Me Teach English Now

Hello World, I am now a teacher!

Today was my second day of classes. Yesterday, I had three English classes, and today I added a Typing class. Maybe tomorrow I will have five classes. It depends on if I can find enough functional violins around to use to teach a class.

Third grade has 24 students, fourth grade has 34, and fifth has 26. Computer class has about 20. I have the most students, total, I think. That's 104 new names for me to learn, and then match to people. Yay.
As you know, anticipation is the worst or best part of an event in life. Yesterday morning I woke up and thought, "You'd better get up and pray harder than you've ever prayed in your life."
So I tried to.
I'm still unsure about how to pray hard. Is that like trying hard? Or is it like asking over and over again for something? Is it praying earnestly?
Prayer is talking to God like a friend, so how would you talk hard with your friend?
I don't know. It's just one of those Christian cliches that I never got.

Anyway, I prayed rather earnestly, because I had no idea what I was doing. For one thing, when I am being watched and expected to do some kind of performance, my brain freezes. But somehow I have to keep going. And so I do.

For another thing, I have become the most terrible, exacting critic of my own performances. So when I do get through a task I feel even worse than before I started.

Self says, "You didn't do a good enough job! You FAILED."

But really what self means is that I didn't do it better than everyone else (who have been teaching for several years. get that).

I'm more competitive than I thought I was. It doesn't matter if I did a perfect job for myself or if it was the first time I've done it and had no idea what I was doing; if it's not as good as someone else's, then I still failed.
Wow, what a nasty little beast self is.

Anyway, after teaching yesterday, I was in great trouble of soul because of this problem. To anyone else, it probably looked like I knew exactly what I was doing, was very confident in my abilities, and was happy with a job well-done, but I sure wasn't.
I was disappointed with myself, overwhelmed with life. In so many ways, the experience of maturing is like being turned inside-out, and it's painful. I really wanted to cry but couldn't find the tears, so I just sat in the dark and felt miserable. 

However, I did bring my book of Bible promises with me, and with God's help managed to summon the willpower to open it. 

This is what I found:

"...the Lord shall give thee rest from thy sorrow, and from thy fear, and from the hard bondage wherein thou wast made to serve."

Isaiah 14:3

I was floored.
Most of my life I have been in mind-bondage to selfish, devilish ways of thinking. I know what it is to be utterly exhausted from fear and sorrow, but here's God's promise to me: He will give me rest.

How totally applicable.

It was easier to sleep after that. When I went back to my room, Hannah was talking quite lucidly about something she saw in her sleep.

"You see that there? It's too low. It needs to be fixed. That one side is too long."

She pointed up at the mosquito net which was hanging evenly from the ceiling.

I stifled a giggle and asked what she thought we should do about it.

"Oh...I don't know."

 I really wanted to ask her more questions, but I was falling asleep myself, and couldn't think of anything intelligent.

So the first day of teaching ended well after all. 

Today I was much more prepared, and finished classes with satisfaction. Thank You, Jesus.

The kids don't all understand me when I speak to them, so I found the few who do understand and have them explain the assignments to their classmates. I think they'll figure out my accent soon enough. Hannah and I originally conceptualized it would be funny to teach with a heavy Southern accent, but I can see now that the students wouldn't even realize it is English.
Yea. A lot of Americans don't even realize it's English.

Interesting events of the day:


This morning, I was sitting on the steps outside the chapel during worship, because the room was totally full. Thara Naykawhtoo, the alumni boy's dean, comes around the corner, and he's wearing a crocheted hat down over half of his face. I giggle at him, and he smiles, but I found out this afternoon that he has pinkeye. Oops.
Actually, many of the staff and students have pinkeye.
It's spreading like the plague. (Well, it is the plague, for now)

At the start of computer class today, I announce, "My name is Tharamu Raquel."

They try to say it, "Raquehh."

Karen words don't ever end in consonants.
So if the Karen people try to say my name, that's what it sounds like.
Mostly, they just call me "Teachah", or "Teesha."

Tonight I sat in worship, listening to the book Curse Proof by Eric B. Hare, with my neck nearly bent in half backwards, while a six-year old braided my hair. Mu Wa Wa had practiced braiding the tassels on the edge of my Malaysian sarong and then started on my hair. I like it when kids play with my hair, so the strain was worth enduring.
It reminded me of last summer during junior camp, when I let the cabin I was counseling fix my hair for the mid-week banquet. The girls were anywhere from eight to twelve years old, I think, and really wanted to see what my hair looked like all brushed out. I had told them that I don't brush my hair, but they begged me to do it, so I did it for them. After they finished laughing hysterically, they started begging to do my hair for the banquet. After weighing the cost, I decided to let them. They divided into two teams; team one was the stylists, and team two was the moral support group. With great enthusiasm, team one parted my hair down the middle, pulled it back into tight pigtails on the top of my head and curled them into two giant ringlets. When they were done, team two squealed,
"You're so beautiful!" and clapped their hands. Team one stood by and looked on with pride.
When I walked into the cafeteria with my pigtails, and saw all the other staff girls dressed up with their hair and makeup all done, I felt a little out of place, but when I heard my little girls bragging on my hair, I knew it was worth it. They will probably never forget it. 

Kids are awesome. I never thought I would like kids, but I sure do now.

The Karen kids here took a while to warm up to us, and are still in the process, but many of them greet us now. When I walk into class, I yell, "Good morning, Students!" and they yell back, "Good morrrning, Teesha!"

"Let's sing!" I cry, and break forth into song. As soon as they recognize the song, they join in at the top of their voices. (And I mean, the top of their outdoor voices) When we finish the song, we kneel down and a student prays in Karen for almost 2 minutes straight, in a voice so quiet you can barely hear them.
I know prayer is over when the class shouts, "Amen!"
Then we get up, and I have to keep them busy for the next 35 minutes.

In grade five today, the topic was adverbs. I was concerned that one topic wasn't enough for them, so I copied off the material for pronouns, too.
However, when I told them, "An adverb is a word that helps the verb." they just stared at me.
They weren't even sure what a verb was.
Ok, so adverbs will be at least a two-day lesson. I might get to pronouns next week.

Grade three is next, and they are the cutest little kids. Hannah Steck comes in to teach them their lesson about likes and dislikes. In Karen, if a person says they like something, it means that they want it. Hannah has to explain that in English, liking something doesn't necessarily mean you want it right now. After she leaves, I quiz them.
"Ok class, do you like rice?"
"Yes!"
"Do you want it right now?"
"No!"
Good, they understand.
I hold up a student's woven, traditional Karen bag, "Do you like this bag?"
"Yes!" they cry.
"Do you want it now?" oops.
The boys in the back yell, "Yes!"
I grin at them, because I know they're joking. They understand the concept.
It takes the whole rest of the time to help them work on a very simple worksheet. Only two students in the class can understand me well enough to do the assignment, so I have them explain the paper to the kids near them.

Five minute break, and then on to grade four. This is the last class period before lunch, so the students are antsy. There are at least two of them that read out loud everything I write on the board and then ask, "Teacher, copy?"
Teacher, copy?
Teacher, copy?

YES! Copy everything I write! Copy it all! It's good practice for you. 
I like these kids. One girl, Mu Gel Htoo, says I have very nice Karen handwriting. That's good. It's probably better than my English handwriting. I should just write in Karen always, huh?
I give them a paper with an assignment to draw their family on it. I demonstrate by drawing my family in stick figures on the board. They all think it's uproariously funny, until I tell them to draw their own family. Then, they get shy, and hesitatingly start to sketch.

When I got all the papers back, I couldn't help but share some of them.

This family looks kind of distant

I wonder if this is how he sees other people?

Obviously, the father and mother are the only important people in the family

This boy's family looks fantastical

I'm hoping this is not really his family. Maybe they were killed by Burmese soldiers?

Some of the girls were good artists

The poor father looks a little small and marginalized with all those girls

This looks like a nice family

All-in-all, after two whole days of teaching, I think I might make it alright, provided I put enough time into preparing for class, and trust in God to do the rest.
I'm sure I'll be sharing a lot more funny events over the next few months.
 This is a very hard, very fun, very life-changing experience.

"Unshakeable faith is faith that has been shaken."

Randy Alcorn (?)