celebrate good times!

On Monday, my contact teacher at Tivoli pulled me aside during our 20 minute break in the staff room. She said to me that she received an email from Karin (my roommate and partner in Tivoli induced pain) regarding a bad class she had. My teacher asked me if I had any classes that were that bad. I did not feel like really going into detail about it with her at that moment, so I just said "I have some bad classes, but it's ok." And she looked at me, and said "No, it's not okay. Sit here and tell me about it" So I sat down, and suddenly I felt the death stare of the teacher of my two awful classes. She was clearly listening to our conversation, plus we were speaking in French, so it was that much easier for her to eavesdrop. Then my contact teacher told me there were certain teachers who did not properly use me and Karin, and was kind of hinting that she wanted me to tell her the names of such teachers. My worst teacher was still watching/listening, so I didn't say much. But I was saved by the bell. As I was leaving the staff room, my contact teacher asked me if I would email her some more specifics. I said ok. I kind of grumbled at the thought of that "homework" because I didn't think anything would really change. But I did it anyway. And forget that French nonsense, I wrote it in English because it is easier to say exactly what happened and I didn't feel like having gmail open in one window and wordreference.com open in another.
Our email exchange:
Hi Florence.
How are you?
In answer to your question about the classes I work with, the 3°7 and the 3°3 are completely and utterly terrible. I'm sorry, I was trying to think of a nicer and more eloquent way to say that, but there are no other words. They do not do any work whatsoever during class. I have tried doing just speaking activities with them, but those have all been complete disasters. I have tried giving them worksheets, which are not really fun for anyone, and those don't work well either. I've tried giving them cartoons to look at and describe, and they just color the pictures in and do nothing related to English. I tell them that their work will be graded, but they don't care. Nadine has told them they will be tested on the work they do with me during class, but since we never get anything accomplished during class, there is never anything they can be tested on. There are many days when we get absolutely nothing done.
As far as what they do in class instead of working, they throw things-anything and everything that isn't fastened down (pencils, pens, papers, notebooks, my dictionary, a chair, pencil bags, etc). They get up and walk around, talk to the other students in the classroom, and ignore me when I say sit down and don't get up without permission. A lot of time is spent moving students to different corners of the room when they can't behave sitting with their classmates (but that doesn't work too well since there are only 4 corners in the classroom and there are usually at least 10 students that need to be moved). Sometimes I make them write lines "This is English class, not art class" "I will behave during English class" etc. I have to start each class by hiding all the chalk, and making the students put the carnets on their desks. I told Nadine after the first or second week that the classes were awful, and she said they were like that with the other teachers as well. I thought "well, at least it's not just me." Things continued getting worse, and shortly after the Toussaint holiday, I asked Nadine if I could start giving them detentions. She said no, that generally a detention was only used after writing in the carnets 3-4 times. So I write in the carnets, but it does no good. The students are more interested in learning my last name and seeing whether I wrote in French or English. A lot of days I do not even write in the carnets, because I would literally spend the entire class period writing in every single student's carnet.

For example on Monday, during the 3°7 class, Baptiste and Edouard (two of the absolute WORST ones, week after week) both ran out of class, saying they were going to be sick. I knew it wasn't true, but I could not go after them because I could not leave the rest of the class alone. Of course they came back right as the bell was ringing. Nicolas was the first one to receive a new seat on Monday, and then spent the rest of class period yelling at me, saying I was being unfair, singling him out because everyone was misbehaving, and so on. At one point, when I was trying to talk to Nicolas, Remy and Alexandre started pushing each other, or hitting each other with pencil bags, or something along those lines. That is pretty typical behavior for that class. The "good" students are the ones who don't hit anyone or throw anything, but rather sit and talk to their neighbors (in French, about things having nothing to do with English or the work they are meant to be doing).

Compared to the two 3°s that I work with, the rest of my classes are fine. They have their bad days, but that is normal and expected.
Sorry this is probably longer than you wanted, but if I left out any details you wanted, let me know.

I hope you are having a great week and I will talk to you soon.
Laura

hi Laura,

Thanks for your long email, I'm so shocked it went so far !!....I'm also very sorry about Nadine's behaviour because she obviously can't handle it herself and she didn't give you the right tips!!....

I had already told Mari-DO Lahitte and Patrick Nedelec( Head of college) about that unaccepatable and scandalous behaviour so they went to that clas to tell them off, which is not enough to me!! so I've told their head teacher this morning and trust me, these little fucking terrors will be severely punished !!( excuse my French!! I'm so sorry for you!!!it must have been a nighmare...)

Don't go to those classes from Monday, I will tell them why ! and you won't have them anymore, don't worry !!

rest and take time for you to relax, we'll talk about other classes but just after the holiday.

I'll try to see you tomorrow at school.

take care, Florence.