Where is Moldova, anyway?

I am not an English Teacher. Nor do I want to be one. I have made that clear to everyone in my village from day one. (Well really by day 5 or 6, day 1 was spent unpacking and eating).

I don't know how to teach English, anyone who has been reading this blog is aware of my loose grasp on English grammar. PLUS, I just don't want to teach English. I don't have the patience to be a teacher, the interest in the subject or the desire to stand in front of a class full of students day in and day out. It's not me, I prefer the unstructured approach, and I like my give-and-take "I work with Youth Development" Peace Corps assignment. While harder to explain what I am doing here, in Moldova, especially when everyone assumes I am teaching English, my current work is a better fit for me.

While I refuse the teaching part of English language development, I like the cultural exchange part. I also recognize that going into the English classes once every few months can be useful as well as entertaining -- it gives me a chance to share something about America and American culture, and gives the kids a chance to listen to a native speaker.

Our village's English teacher understands, now, better than ever, how to use me in the context of their English program. I think I scared her at first with my intense refusal to teach English, and thus she shied away from asking me to even come to her class. But now she understands that I just don't want to be teaching, speaking, of course, I can do.

Today I spoke to the graduating 12th graders (there are 9 of them) about the "culture of volunteering" that exists in America, especially with students and we had a rudimentary debate about the benefits of direct vs. indirect service. It was really interesting, for them and for me, as they weren't even aware that volunteer service could be so criticized. Their concepts of volunteering haven't developed past the "it's something you do to help someone" phase. Which is fine, I have full confidence in their openness to explore these ideas with more experience further down the line. The important thing was to get them thinking.

We also talked about advocacy, for which an equivalent word doesn't exist in Romanian, unfortunately, and the difference between cleaning up the river, and trying to stop people from putting trash in it in the first place. I shared with them the phrase we use "band-aid" for an action you do that covers a problem, deals with it for the moment, but doesn't really solve it -- just takes it away from immediate sight. They thought it was funny, but a good comparison. While I loved this discussion, and it is clearly a topic that is very important to me, I enjoyed my time with the 4th graders more.

We had an hour long period and I gave them each a chance to ask me a question about ANYTHING in America. They have clearly limited vocabulary, but unlike the older kids, have no shame in asking anything -- are just curious, curious, curious.

My favorites were:

• What are your parents' names? (they couldn't pronounce either of them)
  
• Are you married? (Why not? Don't you want to be?)
  
• How is life in America? (me: can you be more specific? him: no, how is life?)
  
• Do you play tennis?
  
• What do kids eat in schools in America?
• Why do you guys like sandwiches so much?
• Have you ever seen XXXXX celebrity?
• What do kids read in American schools? (Following this question, I had a 3 minute embarrassing black out of famous American authors. I think I mumbled something about the boxcar children and moved on. Bad job, Sharon, way to represent American culture.)
  
• Do you like to watch TV? Why not?
  
• Do you eat McDonald's every day?
  
• Does everyone in America have their own car?
  
• Do kids in America have chores? (They didn't believe me that "setting the table" was an actual chore -- you put the plates on the table, that's it?)
  
• Why do kids have pets... Don't they have animals in their backyards?
  

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 13, 2008 at 12:51 PM.