Monday, September 18, 2006

We are the Leaders of the Class


Another Engrish Photo

Do you tell your doctor how to do her job? Do you tell your lawyer how to do his?
Why is it that some Japanese adults feel they can tell their English teacher how to do his job?

Leave it to the pros I say. We know how to teach. We don`t need naive people trying to tell us how to teach English. What is it with some people? Any ideas?
Really it is quite surprising, especially when I think of the above examples.

I do ask my students what they like to do or what they want to learn. But that is different. That is me asking.

I feel I am the pro. I am the boss of the class. I am the teacher. I decide what
we do. They are paying for my expertise afterall.

Often though you get some student who feels he or she knows better. Or they are just plain selfish. Probably the latter.

I have been teaching English for over 18 years now. I feel if you have been doing it for 6 months, that is six months longer than any of your students. So you are the pro.

We need to lead the class. If we want to we can ask our students what they like or what they want to learn. But we must lead. We need to remind the silly students who want to tell us how to teach, what their place is. They are the student and we are the teacher.

by Kevin Burns

2 comments:

Shining Love Pig said...

A problem I frequently face is that of Japanese English Teachers who've studied for years, but have never left Japan, thusly acquiring that special "Japanese English"...in a classroom situation, when the teacher you're working with makes a terrifying grammatical whoopsie, what is the ALT to do?

Does he respect the seniority of the teacher & the pecking order of the nation, or does he correct the teacher in front of the students & therefore make sure they actually learn the right thing?

There are times when the ignorant gaijin card is useful...

greatpowers said...

Shining Love Pig`s questions is a good one. Personally I would ignore it. I would never correct another teacher in front of students.

It would be mortifying for a Japanese
teacher to be corrected in front of
his class, and he would lose some
respect from his students.