Childrens Park Panorama 5
Originally uploaded by clarkalastair

Teaching here hasn't been all that bad and I can imagine that the conditions are not nearly as good in other areas. In more central China and poorer areas in South East Asia, the standard of housing and pay can't be as nice. Compare this situation with Africa and India and the slums / infrastructure there, then Dalian must come out a lot more favourably.

I think it's a mistake to judge the life here too harshly, when one considers similarly developing countries (and I don't necessarily mean Africa and India here). Certainly I have felt that as if I make some difference to the student's life here, even not considering the teaching time, but the interactions I have with them around campus, English corner, and on social networking sites such as Twitter, Fanfou, Facebook, XiaoNei, Youtube and Flickr etc. But I doubt it could be the same feeling as teaching in Africa.

China feels very modern in an obvious way, just looking at the architecture, shops and electronics, but there are lots of things in society that will take time to change. I feel that there are things which simply are not fair and just, and although life isn't fair and just, at the level of personal relationships, business etc, I feel this should be much better. Part of this is being a foreigner here, in that you get treated differently, as if you are special/rich. The pay structure is not the same as the locals, people tend to remember you more clearly and offer you better places / faster service than others. I guess there must always be positives and negatives, but I'd rather leave both behind to be honest.

Alex’s wedding ceremony was on Sunday, and was an interesting experience. It was an outdoor ceremony and the weather decided to open up half way through, though thankfully it was only short. I don’t think it was an entirely Chinese in the way it worked, but still authentic in alot of respects. As I gather, there was some issues, but on the whole I felt it was ok. The MC wasn't very good in Miao's eyes and the man controlling the music during the ceremony wasn't exactly perfect either. Before the ceremony he kept testing the mic saying "oui" (pronounced way) for the best part of 15 minutes. The flower arrangements were awkwardly placed, meaning that me and some others couldn't see Alex's face.

We went back into the hotel for the reception and on each table there were some beers, soft drinks, a plate of 15 cigarretes, baijiu (traditional Chinese spirt at 50%) and some dishes for eating. They hadn't provided shot glases for the spirits, so they were asked for and came. Over the course of the reception more dishes arrived including fish, chicken, "sea cucumber" a local delicacy, sweetcorn, sugar glazed potato cubes and others. We were all given a little box of presents including a 20 pack of cigarettes (which we gave to others) and some sweets.

The couple went round drinking (in this case some expensive baijiu) with the guests and giving them / lighting their cigarettes. There were some speeches from the bride's father and Alex's mother, translated into Chinese by a local manager of a relocation and business consultancy. The English speaking element was few, so the Father's speech (and the announcements in the ceremony and  after) wasn't translated into English unfortunately.

Word format version here.

According to a new study, “The Age of Indifference,” released two weeks ago by the Times-Mirror Center, the under 30 generation knows less, cares less, and reads the newspapers less than any other generation in the past five decades. The survey also states that persons between the ages of 18 and 29 are 20 percent less likely to follow important news stories. The surveys most dramatic revelation is the decline in newspaper readership. Only 30 percent of Americans under the age of 35 said they had read a newspaper the previous day. This contrasts with figures in 1965 when 67 percent under 35 said they had read the previous day’s newspaper. What is surprising is that TV has not filled the gap. The percentage of people viewing television news programs is down as well. The Times-Mirror Survey shows the percentage of all of those reading newspapers and watching TV news programs has declined in general. In other words, Americans don’t have the information they need to be good consumers, make good business decisions, vote, or understand the current issues of today.

We don’t have to stay this way, however; there are options.

For example, we can listen to radio news. Most radio stations have a news program every hour and some have them as often as every half an hour. You can also watch TV news. This is possibly one of the easiest and most accessible options for everyone. On the average weekday, there are 56 news programs on television, and this does not include cable channels, business programs, talk shows, or interview programs which do stories about current events.

But just in case television isn’t possible, there is a third option. For 25 cents, which is less than the price of a candy bar, you can buy the weekday edition of The Baltimore Sun or even The Washington Post. Many people shy away from newspapers because they feel they’re too time-consuming or boring. Well, the secret to reading a news article is understanding how it is written. Most news reporters use what is called inverted pyramid style. That is, they place the most important details or facts at the beginning of the article and work their way down to the least important. So in order to understand an article, you only need to read a short way to get the main idea. Sometimes this means you only have to read the headline. Other times you must read the entire article. As you can see, reading the newspaper does not have to be a chore: None of these options are. They are as easy as well as important.

You may wonder why this is so important. What does it matter if you choose not to be informed?

Well, according to the Times-Mirror Survey, the fact that the under 35 generation is so uninformed makes them an easy target of manipulation. We know of powerful speakers such as Martin Luther King, who used his influence for the common good to get people involved in the civil rights movement. And we also know of Adolf Hitler, one of the history’s worst manipulators, who was also a powerful speaker. Do we want to get caught in that trap of blind following? Ignorance is bliss; but then again, ignorance is still ignorance.

We can avoid being uninformed and ignorant by following one of the three options. For example, let’s look at reading the newspaper. By reading the paper you can learn much about world events. You can learn about national events, happenings within the state and county. You can read the sports, the weather, stock figures, the foreign reports, and the classified. You can read stories about real people like you in the features section. Newspapers are truly a fun and enjoyable way to learn what is going on in the world.

Since it’s so important for us to learn about the world, I’m going to ask you to follow through with that last option and to read the paper this week. I’m going to give you all a quarter so you don’t even have to go the library and borrow a copy. Buy a newspaper. Read it, learn, and enjoy. We don’t want to be a nation in trouble because of our lack of knowledge.

Identify the type of speech introduction in the following examples. Decide from one of these options: Asking Questions, Telling a Story, Stating an Unusual Fact, Using Humour, Beginning with a Quotation.

1. How many people in this room smoke at least one cigarette every day?
   1. Asking Questions
2. I am handicapped. This is a title which has been bestowed on me because I am confined to a wheelchair. But, what I have learned is that handicapped people are confined by society in some very important ways.
   1. Telling a Story
3. What will life be like in the year 2050?
   1. Asking Questions
4. Last year our family was the host for a foreign student from Israel. His name was Gabriel Soldad and he lived with us for nine months. It was our intention to give Gab a chance to learn about the United States. What we didn’t expect was that we would learn even more about the world from him.
   1. Telling a Story
5. Materialism has become a way of life in the United States.
   1. Stating a fact (opinion).
6. One tenth of a second is all it takes for you to crash through a windshield of a car if you are not wearing a seatbelt. You could end up dead!
   1. Stating a fact (not unusual).

Welcoming speeches extend greetings to new members of organisations or visitors. University teachers welcome new students, company managers say hello to new employees, and conference organizers extend warm regards to delegates. The speaker giving the welcome should express pleasure at seeing new faces, encourage the audience to make themselves at home, outline what’s ahead in the program, and convey best wishes to the audience members for success. The speech of welcome should be concise, communicate warmth in its tone and message, build trust and support, and establish common ground.

First impressions are important indeed. How you welcome a group can affect a day or even a working lifetime.

The exam will be performed in pairs (groups of two students), will last 6 minutes and be a spoken discussion of a topic. Students need to prepare all 20 topics as in the exam the teacher will choose the topic randomly. Written material, prepared notes, books etc, will not be allowed in the exam. Students should be careful to split the time evenly between each student in the pair. If one student speaks much less than the other, then the other student who speaks more will get higher marks. When preparing, students should try to remember and focus on and the ideas of each topic rather than writing and reciting a script. This exam is worth 50 marks of students’ Oral English class. The groups will be decided by student numbers, for example student 1 and student 2 together, student 3 and student 4 together. If there is one student left, the final group will have 3 students and that group will need to speak for 9 minutes in total.

The exam will take place in students own classroom. The class should wait outside the classroom while a pair is being tested inside. Students will not know which topic they will discuss until they enter the classroom, at which point the teacher will choose the topic randomly. This means that students might receive the same topic as groups before them. When students have finished their exam, they may leave and do their own thing.

Marking Guide

Topics

1. Should people use the Internet for romance?
2. Where is your dream home? Describe the location and what the house is like.
3. Should college students devote all their time and energy to academic life?
4. Should college students do a part-time job?
5. Is it wrong for the media to invade the privacy of star athletes?
6. Should Chinese people celebrate western festivals?
7. Why is introducing western ideas into the Chinese wedding ceremony a good or a bad thing?
8. What are the advantages and disadvantages of being an only child?
9. Do you think that young people living together before marriage is a good or bad thing?
10. Sport was invented by men for men, is sport sexist towards women?
11. In western countries children from an early age are taught to be independent, do you think that this part of western culture is good or bad?
12. In a world where fashion is so important, do you as a student feel under pressure to keep up with the fashion? Why or why not?
13. Do you think confidence is an important quality when making new friends? Why or why not?
14. To be a student union representative you need to have certain personal qualities, in your opinion what are they and why?
15. What job would you most like to have if social and cultural boundaries did not apply?
16. Is China becoming a consumer nation? If not already, will consumerism increase in the future?
17. Would you marry someone of a different nationality? What would be the advantages/ disadvantages of an international marriage?
18. In what ways have Chinese people’s eating habits changed over the years?
19. Are family relationships changing in China? If so, in what ways are they changing?
20. Which qualities make for a stronger and happier society; Independence and self sufficiency or mutual reliance and support?

Media Classroom Computer and Controls
Originally uploaded by clarkalastair

So here I am invigilating the final exam for my elective course. Trying to keep the noise of the keyboard at a minimum. While keeping an eye out for cheating. I find myself happy that all but 2 of my students have turned up for the final week, so I only really need to fail 2 students. I’m not looking forward to all the marking I have to do next week.

As part of the course I’ve had 3 exams, and if any of the students missed any of them, I instructed them to download the mp3 and questions from my blog. One of the students seems to have had trouble doing this and another doesn’t seem to have even tried. In fact it shows a patent lack of ingenuity to go off and search for the answers. Being as accommodating as possible, I told them to try again and email me if there was an issue. Of course they should have done that anyway, but ho hum, such is life.

Just had a walk around, they’ve found the reading, as intended, much easier. I had hoped to give them some easy marks before the listening. Noticed that one of my regulars is not here. Shame that he’s missed this exam but at least I won’t have to fail him. Speaking of the devil, he’s just turned up. Being the kind guy that I am, I’m letting him complete the reading and meaning elements of the exam and telling him to email me the answers of the listening from home.

The lecture theatre I’m in doesn’t serve well as an examination hall. One has to make do and can’t place western ideals and norms into a situation like this. Many students have raced ahead and are going to be bored while the others catch up. Some guys are being really very slow. I doubt they can do well. Beginning to wish I had made it harder for the top students. I’ve just played the listening part of the exam early so that those who have finished the other parts can go early. I now know this was a mistake because all but one left, and as Chinese people need to save face, the slow students couldn’t stay behind to finish. Such is life.

Today’s lessons were very draining. Spent a long time talking in front of class. I also had a good chat about life and working here with a married Chinese woman with a canadian background.

The speech of introduction acquaints the audience with a speaker. The introduction should include more than one repetition of the speaker’s name (so that everyone can catch it), hit the highlights of the speaker’s achievements, and mention the title of the speech. Keep the tone warm, and to the degree possible, personal.

A good rule of thumb is to keep an introduction under three minutes. After all, the audience wants to hear the speaker, not the introducer.

After the speech contest I had lunch with Shay and Lesley. Shay by the way was just an observer at the speech contest, and I can imagine with little else to do other than watch was a little bored. After lunch they invited me to their house to have coffee, which I gladly accepted cause I would have had to wait around for a bus home anyway. This gave me an opportunity to see the inside of teacher housing on the college campus. It was clean, light and moderately sized, and therefore quite pleasant.

We had a long and pleasant chat about things in China and at Dawai, and they very kindly gave me a book about Nanotechnology from American Scientist. They had it spare, because of a shipping mistake from Amazon. The coffee was made in a drip/filter machine and was reasonably tasting. They occassionally buy their coffee from Amici (a local coffee shop selling blend), Tesco (apparently they have some of their own branded stuff which I have yet to see) and Carrefoure. I told them about my experiences with coffee and that the cheapest and best I've found is from a small shop near Sanba Square Tesco.

After this I was then tasked to go down to the fish market in the bay that lies 10-15 min walk away from Dawai's front gate. I had been instructed to buy the same dry/smoke cured fish that I got last time I'd been down there, for Miao to take back to Shenyang and give to relatives this week. However it was rainy, and the live fish sellers were out in force, but there was only one stall for dried fish, and thusly overcharging. I tried to bargain but the woman wasn't having any, so I walked away, waited to get on the bus to go home and listened to BBC podcasts on the way back. Thus endeth the day of the Speech Contest.

Last week I was asked to be a judge in the speech contest final on Friday. I cordially agreed, expecting all the foreign staff as a whole to be part of the judging panel. But no, it was only myself and Lesley [+ Shay]. Whether the others had even been asked I don't know, but I felt a little disheartened by the lack of other foreign teachers. Last year the whole group had been asked and everyone had agreed to participate. However, this year for me, there was an improvement. I was actually judging (giving marks out of 100), as opposed to deciding a "best English speaking manners" prize. Lesley was the "Question Master", which involved reading out a question from a list provided.

The main topic that everybody had to speak on was "I love China". Then they'd obviously drawn straws before hand (at least a day) for an impromptu speech topic, and lastly an aptly written (by the organizers or a teacher … a Chinese person) question related to the impromptu topic spoken out via wireless microphone by the lovely Lesley.

The marking process (for me) was less than fair. After each all three sections of each entrant were finished, you write down your mark (singular) on a bit of paper, fold it, and then passed down the line of judges to be summed and then averaged by the student helpers. Their mark was then announced after the conclusion of the next entrant. This means firstly that the judges have no concept of what marks to give for the first entrant and therefore usually give a lower mark than is maybe deserved, and secondly judges are unable to adjust marks based on other peoples performances. So the winner isn't necessarily the best candidate.

Other than this, the judges were given a marking guideline of between 85 – 98.5%, and were advised that we were allowed to use upto 2 decimal points. Personally I don't think it's humanly possible to rate on that level of accuracy. For the averaging I totally understand using 2dp as a guide. As for the range, I think having a lower limit is fine, it means that student egos and emotions will remain intact and gives a useful guide for the all the judges and acts as a way to limit bias for particular students that the judges know and like, and know and dislike. As for the higher limit, I'm not convinced that this was really needed, as this was the final.

A musical interlude between first year contestants and the second year contestants, allowed people (such as myself) to nip off to the toilet. They were of course singing in English, and the second act (singing a soppy love song) included a girl come on to dance briefly with him and then leaving, causing many laugh and claps.

As for the good things about the competition, as I understand, there is a large student organizational element to it, which obviously provides useful experience, and lest we not forget, the enormous benefit even participating in a competition like this, performing in front of a large crowd on a well lit stage, being able to overcome nerves and the satisfaction this provides even if the particular student doesn't win.

I was trying to rack myself of things like this at Imperial, but the only things that came to mind were professional competitions sponsored by companies. On a more local scale, there were sports matches, and competitions and performances within union clubs/societies themselves. There was little by way of departmental encouraged competitions. I think this will be because the student union takes this role mainly (i.e. completely student arranged and organized) and if you want to participate in a competition relating to you degree you go off and enter a professionally sponsored and organized one. So for me, there is no direct mapping of this sort of activity here and back home.