There IS Such Thing As Too Much Fun

Mondays are the death of me. While I definitely cannot complain about my job schedule (3 days/12 hours a week), Mondays are brutal because I come from a three-day weekend into 5 straight hours of class. Those 12 hours don't count the time spent making lesson plans, brainstorming ways to the attention of the students (who, for the most part, do NOT want to learn) and maybe, just maybe, teach them some English. In general, the teachers tell me to do whatever I want with them. Some might throw out suggestions: "In class we're currently studying ____," or, "Can you teach them about___ in the United States?" I oftentimes find it convenient to re-use one lesson on a few different classes. This is not because I'm too lazy/unmotivated to think of new lessons for each class; for instance, if I had a plan the students hated, I would make a new one. If a teacher gives me a request, I try to make a lesson plan for his/her class around that instead. Basically, give me some guidance and let me soar. I thought I was doing OK.

I have two groups of 2-3 students each from the same professor. Aside from these classes being my wretched early-morning group (again, really have no room for complaints: 9AM twice a week is NOT THAT BAD but still), their English just... sucks. Either that or they have a chronic case of cat's-got-the-tongue. The Thursday group (2 girls) is far worse than the Tuesday group (2 girls, 1 guy), both in terms of language skills and partcipating in class. Imagine how painfully slow a class goes by when your activity goes to shit because the students just... sit there.

So back to Mondays being wretched enough. Yesterday I had a note in my box from this particular professor-- all in very sloppily written French, so A) I could barely read it and B) I probably wouldn't understand it all even if I could read it. Then I saw another prof, Matthieu (whose BTS class is probably my fave, he flat-out told me to take them to a cafe and chat b/c it's a CONVERSATION class), and he helped decipher it. Basically, the students (specifically, the two girls from Thursday's class) had complained about me to their prof, and she was demanding to know what I was teaching them, that they have to prepare for the Bac & I've been wasting their time. OK fine, I understand that French kids could care less about Thanksgiving- I had tried desperately to make a fun lesson to teach it, including an activity, and the other classes loved it. These two sat there, and I borderline panicked once I realized I had gone through EVERYTHING (having counted on more-- nay, ANY-- participation on their part) with 15 minutes left to spare. Yes, I did some good ol' pulled-this-outta-my-ass chit-chat. Maybe they didn't like my approach of playing a game the day back from Toussaint's instead of just jumping into a more difficult lesson. Never mind the fact that I ask every one of my classes at every single meeting, "If there is anything specific you want to study, need to study, whatever, TELL ME!" Perhaps they would've had a more challenging lesson if their English (all two words I've ever heard them speak) did not suck. So yes, I was frustrated, annoyed and... confused.

Matthieu explained it. "When a lesson is fun-- a song, a video-- some students do not see it as real work." He related a time when he had used songs to teach, and even the parents got on his case about it. Basically, some students really just want to be given an assignment and lectured at. Yet one more major difference between French & American education. When I was in high school, read-and-lecture classes were miserable. The active ones-- playing games, class-led discussions, THOSE were fun. I could not name a single person who would've opted for taking notes over listening to music. Ha, I can now though. Besides, I don't think I'm doing them any favors by giving them a text to read, some review Q's, and just have them regurgitate the answers. I guess I'm coming to the realization that some students (and teachers) could care less about learning English. They care about the Baccalaurete. Once they take the Bac, they'll drop it like a French dog drops shit on the sidewalks. Why learn conversational (AKA useful) language when the Bac asks you for text analysis? It saddens me. I feel like my purpose for even being here has been defeated.

So fine. Matthieu saved my ass by lending me a copy of a Bac prep book with lots of mind-numbingly boring texts with redundant review questions after each one. I copied a few of them and ran one by this morning's class. They seemed OK with it-- had a good enough grasp of the language and Q's, but not to the point where I worried it was below their level. And I asked them about 5 times, "Is this text OK?? Not too difficult? Not too easy? Not too boring?" But again, they weren't the ones protesting against my fun lessons. Now, the silent pains in my ass on Thursday... if "real" work won't get them speaking, I'll likely consider telling their prof I don't want to see them. Nah, I can't do that unfortunately. But I could take Matthieu's suggestion of, "Just throw 5 or 6 texts at them at a time and demand full comparisons of each." That'll learn 'em.