I Say A Little Prayer

Something awful has been happening at our school: we've had aspiring EFL teachers come to observe our classes.

Up until recently, I've been spared this horror, and thank God: the kids I teach are so boisterous, so obstreperous and rebellious and disrespectful and every other bad adjective I can think of, I don't want any observers anywhere within a mile of me to witness my shame and bamboozlement.

The observers I've seen scare me silly: they are all so breathtakingly young and keen looking. And they've got that gleam in their eye. In fact, they look so much like I did back in my student teaching days that I just know they'll judge me as harshly as I judge myself. And frankly, I'd deserve it.

Because I remember being an observer with perfect clarity, and I blush. Armed with my youthful naiveness and the sheer conviction that I knew what was what, I observed seasoned veterans with a critical eye. Were they eager enough or -- God forbid -- possibly jaded after years of teaching? Did they segue from activity to activity with a seamless fluidity or fumble about with their notebooks and hastily-scribbled lesson plans? Did they seem fully committed to spreading the gospel of communication or more interested in getting through the next hour and having that break-time donut? Decades later, I shiver to recall my smug, self-assured pomposity.

A few weeks back, one of my younger Turkish colleagues got observed, but that was okay because I knew that she could take it. She's tough and confident and has an air of quiet, calm authority about her that I utterly lack. Then one of my British colleagues got observed with absolutely no notice, and just hearing her story horrified me: not only had she gotten stuck with a duff CD player, but she'd picked up the wrong CD by mistake. "How often does that happen?" she lamented, but I said nothing: I'm scatterbrained and this is something I manage to do on a regular basis.

On Wednesday it happened. I was running late, stressed out from too much coffee and not enough lunch, loaded down with books, notebooks and CD player, on my way upstairs to teach my Turkish delights. Just before I got to the door, a young Turkish man in the hallway stepped up and introduced himself in credible English as someone who wanted to sit in on my class "to see how a native speaker teaches." I felt the blood drain from my face. I wanted to shriek and tear my hair, but instead I nodded. "Come on in," I said graciously, a thousand excuses springing to mind -- I'm tired, I'm not feeling well, I overslept, They're a little excited because it's almost New Years. I resorted to just one: I'm afraid they're a rather rowdy bunch.

As it was, he didn't hear this: it was too noisy.

I took roll and began teaching, praying that just once my wild, giddy group would mind me and pay attention. Sadly, this was not to be. Neylan, one of my younger students, sidled up to me immediately. "Who is man?" she hissed, shooting her eyes towards the stranger. I told her to sit back down.

Baris, a bright boy who has trouble sitting still, paying attention, and keeping his legs out of the aisle, interrupted me twice during my lead-in, wanting to know if I'd had a good Christmas. I told him I had and hurried past him to break up a huddle of three boys engaged in a noisy Turkish tete-a-tete. Finally, after slamming my book down on the table and waving the class roll sheet in a threatening manner, there was a brief lull. "Turn to page 128 and show me you've done your homework!" I bellowed. Two minutes, one interrupted private conversation, two intercepted paper airplanes and three confiscated mobile phones later, we were all on 128. At least here I was winning: an unprecedented half of the class had actually completed their exercises! I hoped to God my observer was making note of this; I was pretty proud.

The class seemed to last forever, but two hours later, my suffering was almost at an end. And I had a treat to finish up with -- a song. My class loves songs, and this one happened to be one I knew and loved: Aretha Franklin's version of I Say a Little Prayer. Most of the time, just the mention of a song is enough to make everyone hush up, but with New Years looming, the class was in a fever-pitch of excitement. Even my fist on the desk and menacing movements towards the roll sheet could not entirely shut them up. I put the CD into the player, plugged it in, and banged on the desk with both fists, and finally I had their attention.

"THE VOLUME ON THIS CD PLAYER IS BROKEN!" I roared. "SO YOU'LL HAVE TO BE VERY QUIET IN ORDER TO HEAR THE SONG!" The class nodded, I distributed the activity sheets, and I flicked the on button. Aretha began belting out her song and her magic took hold of the room for a good fifteen seconds.

"Tee-cha, what language speak?"

My eyes popped. "English!"

"She is French?" asked Neylan.

No way was I going to let the French take credit for Aretha. "No, American!"

"Tee-cha, we cannot hear!"

"THAT'S BECAUSE THE VOLUME ON THE CD PLAYER IS BROKEN! PLEASE BE QUIET AND YOU'LL BE ABLE TO HEAR BETTER!"

But they just couldn't do this.

I turned off the CD player and took a deep breath. "Okay everybody, I'm only going to do this once, so listen carefully." And I sang the rest of I Say a Little Prayer myself.

Aretha may do it better, but I got the laughs. My students even caught one phrase all by themselves with absolutely no prompting -- break time.

As I was erasing the board, my observer came up to me. "They are very noisy," he commented.

I nodded.

"May I make a suggestion?" he murmured.

"Yes." Karma is karma: I knew it was coming.

"The volume on that CD player is broken," he said with no hint of irony. "None of us could hear it."