Puberty Chronicles III

Here is the third and final installment of The Puberty Chronicles. After teaching 880 Chinese eighth and ninth graders for a year I can't count the laughs or measure the awkwardness. I love this job and love these kids.

FEBRUARY

Miss Balge forgets to take her pants strap from her bike off her ankle and teaches half of first hour with her pants cinched like Aladdin.

Class 8 Sasha whips out some binoculars to see the board during class.(Chinese kids have the worst vision on earth. I'm thinking it's writing so many intricate characters for too long since they were kids. Our kids are always squinting to look at the board or stealing someone else's glasses or putting someone else's glasses on top of their own; or just getting binoculars.)

Jr. 3 Class 5 Eric beats his chest with pride after correctly figuring out what “drug induced” from “It’s A Great Day to Be Alive” meant. There was a lot of pantomiming pills, injections, and sniffing happening……

We are listed as Mr. and Mrs. Micah in someone’s notebook.

The students invent a new celebrity: Christina Perry.

Buford struggles for 5 minutes to guess his person in “guess who?”. He cries out “Oh my lady gaga!” in exasperation. His person was Lady GaGa.

We both name two different students Lavar simultaneously. It sticks and fits for one boy, the other changes his name to Batman for one week then morphs into Ali.

MARCH

Heidi in Jr. 3 Class 4 weeps in ecstasy after being assigned Avril Lavigne for her Haiku.

Linda from Class 6 is overjoyed one day because her mom is going to let her keep her cat. Turns out her mom thought it was too much of a distraction from THE TEST so she was planning on letting it go in a park.

“Today is good day to die.”- Ted’s chilling section of the knife Haiku.

“Baby, baby, oh! Oh! Baby! Baby! Oh! Oh! Baby! Baby! Oh!” – Huang’s Haiku about Justin Bieber.

Braver clasps Miss Balge’s hand with both of his to say good-morning and transmits wisdom and knowledge far beyond his years.

The time Braver used the new sign language for “I love you” to us through the cafeteria window. We didn’t know if he was French-pressing coffee or milking a cow or frying noodles in a wok.

“WHY IS HE ON MY PPT!?” –Miss Balge asks a lifeless class 4 about Jeremy Linn during Linsanity week.

Mr. Micah smashes his femur into the podium twice within the span of 2 minutes.

Here are some highlights from letters our 8th graders wrote to 3rd graders in Salt Lake City.

“I am creativity, AM NOT I?!?!?!?!?!?!?!”(Saking) 

"Classmates think I am as lovely as a rice dumpling." (Tina)

"Sometimes they really like a tiger." (Cash)

"I am not good at social intercourse. I don't have many friends. Sometimes I think I'm a 

bird which was catch in cage. I want to chill out. Please give me a hand." (Annie) 

"Mr. Muchel is my Oral English Teacher." (Marcus)

"One of my friends says I laugh as a crazy gorilla gorilla. Ha! Ha!" (Cathy)

"Do you love Katie Perry? She is my cup of tea." (Lulu)

"Holy cow! what a lovely meercat!" (Kate)

"One day I was walking and saw a cat flying in the sky, suddenly it fell in the tree. Just kidding!" (Linda)

I love everything that make me feel happy as a bubbly." (Martha)

"I like Dwight Howard. He is as strong as a cow." (Dwight)

"Let me tell you some of my hobbies. I really like thinking." (Emily)

"I like to eat all kinds of biscuits." (Charlie)

"I think time flies like arrow, just because everyday for me is substantia." (Sally)

"Maybe now China is a small bird, but it will be an eagle soon." (Mark)

"I left my photo at home because is as ugly as a pig. So I draw one." (Jimmy)

"Do you know Linsanity? Let's pray for him. Way to go Jeremy Lin." (Jack)

"Come on, boy!"

"See you later Alligait." (Jackson)

"Here's my photo, it seems like the one should under the word, WANTED. Just a joke." (Alice)

If I tell you how much homework we have you’ll open your mouth until you can put a big apple in there." (Max)

Kalvein throwing and catching the dice in Typhoon. A spectacular display of lack of coordination.

Barrett’s well-timed “You jump! I jump!” quote in class during a Titanic re-enactment.

MAY 

Class 2 Charlie is spider killing hero when one invaded from the ceiling during break-out.

Class 1 excels at Domino Effect. Highlights being when Alex filled up a water bottle and gave it to Frank who threw his head back and chugged it in under a minute. Also, Will taking off his jacket.

While playing "The Price is Right" our student Price wins!

Jack doesn’t know how to do the Y.M.C.A. dance so he just crosses himself in confusion.

Jr. 3 Class 5 Leo’s nose explosion during Sounds of the U.S.A. Two snotty stalactites were dangling for about a minute. Can I hear  a “give me a hand”??

Mr. Simple (a girl) changed her name to Cassiopeia. 

One part of our lesson involved doing jumping jacks. Keith’s looked like a cheerleader having a seizure and Ali was very provocative with a slow-motion thrusting breed of jumping jack. Jumping jacks are apparently not part of the curriculum.


Our 8th graders created their own super heroes last week. Here are a few all-stars...

Tom's Super Bian Bian Man. Literally, "Super Poop Poop Man." Tom wanted a superpower of disgusting smell. He looked like Jabba the Hut.  

Kevin's He-Phone Man:  an iPhone impersonator.

Simon's Wine Man. He meant to spell Wing Man, but it came out Wine Man. 

Peter's Two Long Absolute Being. I have no clue what was going on here.  Google Translate? 

Johnson's Johnson. Johnson loves the name Johnson so much that he named his superhero after himself. This crime fighting wolf knows no fear.

Kyle dumped water on Kevin before class. I took Kyle out in the hallway and we had a "man talk." I told him to write me a letter about how he is going to change and put it on my desk. This is what I found the next morning. 

 Teacher, I am very sorry that I did what I have done. I am very sorry. I should not have poured water on kevin. it was really wrong.  I did not mean to do it. it was a joke. I am very sorry for what I have done I could have hurt him, it was really mean. I promise I will not do it again It is not something we should do out school, It is not something we mean until I haven done it. I will change my behavior. I am sorr for what I have done, I will not do something so disorderly. I feel ashamed. I will control my anger. I will be nice and act nice to people next time and I would not ever pour water on people later in life. I really feel ashamed. I love you.

I am coming back to Beijing for one more year next August. I feel like He really wants me here for another year. I won't be teaching at my same school, I'll be studying Chinese everyday and teaching History at another smaller home school here in the Big B. I don't think it's really hit me that I'll have to say goodbye to these kids in their red and green uniforms. It won't be Christmas everyday next year. 

米佳