fail better

As I look back on the blog, I seem to have focused on sharing success stories. Well, on the one hand, naturally. Who would wanna dig herself into the memory of failures? (Actually, many people – the little voice cries out in my head. :-) While it is OK not to recite one’s misdemeanors and disappointments over and over again, it is necessary to face them every once in a while. Because, ultimately, they are there to teach us. So, let’s see my Top 3 Failures in Education.

ever tried. ever failed.

Number 3 failure story was set in a business English class of a group with a relatively high level of language competence. During the lessons, we watched TED talks, had extensive discussions, and gave presentations on various topics, from serious to fun ones. Since they liked short videos and authentic English, I decided, before that notorious class, to bring some excerpts from the well-known pop series Friends. Not only did I include some videos, the class was closely built on those short conversations we were supposed to watch. Friends had proved to be a hit in every previous context I used it, until this one. It was not only that almost no one had known the series and the characters (which I expected they would), but they couldn’t even follow the 2-3-minute conversations. And, as I said, all the activities were based on this. I don’t need to go into details: the class was wasted.

And I cannot even say that it had to be a total surprise. They were in their 30s-40s, that is, not the ideal age group for sitcoms, and it was obvious from previous experiences that they were not too up-to-date in pop culture either. If not to expect it, I could have at least considered the option of a plan B.

no matter. try again.

Number 2 was more (socially) devastating. As part of my teacher training, I had to teach English in a model high school for a couple of months. These 16-year-olds were my very first group and they mesmerized me completely. I still remember how shocked I was to see that my students always listened and did what I asked them (too bad reality is rarely like this, at least in high school contexts). We had a nice routine worked out: some grammar, some discussion, a variety of tasks, and … every fourth class some oral comprehension, in the frames of watching an episode of the series they had chosen, How I Met Your Mother. I didn’t particularly like HIMYM but they apparently did, which is what mattered.

Our last class was approaching, which was both my exam class and our farewell, so I wanted to prepare with something special. You know, something memorable. (How naive I was!) It was time for HIMYM and the upcoming episode had a particular scene – one character in a funny apron (having the body of Michelangelo’s David) – which I decided to bring to life. I thought, how funny, how cool. So, when the episode was over, I slowly turned to them, wearing the exact same apron – that is, a naked male body. They froze. It was so shockingly surprising for them – so unexpected from me, their teacher – that they couldn’t say a word. Well, the silence made me awfully conscious that I was standing butt-naked in front of a group of teenagers. Our worst nightmare, isn’t it?

Again, I could have expected. Or rather, I could have prepared them. They were too “nice students,” and I was a “too nice teacher” for something improper to be OK, let alone, hilarious.

fail again. fail better.

All-time-winning failure story was one of the courses I had to teach at the university. It is one thing that I never got courses in the discipline I specialized and did my doctoral studies in (cognitive linguistics). In a way, I even liked it. Presentation practice, academic writing, and blog writing were fields I felt important for all students to learn (much more than my own specialization, which I considered relevant only for a few) and I had things to say about them. Although I never systematically was taught about these, I was intuitively good at them, so it was enough to read a couple of books about them to make my knowledge more conscious and organized, ready for teaching.

Once, however, I was given a course I felt completely unprepared for. It was a specialization course, in the second year of a journalism program. By the time the students got to my course, they were already heavily trained about the journalistic genres, styles, and peculiarities of the American journalistic tradition. I, on the other hand, had no experience and no material to pass on. This course (American English in Journalism) was something nobody wanted to teach, nobody had an idea what and how to teach, and it was not embedded into the program. I was left without assistance – in the hands of a group of exceptionally self-confident and self-conscious students, who were encouraged and comfortable about expressing expectations.

I did my best, and, looking back, it was not a worthless course, but I can’t erase that semester-long feeling of inadequacy from my head. It was just horrible.

What did I learn from these experiences? That I can make mistakes and it is OK.