Friday, December 5, 2008

Well that was a big, fat failure

I did a trial run of my phonics lesson on short "i" (with a little bit of "or" and "th" practice thrown in for kicks, to help with their thirteen/fourteen problem) at V School (New School) and it went awesomely well, I was so impressed by how well they did and how much their pronounciation imrpoved. I wasn't expecting the same results from the monster class at Directeur Napoleon Complex School (or L School, which is perhaps easier to remember and type) but I certainly wasn't expecting what happened....

... which is that they were more monster-ish than they have ever been in the past year+ that I've been working with them! OMG, I have no idea what to do with these kids. The noise that they can make is unbelievable, it's beyond anything I could even imagine out of 9 and 10 year olds. Granted, there are 25 of them, but still! And then the drawing that just wouldn't stop, and the constant, constant talking... it was a very unpleasant 45 minutes. Even having the teacher in the room with me did nothing. Not surprisingly they didn't learn much. I just can't think about them anymore today, they will have to go on the back burner until Sunday.

And I have so many things to cheer myself up! I went out and bought two pastries (desperate times call for two pastries) and tomorrow is the Katia and Kyliemac 200th Episode extravaganza! As Sabrina says, "Paris is always a good idea." Especially when you spent most of the day completely demoralized by French children.

2 comments:

BlondeInFrance said...

If we see any kids in Paris, lets kick them! (unless they can properly say 13)

Anonymous said...

This is one of the reason I'm thinking that teaching kids might not be for me (currently teaching govt employees).

Mind you, sometimes mind students are like kids too. I have to tell them to stop eating during classes...