Last Thursday I finally realized that sarcasm doesn't easily cross language barriers. Unfortunatly, I discovered this while being broadcast on classroom TVs across our entire school. Let me explain.
Twice a week, I
oh-so-slowly read a children's book on camera, and am
broadcast live to all the students in their homerooms. Three fifth graders are in the recording room with me, interacting with the story by listening and repeating and answering questions like "How many fish do you see?"
I am currently reading "Brown Bear" to the students, which is a simple book aimed for native speaking four-year-olds. It goes like this: "Brown bear, brown bear, what do you see? I see a red bird looking at me. Red bird, red bird, what do you see? ..." etc. After reading the first two pages on Thursday, I looked up and questioned the students.
"What color is the bear?"
"Brown." They replied with confidence.
"No!" I said.
Just like that. No. My co-teacher, who monitors my TV appearances for just this sort of situation, gave me a strangled, pained, whatswrongwiththishuman look. The kids stared.
"Just kidding!" I smiled. More blank stares. I mentally noted to teach that expression to all of my classes.
**
There's an autistic kid in one of my fifth grade classes. You can't tell by looking at him - average height, glasses, short dark hair - and generally well behaved, if spacey. For the purposes of this blog, I will call him Jay. At the beginning, I didn't realize he had a disability, and tried to help him with his in-class work, until SH told me to leave him alone because he ... "has a handicapped?" (we have many great naver translation conversations). I'm not sure what the learning approach is for him in other classrooms, but apparently nobody cares about his English levels.
I left Jay alone after that; I've barely heard him speak Korean, let alone English. We had one incident where he became upset over a new seating arrangement involving him sitting by a girl, but besides that he blended into the class as shy, awkward 10-year-old. His behavior was so reasonable - and so preferable to my ADHD kids - that I was convinced he had Asperger's, a highly functioning autism. Until Thursday.
We were in the middle of a class game which involved students competing against each other and "evolving" to different parts of the classroom. I was walking from station to station,making sure the target language was being used, when I heard a commotion behind me. I turned to see Jay shouting and lunging at other students. SH tackled him from behind with a bear hug, pinning his arms to his side as he wiggled and kicked furiously. If you recall, SH is tiny - 5 ft, size 0 tiny - and I froze, uncertain how to help. Two or three of the students grabbed his wrists and feet, and I started to pull them off, trying to avoid a fight.
"No, let them!" SH said. "Please control the class. I will watch him." I nodded, unsure how she thought the game was going to continue as usual with a kicking, screaming kid in the middle of the room. None of the students seemed too bothered by it - many of them were smiling.
"We are sorry teacher. Sorry." Two of my kids started apologizing to me for Jay's behavior. Eventually his homeroom teacher came in and calmed him down.
Later SH explained that the kids knew how to help Jay relax; they were used to his outbursts and were allowed to help physically restrain him.
I have no idea how autistic kids are treated in American public schools, but I have a feeling it errs more on the side of avoiding lawsuits (ie. don't let students physically step in). Honestly, the Korean system feels family oriented - it felt like the kids were his siblings. Kind of cool.
**
There's a lady, a science teacher I believe, who has started giving me rides home after school. She speaks minimal English, and doesn't make any attempts to converse. So we sit in silence, sharing yawns and dried mango pieces. Occasionally I say something like "Are you tired" and she says yes and we laugh, and I feel better as though I have fulfilled my conversational duties.
I fear I have stumbled into a giving war with her. I bought Dunkin Donuts for a couple of teachers, and made sure to deliver one to her room in the morning. A few days later, she offered me a Korean equivalent of a Malomar (a cookie made of marshmellow, biscuit and chocolate), and insisted that I take another one home. I'm pretty sure it's my turn next.
11:40 PM
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