Creating lifelong learners!! The Chinese had it right all along.

One of my favorite moments this year was with a class of students who were particularly jaded. They were in their last year of mandatory language classes, and the more the teachers asked of them the less they wanted to do. One student, at the beginning of the year, went so far as to take out her makeup kit during my first class!

I came in one day with a basic lesson prepared on the Civil War, but completely misplaced the projections, worksheets, and activities I had prepared before the class. So when I entered, instead of jumping into an unprepared lecture, I asked the class if they knew anything about the American Civil War - keep in mind I was teaching in France! No one knew a thing. I asked them if they had heard the terms “Yankees” or “Rebels” - Yankees rang a bell! It turned out that a large portion of my class followed American baseball and LOVED the Yankees.

The rest of class became geared around baseball: the disinterested, jaded 14 year olds turned into lively teams of Northern and Southern armies. Each student chose a state and, based just on its location on the map, made a list of advantages in a war. By the end of class the Yankees and Rebels were comparing the states to their own interests - “I’m New York, and I have a big city. Cities are good for making things in a war, and for buying things. I love shopping,” one girl told me!

To wind up the class we totalled up each teams “points” in the war - large cities, resources, rivers, and ocean ports were each awarded certain numbers of points. (The North eventually won.) I was overjoyed to see them the next week, suddenly comfortable telling me about their own personal likes and dislikes, and jumping into the idea of learning about these interests in English.