Follow-up to my last post about forward European men…
I recently taught a group of eighteen secondes (who would be sophomores in the US system) one of my favorite lessons, where we go over all of the vocab for how to describe the location of things in a picture (at the top, in the middle, on the right, in the foreground, above, below, etc) and then they break up into groups and describe their picture to another team, who then does their best to draw the picture without having seen it. It’s always spirited and students resort to French to say the equivalent of things like, “Are you stupid or what? I said a small dog!” or “That doesn’t look anything what I’m describing. You’re a terrible artist.” Taken out of context, the phrases that come out seem crazy… but I assure you that in the heat of the moment, it seems like a big freakin’ deal that the other team drew the giraffe facing the right instead of the left. I intervene as quickly as possible to remind them that we’re describing things “In English! In English!” so that it doesn’t get too out of control. One side note: I wish I had more lessons/activities like this, as it seems like they’re more likely remember vocab if they are able to use the words in some sort of activity. A similarly successful lesson has been to introduce common phrases used when you’re talking on the telephone and then having students write their own conversations to act out. I’ve had groups present everything from practical conversations where they make a reservation at a restaurant and ask questions about “the chef’s special” to ridiculous conversations between spies planning the details for Sarkozy’s assassination…
But anyway, where was I? Oh yes. Secondes. After all of this fun and excitement, the bell rang and students filed out of class. As usual, I was met with a flurry of “Goodbye miss!” and “Have a good day, miss!” exclamations as they ran out the door. The last student was taking his time putting all of his school supplies back in his backpack and when everyone else had left, he looked up at me and said, “You’re so pretty.” I smiled and said thanks and he walked out, clearly pleased that he’d been able to get his point across. With some of my BTS classes, I might worry a little bit more about this crossing the line, but in this instance it was just so innocent and cute. He clearly didn’t expect any response on my end, but merely wanted to tell me what was on his mind. Needless to say, I felt like Maria from West Side Story for the rest of the day.
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