Recently, my boss has been observing my class. She never did this - not once - the first six months I worked there. I guess she had a change of heart about her supervisory role, which is unfortunate because she likes to translate what I say into Chinese before the kids have a chance to digest the English. Did I mention I'm supposed to teach English?
The following conversation took place yesterday after class. I had one student who failed to answer a question, despite much coaxing and hints. Everyone else answered. I know she understood. She was just gripped with a bout of "I'm so embarrassed I'm going to pretend I don't understand anything you say even if you say it in my native language" - a common affliction among Taiwanese children.
Boss: Maybe next time you just tell her what to say then she can repeat it.
Me: She needs to think for herself.
Boss: But this is how we teach here, even if she doesn't understand, she needs to repeat something.
Me: That's why so many students speak such poor English after studying a long time, they've just been taught to parrot, they can't actually talk.
Boss: This is Taiwan's way.
Me: Well it's a bad way to learn a language.
Boss: Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
Me: ha ha ha ha.
Boss: ha ha ha. ha.
Me: ha. ha.
And that was this week's dose of passive aggressive behavior. Stay tuned kids, there's still a few weeks left!
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1 comment:
So, in Taiwan, you can end any argument just by laughing? I wish I'd known that when I was there..
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