Midterms

The past week and this coming week have been devoted to midterms. My students were required to speak for 5 minutes with a partner on any subject they wanted. At the end of this process I will have listened to roughly 180 midterms. And I love it! All of them have put in such wonderful effort and some have taken me off guard with how creative they have been. Traditional Chinese education is that the teacher teaches and the students accept that information -- no questions asked. This is beginning to change.
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I must also note that most of my students have been studying English for 5 - 10 years and still remain at a simplified, slowed down conversational level that is in need of much work on pronunciation. My friend Phil and I chatted about this the other day. It's frustrating because their pronunciation has been taught by Chinese teachers who, though they have done a good job, have trouble with pronunciation themselves. In every midterm I'm finding that my students and I must go back to the very beginning and work on letter sounds along with verb conjugation and sentence structure. But when they are able to express themselves in English, it is a beautiful thing.
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On the 1st day of midterms I had 2 guys talk about the problem of suicide related to the immense pressure of education. I was floored by their ability to talk about such a serious and difficult topic. I had become so engulfed in their dialog that I had forgotten to take notes on the first couple minutes.
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Two girls performed a variation of Titanic. And it was AWESOME -- complete with props and signs to tell us what year the scene was in. Jack and Rose had both survived and, 50 years later, bumped into each other on the street. Their undying love awoke and they began to recall those days of yesteryear on board the Titanic -- reenactment of the "I'm flying" scene ensued. Back to the scene on the street, they decided to do that once again for ol' times sake.
Rose: Oh Jack, let's do that again.
[Rose steps forward to "the railing" and Jack goes to help her but struggles.]
Jack: We can't. You are too fat!
The play concluded with a performance of the famous, and ever-popular-in-China song: "My Heart Will Go On".
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Another group (which included my most creative student) performed for the whole class a skit and a song and mini dance lessons to a few volunteers. All of this was based on Obama's speeches and slogan "Yes, we can". (99.5% of my students would rather fail then speak publicly.) I was left speechless at their creativity. Afterwards I told the whole class how amazed I was that these guys took the undesirable task of a midterm and modified it (while fulfilling all the requirements) into something . I requested a written copy of their performance. Here it the song:

It was a creed written into the founding documents
that declared the destiny of a nation.
Yes we can.
It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists
as they blazed a trail toward freedom
Yes we can.

It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores
and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness.
Yes we can.

It was the call of workers who organized;
women who reached for the ballots;
a president who chose the moon as our new frontier;
and a king who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land.

Yes we can to justice and equality.
Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity.
Yes we can to heal this nation.
Yes we can repair this world.
Yes we can.

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Obama has been a hot topic, so I decided that I would have my classes watch the speech he gave after becoming the president-elect while I was listening to midterms. They were required to write a response paper answering the following prompt: "Whether you like Obama or not, he won. What does that mean for America, China, and the rest of the world?...also include YOUR thoughts and opinions." After reading 1/2 of the 350+ papers, I realize that I will need to go over the fact that "negro" is not a word we want to use anymore. One paper had "bla" crossed out and "negro" written in. From their papers it appears that my students believe discrimination to be very prominent in America -- almost to the extent that is was in the 60's. Next week's lesson: MLK's speech and racial discrimination.