Welcome to the first post in my two-part series on being a Fulbright-Nehru ETA. Now that I’m more than two-thirds of the way through my grant, I’d like to dedicate two posts to discussing the unexpected challenges, positive experiences, and favorite lessons that characterized my teaching experience.
There were definitely several days in late September/early October when I felt overwhelmed and wanted to quit. The challenges I faced then are still present today, but I’ve learned to deal with them differently.
I chose to discuss challenges first because I think they are often forgotten or glossed over.
Some may be shared by ETAs in India and elsewhere. Ultimately, however, they are unique to my experience and should not be generalized to all ETA experiences.
Double standards
They’re painful. Really painful. I have to show my lessons (typed) to the teacher who normally teaches that particular English class. That teacher usually quickly glances through it and sometimes makes suggestions. Most teachers, however, don’t plan their lessons. They frantically write all their lesson plans at the end of the session when the principal requests to see their planbooks. Why do I have to be critiqued by someone who doesn’t even write lessons themselves?
Once, I also got reprimanded for not immediately leaving the staff room when the bell for fifth period rang, which I found completely unfair. I had a class during fifth period, but I knew that I could leave a couple minutes late because the previous period was “Break Time” and students would still be eating/running around. Most teachers don’t run to their classes anyway because the previous teacher usually continues teaching five minutes after the bell rings.
Ultimately, I learned to swallow your pride and do what’s expected. I’m there for the students. Arguing with teachers about small things doesn’t accomplish anything.
Half-days
There are eight class periods. Most days, I teach during 4-5 of those periods. It’s particularly difficult on Mondays because I teach during the first three periods of the day and eighth period. Having so much free time in the middle of the day used to exhaust me. In the beginning, I didn’t have a steady routine and wasted a lot of time talking with other teachers in the staff room or doing nothing. Now, I use my free time to plan lessons, grade students’ work, or do my own work.
No consistency
The lack of consistency can be frustrating at worst and disappointing at best. One time, I was teaching Class 5B and other students kept walking into the class and saying that the students in 5B had to leave for drill practice. I was able to complete the class because they ended up not going. Still, the uncertainty, along with having class interrupted several times, was not fun.
Two weeks ago, I was prepared and excited to teach a class of 25 students. When I entered the classroom, I found out that more the half the students were absent because they were participating in Science Olympiad. Things aren’t generally planned in advance here, so there’s not much you can do in these situations. You just have to learn to accept things as they come and go with the flow.
It’s not my class
I don’t have as much ownership over my classes as I expected I would. The plus side to this is that I’m not held responsible for making sure students complete the syllabus and pass their exams. The downside is that I have to share my classes with the regular English teacher. If she says she wants to teach Class 7 on Wednesday and Thursday one week, then that means I only get to see Class 7 on Monday.
Precedent
The Fulbright-Nehru program sends a maximum of three ETAs to a school. For the first month I heard nothing but glowing reviews about the ETA that was there before me. She was so much fun. Are you going to do the same things with us that she did? Is she coming back? I miss her so much.
I felt like no matter what I did, I could never be as good as she was. And would the students really benefit from learning about American holidays a second time? Later, I learned that most students didn’t fully remember everything she taught them. I also realized that there is a first within every second. I was the second one to teach about winter in the U.S., but I added something new by talking about the superstitions that surround snow days. It’s silly to feel like everything about an entire topic has already been taught.
Wait…what am I teaching?
For my Class 7 and Class 8 literature classes, I’m required to teach short stories from the Oxford Modern Reader; for Class 5, I teach from The Ruskin Bond Children’s Omnibus. Preparing for these classes consists of a lot of frantic Google searches on the topics that the stories cover.
I’ve learned about freighthopping, gooseberries, animals that live at the North and South Pole, famous rock-climbers, etc. I also learned the biographical details of a bunch of European authors, like W.H. Davies, W.B. Yeats, and William Wordsworth. Not complaining about this—but it’s just strange to be learning something just a few days before I’m about to teach it.
Why am I here?
Why am I teaching English at a private, English-medium school where most children come from middle-class backgrounds? Wouldn’t it make more sense for me to be at a school with higher need?
I can see that my role at Akshar is to make English fun and less about rote memorization. But still. I think the Fulbright-Nehru ETA program should reconsider its priorities or at least do a better job of matching applicants with schools.
I know Hindi, so I could have been useful at a Hindi-medium school. I don’t have a background in special education, but there are other ETAs who do—and they would probably be able to contribute more to Akshar than I can.
All this being said, I’m incredibly grateful to have this experience and to learn from it every day. I love the students and teachers at Akshar. I can only imagine how amazing it must feel to be a second-year teacher after having learned so much from your first year of teaching.
Through this series, I hope to give a realistic perspective on the ups and downs I’ve faced throughout the program. I hope these posts will be helpful to future ETAs.
Please feel free to comment below or email me at sushmita.gelda@gmail.com if you have any questions. Stay tuned for my next post on what I love about being a Fulbright ETA!
Interested in applying for the Fulbright ETA? Check out my FAQ page.
Aksharbet 