Planning for the Unplanned

Riding around on a scooter in Taiwan in my neighborhood: it's an obstacle course. It's like driving on the Beltline Highway in Madison - every day on the Beltline there is some new amazing piece of trash that you have to swerve to avoid: a rust covered toilet, a metal pipe, a huge block of styrofoam. Only here in Taoyuan, Taiwan it's not trash, but rather stray dogs, old people on battery operated motorized carts, or a guy in khakis doing some kind of cha-cha dance while he walks down the street (but that's later at night).

I was recently assigned a really tough class to teach. It has 20 kids, all around the 7th grade age (remember that age where almost everyone torments each other?) There is a student in this "advanced" class that barely speaks English and really doesn't want to be there. There is another student who is very smart, but is in his own little world. He has Asperger Syndrome (autism) which makes him unable to socialize with other kids, so he gets picked on by the other students (which I will of course have to prevent). He is a good kid, though and seems to get along fine - unaffected by his antagonizers. The only way I can effectively bring this class in the right direction is to let time do it's thing. Over time I'll begin to learn their English levels, and who needs to work on what. And over time I will be able to get to know them so I can make the material more personal (student-centered) and interesting for them.