On Wednesday (or as I personally like to refer to it as, my version of Monday this week) I was reminded by some students of an important milestone in my teacher career. However, when I say "reminded," I don't mean to imply that this was some casual walk down memory lane; instead, picture 12 laughing 11th grade students surrounding me and bumper-car pushing me down a muddy path. That'll be a bit closer to the truth.
This tale is quite dear to this particular class' memories because it delves back to my first year as a teacher. 4 years ago I was new to China, overwhelmed, and lacking experience dealing with herds of students; they were prepubescent, energized, and often uncontrollable in the classroom. This made for a winning combination, and I often dreaded showing up to class. I felt nervous and unprepared, but I decided that I could overcome this nausea by becoming "super teacher." I decided that to best suppress my inexperience and naivety I would build a teaching legacy of creativity, hands-on activities, and become a teaching idol for young educators everywhere.
Because everyone knows that the best way to achieve success is through inexperience and ambition...
Our story truly begins one fateful day, in the midst of a fantastically thought-out lesson. I was reading books in both my eighth grade classes and in my tenth grade class that featured a pig. Trying to make learning "fun" and hands-on, I debated about what kind of lesson I could use that would create a memorable, yet educational, experience for my students. Bringing a pig to school seemed like the obvious solution.
In my mind I pictured a cute, well-mannered, rosy skinned little piglet that I could carry around with me during the day as I travelled from class-to-class, spreading swinish-joy. The students would watch a short video and then play with the pig until the end of class. Looking back, it doesn't sound like the worst idea, however, experience can be a cruel teacher.
Through a fellow teacher, and some connections through our cafeteria (don't think about the implications of this relationship), that Friday morning our school's driver set out to pick up a piglet from a local pork farm. I waited expectantly all morning, darting back and forth to the office window, for the arrival of the main event until around 10am when they arrived. They? Yes...they.
Before taking them to any of my classes, I attempted to bathe the two squirming masses in the teacher's dorm. That's how badly they smelled. The bath vaguely improved their scent, but there wasn't much else I could do with limited time and nervous pigs. However, I tried to not let these obstacles phase me. I mean, it was still going to be a surprise for my students and for my grade 10 students it was nearly show time.
Grade 10
Before the students returned form their morning exercise, I was able to sneak the box into the classroom so that it sat under the desk residing at the front of the room. The pigs were fairly quiet at this point and I smiled inwardly as my unware students filled back into their seats, oblivious to the fun that was about to be had.
The plan was my students would play a short game focused on pig trivia, during which time I would stealthily remove said pigs from the box. By the end of the game, I expected both pigs to appear from under the desk and pleasantly surprise my students. This is not exactly what happened.
Students played the game. I removed pigs from box, quite stealthily. When game concluded, there were 2 sniffling pigs under my desk and students were curious but not yet wowed. I began to nudge the pigs out from under the desk with my shoe, and a couple of things happened simultaneously:
1. The students did see the pigs and were excited.
2. The pigs saw the students and were terrified.
3. 1, if not both pigs, began to urinate all over the floor.
From an objective, uninformed bystander's point of view, I had just brought 2 confused pigs into a classroom of students to pee on the floor. Awesome. (On a related note, in between classes I moved the pigs into our office's conference room, where they again peed on the floor.)
Grade 8
I taught two middle school English classes, 8A and 8B. The idea was the lower-level English students were regulated to one class and the higher students were instructed in another. I have mixed feelings about this approach to language learning, but let's get back to pigs.
On this particular Friday I taught 8B students before lunch and 8A at the end of the school day, several hours later. I quickly realized that teaching with these pigs came with a steep learning curve. I knew I couldn't let the pigs roam around the room unless I wanted to repeat the "floor baptism" that occurred several times earlier that day. So, my next plan was pretty simple: bring a pig to the students. During class, I decided to choose the least fussy pig from the box and carry it around the desks for the students to pet. No students would be running around so the pig should be less terrified and I would be in control of the situation more than I was earlier.
Of course, this seems like a simple plan, however I was surprised by 2 things. Did I say 2 things? No, I mean number 2. As soon as I had one pig cradled in my arms, I had barely taken 10 steps down the center aisle when this seemingly tranquil pig had a spasm of diarrhea, shooting a trail of putrid brown sludge down my dress onto the floor. Again, at this time, multiple things occurred at once:
1. The pungent smell of poop strongly erupted into the room
2. Students in the nearby rows immediately begin gagging at the stench
3. Noise, such noise as students giggled and screamed in response to this outburst
4. A couple students flew into action, opening the windows and running for the mop
5. I experienced an overwhelming wave of embarrassment and the rapidly growing urge to die
As a new teacher staring into the eyes of 20 middle school students, whom I already questioned regarding their ability and desire to respect me in class, I felt that my status and reputation was not improving with the blush blooming upon my cheeks and the thick line of pig refuse prominently displayed on my clothes. In this moment, I inwardly repeated the mantra that quickly was becoming the theme of my first year teaching: "They don't know you're scared. You're the teacher...fake it till you make it."
I quickly returned the pig to the box and forced myself to laugh while I frantically used tissue to daub at my dress. Unexpected things happen, but I wanted the students to see that I had a good sense of humor about getting pooped on...at least, on the outside. The room was cleaned, aired out, and I eventually regained control of my class. Lesson learned: you can bring a pig to children but you can't keep it from crapping on your dress.
Fortunately for me, while disappointing to my 8A students, my last class of the day with my special guests was much less eventful. At this point, word had spread across grade 8 and they all knew of my pig debacle in 8B. They knew pigs were coming, and many of them were hoping to see some poo.
After two bumpy attempts, by the end of the day I had finally arrived at the best solution to my pig-student interaction debacle: don't bring the pigs to the students, let the students come to the pigs. I kept the two pigs inside their box and set it on top of the teacher's desk. Then, I allowed students to approach the box and reach inside to touch the pigs. It was so simple! I couldn't believe how my over ambitiousness and dramatic ideas had overcomplicated the situation.
At the end of the day, I was quite happy to load the pigs into their awaiting chariot (aka, the school's van) and see them drive off, leaving the school and my stress-filled day behind them. Overall, I don't regret the ambition of this plan. Considering all things, the students did have fun, and four years later they recall this story as a cherished memory (possibly because this has never
happened to any of their teacher's before, despite their personal hopes and dreams that a pig would defecate on them).
Since then, I haven't attempted to bring any more domestic creatures into my classes. I'm not that brave or prepared at the moment, but I do think that for an entirely unexperienced green teacher, it wasn't the worst lesson with which to start off my career. I might never be a teaching idol to others, but I can attest that I continue to learn from my mistakes, and working in a school ensures that you never have a dull moment (curtesy of my unpredictable students and my own unpredictable, overzealous ideas).
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