First lesson is up.
Right, so I just go in there and talk right? Cool, I can do that. I mean how hard can it be? These guys speak English, they want to learn and surely they like the idea of tripping the light fantastic linguistic styleeee, right?
Well kind of. But I sense the fear. In their eyes and in my trousers. The boss of the school natually smelt my fear from a hundred paces and so was kind enough to make things even worse by sitting in. Aha, so not only do I not have an utter Scooby of what I’m supposed to be doing but an actual teacher, with actual experience is watching my every uncomfortable move.
We start. It’s not so bad actually. They seem to understand me and I am trying hard to understand them. Moving nicely through the material until the worst possible scenario happens. I see a word (an English word) that I have never ever ever seen before. The question in the book asks……..”What is the paradigm of Fall?” Now out of the six words in that question I sense that the most important of them is the word “Paradigm”. I don’t even know how to even pronounce the stupid thing. I glance at my boss who is sitting with a rather knowing, worried face. “So!” I ask the strongest student……..”What is the paradigm of Fall?” I then realise that his answer is kinda irrelevant as I don’t know the answer either. Of course, I do the brave and decent thing………I go round the group asking the other students if he’s right. They all seem to agree. “Well done!” I spout unconvincingly. A side glance to the boss suggests I clearly haven’t got away with it.
We continue, crossing perilous bridges signposted “Past Simple” and “Present Perfect”. There’s even one called “Present Perfect Continuous”! What are these? We go on to “action”, “time”, “in progress”…….. errrr, eh? There’s more confusion: “What do you mean time hasn’t finished?” “What do you mean the action continues up to the present time?” “What is a gerund?” WHY ARE YOU MAKING THIS SO COMPLICATED FOR ME !
Calm down, deep breaths. Is it me or is my face on fire? The rather humbling feeling I get from all this is that I’m certainly no John Keating. There will be no Dead TEFL Teacher Society. There will be no students clambering up on to the desk, holding their hands to their hearts pledging “O captain, my captain”. Well, what did I expect.
So the lesson from the lesson? Blag it baby……………………they’ll never know the difference………….and even if they do, it will give them confidence knowing that you can’t get to grips with the language either.
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