Cardinal directions not "developmentally appropriate"?

Exactly. How can I say to the kids “You can see that the storm system is moving to the East” without the kids wanting to know “What is East”?

The report was a hit piece. It’s not like I didn’t know why they observed 3 of my classes today.

Why odd? The school refers to them as Chinese teachers.

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You really should dye your hair and get some skinny jeans. I guarantee the problems with schools will disappear.

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Kindergarten children are in what Maria Montessori described as the “Absorbent Mind Period”. Basically, there is literally no better time in a human’s life than 3-6 years of age to teach incomprehensibly complex vocabulary. They probably won’t repeat it back to you ever, but they absolutely pick up on the most insanely “advanced” and scientific language if you teach it, pulling it out of nowhere many years down the line. (And lets not forget all the four year olds that can name more dinosaurs than you knew existed or can tell you every make and model of every car ever made. That’s not autism spectrum, that’s children at that age get interested in things and learn them)

So yeah, the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. Taipei is in the north and Tainan is in the south. Teach it to them now and they’ll know it forever.

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Right. I know this from raising my daughter. For this reason - Don’t talk garbage English in my classroom. If you can’t speak English properly in a school with young children don’t speak English at all.

Old dogs, on the other hand, struggle to learn new tricks

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No genuinely elite private school has teachers with broken English. I mean, the Chinese speaking teachers are more than welcome to have shit English if they’re only speaking Chinese, but a good indicator that a school is very much the opposite of elite is that the teachers can’t communicate with near or actual native proficiency in the language they’re teaching.

That’s it. The woman was teaching exclusively in English until I demanded her stop doing so.

I’m not kidding this is known to be an “elite” school. This woman was talking trash in the class and I kept having to stop her and correct her. She would get red in the face. I know it was uncomfortable for her. It was more so uncomfortable to me !!!

It brings me back to a high school girl I tutored on the weekends years ago. I realize now that she went to this same school. Maybe she could read the English but she could not read the English out loud or with proper pronunciation. All of these years I wondered how in the world could such a wealthy family send their daughter to this “elite” school and the young woman be so horrible/ignorant in English"? Why? Because it was all a FRAUD. Just as I have witnessed from the inside, this elite school is a total fraud. Go on - take the money and run.

So I don’t fit in with their clique. Fine. I’ve never fit in but I sure do have the understanding and intolerance you never hoped for.

Thank you so much for your comment.

This week I asked the kids about water - a theme we are just getting into. Where does water come from? How old is the water we drink? Where does water leave our body? How? Why? Why do plants need water? Where does it go?

Our water comes from star formation. Our water came from the formation of a star - a fire ball. Our water is billions of years old

Where does our water go that we drink? Yes, we pee but also every time we breathe out gas (carbon dioxide and water) we lose water (fogs up a glass).

How does a plant “drink” water? Well, it has to lose water to draw water - Stomata releases water and gas (oxygen) so the roots can soak up water .

The hydrologic cycle (water cycle) how water moves around in our environment - explained the cycle to the class. A wet table top dries. Look out window and see fog and clouds everywhere. Look at weather radar. Water everywhere.

Yesterday, I had to wait for the dork across the hall to show his class how a hot water machine works (push this button) so that I could get hot water for my tea.

I agree, and I know from raising my daughter - kids pick up on everything - even things you didn’t even think about.

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If its that bad, you might consider calling them out for it on google reviews. Make sure you use fact-stating only and they can’t sue you for slander (because you are stating facts). “Teachers leave every xx months” (accurate number), “Taiwanese people who do not have native level proficiency in English teach the English class”, that sort of thing. But stay away from “the teachers speak horrible English” and “no one wants to stick around for more than a few weeks” because no matter how anonymously you think you’ve posted, your identify can be found out if they can sue you for slander, even if you both know that’s also true

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All this stuff about water can be followed up by experiments — put a bag on a leaf on a tree and come back a few hours later to see the condensation that formed, actually boil water and watch steam rise, etc.

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Sounds like they’re just nitpicking because they want you gone.

Never mind the fact that “north,” “south,” “east,” “west” and “central” are a part of place names all over the island.

From now on I’m going to tell people my brother-in-law lives in “Tai Up” and my mother-in-law lives in “Tai Down.” When I’m in “Tai Right” next weekend I’ll also be sure to refer to it by its more developmentally appropriate name.

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Had fun this morning. Took smoke breaks and everything.

Showed the kids how the pressure of the water moving creates a vacuum that can move the water from here to there. Using a hose showed how the water can be transfered from the sink to a bucket.

Related this to how plants suck water out of the soil via their roots and move the water throughout the plant. Explained that the water and gas leaving the leaves provides negative pressure which allows the plant roots (straws) to suck water from the ground.

Also enjoyed seeing the babies draw their own compasses over the radar image.

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What’s their brand?

The Killer Brand

Sounds elite!

It was only last weekend I cut my smoking in half by using the nicotine gum. Now I’m back to previous levels.

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Me too, but they’ve only ever been referred to as Chinese teachers by the boss and each other.

For lunch I went to fill up the scooter and then bought a couple of cans of Gold Medal. I’ve been thinking of ways to get fired so when getting caught smoking on campus didn’t work this morning my thoughts were to crack a can open at my desk in the early afternoon. That didn’t work either. I never drink during the day so it wasn’t going to work.

It occured to me though that I had much less to be immediately concerned about. Ride out the next 2 months with much much less responsibility. Smoke breaks. Coffee breaks. Tea time. Reading reading reading reading.

One of today’s classes somehow turned into a music class. Kids grabbed instruments and we put on some tunes and made a scene. The kids were very happy to be jamming. Who could complain? No one did.

Tomorrow is another day.

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