I'm having a hard time with this Swine Flu ish. Perhaps this is because of the mask I have been asked to wear at work. (see stern photo of me and the King above.) Perhaps because the way I was instructed to wear this mask was via a handwritten note placed on my desk that read, "Ajarn Elena, Here is a mask for you to protect yourself from the flu. -Oyporn" Perhaps because of the fact that the other note on my desk at the time read, "I put your books on the chair. Hope u don't mind. (can you see my folder?)" (I then proceeded to have a very meta argument with myself over the wording of "can you see my folder?" "Yes I can.") H1N1 is all everyone is taking about, save the sick baby panda, ("baby pandaaaaaa!" as they say.) my classroom now looks like the surgery ward, and the air conditioners have been cut off for free of "spreading." School was nearly shut down for a week for "flu cleaning." Unclear as to what they figured that would do.
School carries on and so do the same old stories. Today I confronted the cheats and had them all write me letters about why they cheated. What I learned from this experience is that I am not built to be a disciplinarian. (surprise, surprise.) I almost started to cry while I was yelling at them, their puppy eyes and quivering lips. The letters they wrote only made me sadder.
"I don't believe myself. I believe you cannot do it very well. I think like this."
"Dear Lena, I'm sorry to make you upset. I don't want to do that. For the thing that I have done, it's because I think, I'll coppy some sentense to make mo detail. I don't know what I done. I serch for information and coppy down. It's not good I'm really sorry. I'll not do it again. And I don't know that is falt. I don't understand in the sentense that I copy so I coppy all."
"To my teacher, Elena, I'm sorry for that. I copy from the internet because I'm not smart in writing such as grammar, vocabulary. On next time I wouldn't do that again. I will practice my writing. I promise. And I want to tell you, I'm sorry."
"I feel very shame."
Maybe it's the broken English that made me feel so bad or the fact that they all turned in these letters with their heads hung low, but I really feel sorry for them. As I promised I gave them all zeros, hopefully from now on we will steer clear of the online downloads and I won't have to hear the quiet mumblings of, "I'm so sorry Ajarn."
Oyporn? A yiddish mother fed up with her son's online activities?
ReplyDeleteYour first cheating experience! Congratulations!
After about half the class cheated last year in one of my classes, our very experienced teacher had a total breakdown while yelling at us and, while starting to cry again, said she cried so hard driving home she had to pull off on the side of the road. She also informed us that she considered quitting. So you sound like you are handling it pretty well.
And I love the image of you trying to yell at them.
elena, the picture is amazing. i might steal it and put it on my blog to illustrate the swine flu fears. and those letters? they are *heartbreaking.* a little hilarious to me, though, since i didn't have to watch them suffer.
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