American Girl Found in Classroom Tied Up and Gagged by a Pack of Angry Vietnamese Children

Character-building indeed.  When I wrote about my fears of mayhem breaking out during my children’s classes, I thought I was exaggerating for comic effect.  Little did I know that my teaching nightmare would become a reality.  No, I didn’t end up actually crying in the corner and no furniture was broken, but it only seems to be a matter of time before this happens.  As for the running and screaming, there was plenty of that going on.  There was also crayon-throwing, teacher-mocking, non-stop chattering, wrestling, running out of the classroom, getting out of chairs and dancing, glaring, bullying of other children, and flat out defiance.  At one point, a kid whined “I wanna go home!”  Hey kid, you’re making me want to go back to my home country, so at least we can relate on that level.   

 

 

Much of this has to do with the fact that I’m inexperienced.  I’ve observed one children’s class ever, and therefore I’m supposed to figure this all out by trial and error.  I also have no idea what I’m supposed to do to discipline these kids, and I’m not really the disciplinarian type in general.  I was reluctant to send them to our equivalent of a principal on my first day and wasn’t sure if the behavior even warranted that.  I want to keep it as a nuclear option that I use only for truly abhorrent behavior (that and speaking to their parents, who almost assuredly won’t know English, but I’m sure there’s a way around that).  I suppose I could send them out of the class for a time out of sorts (or is that a reward?).  What do you do when they simply won’t listen to you?  I’m serious.  Any ideas?  All the other teachers I spoke to beforehand said to just play lots of games.  We did play lots of games, and of course that just gets them riled up.  My mom, who actually teaches little kids, said, “No. No games until you’ve established some kind of control.  You can reward them with games once they’ve chilled out.”  Or something like that.  She was a little unsure about how to discipline effectively when your students don’t speak your language.  Everyone says you must be strict in the beginning – let them know who’s boss – because if you don’t do it initially, it’s almost impossible to do it later.  Great.  And some teachers have given me the impression that this is all normal, and it doesn’t really get much better.  Fabulous.  My Sundays for the next 6 months are starting to look bleak.

 

Despite all of the above whining, the 3 kids’ classes I had weren’t a complete disaster – just teetering dangerously on the brink of complete disaster.  There were good moments…I was so proud of them when they were able to understand the difference between uncountable and countable nouns.  When given worksheets, almost all of them do the work and do it well.  And there were definitely times when they were on the same page as me, chanting sentences that I asked them to chant rather than attempting to beat the shit out of their neighbor.  And of course, they’re cute as hell.  But I still have a long way to go before I can successfully take my peers’ advice to “have fun.”  Fun?  What kind of sadistic idea of fun do you have in mind?  Jouke thinks that some people just love the kids’ classes while others can’t stand them, and there appears to be no middle ground.  I’m currently in the latter category, but I haven’t resigned myself to it yet.  I’ll hopefully figure out how to achieve order or at least some kind of controlled chaos, and then it won’t be so bad.  I figure if I give it a few more weeks, and it doesn’t improve (or God help me, get worse), I’ll have to just beg my boss to find someone else who can handle it.  Do you really want these parents paying for a really bad babysitter?  Alas, we’ll see how it goes.  I also had teenagers, who intimidated me at first (what could be worse than teens?!).  The teens were great, though, and my only issue with that class is that I need to grade my language more and figure out activities that aren’t over their heads.  They were sweet and adorable.  Also, so far I have one adult class which I’ve taught twice, and I’m completely smitten with them as well.  They’re also sweet and patient, and I find teaching them really is fun.  They’ll pretty much do whatever you ask them to, and go beyond what’s asked of them when they can.  I heart them.

Hanoi Street - nothing to do with the post, but I like it.