Teaching Roundup 1: First Attempts

In the midst of arriving in Europe, struggling through French, meeting new people, and making travel plans for my upcoming vacation, my focus can sometimes shift from the main reason I’m here: to help teach English to French high-schoolers. This part of my experience began on October 7, and over the past two weeks I’ve worked with several teachers and met a lot of students.

Teaching is both foreign and familiar to me. My limited experience comes from teaching Hebrew School to a class of six-year olds during my senior year of college. I’m not sure how well that stint prepared me for this—teaching three kids about Jewish holidays via coloring pages and story time is hardly the same as working with an entire class of adolescents who’s first language is different from mine.

It’s still very new, so I’ll just have to see how things progress! For now, here’s a list of 5 things that have surprised me in my new role of English Teaching Assistant.

# 1. Trying to dispel stereotypes about the US. A lot of information the students have about the US is from American TV shows like Glee, Desperate Housewives, and One Tree Hill, and several times they have asked me if I’ve met a celebrity and if life in the US is like life in American TV shows. It’s not, for the most part, and I think the students are a little disappointed to hear that!

# 2. Talking about 9/11. I think this is like when I ask my parents where they were when MLK or Kennedy was shot. Everyone who remembers 9/11 has had the “where were you when” conversation, but when I told one class about it this week, I had never felt more like an outsider… extremely separate from the class and also extremely American. To the students, I have detailed information about this thing that happened really far away when they were toddlers and hasn’t had much impact on their lives. It was a strange and surprisingly difficult few minutes, to say the least.

# 3. Questions about American politics. I’ve cared a lot more about politics since college, but some of the high school students have been asking me extremely thoughtful questions about the US government and my views on it. One day this week, I got into a conversation about American foreign policy and whether or not I agree with it. I’m impressed that the students are savvy enough to want to discuss complex issues like this.

# 4. Being stared at. Maybe this should have been obvious, and to their credit it's probably odd for the students to come into class one day and have this strange American lurking in the corner who proceeds to spend an hour speaking non-stop English. I’ve never loved being the center of attention, but I assume the staring will diminish as students get used to me being here.

# 5. The utter incomprehension as to why I would come to Saint-Quentin. Apparently a lot of young people in Saint-Quentin are waiting for the day when they can move to a bigger city. It’s a complete mystery to them why any foreigner would choose to be in Saint-Quentin, which is amusing to me because I’ve found the town to be quite pleasant. I’ve been quick to assure them that while I only chose the region, and not the precise town, I’m comparatively lucky since other assistants are in towns a sixth the size of Saint-Quentin.