End of Term

The last two weeks of school were very busy, I had to give my students progress tests and then mark them (almost all of them improved, which made me happy), do their reports and have parent-teacher meetings, all in the space of a week.  In addition to normal teaching, paperwork and meetings.  For the classes last lessons of the term I gave them more fun activities.  In English, they had to make up a poisonous animal, draw it, give it a name and write information about it.  In my lively grade 6 class, ALL the boys stayed in voluntarily at break, and worked in silence on it.  I was amazed.  These kids are normally running around at break playing football and kicking a Vietnamese-style shuttlecock around.  Unfortunately I can’t take any credit for the idea, it was taken from one of the other teachers.

For the maths lessons, I decided to brave the computer room.  Never again.  Out of a room with 40-ish computers, 12 were working.  All my classes have more than 12 students.  The computers were extremely old and their break-down-rate reflected that.  By the end of the lesson all the students were working in pairs and most of the computers had been reset at least three times.  It was an educational experience, probably more so for me: only use ICT when absolutely necessary.  And threaten the students with many types of punishment, as well as bribery, before you go into the computer room.  I had threatened them (it did help that I was meeting their parents that week), and they were exceedingly well behaved.  I was very proud of them.

I did not take my largest class (30 students) into the computer room, for obvious reasons, instead the other teacher and I combined our classes, and with the 45 students, taught them about English culture – specifically, children’s parties.  Pin the Tail on the Donkey/Lion/Monkey/Pig, and Pass the Parcel, were a big hit and they had loads of fun.  Unfortunately there was no time for the ‘Hokey Cokey’, and we let them calm down in front of Disney’s Robin Hood, popcorn and sweets.  We all had a brilliant time, teaching is so much easier when you can do things like that because you trust them to behave, and do what you say.

The term ended with the EMG Celebration – Sunday morning spent in a theatre listening to important officials from different departments in the government making speeches about education and Vietnam.  It was followed by students singing and acting ‘Snow White’, and then awards were given to some students.  All in all, the performances were brilliant, the awards necessary (that was the point of it) and the speeches too long.  It started at 9am and didn’t finish until 11.45.  Most of the students had been there since before 8.30am, without parental supervision, because parents weren’t invited due to lack of space.  Imagine 1500 6-14 year olds with next to no supervision in a theatre ‘listening’ to an hours worth of speeches.  Yes, it was chaotic.  The students didn’t listen to the speeches, they were turning round in the chairs, chatting, playing, etc, and I can’t blame them.  I could hear two things – the speeches at the front, and a roar of chatter from behind us (teachers were seated at the front).  But it is now over, and I was proud to see two of my students receive well-deserved awards.

School is now over and unlike British schools we don’t get 6 weeks of holiday in the summer, if we are not teaching we still have to go into the office and ‘work’.  I have taken some leave starting next week (very exciting travels are planned), but at the moment I am stuck in the office, supposedly working, in actual fact I am playing quizzes and games on the internet, talking, colouring in flashcards for a primary school teacher (you have no idea how much my colouring has improved), spending a lot of time on facebook, and updating this blog! 


To say ‘thank you’ to us for our hard work, the company took us to the beach resort of Mui Ne for three days.  It was a great trip, with 40 Vietnamese and 20 foreigners.  We saw the local sights and relaxed by the beach and pool, played team building games and generally had a good time, despite the long bus journeys and mosquito bites.  The best part was that we were paid to go on a paid-for trip.  I made money by relaxing in the sun, in a four star resort!

A classroom where Ho Chi Minh used to teach in 1910 - the desks and benched have not changed in most of the schools in Vietnam - classrooms still look like this, including use of the chalkboard.

One of the sights of Mui Ne - the Lotus Lake and White Sand Dunes.  It was a beautiful view, and not too difficult walking up one of the Sand Dunes, obviously my time in the gym is paying off!

Now it is back to work, well, colouring and facebook.