I had to invigilate a test yesterday. I hate invigilating (and testing,
but I’m coming to that later) so I armed myself with a copy of
How Languages are Learned from the DELTA
reading shelf* and reluctantly sat down in front of my thirteen – unlucky for
some – advanced level, adult students. We discussed International House rules
about not talking, not showing your paper to other students, etc. So far so
standard.
You may begin.
About fifteen minutes into the test (or halfway through ‘behaviourism’
in HLAL) two students at the back of
the room started discussing an answer. I gave them what was, I thought, a
no-nonsense sort of stare, and they desisted. Uh-huh. But ten minutes later (‘innatism’)
I looked up and realised that three or four other students were merrily
checking out each other’s papers.
“You guys, seriously, test conditions,” I said, not sternly enough.
Silence returned until someone else put up their hand and asked me to pretty
much translate the reading passage, and that was it. Domino rally.
“I need to go out,” said a student who has previously presented me with
a drawing of a cobweb with his name in it**, and assuming he was going to the
bathroom I nodded. He stood up, took cigarettes and lighter from his pocket and
headed for the door. Before I could protest:
“I also need to go out,” said a student who has never drawn me
anything.
“What does ‘summary’ mean?” asked a student who was about to fail the
summarising task.
“Okay, enough!” I shouted. “Don’t
make me write C on your papers.”
(I would never write C on their papers. Teachers are meant to write C
for Cheat on the paper of anyone who speaks during the exam, and they lose 5%
of their final mark. Ha frickin’ ha.)
I tried to go back to ‘interactionism’ but the momentum was lost, plus
I was wondering when / whether Cobweb was coming back. What was going on here? I
mean I can see how, on the face of it, this looks like the very picture of
classroom management incompetence on my part. But I’ve been there, and it’s not
how it felt. It felt like all fourteen of us were trapped in a stupid
situation.
The students hated doing the test as much as I’d hated writing it; as
much as I hated saying things like “Don’t make me write C on your papers” when
in the real world that C might just as easily have stood for Collaboration; as
much as I hated furrowing my brow at grown people who were bored and antsy and would,
like me, rather spend their Wednesday evening chatting and smoking than sitting
through a zero-stakes progress test. In short we all wanted out, and the
ridiculousness of the whole thing made me confront an issue that’s been
cantering through my head lately: how do I square the requirements of the job I
love with the human being I am?
It was serendipity rather than drive that led me to this career, and however
much I later came to love it I’ve always considered myself an accidental
teacher. Can this be right? Can something as consequential as your life’s work
(forgive the pretension; I’ve been a teacher almost as long as I’ve been an
adult) really be down to a series of happy accidents?
Well, yes, because I just
happened to start a temp job at the Department for Education and just happened to work for an amazing
former ESL teacher who opened all kinds of doors for me. But also no, because I
don’t think I’d have become an accidental anything if I’d needed to increase shareholders’
profits or promote right-wing politics or even, at the sillier end of that
spectrum, wear a suit and heels every day. Like most people given the choice, I
didn’t want to sacrifice my personal beliefs for a paycheque.
What does this have to do with ‘teachers vs humans’? Well, if I was
never prepared to do a job that swallowed up my identity and spat me back out
to face the world in a pair of black court shoes and a grimace, why have I recently
been feeling this tension between Being a Teacher and Being Me?
On one hand, English language teaching allows for a whole lot of
authentic self. Not only can I wear purple Converse and rhinoceros earrings to
work, I get to do most of my favourite stuff on a daily basis: ponder and
discuss the infuriating beauty of the English language; attempt to convey my
love (of English, although perhaps this could also work with a romantic
partner? You are welcome) through stupid mimes and voices; spend a goodly
amount of time reading geeky articles on Twitter; and quite literally labour
under the apprehension that I am being socially useful. It’s tangible and
dialogic and nine times out of 10 I don’t mind getting up in the morning.
On the other hand, I’m supposed to coerce other grown-ups into taking
tests I don’t believe in, and I’m meant to bite my tongue when a student says
that gay people are the biggest problem in Georgian society, and that is
absolutely not my authentic self.
 |
| Well, a sort of diversion. It's related. |
There’s a good deal of
conversation about LGBTQ in ELT right now, including two particularly
readworthy posts by Tyson Seburn (
here) and Michael Griffin (
here) respectively.
It was even the theme of
this year’s NATECLA London conference so I don’t
think, at this point, I can bring much extra to the party by recounting my own ‘Uh-huh,
really? You hate gay people?’ stories, but a comment by Funky on Tyson’s blog
really struck me:
"I simply say [when faced with homophobic comments] that this is not an
acceptable view in Canada...and that this discussion is over. My only response
is to shut it down because I cannot stand to listen to it...but at the same
time, I feel like this is insufficient."
Me too. ME TOO. This is exactly what I do, and exactly what I feel. I
mean the Canada reference would be somewhat lost in the Caucasus, but you take
my point: Teacher 0, Human 0. It’s a massive cop-out. Do I really have to suck
at being one or the other? Or both?
I suck as a teacher if I don’t allow space for opinions to be aired,
and I suck if I abuse my relative power in the classroom to chastise someone for
holding those opinions, especially when they generally stem from ignorance
rather than thoroughly considered malice. But I suck as a human being if I
don’t stand up to prejudice. You know what? You’re wrong to (say that you) hate
gay people. You just are. Because what we’re talking about here is the right of
one person to love another, and love is good, and hate is bad, and if that
sounds facetious it isn’t meant to. I honestly don’t think it’s any more
complicated than that.
 |
| That's enough of that. |
To go back to testing, I must kind of suck as a teacher if I can’t fulfil
the basic administrative duties of the school I have, after all, chosen to work
for. I suck if I don’t give my students the chance to see what they’ve learned
and to feel good about that – although I would still maintain that testing is
one of the least effective ways to go about it. But I suck as a human being if
I ask a group of people who I basically like and respect to jump through a
series of hoops I’d be none too keen to jump through myself. Heck, I’d suck as
a human being if I made a group of people I didn’t
like or respect do that.
So what to do? Is authentic - in the existentialist
sense of the word - teaching a workable reality? I guess the answer is yes, but only inasmuch as being an authentic
human is a workable reality. I’m doubtless less authentic as
a human than I’d have myself believe, since I daily forgo opportunities to tell
people that I don’t understand (must appear smart) or that I love them (must
not appear vulnerable) or that actually, I don't take milk in my tea (never mind). In the classroom as in life, maybe the best we can do is adopt a
policy of Do-As-You-Would-Be-Done-By, and try to share our thought processes
with other people even when those thoughts are difficult.
I
read
an article this week by a librarian/teacher called Carrie Donovan that
blew my mind, and I’m stealing a paragraph of her blog post here to finish my
own, because it’s better than anything I could say on the subject even if I had months to write a conclusion.
Let’s go out and keep it real, yo.
“Authenticity. Something that is so central to the success of
one’s craft could take an entire career to cultivate, without ever truly
reaching the pinnacle of achievement. But, librarians out there, if you’re
anything like me, you revel in your teaching escapades because they are the one
aspect of the job that is challenging beyond all expectation, shaking both body
and soul, and making you all-around better and stronger. If it were easy,
everybody would do it. But teaching, like so many things that are worthwhile,
will break you down before it charges you up. It offers up the sweetest rewards
for those who are willing to take the hardest hits. Nobody could do it really
well without the reality and rawness that comes with self-disclosure, which can
be at times a breathtaking walk on a tightrope and, at others, a freefalling
leap of faith.”
* Currently have DELTA envy. Been wondering if there’s an argument for
doing another one since mine was six years ago. There isn’t, but hear this: I
will be stealing your books and infiltrating your reading group wearing a
high-quality synthetic moustache.
** What does this mean? I just don’t know.
