Tallinn School vol. 3: The Students

According to the on-line work camp description, i signed up to work with "English-language students, ages 10-12, from the minority Russian population." From this, i made certain assumptions, like that the students were in need of quality english instruction, that they were in fact 10-12 years old, and (for whatever reason) that because of their minority status, they would be in some way socially or economically disadvantaged. I wasn't the only one in my program to make this assumption, but it couldn't have been further from the truth.

As it turns out, they already speak wonderful English, the age range was 9-13, and our camp was populated exclusively by the Russian minority, which just happens to be socially dominant throughout Estonian thanks to very controversial Soviet repopulation, or "Russification," efforts. Additionally, many students came from the priviledged upper echelons of Tallinn society, one good example being an 11 year old with an iPhone.

So ok, abandon all sense of social benvolence ye who enter hear, but kids are kids, and while they didn't need us to explain grammatical concepts or even present much vocab, they did need to be entertained while their parents were at work, and what better way to do so than to practice their english.

It is against this backdrop, where the reality is much less noble than the concept, but the challenges just as real and demanding as any other work with children, that i had the following experiences/thought processes:

1 - Sunlight is my friend.
I didn't feel this way when i was getting baked alive on the mediterranean coast, but suddenly the presence of the sun was a direct determinent of how hard my day would become. the school is in a small vertical building split into 9 classrooms with no gathering space larger than the entry hallway. we were allowed to use only 4 of these small (15' x 20') rooms for 40 kids. so obviously we needed to get outside whenever possible. no problem in Sunny Tallinn, right? Apparently June is the "wet month" by which i mean it rains at least a little every day or two, with larger downpours about once per week. Since the weather was also unpredictable, trying to plan for even the next day became problematic. I know rain plans are a good idea in theory, but realize that when you start planning tomorrow 30 minutes after you just got rid of the kids, anything that effectively doubles your workload is not going to be welcome. I won't say that I drifted all the way toward the paganism of the past, but I did whisper a few short prayers for dryness to whatever god would listen, and i gained a new appreciation for the plight of anyone who's life more substantially relied upon the good fortunes of weather to survive.

2 - Learning about Teaching vicariously does not work.
I have been in orbit of teachers now for a good 6 years, and not just tertially aware of their training and profession, but deeply involved in their discussions of theories, frustrations, solutions, etc. And now that it was my turn to be a teacher, i must say all that surface awareness, without the actual skills and experience necessary to implement it, was as much a curse as a blessing. I knew what methods would undercut my authority and discipline in the classroom, but i couldn't figure out what alternatives to use, or why my attempts kept failing. I know many of my teacher friends are thinking, "yeah, now you respect what we go through," but no. i already respected what you go through, what you know and how you're able to use it, now i'm just pissed that all those years of listening and trying to learn from your experiences has proven so limited in its usefulness. in fact, the real curse is that if i didn't know better, i could have ignorantly assumed that we were doing a great job, maybe even as good as anyone else could. but instead i was faced with the realization that none of us were real teachers, and while we may have done the best we could as amateurs, by any professional standard it was mediocre, and bordering at times on catastrophe.

3 - Poly-Lingualism is awesome and belittling to behold.
And it's everywhere. among the camp leaders, I was the only native English speaker, making everyone around me at least bi-lingual, often with one or two other languages they were learning, or at least understood. This is an important facet of modern european society, but it never stops amazing me. my teammates would comment about how unsettling it was to use their english with a native speaker, I had all the advantages of a nuanced vocabulary and definitive awareness of any mistakes, but their english was so refined and comfortable that I regularly forgot it was their 2nd or thrid language, until they'd make a phone call or bump into someone on the street. then it was my turn to feel uncomfortable, and frankly a bit stupid. I even had one Estonian ask me what it was like living in America where everyone learned only Spanish and French, to which i had to correct her that in America people might learn Spanish or French, but more often didn't learn either to any useful extent. The real topper was in speaking with the students. This camp was for practicing English, but the same school runs French and other language camps as well, with some repetition of students. So yes, i met a 12 year old who spoke, functionally, English, Russian, German, French, and was working on Spanish. In fact, even as i write this blog (now in Poland) I've eavesdropping on a spanish conversation between a Catalonian and a Finn about... something about why they don't like speaking French in Quebec.
Amazing.

i could go on longer, i'm leaving a lot out, but Tallinn is behind me, and much of what i learned from working there are the same worn out lessons I watched so many friends go through in their initial teaching experiences. I did leave with an odd sense of the universality of children, these russian youth were identical in behavior, mischief, and cuteness to their counterparts back home, but i think more diverse traveling might dispell that assumption. but i'm not rushing off to teach English in Thailand just to check.

nope, camp was fun, but what I got most out of the experience was the chance to meet and get to know other travellers, Europeans of diverse nationalities and opinions, and hopefully a couple friends i can hang onto as time and distance return us to our normal lives.

Time will tell, but now i must be getting back up on the lamb.

Weber