time on his homework, and attend the tutoring lessons.'

A week later his older brother (who takes care of him while he's living here) phoned demanding to know why Mehmet has such a low grade!

[ghost]

[justme]

Yeah, I suppose the problem with that student comment was 'If he wants to improve his score...' because it's not if Mehmet wants to do it, it's whether or not I can do it for him. And perhaps it's all my fault-- I gave up on tutoring him, when after 6 months of intensive English he still didn't know things like 'run', 'bad', 'tired', 'house' and regualr past tense. I'm so selfish I decided to devote my time to my 55+ other students... Actually, it seems to me that if a student is failing, both the student and the parents think it's because the teacher doesn't like the student.

Which is sad. I actually like Mehmet. It's not his fault he's dumb. And he's a nice kid otherwise.

But support from my higher-ups has thankfully never been a problem. They reiterate to students and parents whatever I said about having to study harder and pay attention. Then the students or parents say 'İnşallah,' which I guess means it's nobody's fault but God's if the student fails...

[crashartist1]

Can I join? My story doesn't have any parents in it yet, but it is funny/sad at the same time.

I am an Instructor for a University in the English Language Teaching Department, I teach a very simple and basic speaking class. It is a great chance for the students to work on speaking with a NS. The only requirement to pass this class is attendance, show up and you pass, really that is it, no homework or tests or quizzes, just show up. The classes are once a week, and I have three speaking classes and if the students miss their Monday class they can come to the Tuesday class or to the Wednesday class and vice versa. So the semester started in February and some students are coming to class now, for the first saying they didn't know they actually had to come to class, they thought they would just pass! The ones who don't come are the ones who, of course, claim it's difficult!

If you show up and utter a few words, you are fine, most of classes are very lively and just a whole lot of fun, but if you want to sleep through it, tamam no problem, at least you got out of bed and showed up at 10am.

Before I say Turkish students are the laziest students I have ever met, can someone tell me, where we like this in college?

[justme]

[whynotme]

[crashartist1]

My students on a whole aren't lazy, but they just kill me sometimes with their rationality. "Oh we didn't know we had to show up? Do we still have to show up or will you just give us a good mark?" WTF is what is screaming in my head, the words that come out of my mouth are much more civilized, "Are you so lazy that you can't come to class that you are allowed to sleep through?" There is no good way to answer this so either way they call themselves lazy, I know, I am mean and evil to expect them but darn it, they are the future English teachers of this country, and we will have to deal with their students later in life!!!

[crashartist1]

Actually whynotme, I have to do a speaking review of them at the end of the semester, but actually it is very relaxed because they all do speak very well, but I know all the students in my class so I can rate them as they have progressed through the year along with the attendance to give them a final grade. The class is an elective, so it is not in the curriculum and required. The University is a public university, but there are no native teachers in the ELT faculty, only three in the prep school, so they saw it as a good chance for the students to speak with a native speaker.

[whynotme]

and they are going to be English teachers
never let them pass....these cabbages should understand that education is so importand and not tat easy....

[justme]

Hee hee hee cabbages....