Out of Office Reply

This month marks the four-year anniversary since I stepped foot in an ESL classroom. One day I was a teacher and then. Well, then I wasn't.

I felt sick one Friday afternoon.

So. There I was, not a teacher, but a patient. A scared, medically-illiterate newcomer patient who no one had time to teach. There was no time.

And then I was a recovering patient, in isolation at home for weeks and months, starting to walk again, trying to digest what I'd been through. Angry for what I had and had almost lost. Grateful for my life but mostly angry. Angry because the doctors had failed in their duty. Angry because the life I had known was altered forever. But mine isn't a story of loss or anger. Nor is it a story of new beginnings. It is a story of starting something fresh and different from a familiar foundation—seeing and doing from a new perspective.

When the anger fog cleared and my strength improved, I still wanted to teach, but, more than anything: I wanted to unite my students with their community. The missing link for me as an adult educator in a domestic ESL environment was that the wealth of cultural and global knowledge my students possessed and shared was locked behind the classroom door at the end of day. My students had so much to give to the community and no one was listening—or took the time to listen.

The safe, inspiring, creative space we had built together allowed so much. Confidence. Language acquisition. Skill development. Cross-cultural awareness (if you've never seen a true example of multicultural diplomacy and negotiation, just watch a group of students from 6 different countries/cultures/language groups complete a project together). I've said it before: the ESL classroom is the shiny pearl of the Great Canadian Multiculturalism Project. It is no accident.

But the Project isn't complete and that inspiring space lacking if it doesn't touch the wider community. As I write this, I think: I'm an evangelist. And that's o.k. You see, when the fog cleared, I decided to bring the stories of these gifted, brave, multi-faceted, skilled, educated "ESL students" to the community. I decided to help them speak and write their knowledge and experiences (in English, of course—I'm an ESL instructor for goodness sake!). I decided to take everything I knew and the incredibly massive amount of things I didn't know—graphic design, publishing, marketing, public relations...the list goes on—and create a new space beyond the classroom door. A space where newcomers and immigrants can say: Hey! I'm here, and this is my story, my background, my culture, my knowledge. And a space where those more established in Canada can say: Welcome! Let me tell you a bit about me, what I know, and about our community.

That awesome space is HERE! MAGAZINE* and I'm proud to say that not only has my classroom door burst wide open, but the students are leading the lesson. Just as it should be.

*launched in 2013 from the impossibly beautiful city of Victoria B.C., Canada

Recalling Nunan: Action Research & A Grain of Salt

I have no doubt he had done this drill before - it was so well-executed. The purposeful transition from transcript-to audio-to video. He had us hooked. The resulting collective arrival at understanding a certainty for him - both an eye-opener and aha! for us. As they say, David Nunan had it going on.

In those early days of my teaching career, the idea that I would willingly analyze, evaluate, and (egads!) criticize my own teaching seemed foreign...and terrifying. I was just trying to find and keep a good teaching job and not screw up TOO much. What Nunan showed us in his seminar that day, that teachers are imperfect, that he was imperfect, and that it was worthwhile, even vital, to explore these imperfections was frankly, beyond me.

Fast-forward fifteen years or so and those early insecurities have long been quashed by the thousands of classes I have facilitated and the students I have taught . That's not to say I don't get the occasional butterfly or sinking feeling of  impending pedagogical disaster but, generally, I like to think I'm on pretty solid ground in my classrooms and with my students.

What happened a few weeks ago, while not shaking the ground exactly, was a gentle Nunan nudge, a reminder that what I may perceive as a well-run classroom stuffed with great learning and instruction, may indeed be a dud, or worse, a missile with no target - set to explode in the wrong place at some inopportune time.

I was subbing for a colleague, off for some long-put off and vital dental work. My colleague is a pistol and she knows her stuff but within minutes of starting the class I knew the students had turned on her. Throughout my lesson, there were furtive looks and an undercurrent of energy that smelled like excitement. Predator on prey. I can't explain why I knew this bloodlust wasn't about me. I can't explain why I wasn't surprised when I was pulled into the office later and told that there had been a mutiny after my lesson and that they were demanding my colleague's pretty head on a stick.

This all made me feel quite sick.

My years teaching ESL to adults have taught me many things, including: 1) ELT is a minefield like no other teaching field - with cultural, racial, individual, financial, and political overtones of every sort 2) ELT professionals are sometimes treated by students and administration alike as if they are dispensable, disposable (the "you speak English therefore you can teach it" mentality) 3) A successful classroom is sometimes not about skill and experience but a "good match" 4) Adult ESL students can be fickle.

Never in a million years would I imagine a mutiny in a college Physics class. Or a university German course. Why does criticism seem so much more accessible in ELT? Most of us in ELT embrace Nunan's action research philosophy with gusto. Perhaps too much gusto. Perhaps we haven't asserted ourselves and established our profession as a profession. How else can I explain a group of adult language learners demanding a different instructor for no other reason than they thought they were missing out on something?

I do know what happened that day and I don't need any formal action research to explore it - my personality and approach were better matches to the students' perceived needs. I was no "better" or "worse" a teacher than my colleague. They simply believed that my approach was better-suited to their needs. They believed. Is perception everything?

As I said to my colleague that week, while she kicked herself over and over, the one piece she could own, the single thing some action research might have revealed is:  why didn't the students talk to her about their concerns?

 My colleague is an exemplary teacher. What her students thought they had missed from their coursebook and lessons had been well-supplemented with more current, relevant, and interesting material. As students, they couldn't recognize that. And they shouldn't have. That's the teacher's job.

Nobody's perfect. Definitely not me. Not you. Not Nunan.

That said, we are educated, gifted, progressive, reflective, intuitive, experienced, creative, and skilled educators, facilitators, guides, and mentors. It's time to own what we know.