Teaching the Teacher

Funny lesson anecdote: Visa and I have split the 10th grade, which is in its first year of English language studies, into two groups to motivate the students and build up classroom control. I have a group of about 20 students who are beyond restless, but are a lot of fun to teach and always game for interactive learning. Example: Today we did a warm-up with imperatives. The students took turns being the teacher and ordered the rest of the class to open windows (allowing blasts of freezing mountain air into the room), trade seats at top speed, crawl awkwardly under desks, etc.

Last week we were working with “I like to” followed by an infinitive. One of the students offered Unë pëlqej të kalëroj (“I like to horseback ride”). I couldn’t work this out in my befuddled brain, failing to deduce the root word kalë, which translates to “horse”, in the verb kalëroj, which translates to “horseback ride”. So he patiently began to break it down for me, miming with his hands and explaining (in Albanian) “Okay, so I have a horse; I climb on the horse, I sit on the horse” and then he bounced in his seat, elbows flapping energetically. He was so serious, *so* earnest, I just turned red and started laughing. I could not keep my composure for about five minutes, which the class thought was hilarious. I tried to continue with “I like to draw comics” and fell apart all over again. The kids loved it.