Biography of an English Teacher
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BIOGRAPHY OF AN ENGLISH TEACHER IN CHINA.
The { COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE, INTERNATIONAL TEACHER }, [CLIT] , as they are referred to in the trade, is essentially an accomplished actor, a consummate bullshit artist, being able at any given moment, to unfailingly convince students, peers, administration that h/she is in total control, that the lessons are going exactly as planed, that students are making great progress. Sadly, the truth is somewhat different, invariably the CLITs mind is racing, bordering on panic, thinking " sweet jesus please help me, what do I do now ", calling on help from every shred of long forgotten religious conviction after the lesson has fallen flat on its arse. H/she remains outwardly calm, while trying desperately to think of "what the hell to do next", looking at his/her watch and the door every minute, wondering fearfully whether anyone has heard the bullshit h/she has been dribbling for the last hour. Mind screaming for inspiration to get through the next hour without looking like a complete dickhead. The honest CLIT will admit to regularly having thought " after a big night on the local beverage, and no lessons prepared for next day" I'll just give them some crap about differences between western and Chinese culture, they won't know the difference anyway.
The real difference between the great and the average CLIT is their ability to pull it off. The truly great CLIT can make a lesson out of nothing at all and not flounder, a fly crawling up the wall is a solid basis for a lesson for the enlightened CLIT. Verbosity is the desperate CLITs secret weapon, the ace up the sleeve, the condom in the wallet. The secret is to keep talking, any mindless garbage will do, tell the students they are having a listening test, the topic immediately becomes irrelevant since you know full well they will only understand about 10% of it...