What is this "work" you speak of?

So, walking home Friday afternoon after a long and fruitful day, it occurred to me that I've never written in any detail about my actual "teaching" "responsibilities"/"job". In other words, how I really earn my keep. And since you, my faithful readers*, are basically my employers (hey thanks, taxpayers!!!) I figure I owe you some explanation. Interested? Read on. Disgusted by the very notion of "work"? I feel you, but read on anyway. My work is kind of fun.

Despite my judicious use of quotation marks above, I do actually have a job. I am an English Teaching Assistant, known henceforth as an ETA. This means that although I am not a qualified professor, and in fact have virtually no teaching experience, my status as a Native Speaker qualifies me to teach a couple of classes in the English department of the University of Kragujevac. I do so in cooperation with/under the watchful eye of some actual, certified English professors. But for the most part I plan my own lessons, sticking to a pre-arranged syllabus.

Action shot, courtesy of Nicky Bell

I teach two groups of students: about 75 second-year students and 60 third year students, split up into several sections. With the second-year students, I focus on reading comprehension, vocabulary, and summarizing short texts. I begin each class with a short warm-up activity, designed to wake up my sleepy students at 9:30 a.m. on a Monday and get them started speaking English. This is also my primary outlet to get all the wacky speaking games and activities out of my system.

Then I separate the students into groups, often using the counting-off method, which I LOVE and my students HATE (Having all the power is pretty nice.) I get the impression this is not something their professors usually make them do, but I like it because a) it forces them to interact with people out of their group of close friends, which I find makes them more productive and more likely to speak English and focus on the task at hand and b) it forces them to physically get up and move, which, left to their own devices, they refuse to do. What can I say, I like to shake things up, and I like to have a high-energy class on a Monday morning (teachers get sleepy too!)

We usually devote about half the class to checking the answers to their homework, which they first do in their groups and then as a class. This always takes longer than I expect, but it's useful for them to have to justify their answers and get some practice for their exams. In the second half of the class, we do some kind of group activity, which varies from week to week. I try to strike a balance between covering all the material and preparing them adequately for the final, and making sure class isn't dullsville- which isn't productive for anyone. No one learns anything if they're just taking a nap.

And with that, each 45-minute class period flies by. I have been trying to incorporate some written responses at the end of class, as in "take five minutes and respond to this prompt." This, too, seems to be an activity they are not familiar with, but I find it valuable to have a chance to respond individually to students since we don't always have time in class. Trying to teach and instill these kinds of behaviors that seem second-nature to an American student is one of the trickiest parts of my job, but I think (hope) the benefits outweigh the difficulties.

I devote my free time to other scholarly pursuits, like grapefruit beer taste tests. (Yes, it tastes as weird as it sounds.) Actually, I just wanted to add more pictures to trick you into thinking this post isn't too long at all.

My third-year class is a lot more varied from week-to-week. It's technically accompanying a class on argumentation and debate (they'll be doing debates next semester) and, although I consider myself to be relatively proficient at writing and analyzing arguments (thanks, liberal arts education!), I certainly don't quite know how to teach it. Of course, their full professor is actually in charge of teaching it and I just have to help them practice. And occasionally, I get to design my own class on a "American culture" topic of my choice, which is awesome. For instance, when the great Nicky Bell came to visit me from Amsterdam, he helped me present a lecture on the American higher education system, which led to a great discussion on the similarities and differences between U.S. and Serbian higher ed.

Higher ed discussion with 3rd year students + Nicky

And on top of my grueling 6 hour a week workload, I've recently implemented some awesome new programs at the local American Corner. Namely, this week I started Ted Talks Tuesdays, with the inspiring talk "The Danger of a Single Story" by Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Adichie. And yesterday, I screened the amazingly awesome documentary Miss Representation. Although only three students came to the screening, it was crazy rewarding- we had a very thoughtful conversation afterwards, and clearly the documentary impacted them in a similar way that it did me. I highly recommend it. It was my second time watching it, but today, for some reason, I was moved almost to tears several times. Tears of empathy, frustration, and also appreciation- appreciation both for the inspiring words of the people in the film and the thoughtful reactions of my students. I can't recommend it highly enough- it's available on DVD through Netflix, and also on youtube here.

After the documentary discussion, I had coffee with a lovely gentlemen who's in the process of applying for a Fulbright research grant to the U.S.. He has an interview next week and wanted to practice conversation beforehand. See? I'm keeping busy, interacting with the community, forging ties of friendship and cooperation or something like that. You're welcome, boss.

And last, but not least, I started private Serbian lessons this week. I'll have two hours of proper instruction weekly with a super nice teacher. Although my Serbian has improved by leaps and bounds, and I can often (dare I say usually?) understand at least the gist of what people say to me, my lack of grammar instruction and difficulty with sentence-formation makes me uncomfortable and decidedly un-fluent when I try to speak. So it's high time I get my butt into gear!

Thanks for sticking to the end, folks (unless you skipped ahead, which I do all the time with too-long blog posts.) Hopefully you have a better idea of what I'm actually doing with my time, and maybe some aspiring Fulbrighter might one day stumble upon this post and find it useful. Have a great weekend!



*Excepting my non-U.S. readers, to whom I say: I owe you nothing!!!