English teacher presents past perfect, fights for freedom
Although I often feel disappointed with the lack of any social value in my life of teaching adverbs of frequency to spoiled teenagers who want to be dolphin trainers and finding grammar points in Friends videos and typing up worksheets, it seems all English teachers must be on the side of justice and freedom after all. If you can’t judge us by our friends (because they are almost all TEFL teachers too and so not a good control group), have a look at our enemies:
First, the Taliban put the element of surprise back into the idiocy of their actions by not only attacking school teachers, but killing a 16 year old kid for teaching his classmates English.
Even more bizarrely, the guys who are supposed to be protecting us from the Taliban ( motto - Proudly Overthrowing Fidel Castro Since 1962) have decided to do so by taking the power of the English language out of their hands- studying English being banned in Guantanamo Bay!
And finally Putin (a man whose name is very funny and very descriptive in French) has decided the English language teaching services of the British Council could stop him retaining power and ordered the British Council shut down in a matter of weeks.
It is also occurs to me that banning my teenage students from studying or using English is probably the only way to motivate them to learn it. If we don’t want to go quite that far, maybe giving them a list of slightly rude English words they are not allowed to use and English-language music and TV programmes they should try and avoid should get them going like no-one’s business…
So, now that it’s proved that we are the good guys in white hats, let’s hear no more about cultural imperialism please, because it can make the Guardian Education readers amongst feel bad, and us middle class left wing teachers find ourselves more than enough things to feel guilty about already…
The CIA fake motto above is from “Dave Barry Comes from Mars and Venus”, btw