Foreign Infatuation: On Teaching English Abroad & the French Foreign Legion

da teachada teacha Regular
edited August 2010 in Life
So I'm now back at home, after what's been a pretty eventful year. I flew out to Poland in September, where I worked as an English teacher. In March I got pretty bored one week and decided to find work in Kiev, but again, got bored of that and decided to enlist for the French Foreign Legion. Now I have fuck all to do, I'm writing up bits of my diaries I wrote along the way. Unfortunately however, all my shit I wrote in Poland got tore up by the Legion, so most of it for now is about my time in France.

www.foreigninfatuation.blogspot.com

Comments

  • da teachada teacha Regular
    edited July 2010
    A typical lesson...

    Times have changed it seems. Gone are the days of rocking up to lessons 4 days a week for an average of 2.5 hours, and here are the days where I'm going to be regularly waking up at stupid times like 7am, manning split shifts and sometimes working 6 days a week. Yesterday was one of those 'some' times; I had to lead a fucking discussion club.

    It was at 12, but the school takes an hour to get to from my current location, and I needed to prepare something beforehand. Combined with having something to eat and a shower, it meant that I had to get up someetime around 9: an unheard of time for a weekday, let alone Saturday morning. (Unless it's when I'm stumbling back from a night out)

    Needless to say, getting up at 9 was never going to happen, and I opted to get some grub down me instead of solidly preparing a lesson at the school: that's what an imagination and public transport is for I guess.

    So I rock up to the school, with 5 minutes before class, still wondering 'what the fuck is a discussion club?' And 'why the fuck are people wasting their Saturdays attending?'. I tried finding my answers on a quick net browsing session, but I got heavily distracted by the news of the Polish presidents death: something which took me back quite an expected way for some strange reason.

    Though it was pretty lucky that it happened, as it gave me something to 'discuss'. I walked in the room to a single, eager student who I vaguely remembered from another class. After skillfully extracting his name, I started to have a chat about the death, and various conspiracy theories possibly connected with the situation. It culminated in me somehow changing the topic into previous 'clubs' and what the fuck the teacher actually did. He basically told me all that I was planning to do, then proceeded to tell me that most people thought they were shit; putting everything into a bit of disarray.

    The free conversation didn't last for long: and one by one, more students trickled in. About 10 minutes had been killed, but it was 80 minutes too little and I was desperately in need of ideas...

    I eventually burst into the 'yes/no' game, and explained it is a valuable skill to be able to express yourself in a variety of different ways. I didn't have any questions planned however, which meant I asked a series of the most bullshit questions of my life. At 2 minutes max a person, I managed to kill about another 10 minutes; possibly another 5 with some 'consolidation' and 'feedback' work on the activity.

    Being back in the doghouse, I decided to revert to the 'boring' topic i thought of beforehand: whether Ukraine should align itself closer to Russia or EU. I split the groups purposefully so those who felt very anti-Russia would be supporting Russia; much to my ammusement. The smarter ones seemed satisfied debating away, but the hot bitch who was last to arrived didn't seem too impressed, and her for benefit (and possibly for mine), I decided I needed to find something more entertainining to do. I slipped into 'pretending to listen' mode, and thought of ideas... Nothing came, apart from an idea I had a few days ago which fucked up pretty horribly. The debate was decaying away, and I decided I had no choice but to cringingly burst into the generic desert island situation. With a twist of course...

    Basically, they all spend a few minutes writing down on little torn off sheets of paper what items they could not live without; which they'd want with them on a desert island. I then collected up all the sheets and one by one wrote various items on the board, making the class discuss who they thought would bring each item. However, instead of actually using the incredibly boring shit which they wrote, I used a few ideas of my own. A few bottles of vodka, guys and a deck of cards were a few of the more interesting and probing items I had them discuss, in a ploy to find out the charecter traits of some of the hotter students. I wanted to dig a bit deeper, but I was worried it might get a little bit too obvious if I wrote a '20 year old English teacher'...

    Funnily enough, the 'discussion' went extremely well, and after the 'club' the students poured out with smiley faces and gave compliments about me to the secretary; claiming it was a pleasant contrast from the old boring native faggot they usually have. So, I learnt a few things:

    1) If a lesson fucks up, it isn't necessarily your fault; some groups are just dull and boring and nothing will help the pitiful pricks. You just have to clockwatch, bite your tongue and be patient.

    2) I don't actually need to spend so long planning lessons; making shit up on the spot seems to work just as well, and saves a hell a lot of time.

    3) Some people really are fucking boring and seem incapable of thinking for themselves without constant pressure and prompts.

    4) Getting up early is shit. Really shit. I want to sleep.

    http://foreigninfatuation.blogspot.com/2010/04/breakfast-club.html
  • uncutdiamonduncutdiamond Semo-Regulars
    edited July 2010
    You are a fucking idiot and I hope you get the shit kicked out of you for eyeing off your students. A good lesson DOES take preparation and practice as well as a goal for the lesson. They may as well have a filthy Filipino teaching broken English from a good book than your shitty improvisation.
  • da teachada teacha Regular
    edited July 2010
    You are a fucking idiot and I hope you get the shit kicked out of you for eyeing off your students. A good lesson DOES take preparation and practice as well as a goal for the lesson. They may as well have a filthy Filipino teaching broken English from a good book than your shitty improvisation.

    LOL, I was happy, they were happy, my director was happy.

    Oh, but fuck, you're not happy... Shit, I better re-evaluate my approach to life!
  • trippytrippy Acolyte
    edited August 2010
    You are a fucking idiot and I hope you get the shit kicked out of you for eyeing off your students. A good lesson DOES take preparation and practice as well as a goal for the lesson. They may as well have a filthy Filipino teaching broken English from a good book than your shitty improvisation.

    what are you just trying to be an asshole? if you are that wasnt even creative. and if your serious you have no sense of fun or amusement and you should die. also if your serious i bet me starting a sentence with and, and using no caps is gonna keep you awake for days huh?
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