EXCERPT from PARTY IN CHINA Chapter 31: Teaching my first Kindergarten. I’d brought my “Australian scary animals” slideshow but the computer wasn’t working, so resorted to Simon Says – which they didn’t understand – and Hokey Cokey, which they sort of understood except for the whole left/right thing. When trying to correct one girl by lifting her right arm and lowering her left, she erupted into the most astonishing sobs… very long, very loud, soul wrenching wails, followed by an almost equally long intake of breath. Trying to make the most of a bad situation, I invented a game based on Musical Chairs: when she was screaming, you had to freeze but as soon as she breathed in, you could run around madly. The other kids cottoned on to the new game instantly but we only had maybe half a dozen rounds before two other teachers came in and put a stop to our innocent, if cruel, amusement, trying to comfort the screamer and berating me. On another occasion, when the weather had warmed up, some kids were thanking me at the end of a fairly physical lesson when the tallest boy moved in from my flank and gave me a big hug, unfortunately choosing to bury his nose in my sweaty left armpit. As he recoiled, with a wonderful look of horror on his face, I told him “That was your fault!” He took a while to get over the offensive odour, so I think he learnt something that day. I learnt something too, later that day. On my return to one of the kindergarten classes, the kids all cheered, clapped and chanted “Pang Laoshi! Pang Laoshi!” I knew ‘laoshi’ was teacher and stopped a passing Chinese teacher to ask her what ‘pang’ meant. “Fat!” she told me with a big smile. “They are very happy to have the Fat Teacher back!”
Posted on: Thu, 10 Jul 2014 04:39:30 +0000