My regular visit to St. David's school took me into a classroom of Grade 6-7 students today. There was no smart board, and there were no iPads this week, but there was an artist's chair, so this is where I perched.
From this vantage point, it didn't take long to begin the conversation (they seem to come easier and easier each week). Compared with some of the younger grades, this age group necessitate a slightly different style of presentation. Thus I began asking the students what they remembered from the last time we encountered one another. Details about my given name were freely given, but when we advanced into the territory of my family name, this was a different kind of challenge. To be fair, these students had probably not heard my family name pronounced, so we were moving into uncharted territory for them.
Always looking for new angles, I began by writing the name (in Chinese characters) on the blackboard, and then asking them to pronounce it. In the words of one of the students, there was dreaded silence This too was a challenge, but it opened the door for me to present a lesson on the structure of Chinese names (monosylabic in nature and written in an order somewhat varied from that which we would be more accustomed to seeing).
The students seemed to soak up the information, until I asked them to consider preparing a fact sheet about me. Their response: you've told us about the history of your name, but not much else. We need to know something about your friends, your likes and dislikes etc. Thus began the next phase of the presentation. I launched into a geography lesson, wherein I spoke to them about the Christmas card list that I will soon have to prepare, and the different countries where I will have to send greetings to various friends and aquaintances. Who knows whether I won't eventually assemble a complete list of the countries and then invite this class to do a project of some kind to study the location of each country, and some of its attributes.
As to my likes and dislikes, there has to be something left for a future visit. From the sounds of it, that won't be long in coming.
From this vantage point, it didn't take long to begin the conversation (they seem to come easier and easier each week). Compared with some of the younger grades, this age group necessitate a slightly different style of presentation. Thus I began asking the students what they remembered from the last time we encountered one another. Details about my given name were freely given, but when we advanced into the territory of my family name, this was a different kind of challenge. To be fair, these students had probably not heard my family name pronounced, so we were moving into uncharted territory for them.
Always looking for new angles, I began by writing the name (in Chinese characters) on the blackboard, and then asking them to pronounce it. In the words of one of the students, there was dreaded silence This too was a challenge, but it opened the door for me to present a lesson on the structure of Chinese names (monosylabic in nature and written in an order somewhat varied from that which we would be more accustomed to seeing).
The students seemed to soak up the information, until I asked them to consider preparing a fact sheet about me. Their response: you've told us about the history of your name, but not much else. We need to know something about your friends, your likes and dislikes etc. Thus began the next phase of the presentation. I launched into a geography lesson, wherein I spoke to them about the Christmas card list that I will soon have to prepare, and the different countries where I will have to send greetings to various friends and aquaintances. Who knows whether I won't eventually assemble a complete list of the countries and then invite this class to do a project of some kind to study the location of each country, and some of its attributes.
As to my likes and dislikes, there has to be something left for a future visit. From the sounds of it, that won't be long in coming.
Amazing - it is obvious that these kids are getting a tremendous amount of positivity from your visits!!
ReplyDeleteGina Tullio