Lessons in English

Instinctively, I grabbed the stick from her and hit the table. Maybe it did work to quiet the class down. “No, madam, to the student you use.”

Going in as a volunteer teacher I had two strikes against me. First, I was the ‘new’ teacher and second, I was the white woman teaching in South India. I decided to arm myself with a lesson on English grammar, which was not as dumb of an idea as it might sound. Indian children were often asking me the meaning of English lyrics and how to use the past or present tense. But when I entered the classroom my lesson got totally trashed. A group of girls approached me about the difference between the words, 'brave' and ‘beauty’.

"Madam.” they said. “Much confusion is there.”

I began the lesson by writing the words on the blackboard. Their classroom was an archaic assembly of wooden benches with attached table tops containing 62 children. “A smaller class”, I was told by one of the teachers. The room was not adorned with any modern conveniences. An orange drape hung sloppily over the window to shield the sun and there were black bars to prevent anyone from escaping. A rickety fan was in the center of the ceiling, which wobbled sideways as it spun around. Sometimes it stopped as if it was deciding whether or not to carry on. It was mid-day and already very hot.

“Are these the words you are having trouble with?” I asked. They nodded eagerly. There was a faint, “Yes, miss, yes, miss, yes miss”, which echoed from the other students. In India, madam, miss or auntie were the names I was used to. This was when things were going well. I was also called by my last name. This was when things were not going well. Only the very bold students eaddressed me with, “Hey Morton, how are you?” and laughed like a hyena. However, if one of their teachers caught them they would not be laughing for long, but crying from the slap on their head.

Yes, a good slap on the noggin. The year I did research on yoga for children in India, I watched teachers slap the children without a second thought. “It’s allowed,” I was told. On the surface, I nodded politely. Inwardly, I went crazy.

“Hitting?” I thought. “Now, this is really archaic.”

It was exactly the same when I taught English in Korea. They also welcomed hitting as a form of discipline. During one of my lessons at the school, I had returned to the office and saw 5 little kids with their arms over their heads. As I excused myself to get around them and to my desk, they looked as if they were being read their rights before getting handcuffed and shackled. It was not only the supervisor of the school who held a degree in fashion design, but the parents who also encouraged this.

A Korean father told me, “And if my kid gets out of control just give him a slap.” We used to joke amongst ourselves by saying, “Yah, if my kid gets out of control just give me a slap!” It helped us deal with the tensions between what we felt was morally wrong and what was expected.

Now in India, I was surprisingly confronted with students who approved of hitting as well. When we started the lesson on ‘beauty and ‘brave’, one little girl got up from her seat to pass me a stick. She pulled out my hand and laid the slender stick onto my palm.

“Here, madam...you can use it...” Seeing that I was confused, she picked it up and offered a demonstration.

“Like this, Madam!” as she slapped it on the desk. Tap, tap, tap.

Instinctively, I grabbed the stick from her and hit the table. Maybe it did work to quiet the class down.

“No, madam, to the student you use.”

I became silent. Realising that I had just succumbed to what was expected of me and torn between what I knew was right, I put the stick down. The little girl looked confused. Another child piped up, “You beat.”

I decided to ignore them both and went on to discuss the words in question. Looking out into the sea of 124 black eyes, I suddenly wanted to hug them; not beat them. I wanted to explain to them that hitting and stick rapping were ineffective. I wanted to rewrite the book on discipline. I thought to myself, “Do they know that the Ontario Teacher’s College has blue pages for such teachers and worse?”

“Of course not”, I thought as their innocent eyes shone back at me. I wanted to show them that controlling a class does not come from slapping their heads. As my thoughts overpowered what was happening, I did not notice that a student had slipped out to call for a teacher. I did not notice that the students had begun to talk loudly amongst themselves.

An Indian teacher entered the classroom and shouted, “Silence, children.” The children hovered at their desks. One little boy carried on making jokes. She went over to him and slapped his head. He quickly snapped out of his bratty behaviour and sat up straight.

“You take the lesson?” she asked me.

“Yes.” I said meekly.

“Okay” she replied and left.

I returned to the black board and pointed to the words, “beau-ty” and “brave.” My lesson continued.

All Copyrights Reserved, 2009. Heather Morton, The Yoga Way, Toronto, Canada.