I used to teach, in my pre-baby life. It was funny as heck, and my students and I laughed on a daily basis. Here's an essay I wrote after a particularly funny day.
For anyone who has ever had students
from China, you know that any good essay, project, presentation, or
-heck- paragraph, begins with that beloved, ingrained phrase, “as
we all know.” The best part is that most of the time, we don't all
know it. I've gotten such beauties as, “As we all know, Chairman
Mao founded America during the Qing Dynasty,” and, “As we all
know, flossing makes your teeth loose and fall out.” So for me
anyway, this little phrase is usually a red flag to announce that
something wrong this way comes.
My first year teaching, I co-taught a
listening and speaking class with a 40-year veteran teacher. He was
in his late sixties, and was a veritable walking textbook of lesson
plans. He'd truly seen and done it all. We made a great team, and the
students loved our
overly-enthusiastic-20-something-VS-the-crotchety-grandpa shtick. I
have never had so much fun teaching a class since.
Early on in the year, we assigned a
presentation project for which the students had to research something
about American culture or history and teach what they learned to the
class. The subject was pretty open and simple, but students liked it
because it allowed them to pursue whatever genuinely interested them
and had drawn them to this country in the first place. We had a
presentation on how American high schools work, how Americans go
shopping, and another on basketball. It was going really well, and my
co-teacher and I sat across from each other with the class in the
middle as we watched and assessed.
Then, Barney stood up. “Barney” was
his chosen American name, and despite cautions of forever being
identified as a large and loving purple dinosaur, he insisted on “Barney.”
I've had weirder names over the years, including: Mavis, Mildred,
Cherry, Machine, Felix, Rainbow, Berry, Azure, Daisy, Paolo, Hazmat,
Deshandra, and variations of classics brought on by misspellings,
such as “Cholé” for Chloe and “Bard” for Brad (who
unfortunately didn't care for poetry or for being asked if he did).
And there were always a dozen Jacks. Big name over there, apparently.
Did I mention that all of these students were from China? I thought
Chinese Paolo took the cake until a coworker of mine who had taught
in China once had a student who went by “President Ronald Reagan.”
No no – not just “Ronald,” or even a familiar “Reagan,” but
the fully titled “President Ronald Reagan.”
