06 - And so the real teaching starts

Okay, now the action begins..

Just recently had my second and final computers lesson for this weekend. I feel terribly exhausted. Not only was it my first time teaching more than one person at a time, but it was also in Spanish, and some of them had never even touched a computer before. And on top of that, of course, it had to be five and a half hours (for two days straight!) so that I need to plan ahead A LOT not to make them fall asleep of boredom. I bet MY teachers didn't get such a hard assignment for their first teaching job.

Though I managed, and they seem to be learning something at least, which is what I'm here for. Only this last hour and a half I didn't have anything for them to do except “freely practising” what they have already learned, which seemed to make them pretty bored after an hour of writing into an OpenOffice-table (why can't they be more creative.. ;_;) . So I got them to try Mahjongg instead, a little Chinese puzzle game which comes with the normal Ubuntu 10-package. Indeed, gaming is one of the best ways to learn how to handle a computer. Especially when you need to practise your mouse-aim. Which, unfortunately, is a common problem in my class.

It is quite fascinating sometimes though, especially when I realized that I've grown up in a Swedish generation where everyone can use a computer in a basic manner. And when I say basic, I don't mean what I used to call basic – it took all week before most my students could open up a program without having to tell them every single step. The difference is pretty huge compared to when we had our course in digital art at my school, when the teacher can simply say “Draw a rectangle!” instead of going to every student and point out where to click, and right afterwards having to tell them to HOLD the mouse button down and WHILE it is down DRAG it and then RELEASE the button, to make the rectangle. Oh, and again, he didn't have to tell them to retry it three times because the students can't aim with the mouse.

One thing really surprised me though. At the class yesterday, I gave them a practical exercise. At the lunch break I unplugged all the computers, grabbed one which wasn't in use and when they came back I explained all the different cables for them. And then they got to plug in all the things by themselves. Although I was a bit afraid of anything breaking (I realized how crazy it was when it had already started), they actually managed this part better than many Swedes I know. I guess either my instructions were much better than usual, or these people are better at practical work than with software, which requires more logical and mathematical thinking.

I bet it's like Einstein said: Don't judge a fish by it's ability to climb a tree!