Somehow, the time has slipped away, as I suppose it is want to do. I guess that, after my first month of full-time teaching, it’s time for another good ole’ reflection blog.
Along with my overall New Year’s resolutions to return home alive and with at least a few pennies in my pocket by the end of the year, I’ve opted for “New Month Resolutions” since those seem to be more manageable brain-wise. January’s resolutions: move out of my increasingly odious old apartment and get a decent handle on this whole “teaching English” thing.
With regards to the first of these, I have successfully vacated the Panopticon (as I was want to call my first apartment in which I felt like I was always under the gaze of the land family). The family that lived above me and rented the first floor out to foreigners had become increasingly snake-like with regards to money and privacy. I had watched each of my beloved former roommates succomb to frustration and exile following their unexpected requests for supplies purchases, rearrangements of our kitchen supplies (some of which went curiously missing), and insistence on having us pay exorbitant rates for guests visiting (something, which, I am proud to say, we seem to have managed to weasel out of).
Happily, I have left said palace of judgement to a new abode on the other side of the old city. I will write more about it when I actually take some pictures of it. Just know for know that it is both romantic and old, and therefore not without it’s many quirks.
I remember, when flying back to Tunis, looking forward to being at the end of the month and being able to look back on my first month of teaching with ease. At the time, I had a lot of anxiety about teaching on my own. I had had an excellent role model in my mentor but was unsure I could live up to her example. While, I may not have yet reached her pinnacle of excellence, I do feel a lot more comfortable and confident as a teacher. It hasn’t that I have four classes that are all the same level so I get to teach the same material four times. Also, I lucked out and have my best class first (I always get excited when I find out that they all did their homework). They’re quicker than the others and more forgiving so it’s easier to work out a few kinks here and there before I see the other classes (for example, have you ever thought about why we say “Can I help you?” and “May I help you?” but not “Could I help you?” yet say “Could you give me something for a cough?”. This is why I’m thankful to have office staff and veteran teachers who know better than I do and who I can look to for help tomorrow).
The kids are another story. Just as (to quote my father) “everyone, regardless of race, religion, class, gender, or sexuality, is allowed a seat on the Bozo Bus” there seems to be something timeless and placeless about 14-year olds. Be they private school kids in LA suburbs, public school kids in the South Side of Chicago, the wealth of Tunis’ children at AMIDEAST, or the kids from working-class neighborhoods near the US Embassy who I teach on Saturday, they seem to have a penchant for a very special flavor of annoying. I blame the hormones. That and the fact that trying to get them to give a shit about anything that isn’t themselves, Justin Beeber, or their peers’ opinion of themselves seems neigh impossible. That being said, there are good days and there are bad days and, so long as I give them lots of games and down time (and let them TALK, because that’s all they seem to want to do), I think it should be ok? I’m going to go to some various kid drawing boards because, as I seem to learn time and time again, just because you can get kids excited about summer camp does not necessarily mean they’ll be excited to learn something.
So I guess my February Resolution, besides actually getting some Arabic practice in (I’ve got a lot of language exchanges lined up that I’ve been, until now, noncommittal about), is to make my Saturday middle schooler classes more fun. For both of us.
felafelsophy 