Chinese Class

Some background on what you're about to read:

The Chinese 4 AP class feels like we are not being prepared well for the AP test in May. The teacher we have this year is new. She had an accident at the local middle school, where a projector screen fell on her head and she was out for 2 months.

******************************************************************************************************************

         That fateful day, we walk into class, expecting WenChi Laoshi to teach us more, and have another lab day, to prepare for the writing portion of the AP test. I walk in, and the class is bustling as usual. Something's not right. I see Zhu Laoshi with WenChi Laoshi over in front of Jessica's desk. Then I see it. Wang Laoshi is back. I'm on my way back out to my locker, because I've come straight from 0 period, and haven't had a chance to grab my stuff for 1st period yet. Alison walks in, and stops dead in her tracks. Her mouth is literally gaping open. Her hand flies to her mouth. That's all I see before I leave for my locker. That class is naturally unproductive. We spend 3/4 of the period talking about how she was injured. In the words of a table-mate in my Marine Biology class, who dropped Chinese 3H, "Narcissistic much?" Yeah. Very.

         Alison comes up with the idea of writing a letter to the principal. My sister writes it. I edit. Minor changes, but I contributed, nevertheless. Last Monday, we went to deliver it. During class time. It was the scariest school moment of my life. I didn't want to get in trouble. Going into college soon, I'm not about to get into trouble then have my future jeopardized. What happened was we gathered outside the classroom before the period began, and with the exception of Mindy, who liked Ms. Wang better, hatched a plan. We were to go to the principal's office and ask to see him. Not only that, we were to give him the letter. Thankfully, the principal was in a meeting at the time, and all my sister ended up doing was giving the secretaries the letter. The thing about the letter is that nobody wrote it. My sister and Alison made that extremely clear. The problem would be, if "nobody wrote it", then where did the letter come from? Even she didn't have an answer for that.

         I'm digressing here. After the visit to the main office, we walked over to senior park, trying to craft an excuse. They wanted to say "we were talking with the principal". The catch with that would be, that's traceable, and when she finds out we weren't talking with the principal, we'll be in huge trouble. My solution was, go back to class, tell her, we wanted to talk with the principal, but he was unavailable to talk with us. Everyone else agreed on the cover story, and we trekked back to the classroom. On the way, somebody came up the idea of going to see the vice-principal. By this time, me, Nancy, and Jamie all wanted to go back to class. Paige was also on the borderline with us. I felt obliged to go with my sister to the office, yet, I felt as if the right thing to do would be go back to class. I stood there, frozen, not knowing what to do, until my sister began chasing after Nancy and Jamie. At that moment, the teacher chose to come out of her classroom and walk the opposite direction as us. Everyone scattered. I hid in the girl's bathroom, and until a text came from my sister saying that I should go back to class, I stayed there. I was the last one back to class, which looked really bad, because: a) It made it look like I was the main one defying her, and concocting the plan, and b) my sister's "cover" for me was I stayed behind to talk to the principal. That pretty much flashes neon arrows at me, saying I'm the leader, and the one who is in charge of all this. I'm NOT. I'm just a follower. I support the cause, yet, I don't want to be too drastic about it.

         All that happened Monday. Wednesday was pretty uneventful, I don't think anything major happened with that, besides the class making a big fuss.

         Friday, the teacher moved half the class's seats. The desk-chairs are positioned in a U shape, with nobody sitting at the bottom part of the U, which would be the back of the classroom. The upperclassmen, minus Royce, all sit on one side of the U, while the underclassmen, minus Nancy, sit on the other side. My sister came in extremely late on Friday, because it was Club Rush that day, and she had some drama to solve regarding her social studies honors society and another teacher's history club. When she got to class, she left almost right away again, to talk to the principal about the issue. When she came back the second time, my side of the U had moved to the back of the room, so that Ms. Wang wouldn't have to "keep turning around to talk to us". There are three columns of seats in the back, it's a 3x3 formation. I sat on one end of the first row, and my sister sat on the other. When Ms. Wang's back was turned, I moved one seat over to ask my sister how it went, with our own sign language. I was pretty much silent. Ms. Wang turned back to face us, and surprise definitely registered on her face. She said, "let's not have the sisters sit next to each other." We naturally protested at this. my sister said, "Oh, don't worry, teacher wang, we're very peaceful with each other." Ms. Wang then tried to cajole me into moving. I stayed firm. "Now, be a good kid, and move back!" She told me. I didn't move, and when she turned her back, my sister moved into my old seat. The teacher proceeded to get my sister and I mixed up. it took her and the class at least 10-15 minutes (being nice) to sort out the second part of my name was Long, not Lang, and that the second part of my sister's name was Lang, not Long. She was saying, "oh, Long, please move back to that seat, and Lang, please move to that seat. Now be a good kid. Yes, that's it!" I didn't do anything, except correct her. Alison also tried correcting her. The rest of the class joined in. She still didn't believe me. I would think that, of all people, I would know my name, right?! Eventually, I had to move, and when I did, she put her hand on the small of my back, kind of forcefully, and steered me towards the seat, too. I floundered my arms around, as if to send out the message of "don't touch me", but I don't think she quite understood.

         Afterwards, we began prepping for out historical city presentations that she still wanted to do after she was gone for 2 months. My sister raised her hand, and asked the teacher, "Teacher, I feel like we still don't know you very well yet. You were saying that we need to get used to each other more. Can you tell us more about yourself?" MS. Wang began a long spiel, telling us her autobiography, which I'm not sure how long it lasted, because I asked to "go to the bathroom" (aka go to the library). Once more, "Narcissistic much?"

         I was going to take my phone with me, until she made the announcement that she decided that when we "went to the bathroom", our phones had to stay in the classroom. Otherwise, wed stay out forever, texting and playing on our phones. "aiya!" My sister exclaimed. "But what if there's a lockdown?!" She asked. The teacher replied, "I'll know where you are. And I know you are safe." My rebuttal was, "But my mom doesn't!" She sighed. "But your sister here has her phone, and can tell your mom you are safe, ok?!" At that, I left.

Over the weekend, she sent our mother an email, saying essentially, that we were great students and that she was very glad we were in her class. We were also great leaders and she respected our rights to talk to administration. However, if we had any concerns about the Chinese class, we should not hesitate to talk with her about it. With a successful background in teaching, she wants to help all "[her] students succeed in [her] class, and enjoy learning."

         Today, she read us an article translated into Chinese "authentic material" as she claims, from the Associated Press. I had to correct her on that. She said it was translated "from the AP, American Press". Hey. I'm in yearbook. My sister's in journalism. Someone's going to catch that. I later raised my hand and made a point of speaking in English. "Isn't AP 'Associated Press', and not 'American Press'?" I asked. She thought for a bit, and then said "oh yeah, it is." she explained that she had gotten confused because the name of the source was called "beautiful news", or something like that (translated), and the direct translation for America from Chinese is "beautiful country". I also counted today. Within one hour, she said the phrase, "authentic material" at least seven times.

         Also, right now is the time when the Psychology AP class does their "flour baby" projects. My sister brought hers to Chinese class, and Marlie, her baby, was the object of everybody's attention. Naturally, this did not please Ms. Wang. She asked my sister, at the beginning of class, "aren't you a little, old, to be playing with dolls?" With some sort of degrading tone. My sister pulled out the assignment sheet and told her, "It's not a doll, it's a project!" My sister began taking pictures of other people with her baby: Alison, Matthew, Tristan, and me. When it came to my turn, Ms. Wang finally gave up and asked for the paper. "let's not use our phones in class." she said, literally taking it out of my sister's hands and placing on the table next to my sister. My sister reached around and took it back, and leaned back so she could take a picture of me and Marlie together. At one point, Ms. Wang took the baby by the arm, dangling it, from Tristan, who had wanted to give it back to my sister. My sister, horrified, leaped from her seat and tried to rescue poor Marlie. We also finally got around to doing the "famous historical city with cultural background" project presentations, and during mine, Ms. Wang took Marlie and put her on a desk far away from my sister.

After class, my sister texted me, saying "stay after class. Spread the word." So I told Jamie and Nancy, and we stayed. It turned into me, Jamie, Nancy, Royce, Tristan, and Matthew. Alison left. My sister marched us to the front office and demanded to see the principal. Thankfully, he was at another middle school, in a meeting, so I went to 2nd period. Royce called my sister a horrible leader, and everyone else agreed, including me. Somebody needs to set up an appointment with the principal before we all go rushing in to talk with him, without an appointment.

On Thursday, we ended up watching an hour-long video/interview on the Chinese Ambassador. Needless to say, it wasn't very interesting. She showed us 5-10 minutes of it, at first, then asked if we wanted to watch more. The class unanimously said "yes". I suppose I see where they came from- more video time=less work. Afterwards, we had to say our "impression" on the video and what happened. There really was not much I could say. I mean, it was a video. An interview. In English. Aren't we in Chinese class? We can all understand English quite well. Why do we have to watch an English interview, then comment in Chinese?

We are fully aware that replacing the Chinese teacher is pretty much impossible at this point, so we push that we are so bad that she doesn't want to teach us anymore. Then, it is her fault, and not ours, and perhaps we can get the teacher from Chinese School back.



Last Thursday, December 5, we had a "quiz." She posted the material for it Wednesday night, at 8 p.m. Our class is first period, 8:00 a.m. This span of 12 hours is an inadequate amount of time for anybody to retrieve the material. I have dance class from 7-8:30 p.m. on Wednesdays. I don't get home until 9:00 p.m. most of the time. I always finish my homework before I go dance, so I can go straight to bed after dinner and a shower. That day was no different. Therefore, when I got to class the next morning, hearing that there was a test was probably the worst news. We had had a sub the class before, so in a way, that was a pop quiz, too. Exactly two people in our class had the printouts. Not to be mean, but one was the class suck-up, and the other was just extremely responsible I guess. No surprise, I flunked the test- well, I got a D. I wasn't pleased- I'm a straight-A student, especially in Chinese. I DO NOT get Ds in Chinese. That's just.... in-explainable, I guess.



Then, last class, we were discussing gender equality. Turns out, the teacher believes, and I quote, that she can find a person to cheat with? "any time" she wants. For those who have seen her, that's a horrible mental picture right there.



         Quite technically, I'm not supposed to be telling anyone this. You didn't hear this from me!