Buckland Weekly #34 - Class Sizes

When you come to China - even if you are an experienced teacher at home - there is one key difference that you can’t fail to be shocked by - class sizes. I taught at a college in England for over ten years and my largest class was about twenty students. In my six years in China my smallest class has been double that and my largest regular class was eighty four students. I’ve averaged about sixty.

It can be quite a daunting prospect. When you first walk into a small classroom packed to overflowing with eager Chinese teachers your first instinct might well be to turn around and go home to a country where classes have a sensible number of students.

Don’t panic. There are ways to manage large classes and once you get the hang of it, it isn’t really any more difficult than smaller groups.

The first thing to realise is that many of the typical EFL activities you may have learned if you have done a CELTA or a TESOL course simply can’t be done as they are usually done and if you attempt them they will be a disaster. The kind of thing I am talking about is any activity that involves the students getting up and moving about or involves you, the teacher, rearranging the classroom layout. Try it if you like but I’m confident that chaos will ensue.

For example, one typical activity in an EFL classroom is “Find someone who…” where each student has a list of activities and must find students who can do each one by walking around and talking to classmates. With so many students and so little space there is no way at all that this could work. In a way, being an experienced teacher with a wide repertoire of activities will work against you as you need to drastically rethink what is possible and how to organise things.

So what can you do?

The main thing is to work in groups. Groups of four or six are best because fewer restricts the scope of activities available to you and more makes it impractical for all the students to talk to each other.

When you try to set up your groups you hit another snag. Conventional wisdom says one of two things. Either you group students of a similar level together to promote maximum interaction or you mix the levels so that the stronger students can have a chance to help the weaker ones. Either way you are supposed to vary the groups frequently so that they aren’t always working with the same people.

That just isn’t possible when you can’t move students around. You can only group students with the others sitting near to them but the good news is that it takes seconds to walk around the class indicating who you want to to work together with a group number and a wave of the arms.

Let’s take a look at why this is such a good idea.

Now that the students are in groups you can teach the class as if each group is a student. What was an unmanageable eighty students has been reduced to a far easier twenty groups. How does this help?

Let’s think of some advantages.

1. Where a single student might be reluctant to answer a question because he doesn’t want to be wrong and lose face, a group is more likely to answer because its a consensus process where no one loses face.

2. Activities such as “find someone who…” can be reduced to “find someone in your group who…”.

3. Discussion activities are easy to organise because discussion can now take place in a group.

4. When walking around monitoring you can talk to a whole group at once instead of trying to talk to every individual.

5. You can choose a leader in each group and have them ensure that everyone is participating.

6. Students who haven’t understood the task can ask the others in their group for help in what they must do. (I allow them to help each other to understand the tasks in Chinese though the tasks themselves must be done in English.)

7. Feedback at the end of the tasks is far quicker and classroom management in general is easier.

8. If you need handouts you can make one copy per group for your largest class and then collect them and reuse them every time. Making one copy per student would mean carrying a pile of papers six inches thick and, as you might have to spend your own money on producing them, cost a small fortune.

Will this solve all the problems of a large class? No. Of course not. There will always be students in a class who won’t participate whatever you do. (I have a student in one class who has literally (and I mean that literally) slept through every minute of every lesson. As he wears a hoodie pulled over his head I have never actually seen his face. I have been told by the other teachers to just let him as he sleeps through every minute of every class.)

What it will do though is encourage the students to interact with each other in English and greatly simplify your job in the classroom. 

Buckland Weekly #14 - Still not in Kansas

I started an article a while ago with the Wizard of Oz quote about not being in Kansas any more. From a number of complaints and criticisms that have been circulating recently, I suspect I may not have emphasised it enough.

The general idea of that piece was to give just a few indications of how living in China is not the same as living back home, even though it may look, at first, quite similar. So, here is Part 2: “Still Not In Kansas”.

Before I begin let me assure you that, while the reason for this article is that a number of teachers have contacted us with issues at their schools*, it's not intended to be about anyone specifically. It's just general things that have come up over the time I've been here and some advice on how to deal with them. If you think you recognize your own circumstances or problems, that's because others have had them before and others will have them in the future.

Let's start with documents: visas, residency permits, your passport and so on. China has lots of laws regulating where foreigners can go and what they can do. For example hotels need to be registered if they want to accept foreign guests. I once spent almost a whole day trying to find a hotel in Baiyin that would accept me. There are only three hotels – and all expensive ones – in the whole city that can do it. If you go to stay with a friend they are also supposed to register you with the local police. As well as the national laws each province has its own way of doing things and those procedures can, and do, change. The bureaucracy can, to us, look like a nightmare. There is nothing at all that you can do about it except follow whatever procedures are in place and try to be patient. It can be a worrying time but worrying won't make the process any quicker or smoother. When the PSB has your passport for twenty days and all you have is a receipt with your picture on it, it's natural to be concerned. It's natural but it won't help.

Of course most problems arise because of issues at the schools. This is where you need to realise that schools in China can be very different to schools back home. Most of it comes down to one thing – teachers who think the school is trying to control them too much. This can be because of schedules, dress codes, teaching requirements, curfews for on-campus apartments, mandatory attendance at school functions, private lessons, weekend lessons... all kinds of things. Let's look at a couple of them.

First of all there are schedules. The contracts are for fifteen hours, normally spread across Monday to Friday but with days sometimes switched to the weekend for special occasions. Exactly how those lessons are spread isn't specified though they usually take place during the normal working hours of the Chinese teachers. Normal working hours, in China, depend on the school but could be anywhere from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. It's possible, though unlikely that you could have a lesson at the start of each day, a lesson in the middle and a lesson at the end. This isn't fun and if you find your schedule difficult, of course you can try to negotiate with the school for a better one. If you contact the office we can sometimes help you with that, but remember, it may not be ideal but it isn't a breech of contract and it isn't in our control.

It also isn't just China. When I taught in England, I applied to go to part time hours because my father was ill. I wanted to go to three-fifths of regular hours and take two days a week off to help look after him. They scheduled me for three-fifths but spread across morning and afternoon every day. I was doing three-fifths of the work for three-fifths of the pay but, taking three hours a day travelling time into account, was no better off. I did what anyone should do in those circumstances, in England or in China. I talked to people, explained my position politely and calmly and eventually got it changed.

What about dress codes? In the orientation, my advice is to wear the smartest clothes you have for the first couple of weeks and then adopt the same dress code as the other teachers. What, though, do I mean by the smartest clothes you have? Smart for a night out on the town isn't the same as smart for a professional business meeting. I mean the kind of clothes you would be expecting an accountant to wear for a meeting with a client. It may be that jeans and T-shirts are acceptable but you will only find that out when you get to the school. It's far better to go in over-dressed at the start because you can always back down. Go in in shorts and a heavy metal T-shirt and you've made a bad impression from Day One.

There are some contentious areas. Schools generally don't like teachers to wear lots of jewellery, or make-up and quite a lot of schools don't like to see a lot of tattoos on display. It can also go even further, especially in private schools which might have quite strict dress codes including the possibility of teachers wearing uniforms. This doesn't always make foreign teachers happy but if those are the school rules, then those are the school rules. From your point of view it may be trying to control things too much but from their point of view they can't understand why you have a problem with it. And that brings me to the thorniest point of all. You can't expect to get special treatment because you are a foreigner. I've come across it a lot; I'm even guilty of it myself at times; the idea that “well it might be OK for THEM, but not for ME.” It's something that you have to get past because the school already treats foreign teachers differently and expecting more from them, expecting them to change things to suit western ideas of how a school is organised, isn't going to make them change anything. It's just going to cause you a lot of frustration.

There are areas where patience, explanation and negotiation can make a difference. If the school is trying to exercise a tight control on the content or the methods in your lessons, that's something you can discuss with them. I have this issue right now. The school I teach at has a text book that was written by the school. Honestly, I don't like it. I don't think it's suitable for an oral English class. At first I was inclined to draw a line in the sand, to say, “No, I won't use it.” I quickly realised that would achieve nothing, so instead we discussed it and I agreed to use it occasionally, reference it occasionally and for the rest continue preparing my own materials for lessons. Since then the school has asked me for advice on how to improve the book for the future. If they don't like the way you teach use it as an opportunity. Invite teachers in to watch you and afterwards explain why you did things the way you did. They might not change their minds but they will at least understand that you are a professional teacher taking your job seriously.

Another area where you can just discuss things is your apartment. If you live on-campus there may be things you don't like about the situation but if you explain that time you spend in your apartment is your private time and you expect them to respect that, they should. If they don't then that's something you can talk to the school about and something the office can help you with. If they are operating a curfew and asking you to be home by ten o'clock, that's also something you might be able to change. Just politely explain that you have friends who don't live on campus and while you don't always want to be out late at night, you want the option. I haven't yet come across a school where this couldn't be sorted out.

One thing that is sometimes a problem with on-campus apartments is visitors. Schools, especially schools that have live-in students, don't like having strangers on campus. This isn't unreasonable. Schools in any country have similar restrictions. When I taught summer school in England, the only people allowed into the building where I stayed were authorised male employees of the program. Other visitors were just not allowed in. That was just for six weeks and it was annoying but it's there for the safety of the students. If you want to have visitors then you need to talk to the school and let them know in advance. This can also impact on your chances to teach private students. Many teachers teach private students in their apartments but that might not be possible. You could still teach them but might need to do it in their homes rather than yours.

Another area where western practices and Chinese practices are different that can cause some friction is sick leave. This isn't just for schools, this is in every business area, Businesses, including schools, expect their staff to go to work with illnesses that would probably keep us at home in our own countries. Colds, headaches, stomach problems are things that are just worked through here. Obviously there are some things that prevent you teaching at all. For example this week I have had a bad cold but only took off one day when my throat was so sore that I couldn't speak. Even then the school suggested that I go and use a microphone and speaker. But in general for the kind of minor ailments that you might self-medicate and rest for, schools expect you to work. When I broke my knee the school was asking on the same day when I could go back. Three days after the fall I was back in class teaching from a chair with a student writing on the board for me. The school was organising taxis to and from my apartment. If you feel that you genuinely can't work you must discuss it as soon as you can with your FAO and if they suggest seeing a doctor, then see one, even if you don't feel you need it. The school will be much more sympathetic if you have seen a doctor who confirms that there is a problem.

Of course there is still one big area that we have hardly touched on. Problems with the actual teaching. The OECD official figures say that average class size for junior and senior high school in China is fifty. This seems low to me. My smallest ever class has been 49 and the average probably around 65. My largest class, a group of twelve-year-olds, was 84 students. I have heard of even larger numbers. Sizes for primary school are often only a little smaller though kindergarten classes can be quite a lot smaller. According to China:Asia in Focus, at any given time in kindergarten, primary, secondary and higher education there are up to 400 million students in China. With so many it is inevitable that class sizes will be big. Unfortunately, as with teaching anywhere in the world, it's inevitable that some of those students won't care about your carefully crafted lessons, some won't care about any lessons from any teacher and some will be actively disrespectful and disruptive.

It is a problem but it isn't a problem unique to you or to your school. Or even to China. Think back to your own high school. Unless it was quite remarkable, there were problem students and problem classes there too. (Maybe you were one yourself!) You may not have had the class size issue to deal with but I've taught in England and I can honestly say that it has its fair share of problems. If you don't think it's that bad I recommend watching the BBC series “Are Our Kids Tough Enough: Chinese School” which was filmed in one of the UK's top performing schools and, even there, the kids were completely horrible to the teachers.

I don't want to sound negative, but if you can't learn to deal with it then maybe teaching isn't for you.

There are things you can do. Make sure that your lessons are at the right level. Ask yourself why the students cause problems. Are they bored because it's too hard? Are they bored because it's too easy? Do they lack motivation because they (and maybe the school) see the lessons as unimportant? Are they just students who will cause trouble for every teacher they ever have? Talk to the other teachers, find out the specifics for each class. Find out if the school will help you with a classroom assistant in the worst classes. Keep records of every incident so that you have evidence rather than unsupported anecdotes.

Remember that even in the most difficult classes there are some students who want to learn. Most of us, after an especially difficult class have had a good student come up and apologise for his or her classmates. Focus on those students and try to just get through the lesson without losing your temper. Way back in the mists of time when I was a teenager there was a student who seemed to consider it his mission in life to make every teacher in my school as angry as he could. He was good at it, too. And I went to a pretty good school in a pretty nice area.

If it gets too bad the Buckland office can try to intervene with the school and help you. Of course there are no guarantees. But before you request a move to another school, remember the same problems may exist there too.

OK, let's finish with some general advice.

1. Don't lose your temper when discussing these issues with the school. It's OK to put your point clearly and firmly but you need to stay calm and polite. Chinese society doesn't have much respect for people who behave rudely or who angrily go in with all guns blazing.

2. Talk about things. First of all talk to the FAO, the other teachers and, if you can the school administration. Try to go in with positive suggestions about how to put things right rather than just a list of what you think is wrong.

3. Choose your battles wisely. There are some fights you might win and some you definitely won't win. Don't spend your energy on unwinnable conflicts.

4. Don't expect the school to bend to your requirements just because you are English or American or Australian or whatever. They won't. They will, if you are polite and helpful probably try to resolve your problems but going in saying “I should be treated better than a Chinese teacher” is just going to make the situation worse, not better, and breed resentment.

5. Call us. Don't leave it until the situation has spiralled so far out of control that you just want to get on a plane and go home. All problems in life are better dealt with sooner rather than later but if we don't know about the problem we can't help with it.

And that's it. Just remember, no matter how long you have been here, this still isn't Kansas.

(*And a number haven't contacted us, allowing problems to grow and circulate on the rumour mill until we accidentally get to hear about them.)

A morning walk in my underwear.

China has a simple approach to Health and Safety - there isn't any. Unfenced, unlit holes may be found in many streets whether  broad daylight or the dead of night. I've tripped down a few myself. A colleague once fell down one as we were walking through an alley from her apartment to the main road. One minute she was there and the next she was in a hole, fortunately unharmed beyond scrapes and bruises.

This cavalier approach extends to building sites (where unsecured loads of bricks in wheelbarrows are precariously hauled up five floors on ropes), roadworks,(which are often unsignposted and unguarded), driving (where the preferred overtaking location seems to be on blind bends) and, of course, electrical fitting.

I fell foul of this on one cold winter morning. I had just stripped off for a shower. I went in, turned the water on and the main fuse blew. Now this isn't an unusual occurrence, fuses here often blow, but the fuse box location is invariably on the landing in the stairwell outside the apartment. I pulled on my boxer shorts, stepped into my flip flops and nipped out to throw the switch. As I did so the door closed behind me.

Naturally my money, keys and phone were all inside the apartment and none of my neighbours would have been able to help as none of them spoke any English at all.

Fortunately I had a spare set of keys at another teacher's apartment. Unfortunately she lived about two miles away. So at seven on a very cold morning, in my underwear and flip flops I marched through the streets, all the time praying that she would be at home.

She was. After I'd recounted my woes she gave me the keys, a bright pink womans T- shirt and the money for a cab.

Of course dressed like that, I could find no cab driver willing to stop for me so, cursing all the way I marched back and let myself in.

You may be wondering where the connection with electrical standards is. Well, when I flipped the switch it tripped again immediately so I checked the wiring. The wire from the water heater ran behind a mirror and lifting it off the wall I discovered that two loose cables had been joined together with sellotape which had, naturally burned through over time, allowing the wires to touch. Hence the short that tripped the fuse.

This "good enough is good enough" attitude is pretty common and you can't allow yourself to worry about it or you would worry yourself into an early grave (if the wiring didn't get you first.)

You just need to be extra vigilant and remember that standards that you are used to may not apply here.

Fighting the school

Something has happened today that gives a useful insight into a problem that might come up from time to time. What do you do when the school insists that you do something you know to be ineffective, stupid or just flat out wrong?

Let me tell you what happened.

 A few days ago I was told by my school that the students would soon be getting a new oral English text book and I was expected to make it my sole, or at least primary, source for future lessons.

I've now got a copy of the book.

I wish I was writing this as a parody but the reality is so ridiculous as to be beyond satire. Remember this is supposed to be the only Oral English text book that I use and I have been instructed by the school to use it exclusively. It's an instruction that I fully intend to disregard – disregard to the extent of not using it at all. I'll fight my corner when they complain. The whole thing seems to be based on the premise that every single student in the school will leave school and become a local tour guide.

The title of the book tells you what to expect. It doesn't mention English at all – it's called “Travelling Around Yangshuo”.

There are fifteen units and I am supposed to use one a week.

The titles of the units – and this is verbatim from the contents page – are

A Brief Introduction to Yangshuo

Food In Yangshuo: Local Cuisine

Food In Yangshuo: Special Snacks of Yangshuo

Food In Yangshuo: Special Agricultural Products

Accommodation In Yangshuo: Living Environment

Accommodation In Yangshuo:Famous Hotels

Accommodation In Yangshuo:Special Homestay

Famous Scenic Sites In Yangshuo: Travel Plans

Famous Scenic Sites In Yangshuo: Travel Information

Famous Scenic Sites In Yangshuo: Packing For The Tour

Famous Scenic Sites In Yangshuo: Asking The Way On The Trip

Famous Scenic Sites In Yangshuo: Sighteseeing

Famous Scenic Sites In Yangshuo: Tips On Tours

Transportation About Yangshou: How To Get To Yangshuo

Transportation About Yangshou: Activities Around Yangshuo

Talk about monomania! I have no idea whose ill-conceived project this is but if if I try to teach that I'll have a riot on my hands by week three. So, as I said, I shall do what I have done before with such daft ideas and ignore it totally. I'm fully prepared to argue my case with the teachers, the principals and everybody else involved. What I'm not prepared to do is waste my time and the students efforts in this daft enterprise.

This isn't the first time I've come into conflict with schools over what they want me to do and what I know, as a pretty experienced teacher, is the right thing to do. When that happens you have only two choices. You can just say "OK, I get paid either way" and do it or you can take a stand and argue for doing the right thing. I always do the latter. Imagine how difficult my classes will be to control by the time we get to the tenth lesson on the same subject. I've sometimes been told to adopt a more Chinese style - with more drilling and rote learning. My answer to that is "fire me and hire a Chinese teacher - it's cheaper". So far no one ever has. 

"I'm not saying you should get into knock-down arguments about every little thing but there are times when you should politely and respectfully say "No". Whenever this has happened in the past the school has ALWAYS backed down. What I'll do when I hit a situation where they won't back down remains to be seen.

Letting go: Changing lessons that don't work

From time to time we all come across the situation where we have planned a great lesson that's chock full of interesting activities and planned down to the last detail; a lesson that we are completely sure will wow the kids and work like a dream.

Then we deliver it and realise that it just doesn't work, that the lesson is falling apart before our very eyes. The temptation is to just tinker with it, make a few adjustments around the edges and hope for the best. That can be the wrong strategy. We have learn to let go.

It happened to me this week and I realised it would be a useful lesson for the teachers that I trained to take a look at the process of adjusting a lesson until it does work.

So here it is.

The lesson, according to the schedule was to be about robots and I had the idea of making it more interesting by basing it on the TV show “Robot Wars”. For anyone who doesn't know what this is, it's a show where teams build remote controlled robots and then battle them in an arena until one of the robots is destroyed or incapable of continuing.

The outline of my lesson went like this.

1. Show a short section of the show including a battle between two robots and a shot of the statistics that are shown for each robot. (These include size, weight, power source, type of locomotion and weapons, strengths and weaknesses.)
2. Divide the class into groups and give each group a handout of pictures of different types of robot from the show.
3. Elicit vocabulary of the shapes, capabilities and weapons of the various robots and make lists on board.
4. Get groups to design and draw own robots using the new vocabulary. While they work let more robot battles run with the sound down.
5. Select some groups to come and draw their robots on the board and present the statistics and descriptions.

Seemed, on paper to be a pretty good lesson. Of course, as I always keep stressing, I had a back up plan. It was straightforward. If the computer wasn't working I would start with the pictures, and write the table of characteristics on the board. We'd develop the vocabulary from there and then proceed as on the first plan.

So. Lesson one on Monday. Started up the computer and plugged in the file and... and nothing. After a few minutes fiddling about with it I got pictures but no sound. And the pictures weren't that great as the classroom was too bright.

So I went to Plan B but that didn't work too well either. The students found it too difficult and confusing and it was clear that the lesson lacked a focus or a purpose.

There was no time to work on it before the second lesson so it had to be done the same way. The computer in that room also didn't work but this time I cut my losses quickly and went straight to Plan B. The result was the same. Too confusing, too difficult, no focus.

In the third and final lesson of the day I went straight to Plan B but this time started with vocabulary. I split it into shape words (cube, cuboid, sphere, cylinder, cone, pyramid), locomotion words (wheels, legs, tracks), weapons (gun, spike, hammer, axe, saw, claw). For each word I drew a picture and tried to elicit the word from the class, adding the word as I got it. Then I handed out the pictures and explained the design task. The pictures, I explained, were to give them ideas. The rest of the lesson followed the original plan.

This worked better but took too long.

And so we come to day 2.

I had a new variation on the plan. I shifted the focus to the shapes, changed the introduction, redid the timings, lost both the video clips and the handout of pictures and planned a new section. And it worked. And that plan will be the next thing I post. The kids all loved the lesson, got behind it, had a lot of fun, learned a lot of new vocabulary and discussed a lot of stuff in English. Twice in the week I actually had kids videoing part of the lesson on their phones. All in all a pretty good success but if I had doggedly stuck with the original plan, not been prepared to dump things that weren't working, the whole week would have been a disaster.

A Note On Levels

Last week's lesson - Dragons' Den - highlighted an issue I've been meaning to post about - the question of levels.

Chinese middle schools generally cover six years which are called Junior 1, Junior 2, Junior 3, Senior 1, Senior2 and Senior 3. That is, grades 7 to 12. In my experience schools seldom have foreign teachers for Junior 3 and I have never heard of a school having a foreign teacher at all for Senior 3: they are too busy preparing for University entrance exams.

It should be easy, shouldn't it? You know the ages of the students and you know the grade levels and you can prepare accordingly. Sadly, this is China, and life is never that simple.

The levels of students within a grade, even within a class, can vary to a degree that you will initially find astonishing. In my Junior 1 (Grade 7) classes last year I had some students who could barely understand "what is your name"* and other students who could hold a perfectly sensible conversation on topics as diverse as environmentalism and whether Penny and Leonard would stay together in The Big Bang Theory. This year I have no juniors. I have only grades 11 and 12 - Senior 1 and 2 - and the spread of ability is exactly the same for my Senior 2 classes as it was for my Junior 1 classes. 

The difference is that for junior one the bell curve was skewed to low end and for Senior 2 it's skewed to the high end but it's still a bell curve for all that.

So how did that impact on this Dragons' Den lesson plan.

I had prepared the lesson intending to teach it to both Senior levels with just slight amendments to the level. I started with Senior 2 students and it was obvious within minutes that I wouldn't succeed. The introduction - eliciting the meaning of "business" and a few examples didn't take five minutes: it took more than ten. The instructions written on the board were, as far as the class seemed to understand, incomprehensible gibberish. We covered less than half the planned work. 

In between lessons I scribbled down a slightly simplified version. It was still too hard for the next class. Virtually no one was able to complete a task that I considered suitable for several grades lower.

At lunch time I revamped the whole thing coming up with version two. All the same, in the afternoon at my other school, teaching a class that is ostensibly a grade lower I went with the original version. They sailed through it easily, completing everything, including the offers of finance and the accepting or rejecting of those offers.

So for the rest of the week the higher level got the really dumbed down version of the lesson while the lower level got the harder and more interesting version.

And that's the way it will have to be from now on - Senior Two will get lessons that are, in my opinion suitable for Junior 1 and Senior 1 will get lessons that I think should be for Senior 2.

Assuming anything about the levels is a big mistake.

(*Even the lowest students can take part in this conversation

 How are you?

I'm fine thanks, and you.

I'm fine too.

But they have learned it the way parrots learn to say "Polly wants a cracker", without any actual understanding. It isn't learning so much as it's a Pavlovian response to stimulus.)

I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore Part 1

Attitude.

It's important. It can make your life in China wonderful or it can make your life in China into a living hell.  It's the same China either way - it won't have changed - but what's inside you can turn a great experience into a terrible one, a pleasure to be savoured into a purgatory to be endured.

It's all in the attitude.

The first step towards getting the right attitude is to remember one simple thing. You aren't in Kansas anymore. Nor in Sydney, Birmingham, Cardiff or wherever. You're in China. Don't expect it to be the same as home.

If you expect everything here to be just the same as at home then you are going to be powerfully disappointed. Everything from shopping to visiting the doctor, from eating out to getting your shower fixed will be different to some degree or other. It might be a small difference. It might be incomprehensibly alien. It will be different.

How that difference affects you depends on you.

Here are a few of the things that might cause you some alarm, but shouldn't really.

The food is different

Boy is it different.  There will be things here that only the bravest of westerners will take to - such as pigs entrails or chicken feet. But there are lots of amazing things too. Try the ones that you want to and politely decline the others. Just accept that the Chinese put salad cream on fruit salad and move on to something else.

You won't starve here - in fact your diet is likely to be substantially healthier.

Shopping is different

I am the world's worst bargainer. I like countries where the price marked is the price paid. (OK - in some US states the price marked plus whatever taxes are applicable is the price paid, the principle is the same) Here, in most places you bargain. You don't bargain in supermarkets or, usually, when buying food, but everything from a pair of glasses to flash drives for your computer to a new washing machine to a bunch of flowers for your girlfriend is fair game. I once wanted to buy a sweater. It was marked up at 300 yuan. My Chinese friend started to bargain and I walked out of the shop with two sweaters at a total of 290. Less than half price.
No one is trying to rip you off. They start at the same price for Chinese customers too. They're just better at bargaining. And, if all else fails remember that most things are cheaper than at home anyway. Even at the starting price.

Health and Safety

The fuses blow in my apartment if I try to boil a kettle while I'm ironing a shirt. There are open manholes in unlit alleys. Apartment blocks as high as twelve floors may have only stairs and no elevators. The tap water isn't safe to drink and even boiling it - while killing micro organisms - may only concentrate other contaminants. Drivers rarely pay any attention to pedestrians. There are a hundred things a day that make me think I'd be safer if I'd taken up alligator wrestling.

When the fuses blow I step onto the landing and reset them and turn something off. I bought a flashlight so that I can see the holes in the ground. I tell myself that the exercise is good for me as I slog my way up the stairs. I drink bottled water (which is very cheap). I pay close attention when crossing the street.

And I don't worry about any of it. I just accept the way things are is the way things are.

Hospitals

Whether it's a broken leg, food poisoning or a boil on the bum you may need to use Chinese hospitals at some time in your stay. So what? I've heard of teachers wanting to fly home to treat even minor ailments but there's no need. Sometimes the decor may leave a bit to be desired but the standards of hygiene and treatment are just fine. If you are out in the country you might need to go to the nearest big city but it's not a problem. They have well-trained doctors and modern equipment. 

One difference you'll notice is that they rarely give injections and prefer to give medicines via IV. Look on it as an hour's rest in bed.

I'll do more later but for now remember that the experience of China is whatever you make it. China is not going to miraculously change just for our benefit so keep smiling and keep repeating :We're not in Kansas anymore".

Dealing with large classes : Part 1

I confess that when I came to Baiyin I was shocked by the class sizes. Of course I knew, in a theoretical way, how big they were going to be but knowing it and seeing it are two very different things. In that first year I taught all my lessons at Baiyin Middle School Number Ten and my smallest class had 62 students. My largest had 84.

Walking into a room and finding that the whole room is filled with desks placed in the old-fashioned rows layout with just about room to walk down between them (and not always even that) is quite daunting.

Many of the standard EFL activities that we all do all the time simply can't be done with groups this size in classrooms this crowded. How, for example, can you organise a "find someone who" activity when there is no room to stand up and walk about?

Even very sedentary activities become impossible if any kind of handout is needed. At the moment I teach, every week, just over 1200 students. Any copying I need to have done I have to pay for. That means that at one handout per student and about one penny per copy I'd need to spend twelve pounds and carry a stack of paper about four inches thick around.

With lessons forty minutes long the logistics of actually handing things out and collecting things in would use a significant percentage of  the time and checking them would be flat out impossible.

So, what's to be done about it?

The first and most obvious thing is to make the class size seem smaller and there is a way to manage that. Divide it into groups. I find that, depending on the actual class size and the type of activity I'm using, groups of four to eight work well. If you choose the groups based on where people are sitting you can do most activities without anyone needing to stand up at all.

The groups can be used in two ways. You can treat each group as if it were an individual student. When  you ask questions ask a group. You are more likely to get an answer. If groups are still reluctant to answer you can get them to choose a leader or you can nominate leaders yourself.

The leaders can then act os a spokesperson for the group.

The second thing that groups allow you to do is a variation on the kind of mingling activity that you might do in a small class. Instead of "find someone who", for example, you can ask "find someone in your group who".

The difficulty with this is that if you give each student a hand out they will just show each other and work on them as a writing task rather than a speaking task. It needs close monitoring and you have to beconstantly walking around the class checking that the groups are doing the activity as you intended.

Another difficulty in large classes, especially when you have a lot of them, is names. Some of the kids have taken English names, most have only Chinese names and I find it impossible to even contemplate learning 1200 Chinese names. More on how I deal with this later.