The Language Teacher

Most of us probably remember a time when our teaching tasks made us doubt our skill to meet them. Perhaps our very first class, when the classroom floor felt like sponge rubber as we walked from the door to our desk, or when we left the language school's little classes of cheerful adults for a seventy-student auditorium of bored adolescents. Or perhaps one day the crust of fatigue, routine, and cynicism just gave way, and, unprotected, we felt the full weight of the responsibility entrusted us: to guide our students in understanding those who are alien to them. One time, when my doubts were strongest, I found something that helped me, and I'd like to pass it along. If such a time comes for you, think back on this and it may help you too.

It was a few years ago. in that limbo of late March after graduation, when nothing seems to be happening, but everyone feels a new school year approaching and wonders if they are ready. A year before, I had left a secure university position to return home, but plans and personal life had gone terribly wrong, and now I was trying to squeeze back into the profession. To my shock and disappointment, I was turned down by a school I had every reason to expect to hire me. Finally, thanks to my friends' help, another school reluctantly hired me for a low-paying, limited-term post on the fringe of academia.

In the end, the experience did me much good, instructing me in the hollowness of the titles, degrees, position, income, and stability, which I had come to trust as an index of my worth. I was most lucky in my colleagues and students, the sources of a few strong friendships and many warm recollections. But as the first classes drew near, I felt shaken and unsure of myself. The curriculum, texts, and students, were all new to me, as were the teaching conditions--large "conversation" classes, reportedly poor attendance, and a threat of reducing or abandoning the program. The workdays and class hours were double what I was used to. Moreover, just a month before, I had been judged inadequate when I had every circumstance in my favor. I was almost 47 years old. Perhaps I was at the start of the long slide down. Could I keep faith with these students and the people who had recommended and hired me? I was not sure I could.

I was fortunate enough to attend the entrance ceremony, however, and there I discovered something that put those worries out of my mind. Despite the length and familiarity of the speeches, the ceremony was tremendously moving. So many faces, so young, so excited, a little scared, but so hopeful. As the speeches went on, my gaze and my mind drifted, and this meditation came to me:

If you are at a loss for one reason or another, try to imagine a student you will be teaching as vividly and in as much detail as you can. Perhaps one person, perhaps one young man and one young woman, perhaps more--as many or few as you want or need, one at a time. Based on everything you know about the people you may be teaching, try to conjure up an image as real as you can make it: name, appearance--clothes, satchel, accessories, shoes, hair, walk, posture, voice, motorbike--whatever makes the image appear real in your mind. Imagine where the person hangs out with friends, what music they listen to then, and what music when alone. What posters are on the bedroom wall? What wallpaper? Imagine this person's story--how many people are in the family, best friends, feelings about leaving home, hometown memories. What was their biggest disappointment? What happened once that made them unbearably happy? Do they have some secret that not even you can know? What do they fight about with their parents? What do they expect school will be like? Will they be surprised or disappointed? What are their future hopes? When they talk seriously with their best friend, what do they talk about? What do they think about when they think their deepest thoughts, about life, about the world, about religion? Even if your students are new to you, you know what it's like to be young, away from your parents, facing new experiences. Take it from there. You will be surprised how detailed and alive your imaginary student will become.

This exercise will work only if you take it into your mind and make it your own. You can't just connect the dots; you have to invent your own process. Don't try to imagine a typical or generic student. Of course you have to use what you know, and, to some extent , the person you imagine will be a composite. But you need to imagine an individual, not a type, not a representative. Please don't try to project your own hopes and wishes onto an ideal student, or make the student's story a fable of The Good Little Language Learner and The Bad Little Language Learner. The point of the exercise is for the image to come to life as an imaginary but autonomous person. After that happens, you'll find that you don't need to make things up; at that point it's better if you don't try. Just sit back, observe, and learn. Novelists often talk about how their characters rebel and take over the story by doing what's in their nature and not what the author wants them to do. You'll find that once your images are fully realized, they'll pick out their own music, read the novels they choose, go to driver's school or study abroad as they please.

When you feel you know your imaginary student really well, take the next step. Imagine or suppose you are someone who loves this person, that this person is for example, your daughter who has all your hopes and fears wrapped up in her future; your younger brother, whom you tease mercilessly, but who breaks your heart when you see him walking home alone from school; your oldest, best, friend who can say anything to you; or someone you break out in a smile to see as you look up from your work. Just imagine your created student is about the most important person in the world. Then ask yourself, "How would I want this person's teacher to teach?"

You will find that problems which overthrew your self-confidence before now seem resolvable. Choices seem more natural and come more easily if you ask yourself, "If I really loved this person, what would I choose?" It's easier to separate the decisions that make a real difference from those that don't. If it needs to be said, I'm not urging us to love our students, not even to imagine we love them, but imagine what we would do IF we loved them. This technique won't help you teach the past perfect progressive, but it may help you decide how important it is to teach it, or what cost of effort on your or your students' part is appropriate. It's commonplace that emotions have cognitive dimensions: If we can imagine our feelings deeply involved in teaching choices, it's easier to make these choices. And even if we make a wrong choice, we still cannot go very far wrong if we teach as if we were teaching someone we loved.