A typical day teaching English

Posted by Joe Hallwood - 18:24 on 08 February 2009

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Every so often, when the old memory banks are firing on all cylinders, I'll be relating the more memorable teaching moments I have had. As far as I remember they range from me losing students to students to losing me.

They will at least give you an idea of what life can be like teaching abroad.

Seeing Red in Class

Living in the moutain town of Tripolis, Greece, I was surrounded by ...er...mountains, some of 'em pretty big. In fact, one of them was about 2000m above sea level, this we lovingly called Ski Mountain.

It was my first year in Greece, and I guess I was a little green around the gills. One night we were reliably informed that snow had in fact fallen on Ski Mountain. So, like the intrepid little explorers that we were, early next morning we jumped on our 50cc mopeds and 'sped' off in search off ski-adventure.

I had never been skiing before, but reckoned a pair of jeans and a jumper should do the trick. After stopping to put newspapers down our fronts and plastic bags over our gloves, we were soon at the foot of Ski Mountain and on the road up to where the runs were. I was new to my little 'papaki' (Little Duckling) and my experience of riding a moped on thick snow was pretty limited. You would think falling off motorcyles would hurt, but there is a technique to falling off, and it is one that I felt i had reached Expert Level at, by the time I had reached the top. At least, I assumed it was the top since the road ended. I could smell coffee, but not see where it could be coming from. My first experience of a white out.

Eventually the cloud cleared, and I was treated to brilliant sunshine on Ski Mountain. The Ski Man rented his trusty skis to me and I was off... and down ... and off...you get the picture. After my third time of falling off the only ski lift and having provided a good five minutes of free entertainment for the locals, some of whom I was due to teach later that day, I made it to the top of the first slope. It then took a further ten minutes to extricate myself from the lift and into a vertical position. But, as they say, no pain, no gain.

To cut a potentially long story into something vaguley manageable, skiing is quite easy, especially when the sun is shining and you're in your t-shirt and jeans and flying down the mountain, what could be simpler? Stopping, yes, that is something that takes a bit of thought, but there always seemed to be plenty of willing skiers around to help me stop.

We were having so much fun that we forgot we had to be back at 4pm for lessons, going down was a lot quicker than coming up and quite a bit scarier; falling off can actually hurt . But, where there is a will, there is a way. We got home, quickly changed and off to school, arriving with minutes to spare. Got my books and straight into my first lesson, ready to tell them about my adventure and newly found passion.

Stepping into the classroom, I was greeted, not by the usual cries of Yassoo, Mr Joe, but by silence. This was immediately followed by cacophony of laughter and the whole class pointing to my head. The school owner walked in to see what the commotion was about and immediately fell about herself. Great. When she finally recovered, she dragged me to the toilet and put me in front of the mirror. It wasn't Joe i saw, but an overgrown tomato. Which would explain the Kefala Domata that the students were shouting at me. (Tomato Head to the uninitiated)

How can you get sunburnt skiing? Well, you can, in fact I don't think me or anyone who saw me has ever seen a face so bright red. It had its plusses though, it meant I could get as embarrassed as I liked in class and no-one would notice.

Your Comments

Comment by Caroline Christie at 15:18 on 26 January 2010.

I had to write after reading Joe's stories of early life as a TEFL teacher. If I was not already convinced by the albeit short conversation we had on the telephone earlier today, I now am. "Soon to be redundant" (albeit for the 5th time) now does not seem so daunting, if you are willing to give yourself back the confidence the redundancy process can take away from you, and believe you are a valuable human being, to many other people in this world - teaching does sound better than spreadsheets! So thank you Joe for the much needed inspiration and very vivid stories, they made me smile at a much needed time and I am determinded to sign up for TEFL very soon! I hope to meet you very soon. Caroline

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