At least 50 years ago my grandfather was the Vice Minister of Education of Southern Vietnam. He passed away more than 4 years ago now, and I can still remember one of my most vivid moments as I stood over his open coffin making silent vows to myself and maybe to him about education in Vietnam. My grandmother asked me what I said to “Ong Noi” after I had been standing there for ten minutes or so. I guess I kinda shrugged and left it to be my dirty little secret number fifty-six. Now I find myself in Vietnam, an English teacher, and walking that uphill battle to fulfill one of the promises I’ve made in life. I’ve still got a lot of big promises to keep so it’s a reason to keep on living I suppose.
I haven’t lived up to my promise to my grandfather yet. But I am getting a glimpse of what kind of work needs to be done. about 8-9 years ago he went back to Vietnam and kinda got a glimpse of the country that he tried to build up and the, he argued, ruins that had been left behind by the war, and the impoverished government (in more ways than one). He compared Saigon to Singapore, Tokyo, Hong Kong, and lamented the wide gap between the industrial, technological and economic progress of the cities. Vietnam has been playing catch up for the last ten years for a number of reasons that I won’t mention here. Nevertheless, you could tell that in his heart he still wanted Vietnamese education to develop. Although he had a Masters in Physics he foregoed it to get a Ph.D. in Education because he felt that it would help more people. I mean, I idolize him now that he has passed, but one thing that I do admire about him is that his mind was flexible, and he knew how he could be of use to others, and he had the energy and intelligence to go in the direction he thought was most fruitful. This is something for me to live up to. After all, despite my half-assed but honest journey into Buddhism, I feel that if I can’t even beat my grandfather, how can I beat Buddha?
There’s this saying in Buddhism…”If you want to compete against someone, compete against the Buddha.” The sentiment being that you should set your goals beyond yourself to the point of extremity (taking into account the Middle Way, of course).
So, where am I shooting in education? Ever since I was a child performance has been the center of my life, this doesn’t help my self-involvement since I’m an only child, and it doesn’t help that blogs are the most self-indulgent thing the internet has come up with, nevertheless…I digress. Ever since I picked up my violin at 5 years of age I’ve been on stage at least 20 times every year. From stand-up comedy to jazz band to theater to teacher. It all culminates in the last. There’s nothing more satisfying than leaving a classroom with everyone smiling and excited to learn more, where people look forward to the next class. I want to end a class the way a great stand-up comedian ends their act. Teaching, to me, is really an act. “All the classrooms are a stage.” – Minhspeare. An act that must benefit the audience in their lives. Over and over again Lillian and I have talked about how English teaching is not just English teaching, that we are social workers that are building humanitarian-oriented community.
I want to walk into a classroom and inspire in others the need to improve together as people with English as a mere medium to instill learning. Doing so to me means making a creative space for people to interact in a new way with each other. It also means pushing people to think in new ways. I want to challenge others. All of these goals, of course, need practical applications. I do most of my activity experimentation with my university students whom are, more often than not, more forgiving than students out in the community. It’s all about finding the right pedagogical formula for the group before you and adding to and elaborating on it. I like this formula for my students…a warm-up activity/game that gets them talking about mundane things…move into a short lecture about whatever our topic is for the day, eliciting their main ideas about the topic and writing those on the board, then splitting into small groups to discuss the deeper details of the subject, then maybe moving into presentations/skits or deeper discussion as a whole class. Of course, reviewing the significant platitudes. This formula seems to work well with me. Sometimes I end with a song just for fun. But that’s just a nice formula for a fun easy speaking class, if I’m lazy. If I really feel inspired I’ll spend over ten hours lesson planning for just one hour of class, because I want that one hour to be supercharged with life significance. Students here are already interested in the progress of their country, but they need to be given the tools to bring that goal into fruition. They need content. I think choosing the right subject for the right class is an art that cannot be achieved through one’s own thinking. And not found in answers to questions like “what do you want to learn?” People don’t always say what they truly want, and maybe what they truly want is not what they need or what you can offer in light of that. In light of this, it’s certainly one of the reasons why I want to improve myself for my students, so that I can be a more informed guide than just an older person with a few more years of maturity. It took me 6 months to realize that English is not worth teaching and 6 more months to realize what English should be used for.
blood...ABSTRACT! 