The life of a teacher (in China)

Owh - how life has changed again in the last half a week. First of all, I now have additional furniture (see picture) – a ‘kitchen’ table and a chair. Aaah…it helps – but the table/desk is belly-button height and the chair is so tall that my legs just swing back and forth instead of reaching the floor. I am thankful for the fact that the school followed through on their promise of providing me with furniture but I think I will go out soon sometime to buy some cheap furniture so that I can have students over and actually seat them.

This weekend I went to the city that’s less that 2 hours away from here and it was great (it is usually an over-night type thing)! I was able to meet up with a foreign teacher who teaches at one of the highschools there and she was able to give me lots of ideas for the curriculum and some resources as well. It was really nice to be able to talk with her and hear that she had the same experience last year – having to start from scratch.

Time in the city was also great because it had so many comforts. The people who’s house I stayed at (again) had a super nice soft bed for me and they had a shower head (I still don’t have a shower head so I end up dumping basins of water on myself)!!! It was lovely. We were also able to go to a ‘western’ restaurant. I think it would have been wonderful if I didn’t know what western food was like – the hamburger I ordered was on a sweet bun (which was to be expected…), had some cucumber on it(didn’t quite replace the relish), and the hamburger itself was super soft like jello so when I bit into the burger it actually squirted out on the sides of the bun (not the grease – but the burger). Perhaps I will order something different next time…like the dessert of ice cream with cut up fruit and tomato on it (I must not be very western because I had no idea we put tomato on our ice cream for dessert). Aaah, but I WAS able to buy butter (YAYY), coconut and the first season of Gilmore Girls. Apparently they even have whole-wheat flour, cocoa, and cheese in the city somewhere…the trip to the city will be glorious next time!

About two hours after I had arrived in the city on Saturday the school called me and told me there was a English teacher’s meeting in about an hour…aaah – I definitely was not able to make it to the meeting but I did hear about it yesterday after I called them and asked what was decided.

So, yesterday afternoon I found out that my responsibilities at the school somewhat changed/increased. Initially I had been teaching 10 classes including 3 different levels and English Corner (supposed to be a time of speaking English but it’s more of a zoo-type idea where everyone comes to see me). Yesterday I was shown my new schedule – 15 classes a week (7am class every day) -6 different levels- including a class where I teach the teachers (was supposed to be 2 classes a week for teachers but I talked them out of 1) + English Corner. Let’s just say that it’s challenging to prepare lessons for all these different classes – especially because I don’t have workbooks for the students, or internet, or a printer…all I can work with is an average of 60 students per class, chalkboard, and chalk. Aaaah, I am sure that once I get a hang of things it will be ok but when I found out yesterday afternoon that today I would be teaching a teacher’s training class as well as 3 additional classes of different levels I was a bit overwhelmed. Owh well...it will be nice to eventually get used to this routine!

In general life is going good. I am glad I am here...I have been getting good feedback from the classes I have been teaching which is encouraging. Also, even though it will be a busy term with the added classes - it is good to know that now that they finally have a foreign teacher they are trying to get the most out of her as possible.

As life goes on...