I love my job..

A couple of weeks ago, I was asked to take on a new class at a local children’s centre attached to a school. It was billed as a “Communication Skills” class, and I was told that there would be seven or eight students with a similar level of English.

I’m about to embark on week three. Week one wasn’t too bad. One lady was clearly more advanced than the others: I did a class on parts of the body and visiting the doctor, and at the end I found out that back in her own country (Japan) she’s a nurse.. Oops! The three Polish students can speak a little but write next to nothing. This was demonstrated when, on filling in their registration forms, all three ticked their ethnic origin as being “White Irish”. The Romanian lady understands some things, but can’t write either, so I had to fill in her form. I spent a good five minutes trying to extract her date of birth from her, including miming rocking a baby and singing “Happy Birthday to you” whilst she shuffled through her purse, bringing out her National Insurance card (no birthdate) and a handful of supermarket receipts (ditto). We got there in the end, but I was beginning to see the magnitude of the task ahead.

Week two was a surprise. Half the students seemed to have decided to bring a friend, so my seven had grown to eleven, of whom three spoke not a word of English. Now things got difficult. If I gave the more advanced ones something to do, the non-English-speakers sat silently looking lost, and if I spent time with the beginners, the more advanced group had finished their work and were discussing other things.  The Polish and Bangladeshi contingents help each other, so that works. The Romanian lady brought her friend, so they can at least sit together for moral support. The Hungarian lady went rigid with fear every time I looked her way. The Venezuelan lady, who came with her husband (he speaks English so he went home), sat looking petrified and then gave me a bear hug at the end and said “Thank you”..although I’m not quite sure what I did!

They can all introduce themselves, so that was a start. By dint of struggle, I’ve learned that between them they have 26 children, all or most of whom were born in the UK, and many of whom must therefore speak English, but that hasn’t helped their parents.  They’re all really lovely people and anxious to learn, so the onus is on me to deliver, but this one’s a real challenge.

It’s only two hours, but if anyone’s driving around the Surrey/Berkshire borders tomorrow at about lunchtime and sees a woman in a little car, gripping the steering wheel with a glazed expression and with her hair sticking out all over the place, don’t worry. It will mean I’ve survived another week.