Job Discussion Forums

[Buck Lin]

Since I have been in China I have watched four people completely flip.
Something I am familiar with also as a teacher in Canada. I watch them in Canada in schools where eventually they were taken away in an ambulance after being sedated. People who spent twenty four hours a day thinking about their jobs.
Here in China you hear them screaming from classrooms at their students. I am presently working with one at my school. He is always angry and has nothing good to say about anything. Usually they are teaching 10 to twenty hours over the contract they have signed. They are workaholics usually from Canada. They can't say a word in Chinese and expect everyone to talk to them in English.
I watched and listened to another guy from Canada who was doing two jobs at once, beat his wife regularly. I wanted to beat him also after he insulted me in my own house and slapped me in the head for not agreeing with him. The university liked him though and he stayed there for six years because his specialty was preparing students for interviews so they could study abroad. Same routine of humiliating and chastising the students into studying. The last I heard of him was that they had to get rid of him because he beat his Chinese wife infront of the Dean.
So the program is the same everywhere, and they tell you they can't get teachers to teach English. I too lost control on my first meeting with my supervisor on this job when they gave me 6 more hours to teach than was on my contract. The Chinese know we can't do the work and expect us to bail. This way the Chinese English teachers get to pick up your classes.
So my advice to anyone in China is, only to work the hours given in the contract. Do the other things like English corners or after school activities, if you like,but get away from the job and enjoy the pleasures of China.

[Hansen]

Buck, I don't understand why you "lost control." Just say NO! If they make an issue of it, leave. I know the leaving is difficult with wife and family and short of money with no future back home.

The Chinese bosses know it too.

[eddy-cool]

Buck, I know some guys like those you described; maybe you are unlucky in that you only meet compatriots but I see a lot of people acting that way that are not from Canada.

You ascribe their problem to being overworked (which they choose of their own volition to be); wouldn't it be more likely that these chaps simply are not in the possession of an allrounded preparation for a life as a teacher among foreigners?

You know, they have their tantrums even when their workload is down to 2 lessons a week or a day.

Where I am working now, we have a laowai that's married to a Chinese woman; he is, however, most noted for his explosive temperament in interactions with fellow laowais.

One reason is that he believes himself to be superior to all and sundry even though he has no pedagogical or linguistic background. He is shunned by nearly everyone and can always be seen seeking to be seen in the presence of our college's leadership - when dining out then their table is his table.

[evaforsure]

[Songbird]

Thank you everyone SO MUCH for your own stories. I am so, so glad I'm not the only one putting up with a 'not fitting in' coFT in my uni.....but I do't want to say anyone as I don't know who's reading this....

[Buck Lin]

Hansen I lost my temper because when saying no, you are looked at, as not being not a team player. They don't understand that in the west one hour of teaching means 4 hours of prep. The person at my school was trying to prepare classes for many majors with material relating to their majors. The students are low level and don't understand him.
I did say no emphatically. My friend the workaholic kept quiet. Recently others have realized the impossiblity of the load and dropped classes. I went to the person who is screaming at everyone and suggested that he too drop classes that are giving him problems, but he prefers to complain.
What I am trying to point out is the need for people to get away from their jobs no matter what they are doing. You will do a better job in the long run. Learn Chinese do Tai-qi or calligraphy. Don't let your employer take advantage of you because you enjoy teaching.

[theincredibleegg]

[Buck Lin]

A good English teacher should be assessing their students daily. Now in China where students are placed in a class according to their majors, you are not teaching English 101,102 and so on. You may have levels ranging from not knowing the alphabet to being fluent in the same class. So quoting Penny Ur " You should be preparing three lesson plans" You need activities for the strong students, activities for the average students and activities for the weak students.
Hitting the middle in China is difficult. The education system in a military one. The most common type of teaching ( Lee Yang Crazy English) is chorussing. This is non threatening for beginners but boring for advanced students.
I have lessons to prepare and shouldn't be wasting so much time on this forum.

[Buck Lin]

A good English teacher should be assessing their students daily. Now in China where students are placed in a class according to their majors, you are not teaching English 101,102 and so on. You may have levels ranging from not knowing the alphabet to being fluent in the same class. So quoting Penny Ur " You should be preparing three lesson plans" You need activities for the strong students, activities for the average students and activities for the weak students.
Hitting the middle in China is difficult. The education system is a military one. The most common type of teaching ( Lee Yang Crazy English) is chorussing. This is non threatening for beginners but boring for advanced students.
I have lessons to prepare and shouldn't be wasting so much time on this forum.

[alter ego]

[Buck Lin]

Alter ego doesn't it depend on who and where you are teaching. Generally the schools in China are hierarchal. So if you have class one in number one high school the students will be good. However if they are class fifteen in number thirty high school you may have a different problem. What I find here in China is that I am given the classes the Chinese teacher doesn't want to teach. I work in one of these programs now for students who did poorly in high school and are paying lots of money to get a degree. I like them much better than the cream I was suposedly teaching last year. They take chances for me.
The same thing occurred in South Korea where I would have 60 students of different abilities. Not students fault because I have worked in many high schools in China and saw excellent teachers and others who managed to stay one page ahead of the students in the text book. So I asked Penny Ur when she was in Korea how to deal with it and she said make three lesson plans. Let everyone work at something they can handle and something that will challange them.

[kev7161]

Actually, the "3-lesson plan" is not quite that. What I think it means is this:

Create one lesson plan that does indeed "teach to the middle", then you have some remediation activities (review) for those that can't quite get it. This could be as simple as making up a word search puzzle or have them look up and write down dictionary definitions of new vocabulary or a fill-in-the-blank kind of work sheet - - any somewhat easier activity that just reinforces a bit more the vocabulary or grammar you are teaching at the time. For those that are beyond the middle, also have a couple of extension exercises at the ready for them as well. Some more complex reading passages and comprehension questions perhaps - - OR, urge them to help the lower-level kids with vocabulary pronunciation exercises. Most of these extras you prepare for your class should hardly qualify for several hours of preparation. Especially after you come up with a dozen or so activities and then just re-use them with new topics and vocab.

But I also understand what you are saying about the different ability levels of students based on which class you are teaching: Class 1 is generally more adept than Class 5. I would still create the same lessons, I would just try to figure out 3 things - -

1. What MUST I teach to all students at all levels?
2. What don't I HAVE to teach but I can to the higher levels (but the lower levels won't be affected come test time if I don't teach to them)? Some language books I have seen in China generally come with suggested extra activities and a quick internet search will probably yield many results as well.
3. What extra 5-10 minute activities can I come up with for the end of class (games, role-playing, etc.) that my lower-level class can do as review and they don't even realize it's review (which, by the way, you can also use in your higher-level classes if you want to or have the time to)?

[joey2001]

[Hansen]

50,000RMB was the laowai cost. A local brownsuit, for the same services, might have been charged ~5000.

[The Ever-changing Cleric]