Meetings

This was a week of meetings. One thing that I have noticed is integral to all Chinese meetings is photos (except faculty meetings, which I guess are routine enough to be exempt). They apparently feel the need to photograph everyone who speaks, as well as the room, at intervals of approximately five or ten minutes at the most. There is also no single designated photographer, although there is usually someone who seems the most intense about it: one person using a fancy camera doesn't obviate the need for everyone else to take pictures on their cameras or phones. And of course, foreigners are a particular curiosity. There seems to be no concept that photography could ever be disruptive, excessive, or rude (to be fair, plenty of Americans seem fuzzy on this concept too).  Except for the first photo, all of the following were taken by others and then sent to me.

The iPad meeting. Note the two cameras to the left and the two local teachers cutting watermelon to the right.
The actual talking was happening just behind the two teachers, between the head iPad person and my principal.

Wednesday and Thursday were taken up by teaching three middle school classes (each a double period...something that we didn't discover until Wednesday morning) and "dialogues" with the local teachers.

Teaching my first middle school class.
"I'm making some plans to volunteer (insert time here)."

Encouraging a reluctant student to speak.

The two main questions that the local teachers had were:

1) How do we make our students interested in English? They say seventh graders are somewhat interested, but then lose interest because of the high testing pressure. We suggested taking just a few minutes of class a week (they have ten 45-minute classes a week) to practice speaking, listen to English songs, or watch an English movie clip. We were told this just isn't possible. Hopefully they'll come around. As the Chinese saying goes (sometimes I find it comforting, sometimes infuriating): 慢慢来 (màn màn lái), "slowly to come" or things come or change slowly.

2) How do we help students remember so many new words? The curriculum here is insane and leads to teachers cramming in as many words as possible into each class, but the students almost never getting the chance to actually speak the language. We suggested giving them as much context for a word as possible. Teach it in sentences, not just alone. Show a picture. Use a hand gesture. Don't just write it five times, but say it too. But honestly, building vocabulary is one of the hardest things about learning a language, and it's something that the Chinese teaching style does well. They cram vocabulary. What's harder is making that vocabulary useful. We all found that the middle schoolers far exceeded our expectations in their ability to understand the quite complex sentences found in their books. But the moment you veer away from those exact sentences, they're at a loss.

On Thursday evening I was told that an important meeting was happening on Friday. Members of the Communist Youth League from another province that has just started to have Teach for China fellows this year were visiting our region to learn about how Teach for China in this region has been cooperating with local teachers and principals. I think the meeting was an outward sign of useful communication, but the meeting itself just talked in big, broad terms.

It was a rather fancy meeting, with more fruit than could be possibly eaten, tea, and water.
And, of course, lots of photos taken.

I was told I had to stand in the middle.