Teaching For Everyone

My only real training with teaching was teaching English as a Foreign Language in Sofia, Bulgaria this past summer, so I do not feel the most qualified to offer teaching advice or suggestions just based off my inexperience with it. However, this past summer I did learn a lot about what it meant to connect with students who were the most different from me.

There is a lot of social and racial tension in our society today, and I think those tensions definitely transcend to the classroom. Whether or not a teacher finds himself personally racist, we will still have to fight the underlying tensions that fight against classroom unity.

For me this past summer, I was the odd-ball in the classroom. Here I was, a 20-year-old American girl, fresh off a plane hoping to be able to figure out English enough to teach it to a bunch of Bulgarians way older and way smarter than me (just smarter in a different language).

Removed from the norms of my own culture, I had to become a student of my students. Instead of simply being able to rattle off facts about English, throw in puns and funny comments to keep them engaged, or rely on my own instincts, I had to learn how they would best respond; the way I found they best responded was when I took a genuine interest in what they liked.

Teachers these days are confronted with all sorts of people who are different from them. For a lot of those kids that seem to be the farthest out, I think one of the only ways we will be able to impact them is to show a genuine interest in what it is they care about.

This past summer, I had to take a genuine interest in the Bulgarian language, in anime, in music, and in culinary endeavors. While those things aren't exactly what ignite passion inside of me, my interest in them ignited passion inside my students, and it gave me a voice to be listened to and respected in the classroom.