Teaching High School

Exam Fun

Exams were given ten to fourteen days ago, but the students and parents received the report cards in the mail last Friday. Now the email and phone calls come pouring in. (I wonder where the concern was previously, but who am I to judge?)

Funny comment from one: "How could my daughter fail the [foreign language I teach] exam? She studied hard and we are both native speakers of the language. Isn't that impossible?" Well, I taught English before too, and if having native speakers at home guarantees a passing grade, many, many students are not doing so well in a "native speaker" environment.

Trying Again

It has been nine months since I made any progress here. Much has changed. I am now teaching in my own room, teaching one subject, and teaching an extra class for which they pay me an additional 1/6 of my salary. It has been a better year, but not without its trials. Keeping that in mind, that there are trails, I want to take a new tact with this blog, one that will hopefully allow me to keep my sanity and see the positive side of what I do.

My new tact is to record the funny things kids say. They are often a funny bunch, because they are so young, but they are also sometimes truly comedic.

For a first entry on funny students, I turn back to the day before Christmas Break back in December. I was showing a movie as many teachers did that Monday and Tuesday, and a young man came to my desk. I was expecting a request to go to the bathroom, but it was better than that.

"Can I have a candy cane?" from said young man.

"Sure, so long as you get any mess and wrapper in the trash, please," from me.

"Oh. Don't you have one for me?"

"No, no I don't." I waited politely until he was out of earshot on his way back to his seat to say to the two girls in front of me, "What was that all about?" to which we all giggled.