Andrew Aigner-Muehlerchapter 27... The end of semester one a new school year
January 10th 2010 10:20
It is Friday the 25th of December, Christmas day of all days. A day that you should be celebrating with your loved ones instead, I am spending two hours with my students who I had called my kids for the past four or so months.
Christmas day is meant to be a happy day, to celebrate the birth of Christ and give each other presents and accept them gracefully, though today was the last day I am going to teach my sweet little lovely grade one kiddies.
It isn’t a good thing when a man cries, but when you are a sensitive guy, and you loved your students like you were their father, it is hard not too when you start to see them cry. So, I just had to take a group photo of each of my classes for memories.
When I look back now, my decision to come to Beijing was a decision well made. When I judged the CCTV start of outlook talent competition in Chengde for the Chengde committee and saw those young kids on stage and noticing how good their English was, and thought back then, yes, I want to teach primary school. I am now glad I did it. Yeah, the package at XiErQi was a not so good one, putting me on less than I was in Chengde, but at least I did have fairly good teaching assistants, they did not give me any trouble, or what I know off, did not say anything bad about me.
The school, was a nice school, well laid out, and looked the part on the outside, on the inside, it looked the part as well, luckily enough my classes had everything working, so I could teach my students to the best of my ability, and teach them in a variety of ways.
Each of my classes had a Chinese teaching assistant, who taught them English, and they knew English quite well themselves. The teaching assistants would bring them to class, and let me teach the class my way, they did not get involved or try to tell me how to teach, they most of the time sat in the back corner marking, except for two who concentrated on discipline, to make sure the kids were listening. If I had trouble, putting something across to the students, they would help me translate, so the kids would understand, though most of the time the kids surprisingly understood me.
At the start of the school year or semester, I had a hard time of things as I had to teach half of my classes by myself as two of the classes did not have a Chinese teacher who taught English. It was hard especially when the kids were just starting to get to know me, and get use to the way I speak, including my accent. At anytime with any one from around the world, it is hard to understand an Australian.
The only thing the school lacks in, which a very bad hate of mine, and that was COMMUNICATION. I need people to communicate with me. I communicate with others. The school never told us anything. I know it is apart of Chinese culture, that things are done at the last moment, but when there is a test or exam, surely they know a few days ahead. The last two times in the school that come to mind was just in the past two weeks. On a Tuesday morning, heading to my first class at 7:45am for an 8:00am start. I have the audio set up for a song and my notes and papers ready, and I am sitting there and sitting there, and no class comes. The funny thing is, I had the same class the evening before at 4:45pm until 5:25pm. Surely they must have known. It doesn’t put you in the right frame of mind for the rest of the day. But apart from the poor communication, and the poor package, the school was great. Yeah, there were a couple little things like the 200 Yuan per month lunch allowance was taken away from us, leaving us to put 150 to 200 on it every month, and as well as most of the Chinese teachers in the foreign teachers office would not say boo to us, with one or two causing a bit of trouble, but at the end of the day, it was a good school to teach at, and I was happy there.
The worse thing about teaching primary school is the semester finishes early for foreign teachers and then they are not back until the 1st of March. You are two and a bit months out of work, of which then the fun starts trying to either find a new school, if you are out of contract or find work for a couple months. In China, at this time of the year, it is hard to travel, as it is so damn cold, especially this year, as it is the coldest winter for 40 years. Finding a teaching job in China is quite easy, if you do mind teaching in a language school, in a small little cubicle or room teaching one to one or small classes of 3 to 6, or should I say, in some cases if you are Australian, it is quite hard, as many schools in China will not employ Australians because of the Australian language and accent, I just had another recent encounter with that with New Oriental. I actually applied for a winter camp position with ForeignHR whom were happy to take me on as a teacher, but they could not send me as a teacher to winter camp because it was with New Oriental who said applicants needed to have a ‘Z’ visa, ‘F’ visa’s were not allowed. Anyway, with out knowing, the next day after having a winter camp interview with ForeignHR, I had an interview with New Oriental for winter camp. My demo class was ‘enjoyable’ which was quoted by the interviewer at New Oriental, my visa was not a problem they said, but they could not take me on because I did not speak English, they only want teachers who speak American English. To tell the truth, I accept that, the thing that makes me mad about that is, these places have foreign teachers from Russia, South and Central America, India, Africa, Philippines and Europe teaching conversational English. The last time that I checked these places do not speak English as a native language nor speak American English.
Moving on, it is time to move on, as I am here to help these kids to being able to speak English, as they are in the right spot at the right time. Give it 5 or 10 years, China will be the powerhouse, they will be the leaders of the world, and all businesses in this country will need fluent English speakers. I hope that in my later years, I can look back and say I was apart of that or I helped to teach English to a president of China.
Grade one, Class 4B at XiErQi primary school, Beijing
Christmas day is meant to be a happy day, to celebrate the birth of Christ and give each other presents and accept them gracefully, though today was the last day I am going to teach my sweet little lovely grade one kiddies.
It isn’t a good thing when a man cries, but when you are a sensitive guy, and you loved your students like you were their father, it is hard not too when you start to see them cry. So, I just had to take a group photo of each of my classes for memories.
Grade one, Class 2A at XiErQi primary school, Beijing
When I look back now, my decision to come to Beijing was a decision well made. When I judged the CCTV start of outlook talent competition in Chengde for the Chengde committee and saw those young kids on stage and noticing how good their English was, and thought back then, yes, I want to teach primary school. I am now glad I did it. Yeah, the package at XiErQi was a not so good one, putting me on less than I was in Chengde, but at least I did have fairly good teaching assistants, they did not give me any trouble, or what I know off, did not say anything bad about me.
Grade one, Class 2B at XiErQi primary school, Beijing
The school, was a nice school, well laid out, and looked the part on the outside, on the inside, it looked the part as well, luckily enough my classes had everything working, so I could teach my students to the best of my ability, and teach them in a variety of ways.
Each of my classes had a Chinese teaching assistant, who taught them English, and they knew English quite well themselves. The teaching assistants would bring them to class, and let me teach the class my way, they did not get involved or try to tell me how to teach, they most of the time sat in the back corner marking, except for two who concentrated on discipline, to make sure the kids were listening. If I had trouble, putting something across to the students, they would help me translate, so the kids would understand, though most of the time the kids surprisingly understood me.
Grade one, Class 3A at XiErQi primary school, Beijing
At the start of the school year or semester, I had a hard time of things as I had to teach half of my classes by myself as two of the classes did not have a Chinese teacher who taught English. It was hard especially when the kids were just starting to get to know me, and get use to the way I speak, including my accent. At anytime with any one from around the world, it is hard to understand an Australian.
The only thing the school lacks in, which a very bad hate of mine, and that was COMMUNICATION. I need people to communicate with me. I communicate with others. The school never told us anything. I know it is apart of Chinese culture, that things are done at the last moment, but when there is a test or exam, surely they know a few days ahead. The last two times in the school that come to mind was just in the past two weeks. On a Tuesday morning, heading to my first class at 7:45am for an 8:00am start. I have the audio set up for a song and my notes and papers ready, and I am sitting there and sitting there, and no class comes. The funny thing is, I had the same class the evening before at 4:45pm until 5:25pm. Surely they must have known. It doesn’t put you in the right frame of mind for the rest of the day. But apart from the poor communication, and the poor package, the school was great. Yeah, there were a couple little things like the 200 Yuan per month lunch allowance was taken away from us, leaving us to put 150 to 200 on it every month, and as well as most of the Chinese teachers in the foreign teachers office would not say boo to us, with one or two causing a bit of trouble, but at the end of the day, it was a good school to teach at, and I was happy there.
Grade one, Class 3B at XiErQi primary school, Beijing
The worse thing about teaching primary school is the semester finishes early for foreign teachers and then they are not back until the 1st of March. You are two and a bit months out of work, of which then the fun starts trying to either find a new school, if you are out of contract or find work for a couple months. In China, at this time of the year, it is hard to travel, as it is so damn cold, especially this year, as it is the coldest winter for 40 years. Finding a teaching job in China is quite easy, if you do mind teaching in a language school, in a small little cubicle or room teaching one to one or small classes of 3 to 6, or should I say, in some cases if you are Australian, it is quite hard, as many schools in China will not employ Australians because of the Australian language and accent, I just had another recent encounter with that with New Oriental. I actually applied for a winter camp position with ForeignHR whom were happy to take me on as a teacher, but they could not send me as a teacher to winter camp because it was with New Oriental who said applicants needed to have a ‘Z’ visa, ‘F’ visa’s were not allowed. Anyway, with out knowing, the next day after having a winter camp interview with ForeignHR, I had an interview with New Oriental for winter camp. My demo class was ‘enjoyable’ which was quoted by the interviewer at New Oriental, my visa was not a problem they said, but they could not take me on because I did not speak English, they only want teachers who speak American English. To tell the truth, I accept that, the thing that makes me mad about that is, these places have foreign teachers from Russia, South and Central America, India, Africa, Philippines and Europe teaching conversational English. The last time that I checked these places do not speak English as a native language nor speak American English.
Moving on, it is time to move on, as I am here to help these kids to being able to speak English, as they are in the right spot at the right time. Give it 5 or 10 years, China will be the powerhouse, they will be the leaders of the world, and all businesses in this country will need fluent English speakers. I hope that in my later years, I can look back and say I was apart of that or I helped to teach English to a president of China.
Grade one, Class 4A at XiErQi primary school, Beijing
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