On The Road to Stability

Earlier this week, I had an interview for a teaching job at a private Catholic school in Montreal's plateau area. The interview went well, with the principal and vice-principal impressed by my French and asking, as usual, for clarification as to how a girl from Calgary came to be so comfortable in French. The head of the English department was impressed by my insights into the education system of Korea, and by my experience as an actor. They promised to call me back by Friday to let me know if I had the job. Thursday I received a call saying they were concerned that with only one year of teaching experience, I may be a little lost when it came to classroom management. Of course, I didn't tell them this, but I was concerned too. My biggest class in Korea was ten kids- at this school, my class size would increase to 28. They asked me to come in the following day and teach a class, to demonstrate my level of comfort and ability to manage the students. Fear kicked in. I was fairly certain that they would sense my inexperience and eat me alive. I awoke painfully early Friday morning (6am) and began the long trip to DeLormier and Sherbrooke East. As a testament to the time of day, my dépanneur was closed and I was forced to go without coffee until I arrived at the school. Then they tossed me in with a class of grade three students to see how I fared. And I learned something. Teaching English in Korea is a thousand times harder than teaching English in Montreal. As the kids grumbled and grunted their confusion about why a young blond woman was demanding their attention and their usual English teacher was nowhere to be seen, I understood every word effortlessly. I could give them the English word when they asked how to say, for instance, guimauve (marshmallow) in English. The biggest difference, however, was the fact that I wasn't expected to play the role of an overly enthusiastic mime. With thirty kids in a class, they aren't accustomed to individual attention the way Korean kids are in classes of ten. They had all their books on their desk when I walked in. Canadian boys aren't used to their mothers dotting on them, so they don't expect it of their teachers. They're accustomed to hearing English spoken around them, so they already have the ear for it. My fear subsided right away and I breezed through the class and was offered the job. Unofficially. I'm still waiting on the final verdict from the principal, but the woman in charge of the department assured me I would be hired. The only catch is that the position in temporary. A replacement for a teacher who's going on leave for an operation, but apparently a date for the surgery won't be confirmed until 48 hours beforehand. So sometime in the next four weeks, I will be working. Needless to say, I'm still looking. It's comforting to know what I'm getting into, however. At first I felt like I was taking advantage of a staffing shortage to gain employment in a position that I was in no way qualified for. Now I can see how much I learned in my year in Korea, and how it definitely prepared me for teaching in Montreal. Once I start working, I'll deal with the question of how exactly this teaching thing can fit into my acting world... or a busy University schedule. Step by step, as crazy Mr Choi would say.