The good:
The standard of English at S.G.O. has always been very high, but I have to say that Kuba Kopriva took the theme of 'Family & home' to new levels! He was the last student in the first week, and was well worth the wait. His grasp of English is excellent, and to think that he is still only 19...wow! Just how far will he go? I have worked with a lot of excellent students in my 7 years, but Kuba's performance was one of the very best...if not THE best! Indeed, he is the winner of the 'Chuck Norris English Award for 2013'!
The bad:
This is where I stop mentioning the students by name...for obvious reasons ;-) However, we had one failure in English this year, which is always a disappointment. The student chose 'Great Britain & Northern Ireland'. I knew it might be tricky when I began by asking if they'd ever been to the UK - they said 'no', and to my question of 'And where would you like to go in the UK?' they answered 'New York.'
They began by talking about Stratford Upon Avon - and did a 'parrot speech' of William Shakespeare'...something Mrs T would have been proud of...only thing was, the theme wasn't 'English & American Literature'. We brought them back on track. The capital of England is...? They didn't know! :-O On being shown some pictures of famous English people, the student told us that the Queen is Queen Victoria II !! They didn't recognise the Beatles.
One teacher asked about ways of getting to England from Europe. 'Air' was the simple answer. Then we got 'Ship.' They were asked if there was another way... Confusion played across their face, as if it was a trick question...the teacher moved a pen on the map between France & England... 'Is there something under the sea?' You could see the look of horror...('under the sea? There is something under the sea?!') Tunnel was not in their vocabulary... :-(
We were also told that in Loch Ness there is 'a big animal'...
In a last desperate attempt to save the student (for no teacher wants a student to fail, really!), we tried to prompt for more information about places...we came back to Stratford...and William Shakespeare...and not even he could save them. That was bad. That was a fail.
The Ugly:
This one didn't concern English...it was Civics. According to Mr Jelinek (who has been at SGO for around 25 years) it has never happened before (to his or anyone else's knowledge). But this student was caught red-handed with a cheat-slip while preparing for their Civics exam - which was sitting on the desk, in broad daylight - with no apparent attempt to hide it! A sad day. An ugly side to education. Ultimately, cheating proves nothing - only that you know nothing except how to cheat...
I sincerely hope that it will be the last time...
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