A Harsh Reality

I have been having a spectacular week. I have noticed that the more prepared you are and the more though you put into making lessons fun, the better they are, and the less you actually have to teach. I mean, it is never going to be perfect, but my patience is not running low and I am in a generally better mood. That is not to say, however, that I am not excited for it to be Friday. One week closer to Thanksgiving which is going to be an extravaganza beyond belief. More on that to come.

But the mundane is not interesting and I am not here to bore you (even though that is probably themmost common side effect of reading my blog).

Yesterday I was grading an assignment when a came across an irregularity in one of my student's work. His work from the week before had been excellent which made me think he was really reading my suggestions and trying to improve. I was really impressed, he had followed my suggestion to a "t" and that almost never happens.

Bu upon reading his work this week I noticed that he had reverted back to his old ways. It was so striking in fact that for a while I sat an wondered how this could have happened. He receives feedback from me every week and I couldn't see any reason why his work would take a one time adventure to excellent town and then back again. So I looked at his work from last week and realized it was not his writing. I told him in my comments to come see me when he read this.

This morning I asked him about the irregularity in his work and he told me that it was indeed his work and that he wrote it. WHY DO THEY LIE? DO THEY REALLY THINK I AM THAT STUPID?

It obviously was not his work, so I asked him again. This time...he lied again. He told me his mother wrote it. This was probably the most unbelievable thing he could possibly say. For one moment imagine a student who is learning English dictating to his mother the words to write on the page. By the way, he is dictating in Spanish, and the writing is English. The only way to do this would be to announce every letter individually. This would take forever.

So I called him on it again and he finally admitted to it being another students handwriting, a girl nonetheless. We all know that boys and girls at age 10 have handwriting that looks nothing alike. I briefly spoke to the two students about why this is bad and told them I would soon have a punishment for the both of them.

I decided to give both of them the same punishment, a falta menor. The real story is that my male student had asked for help to which my female student was much obliged. But when trying to help him, he was stubborn and so this female student just wrote it for him.

When I gave them each the form to be signed by a parent, I explained why each of them was wrong. Jasson was wrong for allowing Susana to do his homework and for trying to turn it in as his own. Susana was wrong for doing Jasson's homework and writing in his journal. Yes, she was just trying to help but if Jasson is being stubborn then don't help him, never should you do someone else's assignment for them. But the moral is not my point.

Both of these students were visibly upset until lunch. Susana changed her attitude once I spoke with her mother who brings lunch everyday. Jasson, however, did not recover. At the very end of the day I pulled him aside to ask him why he had let this effect him the whole day. This was not his first falta, but he had never acted this was about anything, he was literally a negative-nancy zombie all day. His answer was one of those times when you hear something and immediately you feel like you have been punched in the stomach.

"My mom is going to hit me."

I just stood there for about 10 seconds searching for something to say that would ease the situation. But the truth is, there is nothing I could possibly say to him. No child should have to fear going home because when he is in trouble his parents hit him. Sadly, this is common place in Honduras, and many of our students receive the same punishment.

Essentially because of me he will be hit by his mother. Yes, I did not turn in someone else's work. Yes, I did not lie to my teacher. But had I known this I might have given a different punishment. My excellent week had quickly taken a turn for the worst and I somehow felt solely responsible for this child's pending doom.

But, the fact is that I cannot base my punishment off of what a particular family practices at home. Simply knowing that Jasson faces a physical punishment at home is not justification for giving him a lesser punishment. Moreover, Susana will not be hit tonight and she is far less guilt than Jasson. Even though it pained me to see him walk away today, his house is beyond my control.

This was the harshest reality I have faced since being in Honduras.