Homework

This event ocurred when was doing my practice at the Saint Benedict College in Viña
del Mar. That day, I had english classes with the 8th grade class. I was informed that the
teacher was not able to do the class due to a sickness, so principal asked me if I wanted
to do the class in replace of the teacher. I responded yes.

When I arrived at the classroom the students were at the art class, so the entire
classroom was a mess. After they cleaned everything up I told them that teacher was
sick, therefore I was going to do the class, besides the teacher left some workshop for
the students to do, so my work there was to supervise the students. Nevertheless, the
students started complaining about a movie that the professor promised to watch last
week. I explained them that the teacher had left homework for them, that I did not know
about the movie, but they kept insisting about the film, in that moment I lost the control
of the class. Luckily the art teacher happened to be in the classroom so she made them
to be quiet. After she left, I gave them the instructions about the workshop; it was a pair
work where the students had to read about the Internet addiction and how that affected
people. After that they had to answer a couple questions about that topic. It was too
difficult to put them into work, since they did not cease to complain about the promised
movie, however I told them that I couldn’t do anything about it. During the class, the
frustration of not watching the movie was put on me, they started to misbehave and
sometimes they told me some improper words. At the end of the class not everyone
finished the homework.

This event called my attention because, in one minute I passed to be the friendly
teacher’s helper to an opressing authority, besides the fact that they did not watched the
movie frustrated them so their anger was put on the person who is in charge, in that case
myself.

When I was in the class I was wondering why did the students showed so much
disrespect to me? The answer could be that when something amusing is negated the
students need to vent their frustration to anyone they they think responsible, in that case
it was the teacher.

What if the movie wasn’t promised to the students?

In my opinion, it would not have done too much difference, during my assistance in that
class, I noticed how those students showed no interest in the subject, so the behavior
wouldn’t have been any different.

When someone takes the role of an authority, do always the students feel threaten? I
think they don’t, because their anger was produced by the frustration caused by the fact
they didn’t get what they wanted: the movie. In my opinión, it’s the other way around,
the saw an students who took the role of an authority, but it wasn’t the a real authority
so they felt free to do whatever they want since the students believed that no
punishment were to be applied.

Camilo Vásquez Tapia