i like all of my students and they all seem to want to learn english. that said, the administration here is absolutely nuts. when i got here i was told that by the end of level 5, the one i teach, the students should be able to read a 750 word article and get the gist of it, more or less. ok, now tell me what kind of 750 word article. well, the dept heads seem to think that means an article from an academic journal. in english. right.

so one of the dept heads, one who particularly irks me (i call her velociraptor) sends me like 10 articles each about 13 pages long. i skim the first pages and realize that it might be possible to teach them to read the abstract of these articles. acadamic journals are called academic journals because they are written by professionals for other professionals, more or less. so velociraptor asks me last month if i got her articles. yeah, i told her, did she order those dictionaries for all the students? i said it as a joke and we both laughed, but really i meant it. so then i asked her if she understood all of the articles. of course. she studied them in grad school when she first read them. ah. grad school. and these students have taken 5 semesters of general english without books, dictionaries or any real type of true progression because the teachers leave every six months . seems about the same, right?

so i learned five weeks ago that i would teach to my students and not really worry about the unreal expectations of the profs. because i wondered if the profs could really read englis on command, i picked out a spicy and difficult word from on the texts on top and asked ole velociraptor what it meant in english. five seconds. ten seconds. rigghhhht.

i just had a text conversation with my boss, who, as amazing as this sounds after seven weeks, still appears less organized and more incompetent each time i talk to her. she sends me a text asking me to write a self-assessment test for the students based on the course objectives. the class started over a week ago. i gave assessment tests the first day and second day. as she is a fool and has absolutely no record of what previous prof´s in ixtepec taught, and i mean she does not even know where they started or ended, or if they even followed the book, i realized that i must find out from the students themselves exactly what they might know. well, the answer as you might guess, is surprisingly little. ok, whatever, not a problem. what have i got but time?

so now she sends me this text message that asks for my assessment tests. well, i sent them to her three weeks ago when she asked the first time, but ok, i like to play games, sure i can do it again. then she sends me hers. right. she has taken the objectives for the course and replaced the words ¨a student can¨ which begin each objective, with ¨i can¨- there are no questions. there are statements written in spanish and english. so i sent her a question back asking where the questions were. oh, she tells me, i still need to form them into questions and then write up multiple guess answers.

stop here and think about this with me. if you send someone a test without questions or answers, what have you sent them? there are statements in two langauges. as this is possibly one of the stupidest things i have ever heard, don´t forget i taught high school where students thought dumb was cool, i am going to paste in a couple of her questions.

12.- WRITING-ESCRIBIR
I can expand learned phrases through simple recombinations of their elements. / Puedo volver a formular una idea que encuentra en una lectura.
4.- SPEAKING - HABLAR
I can ask for and provide personal information. / Puedo dar y preguntar por información personal.

no where is there a question in here. nowhere. so i shoot her back a text asking if she can tell me exactly what the other profs taught, where they got to in their classes, absolutely anything at all about last semester.

she responds, ¨i have to go, talk about this later¨ are you kidding me? apparently not. i mean, if you are the boss, should you not know something about the classes of your students? it is not like we are talking about a faculty of 20 here. 3 teachers. the only 3 teachers on the whole campus who speak english.

so that is why i must remind myself to lower my expectations. it is like teaching with the hand you write with tied behind your back. i almost look forward to my boss ever questioning something i do. because if she has a better idea, where was she six weeks ago when i asked for her advice-help and she did not give it? i realize this is a bad attitude to have, but at least it does not extend to the students. i love my classes. we have great fun and i think they are learning. wasn´t that the point?