Day One

This morning we--the four Teach for China fellows--were introduced to the students. All 1200 or so of them. School assemblies here mean that the students all stand in the courtyard: two lines per class, four classes per grade, each grade grouped as a section. That means that a lot of students in the back can't actually see the front. Usually I'm sure they don't mind, but today they wanted to see the new teachers. This meant lots of little faces popping up over their classmates as students in the back jumped up to see us.

For the rest of the day most of the students have said hello to me as I walk around campus. This involves not only "老师好" (laoshi hao), or hello teacher, but also throwing their hand into the air in a motion that seems to be a hybrid of a wave and a salute. I usually respond with a smile and "你好" (ni hao) if it's a single student or "你们好" (nimen hao) if it's a group. I'll often nod or wave too. I'm not really sure what the respected response. It seems like the saying is more important to them than the response. Some of them are quite eager and some of them seem to be storing up the courage to speak.

Although we were told that we would not be teaching today, all the other teachers were responsible for supervising classes all day so we offered to give them a break by teaching a class. But it wasn't really a normal class, so I couldn't start with rules and expectations. I couldn't give them a survey. I couldn't give them the diagnostic test. So I read them Goodnight Moon (the simplest of the picture books I brought with me), taught them a few colours, and practiced saying and identifying them. Twice: one third grade class and one fourth grade class. The classes themselves could have been better--after all, it's hard to have a well run class when there are no rules or expectation in place--but now I have some idea of what I'm up against.

One of the students in the very back of the fourth grade class fell asleep sometime during the lesson. I walked to the back and laid a hand on his back, expecting that would wake him up. But he wouldn't wake up. I shook him slightly. He wouldn't wake up. The classmates sitting in front of him started shaking him too. He still wouldn't wake up and I was worried. Was he sick? Who should I talk to? Then, with a lot of shaking from his classmates, he finally woke up groggily. Several students told me he always sleeps in class.

The strongest students are always put in the front of the class and the poor students in the back. This is just how things are done. But I've already found that this makes it difficult to get the poorer students involved. Or hear if they're saying things at all. With 35-45 students per class, the back is pretty far back there. The front row always drowns them out. Then, when I walk to the back, the front starts to chatter. Hopefully between rules, lesson plans, and the expectation of real class, it will get better in the days and weeks to come!