Real Quotes by Real Students – Teacher Old

Ever since my first day teaching, my students have said some pretty unpredictable, strange or just downright hilarious things. In class you learn to expected the unexpected, and I’ve found that a either snappy reaction to turn a comment on its head or good acting skills are my best friends in the classroom when put in a situation that leaves the classroom precariously on the edge of disorder. Funny, awkward or otherwise, these moments in class never cease to make me remember why I adore working with each and every one of my students (although sometimes the situation is not funny until afterwards) and having the chance to get to know them and their vibrant personalities.

To give you an idea of real life in the classroom (and hopefully a laugh or two) I’d like to share these snippets of conversation with you. I’ve been keeping track of them, and I’ll post them from time to time. Of course, they are all anonymous for the protection of the innocent. Here we go.


Today is two for one day at “Real Quotes by Real Students.”

My first day in the 7th grade class I work with on Mondays, the class of 28 students literally asked me questions for 45 minutes. A major contributor to this lengthy session was a talkative young man named “Fabian”. He fired off these two gems among his many queries:

“Are there some gangsters in your town?” I was not expecting this, but I guess that if you watch movies that come out of Hollywood, and you’ve never been to the U.S., this is a valid question. And well, there are some gangsters some places in the country. :)

This was followed by:

“Do you have a boyfriend?”

Teacher: “Oh, you have an admirer.”

F: “No, she’s much too old for me!”

Well, glad that we’re clear about that. Apparently, I’ve entered the realm of “teacher old.”

Deine,
N*

Real Quotes by Real Students – Comic

Ever since my first day teaching, my students have said some pretty unpredictable, strange or just downright hilarious things. In class you learn to expected the unexpected, and I’ve found that a either snappy reaction to turn a comment on its head or good acting skills are my best friends in the classroom when put in a situation that leaves the classroom precariously on the edge of disorder. Funny, awkward or otherwise, these moments in class never cease to make me remember why I adore working with each and every one of my students (although sometimes the situation is not funny until afterwards) and having the chance to get to know them and their vibrant personalities.

To give you an idea of real life in the classroom (and hopefully a laugh or two) I’d like to share these snippets of conversation with you. I’ve been keeping track of them, and I’ll post them from time to time. Of course, they are all anonymous for the protection of the innocent. Here we go.

Do you remember "Frank-Frederick", one of my 9th graders? He’s just one of those people who can always make you laugh. He is funny and he knows it, but it’s a natural kind of funny. Well, his short story on Australia was no exception to this. The whole story was well-written and full of humor, but to this day, this particular excerpt gives me a reason to smile:

“No panic on the Titanic! The tank is full and I have some reserves.”

Apparently people use the phrase, “Keine panisch auf der Titanisch” in German, but it was new certainly new to me.  I appreciate moments like these after I've been grading for hours.

Deine,
N*

Russian in Germany

19. März 2011

Over the past few months, I have been trying to learn Russian (with varying degrees of diligence). I sit in a 9th grade class a couple times a week, meet with a Russian teacher and a GT student after school and meet with two Russian students for Russian-English conversation hour on Fridays. Despite this, I often find it difficult to stay motivated without actually having a consistent class at my level. Not to mention that I’m learning in German. Oy. I have made a decent amount of progress, though, and it’s fun. I love the way the language sounds, although my pronunciation is terrible. At least the grammar makes sense to me.



Check it out!



I anticipated that my learning curve might be steeper than with previous languages I’ve learned because first I

had to learn to read and write Cyrillic (and of course, cursive and print are fairly different, just to make it more confusing), so I’ll just keep trying. If nothing else, I can speak (very) simply and I learned to read and write, which is an accomplishment in itself! Also, I find myself being able to pick the limited words I know out of conversations in Slavic languages while I’m traveling…cool!

What I really want to talk about here, though, are the relationships that I’ve gained in my attempted to learn Russian in Germany.

First, there’s my Russian teacher, Frau Doktor T (Don’t you love the German titles?). She has so much passion for the Russian language, and I actually thought she was Russian for a while. It turns out her Mom did a Russian radio show during DDR times, so she grew up with the language. She’s been really helpful in the learning process and is now a friend in the teacher room. There are around 100 teachers at my school, and I really only have a relationship with a few because people are in and out so much, so making a new friend was definitely positive. Plus, she’s really full of life and fascinating to talk to. We speak German together, and she tries out the English phrases she knows sometimes, too.

I’ve also gotten to know “der kleine Kostya,” the GT student learning Russian. I actually knew him from my time at T’s (my former host mom) school during my previous visits to Germany, so it’s funny we’ve been brought together again. He’s very shy, but lately we walk together to the train station after Russian lessons, as he goes that way to walk home. He talks and I talk – mostly in German – and it’s interesting to hear what he has to say. Sometimes you can tell that there’s so much going on in his head at once that he can’t express it all quickly enough. You can almost see wheels spinning and gears whirring – adorable. His Mom has even said that he can’t read before bed because he starts thinking about so many things that it’s impossible for him to sleep afterwards.

Perhaps some of my favorite people are my Russian-English speaking partners, Lara and Ben. They’re 9th graders, but in the U.S. you’d never believe it because they’re so smart and mature. Lara always comes to our sessions armed with a notebook to write down any words we talk about that she doesn’t know. Smart really since she and Ben are two of the 16 students from our school who will participate in the month-long exchange program in Texas this fall. Since I know them primarily from outside the classroom setting (Lara is also in the dance group I teach in at school), I’ve really gotten to know them on a much more personal level, and I think we’ve all been able to benefit from the exchange. They’ve taught me about a myriad of things in Germany from Bleigießen (lead figures that are melted over a candle on a spoon and then dropped into cold water before their shape is “read” to show what is the come in the new year) to how to tell someone their zipper is unzipped in German (valuable information, I tell you…if someone tells me that, I need to know!) to everything under the sun about the German school system to when you should (and shouldn’t) ring your bike bell. Not to mention that they’ve helped me feel truly integrated in both the school and the culture. I only hope that I’ve been able to share as much of my culture with them as they have their culture with me.



Making guac



One night they came over and we made burritos and guacamole. They’d never had guacamole before (gasp!), and we had a lot of fun mashing the avocados. In true Chipotle fashion, I helped them learn how to roll a burrito and they really managed it quite well. I was pretty sure that they enjoyed their first foray into the realm of Mexican food, and sure enough a couple of weeks later, they told me that they made burritos with their families one weekend. That really made my day.

Who would’ve thought that such fantastic relationships would come out of learning Russian in Germany? My life here is full of wonderful people, and I am so thankful for their warmness and acceptance.



Rolling like a pro...note the pinky!



Deine,

N* 



Beautiful flowers they brought me



 

Real Quotes by Real Students – Spot On

Ever since my first day teaching, my students have said some pretty unpredictable, strange or just downright hilarious things. In class you learn to expected the unexpected, and I’ve found that a either snappy reaction to turn a comment on its head or good acting skills are my best friends in the classroom when put in a situation that leaves the classroom precariously on the edge of disorder. Funny, awkward or otherwise, these moments in class never cease to make me remember why I adore working with each and every one of my students (although sometimes the situation is not funny until afterwards) and having the chance to get to know them and their vibrant personalities.

To give you an idea of real life in the classroom (and hopefully a laugh or two) I’d like to share these snippets of conversation with you. I’ve been keeping track of them, and I’ll post them from time to time. Of course, they are all anonymous for the protection of the innocent. Here we go.

I was not privy to this conversation, which actually took place in German, but H told me about it later. It took place during in the 5th grade class, while H was spending a month observing the student teacher and I was just observing, rather than assisting for that time. There were often a lot of problems during the class; needless to say, it was not my favorite time of day. Apparently this was more obvious (at least to my seatmate – a highly perceptive…and sometimes disruptive…young man) than I thought.

“Richard”: Mrs. H, I think N* likes me.

H: What makes you think that?

R: Well, sometimes she smiles at me, but she doesn’t smile at Mrs. Student Teacher.”

Zing. In my defense, let me just say that none of the other teachers smile at “Mrs. Student Teacher” while she’s teaching either.

Deine,
N*

Real Quotes by Real Students – Confessional

Ever since my first day teaching, my students have said some pretty unpredictable, strange or just downright hilarious things. In class you learn to expected the unexpected, and I’ve found that a either snappy reaction to turn a comment on its head or good acting skills are my best friends in the classroom when put in a situation that leaves the classroom precariously on the edge of disorder. Funny, awkward or otherwise, these moments in class never cease to make me remember why I adore working with each and every one of my students (although sometimes the situation is not funny until afterwards) and having the chance to get to know them and their vibrant personalities.

To give you an idea of real life in the classroom (and hopefully a laugh or two) I’d like to share these snippets of conversation with you. I’ve been keeping track of them, and I’ll post them from time to time. Of course, they are all anonymous for the protection of the innocent. Here we go.
In the 8th grade, the students were practicing expressing something that they did not think would happen but had indeed happened.

“Chen” raises his hand, and when called upon asks, “Does it have to be true?”

His teacher has known him since 5th grade, so she responds jokingly that they all “know he’s a liar anyways” and to “go ahead.”

“Chen” says, “I was not expecting it, but I think I’m gay.”

Gales of laughter shake the classroom. “Chen” looks pleased. Way 458 to disrupt class: falsely confess to being gay.

Deine,
N*

Always Check the Parking Space

19. März 2011

“Did you check the parking space?” my sister screams almost frenetically as we leave every location on family trips. Someone always answers that of course they have, even if they haven’t and then looks guiltily back to make sure karma doesn’t have her way with them for it. This frenzy of my sister’s stems back to our family’s first camping trip when she was four and I was nine. On such trips, our family station wagon is always packed so full that just opening a door leaves you in danger of having something tumble out. In that case, an Eeyore baseball cap belonging to my sister was the offending item. We replaced it later, but even 13 years afterwards, she’s never forgotten the incident. So that’s the rule: No matter what, you check the parking space.

Perhaps you are wondering what exactly this has to do with Germany. Well, now comes the part of the story where N* is stupid…very stupid…twice. Towards the end of our stay in Dresden, Michelle’s wisdom teeth started acting up. Badly. Now as I am prone to losing things, being careless and generally “not thinking” about all things common sense related, I can by no means say that what happened next was a result of that situation, but I can guess that having worry as a distraction did not play in my favor. Something had to give. And so I broke the rule: I did not pass go, I did not collect $200, and I definitely did not check the “parking space”.

About 30 minutes after leaving the train station, I noticed that I did not have my gift bag – a cause for great concern, since all my purchases from the trip were in it. I had already felt a little guilty, worrying that I had spent too much, so of course my first thought was that this was karma “getting me”. My second thought was accompanied by an empty ache because aside from at the Christmas markets, I haven’t really bought myself much in Germany, and the items I purchased in Dresden were effectively irreplaceable. My third thought was, “Please God, don’t let anything happen to my camera.” (If you missed that story, you can catch up on it here).

By some stroke of luck, the conductor had seen my poor abandoned bag all lonely and yellow on the platform, and it was still there when someone came up to fetch it. She gave me a number to call, and I managed to arrange to have my belongings sent back to me. For the nominal fee of (drum roll please…) €20, of course. Way to add insult to injury, but at least I received everything back intact yesterday. So please don’t pull an N* and leave things on train platforms, but of you should…ASK! The Deutsche Bahn just might have put its exacting efficiency into play and rescued your abandoned belongings.

Now this really should have been enough, but apparently it was just that kind of day. On our way to Berlin, we spent a couple of hours in Roßlau so I could grab some groceries since everything would be closed on Sunday when I cam back. While I was shopping, I was also on the phone with my Mom, talking about what was going on with Michelle. As we have just seen, distractions and I do not mix. As far as I can figure out, I must have forgotten to take my German debit card back out of the reader, or I accidentally dropped it on my way back. Either way, I didn’t need it in Berlin, so I didn’t notice it was gone until I was trying to buy my train ticket back to Roßlau.

Of course by the time I managed to change the €50 bill I luckily had with me into smaller bills, I had missed the only direct train to Roßlau for two hours and had to take one via Wittenberg, thus undergoing a three-hour trip while worrying about identity theft, rather than an hour and a half one. I was able to call the bank hotline and lock my card, and on Monday I called the bank and ordered a new one (there goes another €10). Like my package, I also received that yesterday.

While the whole situation was incredibly frustrating and stressful, at least my debit card was protected by a pin number and I didn’t lose any money, and I did get everything back, even if I had to pay (literally) for my carelessness. So as I continue on my travels, I will try to return to the decent track record I had held of not losing things in Germany up until last weekend, and I will always, ALWAYS check the parking space.

Deine,
N*

Real Quotes by Real Students – She’s a Man!

12. April 2011

Ever since my first day teaching, my students have said some pretty unpredictable, strange or just downright hilarious things. In class you learn to expected the unexpected, and I’ve found that a either snappy reaction to turn a comment on its head or good acting skills (especially poker face skills!) are my best friends in the classroom when put in a situation that leaves the classroom precariously on the edge of disorder. Funny, awkward or otherwise, these moments in class never cease to make me remember why I adore working with each and every one of my students (although sometimes the situation is not funny until afterwards) and having the chance to get to know them and their vibrant personalities.

To give you an idea of real life in the classroom (and hopefully a laugh or two) I’d like to share these snippets of conversation with you. I’ve been keeping track of them, and I’ll post them from time to time. Of course, they are all anonymous for the protection of the innocent. Here we go.

Maybe you remember this from long, long ago, but on my first day, in my second class ever, this situation transpired:

In the 9th class we were working on the construction “used to” today. Each of the students was to write five sentences. The standout sentence was by a boy in the front row, we’ll call him "Max", who wants to be cool. He contrived to achieve this reputation with the following remark:

“When he was young, "Phillip" used to be a girl.”

The amazing thing, is that "Phillip" thought this was funny.  This was a true test of my teacher poker face.

Deine,
N*