A Lesson On Inconsiderate...

When I reached over to turn off my first alarm this morning, I noticed that there was an envelope icon just above the clock that read 5:30 am. Text message. So, I checked it. It was a message from the English teacher that I work with at the far away school.

3/12 23:26
hi! what’s going? sorry to tell late. i missed to call u. it’s not good time to call u, so this mail
well, tomorrow pleas go to the elementary school directly. They asked u to have classes for them.
sorry again, i left the schedule that they sent us. 2 classes tomorrow…i wonder
tomorrow morning i’ll call you. thanks

So, I rummaged around the bin of old VHS tapes that have accumulated in my apartment from past teachers. Nothing. Nothing appropriate for elementary school kids anyway. The closest I could get was The Simpsons and we all know that’s not the answer. So I decided that when I got to the school I would just tell them that the teacher told me that I had classes at the elementary school this morning. It’s funny, and I’ve expressed this to others before, but I feel like she’s always trying to “sabotage my mission.” For example, I did a music lesson on jazz for Black History Month. I printed the song “Lullaby of Birdland” (sung by Ella Fitzgerald) to make into a song scramble. For this activity, you cut the lyrics into strips for the students to piece together while listening to the song. There were two sheets of paper and she offered to photocopy them for me. I explained that I needed 18 copies of each sheet so each student would have the whole song. I’m sure she could have put the 2 sheets in the slot on top of the copier, pressed 1-8, and hit print. However, she managed to make double copies of only one sheet. I know the song well so I caught the mistake while I was sorting the strips of paper to go in individual envelops. Luckily, the song is repetitive and the two pages were similar enough that I was able to make the whole song by taking out a couple of lines. So, it worked out fine. Another time, we were doing a lesson on “How do you say … in English?” One of the students said, “How do you say shitajiki in English?” I told the class that we don’t use those in America. A shitajiki is a plastic mat that you place under your paper so that the lead doesn’t transfer from the reverse side when you write. She responded, “In America, they don’t care about the lead getting on the other paper. They do not use keishigomu (a GREAT eraser) either so there is always black on the paper.” I wanted to say, “We don’t use either of those because our writing system is based more on fluidity than straight lines so we don’t bear down as hard with our pencils. So we don’t need shitajiki or keishigomu.” Instead, I said, “No, it doesn’t transfer when we write. Maybe our lead is a little different.” I mean really! Unless you’re a child, you know not to press down so hard that can’t erase it. Americans are stereotyped enough. The last thing I want the kids to think is that don’t have the ability to be neat.

Then there are the countless times that I’ve asked her to look over an activity to make sure it’s what she wants, and she says, “I’m so sorry but right now I am very busy.” So, when we get to class she stops the lesson because it’s not what she wanted. Or when there is literally nothing more in the way of work for me to do so I check my email or the news and she all of a sudden wants to discuss a lesson we’ve already talked about a million times. She had the nerve to get a little upset when I told her that I had a meeting in the city on the day of their graduation. First of all, no one told me when graduation was. By the time they asked if I was coming, I had already committed to my meeting. I had even considered missing my meeting and notified the facilitator about my possible absence, but I’m not a fan of inconsiderate people (that includes the elementary school because they always send the schedule at the last minute then expect me to teach different things to all six grades!) and I have no obligation to do anything for them except teach. So, that settles it. I’m not going…period. I’m not vengeful, but I am a firm believer in the saying, “I can show you better than I can tell you.”

Anyway, she didn’t call me. So, I stopped by the middle school to see if she had any movies that I could show the kids. Well, the movies she had weren’t what I had in mind but they worked out fine. I wanted to show them a movie for fun, but all she kept handing me were educational films so that’s what they watched.