Chapter 8
Disillusion and the possibility of an exchange
As I have already mentioned, “Tour de France” (the course we used from
S1 to S4) had its weaknesses which led to frustration and dissatisfaction, and
toward the end of the eighties a replacement was being sought. In March 1988, I
suggested an approach based on contexts familiar to pupils but which was
dependent (with substantial input) on class input. Our adviser at the time
seemed very taken with this idea and offered to fund a cover teacher for me for
two weeks to allow me to type up an outline of contexts, vocabulary and
exercises which he would then have written up professionally and distributed.
I have to confess I was flattered and pleased to go down this route of
possible career development as the traditional promotion route really didn’t
appeal to me.
So, I spent two weeks beavering away and produced what amounted to a
two-year course with a variety of contexts, vocabulary and suggestions for
speaking, listening, reading and writing extensions. It was duly collected and
the Headmaster received a very nice letter commending my professionalism.
And that was it. My “course” simply disappeared into the abyss of
educational ideas.
Some time later I approached the subject with the adviser and he pointed
out that my whole approach required substantial input from both teacher and
pupil (though I had provided copious amounts of guidance, detail and
vocabulary) which was seen, on reflection, as a major problem. In all fairness,
although disappointing, this was something of a stumbling block as staff had
enough to do delivering lessons without having to create them as well.
Of course, some twenty years later this might have been viewed more
favourably under Curriculum for Excellence in which teachers were encouraged to
depart from “normal” book-based work, but at the time it was, understandably,
rejected.
I was quite demoralised. Although I understood why my work had not been
picked up, it pained me to think my efforts served no purpose. More importantly,
I had thoroughly enjoyed producing the materials and would have liked to pursue
such endeavours, and an alternative means of moving forward which seemed to
have been proffered was now withdrawn. I had been at the school for some seven
years, having intended to see out my probationary period of two years there,
and I had itchy feet. I was reasonably happy, but I felt there may be other
possibilities elsewhere. This feeling was compounded by the fact my father died
a couple of years previous to these events and, as is often the case, loss of
that kind invites reflection on values, purpose and the future, and I was no
longer sure of what I was doing and why I was doing it.
I needed a change and Arthur helped me on that route by organising an
interview for me with the bureau for international educational visits and
exchanges.
To my astonishment, one of the members of the panel had been my own
teacher of French in S2 and S3, Mr Joe Wake! He was responsible for ensuring
the standard of French of candidates, and after pointing out to him that this
was the first time in some sixteen years that we had spoken to one another in
French, he seemed happy that I could communicate adequately and announced that
he was entirely satisfied with the level of my language skills.
The rest of the interview went smoothly and thus I took my first steps
toward spending the following academic year in Rennes, Brittany.
While the school was happy to support my candidacy, there were a few
misgivings about who exactly would replace me for the year. A colleague had
undertaken the same process three years previously and while we appreciated
having a native speaker and permanent source of cultural information in our
midst, there were one or two areas where things didn’t go entirely smoothly.
Dominique (the exchange teacher) was a relatively small, balding,
bespectacled, age-obsessed (he always gave his age as forty, though it
transpired he was still thirty-nine) Corsican with a magnificently sculpted
physique of which he was (rightly) very proud.
He was a fairly tense man not renowned for his sense of humour, and
found it quite difficult to adapt to teaching his own language (rather than
English), the course and methodologies we used to teach French, and of course
his pupils and the relationship they expected to have with their teacher. He
was also accustomed to doing everything at a steady pace and never seemed to be
in a hurry to do anything.
At the start of his year with us (and, come to that, throughout his
stay), he had a few discipline/relationship problems as French teachers tend to
be a little more distant than their Scottish counterparts and have expectations
of pupil-teacher relationships which differ from those that frequently apply in
Scotland. He didn’t cope well with questioning and challenge, and was of the
opinion that pupils should simply accept his authority. When I gently suggested
that he could perhaps make some effort to get on with his pupils and thus win
their esteem, it appeared he just couldn’t (or wouldn’t) understand that
concept.
“I have to gain their respect?”
It was really all a matter of culture and adaptation, but therein lay
the problem.
Dominique insisted on a relatively dry and traditional approach whereby
he would present the work and it was up to the pupils to meet the standard or
not, whereas our course book was built on strategies and methodologies which
aimed to engage and develop personal communication. As he was clearly
struggling with this aspect, I wrote out some forty lesson plans (all very
simple and straightforward), but he abandoned these after about three classes.
While most of the staff made some effort in terms of clothing (shirt,
tie, reasonably smart outfits), Dominique persisted in wearing casual clothing
(as per expectations in the French education system) and often wore rather
large and heavy walking or climbing boots which tended to attract attention.
I once was conducting a speaking test in the base adjacent to my
first-floor room, with the pupil facing the open door which looked out on to
the corridor. As my pupil gallantly tried to answer my questions in French he
was suddenly distracted by the sight of Dominique passing by the open door,
slowly but steadily measuring his pace in his sizeable climbing boots,
clutching a bottle of water and looking as though it had required quite an
effort to get this far up the stairs and along the corridor.
“I know we’re quite high up on the first floor, but that’s ridiculous!”
he said, remarkably astutely, as I stifled my desire to laugh and repeated my
question in French.
Dominique was given the use of a new Citroen 2CV during his stay by his
exchange partner, and toward the end of the year he very kindly invited Arthur
and me to lunch at a local restaurant and insisted on transporting us all in
his car.
It is common for foreign drivers who are unused to driving on the left
to occasionally wander into the right-hand lane, causing considerable anxiety
to oncoming drivers, or to keep so far to the left they almost mount the
pavement and virtually invite fellow road users to overtake them. Dominique
found a novel solution to both these potential problems. While both going to
the restaurant and returning to the school, he opted to drive down the middle
of the road thus avoiding the two traditional problematic approaches, but doing
very little to avoid all other traffic. This was compounded by the fact that he
undertook both journeys at his usual pace and proceeded at no more than 20 mph.
On our return, and with magnificent understatement, Arthur whispered to
me, “That was a bit hairy, wasn’t it?”
The result of all this was that the Headmaster expressed a desire to
meet my exchange partner before giving final approval to my year-long exchange.
I met up with Claire (my proposed exchange partner) at a train station
in Paris during the Easter break of 1989. (I thought it best to spend a week or
so in France to re-acclimatise myself to French culture and life before
spending an entire year teaching English in a Collège (a secondary school for
S1 to S4 pupils) in Rennes.) All went well and we spent a pleasant hour or so
chatting about ourselves, our schools and our hopes for our exchange. Claire
had been an assistante in Scotland some twenty years before and she clearly
wanted to recapture some of the pleasure and benefit she had gained from that
experience. She struck me as a very competent and confident individual who was
keen to make our exchange work. We organised a visit to Invergordon in May so
she could see the school and meet the Headmaster.
Everything went well during that visit. The Head was suitably impressed
and concurred with my thoughts on my partner, and Claire seemed very happy with
what she saw of Invergordon Academy.
Everything was in place for our exchange to start in August 1989 and all
augured well, or so it seemed ….
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