Last Session..

It's amazing what five sessions with the kids can bring about. Yes, I'm glad that the actual teaching sessions are over. I can't believe it but I actually miss the kids already. I'll never forget the way Ah Xue, the defiant girl, walking out of the backdoor, turning back, winking, smiling, waving and saying goodbye to me. I'll also treasure the dinosaur picture that one of the male students drew for me.

The proudest moments for me during the whole five sessions are the way I handled the roudy boys under my charge and getting Ah Xue to do her work in class. I'm surprised that Ah Xue even bothered turning up since she didn't seem interested to participate in any of the activities in class. Not sure why but I seem to have an affinity with Ah Xue. Despite chiding her repeatedly during the first session, she actually listened and did what I instructed her to do for the subsequent lessons. When being asked by my other friends to complete the task, she would refuse to do the work, prefering to sleep or walk around the class.

For the first time since I started teaching, I actually gained job satisfaction. What an irony. I had plenty of job dissatisfaction during the 4 months of contract teaching. I wonder whether the reason is the change in my mindset or the kind of students that I teach. Maybe it's a combination of both after all.

Sore Loser..

Stayed up to watch livescore of Rog's final against Nadal.

No such luck.

Rog still lost.

Rog can't seem to get the better of Nadal.

The French Open crown looks like a distant dream now.

I hate Nadal.

I'm a sore loser.

Wasted my time.

Looking like a panda now.

Only consolation is that I got the body of my lesson plan done.

Hungry, exhausted and extremely pissed now.

Broken EngRish..

My frequent source of entertainment used to be monthly emails circulated by this particular friend of mine. Not sure why but his emails suddenly came to a halt. I suspect my email address was deleted off his mailing list due to reasons that I do not know. Maybe I pissed him off so much with my rather frank comments and perhaps indifferent attitude towards him. Or maybe he knows I'm mocking at his English. Come to think of it, I haven't heard from him for months. Not that it bothers me much. I'm just slighly upset that that I've lost one source of entertainment.

I'm just super put off with guys that write/type in rotten English. Not expecting them to use Queen's English lah. After all, it's just an informal email. A bit of Singlish here and there is also ok lah. But I just can't stand it when they spell simple words wrongly repeatedly, write totally gramatically incorrect sentences and sentences that I can't make out head or tail. Despite that, these emails are a real source of amusement to read when I'm feeling bored.

I have a fresh source of entertaining emails now. I felt really bad regarding one of the paragraphs that was written about me. I think I'm very mean. Oh well, no one is perfect and I never admitted to be a saint. I can be quite hard-hearted at times.

Ok, procrastinating too much already. Back to work.

Bloody Cat..

I was in for a rude shock a couple of hours ago. I was greeted by my neighbour's bloody cat which almost pounced onto me the moment I stepped into MY house. The bloody cat has been entering in and out of my house more than a couple of times. I forgave it and it's owner when it was loitering in my garden. But there's no way I can tolerate a bloody cat strolling into my house, climbing up the stairs and entering our rooms. God knows what it does after that.

I'm absolutely freaked out. Not because the bloody cat scared the wits out of me but more due to hygiene reasons. That bloody cat's frequent hideout is the filthy drains. God knows what infectious diseases or germs it's carrying with it. The bloody cat has been walking into my garden countless of time. I can bear with that. But there's absolutely no way I can tolerate the following: Bolding strolling into my house when I'm reading the newspapers (that bloody cat obviously underestimated my detective powers), climbing onto my mango tree and then jumping onto the top of my car (haven't checked if there are any claw marks left on my car), walking into my brother's room and then lying itself comfortably at the balcony and lastly, hiding at the stairs and trying to pounce onto me.

Just now's incident was the last straw. I walked over to the opposite house and rang the doorbell. The only person at home was the old grandfather. Trying to keep my temper in check, I told him nicely in Mandarin to either tie his bloody cat or watch it properly. I explained to him that his bloody cat has been walking in and out of my house. That old man responded by giving my hand gestures, basically telling me to just shoo the cat. Hello. You think I'm at home 24hours a day to check if your bloody cat has strolled into my house. Anyway, again controlling my temper, I told him that it's alright if his bloody cat just loiters in my garden. But I cannot take the fact that the bloody cat walks in and out of MY house and almost giving me a heart attack. After a while, I figured out that it's pointless telling him too much because I suspect he didn't really understand me. I ended off with telling him to look after his bloody cat. I think I even said "thank you" before leaving. Just didn't want to make things awkward as we are neighbours after all. But I just felt I had to tell them how I felt as it's unfair that I've to suffer in silence just because of their bloody cat.

Anyway I doubt that that family will take any action to prevent their bloddy cat from loitering into other people's houses. After all, that family has been notorious for being barbaric and inconsiderate. They wouldn't care less if their bloody cat causes inconvenience to others. I think I'll heed Duckass' advice: get the 'cat' power and sprinkle it onto the driveway. I dare that bloody cat to step into the boundaries of my territory ever again.

I LOATHE cats.

Normal Technical..

A few gestures by a couple of students made my day yesterday.

My friends and I are allocated to conduct an English enrichment course to a lower secondary normal technical (NT) class. I was initially quite worried as I've never had any encounter with N(T) kids. The first two lessons with them confirmed my stereotyping of them. Restless, hyperactive, not paying attention in class, talkative etc. The students were just not listening when we were teaching. They were also constantly breaking rules. As usual, the fault lie in the student.

But after the second lesson, it suddenly dawned on me that it ain't their fault. Being an observer in class, I finally understood why they were behaving this way. They were just not engaged in the activities we designed for them. In plain English, our lessons were boring. Our lessons would have worked quite well for the Express stream, but certainly not for N(T) class.

After the third session yesterday, I finally found the root of the problem. I was in charge of this 'cannot-sit-still and constantly speaking Mandarin' group of rowdy boys. I was initially in-charge of a group of guai girls, with the exception of one who's just a bit more defiant. Being Miss Nice, I swapped with my friend because she just couldn't tahan them anymmore. Anyway, the group of boys kept having loud private converstaions in Mandarin even when one of my friends was teaching. So as usual, I attributed the fault to them. Since the rest of the class could keep quiet, why couldn't they?

During the group activity, when I was helping the boys, the defiant girl shouted "Not fair one cher, you help them, never help us. You suppose to be here. I don't want to do already lah!" I explained to her that I had swapped with another teacher. I would no longer be in-charge of them. She looked a bit disappointed. (I had initially expected her to be pleased because I had constantly picked on her in the previous lesson.) The boys were quite pleased that their initial teacher was no longer with them. They said during their private conversations that their teacher never listened to them. Anyway, during the group activity, the boys were just not engaged in the activity. Pissed off, I told them, "Ok, no more private conversations." One boy retorted back, "Teacher jiang3 niao3 hua4." The rest of them started bursting into laughter. I found it quite funny but of course being a professional, I had to control my laughter and instead act annoyed. I stared at his eyes and told him "I'm not amused." "Huh?" was his response. (Probably doesn't know the meaning of 'amused') I said sternly, "If I hear that one more time, I'm going to take action against you." He got quite frightened and said "ok ok". Putting the incident behind, I told them to proceed with their work. Instead, I got this response in Mandarin "Cher, don't know what to do lah."

After explaining to them, they were still unsure. It then struck me that the instructions we gave them were too complex and perhaps we spoke too quickly. If a group of 5 couldn't understand when they were given individual attention, what more a class of 40? After glancing across the class, my suspicions were confirmed. The students looked lost and each of us had to repeat the instructions to each group. After working with them, I realised that their command of English language is really weak. All along, I thought they intentionally spoke Mandarin to irritate us. When I got them to read a short paragraph, they couldn't even do so. It then occured to me that they seriously needed help. So I explained to them and helped them along in their activity. I didn't have a chair then and I was practically squatting. Upon hearing that I said "I'll help you all", the boy who said that I jiang3 niao3 hua4 immediately grabbed a chair and told me to sit down. I was very touched and I started laughing. I've never seen a student so enthusiastic when I said I will be offering help.

Anyway, I had an enjoyable time teaching this group. Whenver I taught something, they will confirm in Mandarin with me what I just said. After a while, I just allowed them. At least they know what they are learning now. It's a vast improvement from before, when they didn't even know what they were doing. And I absolutely loved the way they volunteered their answers. With my help, they were more confident of their answers. Hence, they were motivated to raise up their hands and gain points also because theirs was the lowest in the class. By the end of the day, they managed to overtake another group. Boy were they happy about it! It also meant that for the first time, they need not rearrangement the furniture back to the orignial position. The lowest scoring group of the day had to do it.

I really empathize with these kids. With such a weak command of English language, the objective of teaching English to them is to make sure that they know how to communicate with the outside world, or rather in supermarkets, banks etc. Another is to teach them to understand what people are saying in English. Giving them comprehension passages and endless of tests would not help them in their oral communication and listening skills. For NT kids, a total different approach of teaching is needed to entice them to learn. But for a start, I think my group and I need to work on giving clearer instructions.

My views on N(T) kids are very different now. Despite being a little hyperactive, they are generally more appreciative of the teacher's help. They are also a very helpful bunch. When I was having difficulty sticking something on the board, one boy just came up to me and magically took out scotch tape from his pocket and helped me to stick without even asking. I was really grateful for that.

Now I finally understand why a couple of my friends prefer teaching N(T) kids.