There are advantages and disadvantages about not having a textbook or suggested sequence for the oral English classes. On the one hand, I have the freedom to do whatever kind of lesson I want on whatever topic I want, but on the other hand, I don't know what the students have learned in the past and there is no real structure in place to build on or follow. I have two weeks left of class and I plan to talk about Christmas and New Years next week and then the last week of class is the final (short, individual conversations with me . . . all 224 of them - I may regret this).

These past few weeks the students have been more busy and stressed than usual as some of their classes are ending and exams are starting. I have tried to make classes useful but also unusual and fun to raise interest and lower the stress level. Last week we talked about slang, cliches, idioms and cyberspeak. The students had fun with the different activities. They identified English cliches in a funny paragraph and then re-wrote some cliches that they use a lot in their writing (i.e. "no pain, no gain", "time flies"). The results were pretty funny and included some like "time is like toilet paper, it always runs out" and "no fishing, no fish". To practice some slang I gave a word, its definition and an example sentence to two students and they had to make a brief dialogue to the class that demonstrated the meaning. The class then had to guess the meaning and usage of the word. We did some examples like "what's the damage?", "veg out" and "hangover". Sometimes the conversations worked and other times they were just plain hilarious.


When I went over some English "shortcuts" for chatting online or sending text messages the students got really excited and quickly caught on as they do the same thing in Chinese. When they text "886" the numbers sound like "bye-bye" and when they text "3Q" it sounds like "thank you". We went over the basics (i.e. 2=to, too, 4=for, c=see etc.) and then I let them tackle some sample messages and they got a chance to write their own for their partner to decipher (btw, can you do it? "sup qt, sry i made u w8 4 me last nite, i 4got. Let's talk f2f asap. lol - sarah). To practice idioms they divided into groups and talked about several of the more famous ones to see if they could figure out what they meant. Overall, the lesson was really fun and I think the students enjoyed doing something a little different.

This week my lesson was on nature and ways to take better care of the environment. The class ranged from the standard/boring discussions on current environmental problems and brainstorming possible solutions to playing games like "where am I?" (describing natural areas like volcanoes, waterfalls, caves etc.), drawing maps of islands and then describing them for their partner to draw, animal charades and a completely ridiculous (but hilarious) game of "find the other person in the class to match the correct animal with the sound it makes". They loved charades and were literally practicing their animal moves during the break. It was a zoo. Matching animals with their sounds turned into a veritable barnyard ruckus with hee-haws, cock-a-doodle-doos, moos, neighs and baas coming from all corners of the room. Teaching. English. In. China. Is. Awesome.

Teaching freshmen college students has been quite different than teaching freshmen in the U.S. for reasons mentioned before like having almost all-female classes, struggling with creative thinking and conformity and "losing face" while making mistakes in English. But there are some other differences too like the way my freshmen still try and stand at their desks when they speak or answer questions (I have tried to put a damper on this in my classes but old habits die hard). Or another one like instead of using white-out my students use rolls of scotch tape to remove errors by ripping off thin layers of paper.


The most recent thing that has caught my attention is the amount of cute stuff that my students wear, use and tote. You would think you were walking into a class of eight-year-olds by the amount of Hello Kitty paraphernalia, cutesy animal-themed mittens, gloves and hats and stuffed animal cell phone holders and pencil holders that are present. Some of the mittens are even animal puppet mittens which not only warm hands but provide entertainment during class as well. I'm not saying my students act as young as common Hello Kitty fans in the U.S. but cute and girly accessories are definitely 'in'.


The most popular of said animal accessories are the MeToo bears that are adorable-looking bears with pockets and zippers for holding pencils and cell phones. Many female students have these bears and they always take them to class, display them on their desks or hold them during break. I must admit I am starting to fall for the cuteness - it's kind of hard not too since it is all over the place and seems to make the students happy. I mean, really, who doesn't want a little hug from a cute MeToo bear?


Qin Chen indulged this latest interest of mine and got me some adorable rabbit mittens - I love them!

For a recent journal entry my sophomore students wrote about their feelings on love. Dating on campus seems to be a little less popular than dating on college campuses in the U.S. and it is definitely more clandestine. It is common to see couples walking together or sharing a bike but their biggest challenge is finding a time and place to be alone together. That being said, if you walk around campus at night (before the 11pm curfew, of course) you can see couples camped out in dark and secluded places engaging in 'aggressive hugging,' a term coined by previous teachers used to describe what the students do instead of 'making out.' With that in mind, here are two journal entries about love:

"Campus Love"

"In this day and age campus love is appearing in more and more colleges. Meanwhile, there are still some college students breaking up with each other. From my perspective, I stand firmly that campus love is not recommendable.

First of all, on the occasion of falling in love, it takes students much more time to focus on it. Instead of concentrating on studying they probably will neglect the significance of learning. As a student, it goes without saying that we should spend our precious time on study. Every single minute is extremely important to us. What's more, for young people, being young is the greatest treasure for us students. Only by seizing every minute to learn, to develop the skills, and to promote ourselves can we get fully prepared for tomorrow's fierce competition and take advantage of it.

Secondary, it is common to see that lovers are sensitive about each others feelings so that they are easy to feel down in the dumps. Obviously moods do affect themselves and others a lot. Some day if they quarrel with each other, will they behave normally as usual? Their roommates must be influenced which makes the air heavy in the dorm. Besides, breaking up is the worst end of the lovers' relationship. Silhouettes of romantic stories that happened before haunt time and time again in the mind. Love is gone but not forgotten. Don't they think they are profoundly affected by him or her?

Last but not least, during out college time, the money we spend is almost from our parents. They pay for us to study here not to make campus love. Every time when we spend the money on worthless campus love, we need to fathom out why we are here in college. We grow old by deserting our ideas, but the fact is that we shouldn't forget our anticipated outlook; otherwise we are falling short of the goals of being successful.

As an old saying goes, separated as we are thousands of miles apart, we come together as if by predestination. Campus is still the place where we get our batteries charging. We will find our beloved someday, somewhere."

"My ideal husband"

"I think every girl in the world has lots of opinions about this topic. When we are just little girls, all dreams come out. When we read fairy tales, we think the fate of the beautiful princess is our future. When we grow up, we know that the tales about the princess and prince are not true, but the dreams still exist.

I have a dream that one day some guy whom I really love, hold my hands, fix his eyes on me and says 'be my wife, I will take care of you and be true to you. I will make sure that you have a strong roof over your head. If your answer is yes then no one will ever love you as much as I love you. If your answer is yes you will make me the happiest man in the world.

I have a dream that one day I will sit beside the window reading my favorite book. Suddenly a cup of tea appears to my sight, I look over my shoulder and smile because I know he is behind me. Then I relax myself in his arms listening to the rain hitting the leaves.

I have a dream that one day when I would be sad for something about work, he will make a wonderful dish for me, tell some funny things in order to make me smile and after dinner we could wash dishes together in soft music.

I have a dream that one day when we are both grow old, with gray hair over our head, we walk shoulder by should along the street and look back our time together while enjoy warm sunshine in the winter. Maybe we buy a bunch of beautiful flowers in a little shop to pretty our house.

Of course there will be some quarrels between us, some difficulties in our way, some news making us frustrated and so on. But we will overcome these. We could trust each other, help each other and love each other forever."

It's a lazy Saturday afternoon over here and I am sitting outside in the sun leafing through some Lonely Planet guide books while drinking some awesome coffee from a recent care package (thanks Ben and Aly!). There are several cats sprawled around who occasionally try and sneak into my apartment. I have the door open to air things out a bit because of the beautiful weather today. Perhaps they want to get in because they can smell the aroma of stuffed mushrooms. Sean is over using my toaster oven to make another batch of them and I am pretty sure they will be devoured in less than five minutes.


The Gingko leaves from the tree next to my house are scattered around the patio like the spilled cornflakes currently on my counter and they remind me of leaf collecting with my dad. My dad has always been into science and nature in and out of the classroom and passed that interest onto his kids. I can remember learning about the difference between oaks and maples from a very young age and that passed naturally into seeking his help with the genus and species of each tree for a big leaf project in seventh grade. Dad took me around the neighborhood and town and pointed out the common names, the bark, flowers, fruit and leaves of the indigenous trees. The trees that I had walked and played around when I was little now had names like Paper Birch, Red Maple, Weeping Willow, Elm, Horse Chestnut, Hophornbean, Sassafrass, Hemlock and Beech. I learned how to use a dichotomous key and nights before the project was due were spent in the three-season room-turned-leaf-processing-station with Dad identifying leaves, typing out the Latin genus and species names and pasting everything into a professional-looking (for a 7th grader) binder.

There was a Gingko biloba tree that we found and had to be included in my "Extra Credit" section of leaves since it was not native to Michigan. I remember thinking that the Gingko tree's leaves looked so exotic compared with the ubiquitous Maple and Oak leaves that covered our lawn in the fall. I didn't ever think that I would be sitting on a porch drinking coffee next to a Gingko tree in its native country of China, but it's starting to look a little less exotic each day that I'm here.

If you have ever read the cultural part of a foreign language textbook you might have wondered what kinds of information appear in the textbooks of other countries concerning culture and traditions in the U.S. Here is an excerpt from the freshmen textbook "Challenge to Speak" about the eating habits of Westerners. There is a story first followed by a general explanation of "Western" eating habits. It is interesting to see what is mentioned and emphasized as you can notice what is different in Chinese eating habits. It is also entertaining to see how eating habits in the West are generalized and described from a Chinese author's perspective.

"Wang Li was a college student studying in America. One Sunday he was invited to the Smith home for dinner. Although the food was different from what he was raised on in China, he had come to like the American food. He had discovered that chopsticks were best suited for Chinese food, and knives and forks were best suited for Western food. He thought he was prepared, then, to handle this dinner invitation well. Little did here realize that there were other things he should have watched for!

As the family sat down around the table, Mr. Smith said, "Let's say grace." At that everyone bowed their heads for a brief prayer of giving thanks to God for the food. Wang Li was not sure what he should do, but he sat quietly until their prayer was finished. Mr. Smith told Wang Li to "help himself" to the food. So, Wang Li picked up his fork, reached into the bowl of mashed potatoes, then ate it and commented on how good it was. Eight-year-old Matthew Smith giggled when Wang Li did this, although no one said anything to Wang Li. He assumed he had done something wrong. He decided to watch what the others would do. Everyone filled their plates full of food before eating any of it. Wang Li followed this pattern.

He really enjoyed the food. He was so full that he burped. Mrs. Smith's eyes got very wide as they registered shock, which she quickly tried to hide. Of course, little Matthew didn't try very hard to hide his giggle. He knew that if HE had burped, he would have been scolded by his parents. The situation was becoming very stressful for Wang Li. He knew that the Smiths were very kind people, yet he knew that his efforts at being socially correct were not fitting in with their habits, and that there was still a lot to learn in terms of manners. He just wanted the meal to be over with very quickly so he could go back to his dormitory and hide his embarrassment."


Cultural Background

"Eating habits in the Western countries: the Westerners use knife, fork, and spoon during a meal rather than chopsticks. All the food a person intends to eat is put on a large plate in front of him at the beginning of the meal. If the person finishes the food on his plate and wants more, he will get a second helping or "seconds." When seated at a dining table, you should wait for the hostess to join you before you eat. Sometimes the host will say something in honor of the guest, or some families say grace before beginning to eat. Sought should be eaten with a spoon. Some foods like hamburgers, french fries and fried chicken are eaten without utensils; you should use your fingers. Water or other cold rinks with ice is usually served with meals. Toasting at meal is uncommon, so you should drink when you feel thirsty. Slurping and burping are considered extremely rude. It is also considered rude to sing at the table, to put your elbows on the table, to chew your food with your mouth open, to talk with your mouth full, or to make loud noises with the utensils against the plate.

There are not any specific places of honor at formal dinners, but you should ask the host or hostess where you should sit if they do not tell you. The host and hostess often sit at the two ends of the ordinary rectangular tables. If dessert is served, the table will be cleared first. Usually a dessert and a hot drink will be served together. It is polite to let the hostess sit down before you take the first bite of dessert.

Many Westerners do not get a long break at noon for a big meal or a nap; workers will get a 30-minute to one-hour lunch break. Some people will buy fast food like hamburgers. Many people will bring food from home, like a sandwich. These lunches from home are often placed in brown paper sacks, and therefore are called "sack lunches" in the U.S. or "packed lunches" in the U.K. Other sin the U.S. may say they are "brown bagging it", meaning they brought their lunches in brown bags from home. Not all Westerners say grace before a meal; however, it is common among Christan families."

I am over at Sean's place and he is currently sitting at his desk grading papers. Earlier today he finished typing out all of his lesson plans. He keeps everything organized in one of those portable accordion folders and saves and cuts up pieces of paper from the trash and saves it for scrap paper. Meanwhile, my place is a bit of a disaster at the moment and I have some stacks of papers that I haven't given back for weeks. I have never seen this side of Sean before. Perhaps it is because he is not surrounded by his usual posse of ultimate frisbee guys or maybe because he hasn't had to have this type of organization and responsibility until now. I don't know. But for those at home, never fear - Sean is still Sean. Sunday night he stayed up late to help with teaching the logistics of "Flip Cup," he played ultimate on Saturday and he eats as much American fast food as he gets the chance to. I am pretty sure that ultimately you can take a Sean away from the Doyles but you can't take the Doyle out of the Sean. I am also pretty sure that he is not going to read this blog post =)

Here's what a student wrote recently about talking with Sean and Jordan at English Corner last week:

"I was really delighted today. Just now, I went to English Corner, talked with our foreigner teachers. Foreigner teachers were all activity and gentle. One of those teachers, whose name is Sean he is my foreigner teacher, Sarah's boyfriend. He is gentle and easy to get along, and he worked very hard. He answered every question which we asked. In order to let us understand him, he spoke very slowly and always ready for explaining the simple questions. When we talked about his girlfriend, he didn't shield his love to her and he told us that he had about 4 girlfriends before Sarah but now he only loves Sarah. I liked Sean. I liked his smile and his attitude to his work.

Another foreigner teacher whose name is Jordan. I also liked him very much. He was gentle and full of energy when we communicated. He was the last foreigner teacher who left English Corner today even there were only two students even until the two students wanted to leave, did he leave. I was moved. I hoped we can become good friends. In all, I liked the foreigner teachers who came to our college this year."

Saturday morning Sean and I took the early 7:30 D-train from Changzhou to Shanghai. We arrived in Shanghai a little after nine and tackled the challenge of the huge subway system in order to get to the playing fields of the pick-up ultimate frisbee game that Sean wanted to join in on. About an hour and 3 transfers later we made arrived at the Shanghai rugby club fields in the outskirts of the city.

Sean found the pick-up game on the ultimate frisbee website and contacted some of the guys about it. All of the players (about 15 in all) were very nice and welcoming. Almost all of them were Americans in their twenties and thirties but there were a few older guys, a Canadian and an Englishman. I didn't play but I sat on the sidelines and watched the game with two interested Chinese girls (daughters of fathers playing rubgy) and a two-year-old belonging to one of the guys playing frisbee. Watching the game was fun and Sean played for about 2 and a half hours. He also found out about some upcoming tournaments in Thailand and South Korea.

After frisbee we headed down town to eat a delicious and highly anticipated lunch at Burger King (there is only a McDonalds in Changzhou). The flame-broiled whoppers were consumed in record time and made us remember how much we western food. We met up with Ken who had come a day earlier and walked around Nanjing Road, the main shopping strip. We found an English bookstore that had been recommended to us and had a great time finding a few books in English and some workbooks to help with learning Chinese. Then we met up with Peter who had also come a day earlier and had dinner at a really nice Chinese restaurant.

The next day we had to get up really early for the marathon. It was a chilly morning and the start of the race was packed with people. I think the total number of entries was around 20,000. Ken, Sean and I ran the 1/2 marathon and had a good time. The race was well-organized and everything went smoothly. We went at a nice, easy pace and all finished around 2 and half hours. The goodie bags for the race were pretty funny and included: a sample of cooking oil, medicine for heart conditions, off-brand Gatorade and Power Bars and a hideously ugly t-shirt (bright teal with neon orange, green and purple lettering).
After the race we went back to the hotel, showered, packed up, grabbed lunch at Subway (yum!) and took the D-train back to Changzhou. The weekend was very busy and fun and I was pretty tired on Monday. Sean and Ken, however, rallied and held beer club Sunday night in which the basics of "Flip Cup" were demonstrated. I am told that everyone had a really good time and things got especially fun during "Survivor Flip Cup."