After our Eid break, as I started to settle into a routine, I thought I might like to see some schools in Amman from the inside, possibly teaching English. One of the host sisters in the family I live with is a teacher so I spoke to her, and after a crazy week I have acquired a job teaching English conversation at a local school. The entire process was so completely bewildering that I have decided to dispel a few common myths below:
1. It’s hard to get a job teaching English
This could not be further from the truth. It was all I could do to stop them taking me on as a full time teacher, despite not having a single TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) qualification to my name. The school does not even know (or care) what my second name is. When I was taken to see the headmaster, I started asking Samah, who set me up with my job, some logistical questions, and was kicked out of his office because he had more important things to do.
2. It’s no problem to teach English in English
On my first day at the school, Samah took me to her classes and dealt with sorting out my new job between classes. One of the few questions I managed to squeeze in was that I don’t know enough Arabic to teach in Arabic. She assured me that she ALWAYS teaches in English, however this turned out to be a complete lie. Some of my classes are (or at least are doing a very good impression of being) very lost, however there is not a lot I can do. My insistence on English does mean I get a slightly patronising round of applause every time I introduce myself by writing my name in Arabic.
3. Schools are very organised places
On my first day teaching on my own, I was ten minutes into discussing pets with sixth grade when I was interrupted by Teacher Sara, who announced that it was her class and asked what I was doing. She went to check and came back five minutes later to tell me it was okay, opened their book and said please teach ‘a letter to an exchange student’, and left me to it. It took me twenty minutes to explain the concept of an exchange student because they hadn’t actually covered it in class yet and I didn’t know the Arabic translation.
4. Teachers clean their own whiteboards
This is a strange one. Samah sat in on one of my classes and when I grabbed the rubber to clean the board, she stopped me and said that the students have to clean the board for me.
5. English conversation is all about speaking English
Samah and I have quite an extreme difference of opinion on this point. She keeps sweeping into my classes to announce that these sessions are all about acquiring a British accent. I don’t have the heart to tell her that I don’t have the faintest idea how to coach British pronunciation, and also that her twelve year old students can barely hear the difference, let alone care what their accent is like.
6. Unqualified TEFL teachers can only get volunteer jobs
Bizarrely, the school claims to be more than happy to pay me for my work. I’m teaching six hours a week however I don’t have a contract and they haven’t told me what my salary could be yet. I’m going to start demanding answers on Monday...
7. There is a syllabus
Every class has a textbook, however I am not teaching from it. I am teaching from 5th up to 10th grade (that’s ages 11 to 17) so the level goes from talking about families all the way to discussing the dangers of the internet. Some teachers are just leaving me to it while others tell me a topic when I arrive which gives me about 30 seconds to plan a lesson. Sometimes Samah waltzes in and starts lecturing in Arabic, which is very irritating and confusing for the students. I asked myself what a qualified teacher would do and have now bought a notebook to try to keep track of what is going on in each class, plan ahead and pretend that I am completely on top of things.
8. Speaking activities are a part of normal English lessons
I must have sat through hundreds of hours of language lessons by this point and done far too many lame speaking exercises where you ask your partner a question. This approach struck me as anything other than revolutionary however my students are completely overwhelmed. They keep asking each other in Arabic, completely missing the point that I couldn’t care less how many brothers and sisters they actually have. On my first day the receptionist smiled at me and said ‘I want everyone to speak English’, yet it is obvious that they have never been taught like this in their life. It’s a tall order for an unqualified student.
One thing that is definitely true is that, no matter where you in the world you are teaching, learning names is hard. I always thought I was pretty good at this, however I have nearly 200 students and Arabic names are all actual words, so if you say it wrong it’s both utterly hilarious and borderline offensive at the same time. Overall, it seems that getting the job is ridiculously easy, it's the teaching itself that comes with all the challenges typical of any teaching job. My experience has come with the added challenge of attempting to understand the organisation of the education system which has been nearly impossible.
