It’s hard to believe it’s been 8 ½ weeks since I left
home. In the first month I’ve had
many ups and downs, but I feel like I’ve pretty much adjusted to life in
Guangzhou. We’re still discovering
new great places to eat around our apartment. Just this week we found a place down the street that serves
great noodles for less than a dollar.
One of the only complaints I have is that the temperature has not
changed since we got here. It’s
still 90 degrees and humid most days so I’m missing fall weather at home.
Clearly I’ve been busy because I’ve been neglecting my
blog. My teaching schedule changed
many times at the start of term and I still get surprises in my schedule that
are teaching me to just roll with everything. One observation I have of the Chinese, at least the teachers
at this school, is that they tend to be vague when explaining and answering
questions. One of the most
important part of social Chinese culture involves “saving face,” a concept I’m
still learning to understand. The Chinese
are extremely social and also very concerned with the greater good and putting
the larger society before themselves.
Some evidence of this in everyday social interactions can be witnessed
on public transportation. Most
people use the public buses and subways to travel around the city, thus there
are all ages and types of people.
Young people ALWAYS give up their seats for elderly people, small
children, and pregnant women or women carrying children.
For the first few weeks I have been teaching 11 classes of 7th
and 8th graders, observing three high school science classes, and
teaching six classes of elementary school each week. Half of my middle school classes are science and half are
oral English. I knew it would be
challenging to teach science through the English language and it is. In order to get into middle schools and
high schools, Chinese students must take entrance exams. These are the source of much pressure
because they determine the quality of the school the students can attend, and
thus determine their future success.
Only students with very high test scores may attend the campus where I
live. I teach some of my classes
here and some classes at another campus where the students have scored lower on
entrance exams. I honestly have
not noticed an extreme difference in the students of the two schools, but I
also only see my students once a week and receive little written work or
assessment. Thus my experience
teaching here is VERY different from any student teaching experience in America. The added challenges and differences are
no doubt beneficial, but make it difficult for me to plan lessons and assess to
students’ knowledge. I am
beginning to adopt the attitude that regardless of how well my lessons are
planned according to American or Ohio standards, my students will still enjoy
them and learn from them. My
biggest challenge in the classroom is keeping the attention of 50 plus students
and ensuring that they are all active and involved and practicing their
English. Some of the students have
amazing English speaking ability, and others claim to have little to none. I’m convinced some of those students
are just nervous to speak to a native English speaker. Once again, everything is about “saving
face.” No student wants to admit
that they don’t understand something and risk losing face or being embarrassed
in front of their peers. Thus it
is difficult to really know whether the students actually understand me, or
just claim to understand me to save face.
The teachers and other Chinese people I interact with sometimes
use vagueness to save face. At
first I sometimes became frustrated when trying to communicate with our
coordinator here because he speaks English fairly well, but I felt like he
never realized or admitted that he didn’t understand something I said or made
an effort to have me explain it better.
Thus sometimes I felt my questions were either ignored or answered very
vaguely. When communicating
with your coordinator for living and teaching, this is frustrating. But I have come to understand that this
is really just him “saving face” and that this is an extremely important part of
the culture that becomes embedded in all interactions. It also causes everyone I speak with to
be extremely nice and helpful. I
do not doubt that they are being genuine.
I’ve made several Chinese friends who are always so happy to see
us. I immediately get a big smile
and a hug whenever I see them. The
girls are also big fans of linking arms when we walk down the street. It’s so nice to feel so close to people
who I just recently met. The saving
face niceness is also evident when taking part in social gatherings. We have eaten at several nice dinners
where we are served family style at a round table in a private room. No one wants to sit down first or take
food first. No one wants to sit at
the head of the table, which I learned is the seat opposite the door. If someone serves more tea or food to
themselves, they first serve everyone else around them. Everyone constantly toasts each other,
causing everyone at the table to stand up and cheers at least 15 times per
meal. Everyone we have eaten with
always treats us as special guests.
Last Thursday Livia and I started a game with the students on
the soccer field during the evening dinner break. It was pretty fun and we got a group of students who are
going to play every week. Two of
them are Amy and Katherine from my 7th grade English class. A couple weeks ago in class they read
short stories in pairs. Amy and
Katherine read “Sleeping Beauty” aloud together and at the end of the story,
they hugged each other because it was “so romantic.” Needless to say they are now some of my favorite
students.
Despite the difficulties classes have been going pretty well
and I learn more each week. The
students are still excited to have me teach, even though my lessons are not
always as exciting or fun as I wish they were. I think the students have to endure boring lecture-style lessons
too much, so I want to make mine as interactive and interesting as
possible. This past week I finally
succeeded. In English I taught a
lesson on the Titanic. When I
asked what they knew about Titanic, they all said “You jump, I jump!” and
several started singing “My Heart Will Go On.” Celine Dion is apparently very popular here. After I let them tell me about the
movie Titanic, we learned about the real ship. The students watched a video on the sinking and learned
about what happened and why so many people died. Then they listed as many jobs as they could think of and had
to decide which five people they would save first in their lifeboat in small
groups. At the end we took a class
poll and decided on a class lifeboat and they had a discussion on why they
chose certain people. It was
educational for me and interesting for them. More students were willing to speak and were less shy
because they were enjoying the topic.
Most classes chose pregnant woman, child, sailor, doctor, farmer, cook,
and inventor for their lifeboats.
The pregnant woman was chosen because “we can save two lives in one” and
also because “children are the future of the country.” The others were chosen based on how
useful they were to the rest of the people. The “best” jobs or jobs that make the most money were thrown
out if they weren’t helpful.
Although one student did want to save the lawyer because they could get
money from the crash. They decided
that I wasn’t helpful because I am a teacher, so I had to die to save someone
else. I acted really hurt and they
all laughed. They all agreed that
women and children should be saved first and that the captain should go down
with his ship.
more to follow this week...
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