First and foremost, thank you to everyone who prayed for me
when I asked for support! I truly felt at peace during my week in Bangkok. With
only a few days notice before flying down to teach about 150 Thai teachers,
everything went smoothly. God is so good.
Many people want to know how this happened and since
everything happened so quickly and I was very busy all week preparing and
teaching, I didn’t have much time to go into detail so here we go!
About a week and a half ago, I was asked by the Coordinator
of The Bureau of Personal Competency Development to be a speaker for the
English Language Proficiency Development for Teachers of Office of the
Vocational Education Commission (OVEC) seminar that was held last week in Bangkok. I assume that
the original speaker backed out and they were desperate for someone to fill in (insert
me). One of the Thai board of directors for Remember Nhu has connections with
the Thai government and knew about the government’s need and that we had an
English teacher on staff in Chiang Mai, so she contacted my boss. My boss asked
me if I would be interested, that it would help our organization in the eyes of
the government because not only are we concerned for the wellbeing of our
children but also the country itself. So I said yes. The next few days were
full of researching, PowerPoint creating, activity gathering chaos. Hence why I
needed prayers. I could feel stress and anxiety trying to break through the
surface of my ability to work under pressure and knew once I let those emotions
overwhelm me, I wouldn’t be able to function properly to complete my work by
the deadline, Sunday morning. So thank you to everyone who prayed because I
never once felt overwhelmed! I was able to speak to the coordinator and ask
what was expected of me, what I should teach, how long a session lasts, how
many students I would be teaching, where I’d teach and when I should be in
Bangkok. That’s where I found out I would be teaching 150 students in four
group sessions Monday-Thursday with Friday being the closing ceremony. The
teachers I would be educating scored low on the Common
European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) exam and were receiving
additional support to improve English speaking and teaching skills in the
classroom.
It wasn’t that I was stressed out about the information of
what I was teaching, it was more that I wasn’t sure how to put it together,
what activities to provide, and how I could present the information resulting
in teachers being engaged with the language and cultural barrier between us. As
I planned my seminar, I tried to incorporate as many Thai cultural examples
along with American cultural examples as well, the birthing of a Pokémon themed
presentation, which worked out impressively well because my students found my
teaching sessions amusing and entertaining. Having taught English for 2 years
now in Thailand and being an educator for 5, I’ve gained some experience and resources
I was excited to share with my fellow educators.
The week went by so quickly! Each session I taught was full
of jokes and games. I never had to take a photo because all my students were
snapping candid and action shots of me, some of which I hope never surface the
internet.
At the end of the week long seminar the closing ceremony was
held, where each of the four groups had to reenact one teacher. One group (my
favorite one…I hope the other three groups don’t read this blog!) did a Pikachu
dance in honor of my Pokémon themed presentation. It was thoughtful and
completely awesome. Since then I have made over 50 new friends on Facebook and
am excited hear about my new teacher friends classroom endeavors.
This is definitely an
experience that I will look back on very fondly.
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