Teaching

By this past Tuesday at 11am, I had taught ten different classes the same lesson plan.  During my 11th class, I find out that probably none of the other classes knew what I was talking about when I asked them to 'write' something down because I did not use the word 'copy' and these students did not know what the word 'assignment' meant so the other classes probably didn't know either!  I am not sure yet what the Chinese call it when they are assigned class work or homework but I will try and find out before this afternoon's class.

I teach 10 classes each week, total of 20 in a two week rotation, with 16 of them being different classes.  So, most of the classes I only see once every two weeks.  I will also be involved in the English corner when the students get it going and that is considered part of my teaching contract.  I have not set up office hours yet as I have been working on establishing a scheduled time for each student to visit with me three times during the year.  Now that I have developed, printed and posted that schedule, I need to find out from the students what other times they are free to visit and I will establish my office hours for that time.

These students really need more time to just talk in English than the few minutes available in a 40 minute class.  I am trying to come up with some sort of challenge that would make them want to participate in speaking English during their free time instead of Chinese.  If these students committed to speaking only English during their free time to each other, their English would really improve over the course of the year.  I am open to suggestions.