Differences in Educational Culture - Part 2

Okay, last time I left off I was pretty upset with the way my lessons had gone and so I decided to blog about differences in culture between Russia and the US.  I'm here to continue the discussion, but with less exasperation and irritability.  So here goes.

One of the main differences I notice (at the university level) is the differences in types of classes that students take.  Let's focus on language students since those are the ones that I work with most often.  These students have 2-3 professors throughout the week and have several language classes (of the same language) each day.  For example, the typical first year student here will have, maybe, 1-3 classes of varying English lessons (all with the same professor the entire week), the same thing in German and maybe a history class or two.  This is pretty much how their class schedule goes for years 1-5.  I'm not saying there's anything wrong with this, but as an American I would get a little bored.  It's the same for different departments: economics students have classes that are virtually focused entirely on economics, same with math, law, etc. You get the idea.

As most of my readers know, American university schedules are quite different.  For most of us, years 1 & 2 at university (yes I'm using university instead of 'college' - deal with it) include a huge variety of courses. Maybe a language class, some history, maybe poly-sci, certainly a math and science class or two.  For some of us this extends into our third years and only when we finally choose our majors, do we narrow the focus of the classes we enroll in.  As I said, I don't generally consider this a problem, except I can anticipate that students could very easily get burned out with their fields.  I focused on my undergrad major (European Studies) for maybe 85% of my junior and senior years and by the time I was done, I hated the topic and haven't really thought about it since.  I can only imagine having several language classes a day, always with the same teachers throughout the entire year and with the same group of students for every year (Russian university students move in groups, so 1 group will have the same classes with his/her group for years 1-5...crazy!).  Personally, I'd go insane, but I think this can certainly have an impact on the education students receive.

Writing papers & research. Russians, on average, don't do this, don't know how to research, don't know how to write an argumentative/research paper, or do citations. These things are often part of their requirements and while I've never seen a thesis done, I know they do them in their 5th years, but, as an American...no as an academic, the sheer amount of plagiarism that occurs here is beyond belief.  I cannot, however, make any claim to plagiarism in areas outside the study of English. I believe that students researching in Russian would be able to do this much more successfully (by Western standards), but in English it's...wow.

Ask English students to do a project on someone, to write a paper and you will get stuff literally copy and pasted from the internet. They don't bother to correct anything. If they find something in Russian, they will throw it into a translator and just use that.  They often times cannot even pronounce half the words in the report.  Another ETA even had an instance where she was chatting online with one of her students and her student proceeded to copy and paste their chat and use it in a paper.  By American standards, you wouldn't survive a month at university.  You'd fail classes left and right and eventually just get kicked out.  Again, however, I cannot blame students for a lack of trying *usually* because this is the norm throughout Russia and most teachers here take no issue with this.

Now don't get me wrong, I hate citations. I believe you need them, but all these different pointless formats? APA, MLA, Chicago, NRA, NCAA, NBA, CFL, NAFTA, NAMBLA, etc (you get my point); there are so many different types of citations and why we can't have just one is beyond me so long as the appropriate people get credit.  Oh well. Anyways, as a bi-product of this, I am working with my students on teaching them to cite their sources in a very basic way: author, title, date or website, address, date.  I've had varying success, with some students going way overboard and I think listing sources they didn't or wouldn't even use, to students continuing the plague of plagiarism.  Since I work with Access or "school" students, this seems to be a travesty occurring at all levels.

*I'm also going to throw in the concept of cheating in this area.  Much of the focus of Russian education is on memorization, not conceptual understanding, and as such a lot of cheating occurs.  Give students a test in class and they will use their phones, they will blatantly look and copy off another student or they will just plain turn and start to talk and ask if they don't know.  When you don't need a conceptual understanding of ideas and aren't asked to give opinions, thoughts, etc, it can be a breeding ground for cheating. When teachers simply want the right answer and that's it, it can lead to a breeding ground for cheating. *

Russia is working hard, however, in pushing their students to be better writers and to stray away from plagiarism. It's a process and old habits die hard, but they are pushing for this and it's my understanding that significant progress has been made in the more metro regions.  Out here in the boonies, educational reforms such as these are slower to arrive, but they are happening and it's encouraging to see.

Attendance here in Russia is also interesting.  Interesting because half the time it seems optional, whether at the university or school levels.  At the school level, in the US, attendance is much more strict and missing an X number of days can result in consequences due to missing lessons, homework and tests.  That is not the same here and students frequently miss classes, sometimes for reasonable reasons (doing Math Olympics, etc) and other times not (playing video games at home).  I am, as a teacher, also discouraged; from the perspective of the students who often choose to skip and parents who don't enforce their children to attend, but also because teachers don't take initiative.

At the university level, it's not so different. I skipped more than my fair share of undergrad classes, particularly the lecture classes where I wasn't going to be missed.  Here they're a bit more brave in skipping since the class sizes are quite small (anywhere from 2-10 students and the teachers know each of the students personally).  I don't think I'd be that brave, but you never know. If I had as much repetition, I just might be.

Finally, I'm going to discuss respect in general.  I had intended this last bit to focus solely on mobile phones, but I realize that isn't enough. There is a considerable gap between what respect looks like in Russia and in the US and it's important to note.

First, students here stand up (at least in Elista) when the teacher enters the class. It's a sign of respect and one I have certainly not become accustomed to, but it's not such a bad thing.

Second, if you've ever been to Russia, you know that Russians mobile phones are attached to them in a way that Americans can't compete with.  This is generally not awful, except during class. Americans turn off mobile phones, put them on silent and tend to not take a call unless we know it to be an emergency.  That's not to say we don't text or use our computers or find numerous other ways to be disrespectful during classes in the US, but we try much harder to be sneaky about it.  Both teachers and students here in Russia leave mobile phones on during lessons. Should a phone ring while the teacher is speaking, he/she will stop, grab the phone and start to talk. If a student's phone rings, they will ask to step out and have a chat.  This is really difficult for Americans to get used to and one that I personally find, at least from a US perspective, very disrespectful.  Just today I asked a student to put his phone away so he looks at me, hides his phone and then turns his back to me like I didn't know what he was doing. The result was me holding on to his phone for the rest of the class. Fun for him!

Finally there is general conversation.  In my experience, and this may certainly not be the norm, when one person who is not the teacher (and occasionally is) is speaking, people chat and they chat loudly.  Despite repeated shh's or quick notes of "so and so is speaking and I can't hear them" this trend persists and again, as an American, is very frustrating.

Overall, Dear Readers, I hope these posts on educational differences don't come off as me complaining (though some of it surely is) or condemning Russian culture.  Russian culture is simply different than what I am used to and it requires adjusting in many different areas. I do have my preferences as to what I think works and what doesn't, but I have no intention of voicing those, although I think these preferences come through quite clearly in what I've written despite my best efforts.  In the end, perhaps these are my observations from the view of a purely annoyed, angered teacher or perhaps they are just general observations from someone teaching in a foreign country. Either way, I'm sure there's several lessons to be learned.

Differences in Educational Culture - Part 1

I'm actually pretty surprised that I haven't taken the time to blog about this yet, but my classes today pushed a button and it just so happens that button was my self-destruct button.

Before I dive into what happened today, I believe a little background info is required.  My main responsibility here in Elista is working with Access students. The Access program here in Russia provides students aged 13-16 (or in 'school' in other words) with after school classes, camps and summer camps all aimed at learning English in an interactive and fun atmosphere.  Well this new semester, I was told that we wanted to make things slightly more American, so I should give out homework, give grades etc.  This was great news for me. It would provide a nice and certainly unique opportunity to finish my graduate work and would also be a big help in preparing me for the trials and tribulations of taking over my own class next year.  I eagerly planned my lessons, readied homework and even created a class contract for my students.  Here, however, is where my excitement was abruptly and unceremoniously cut short.

The other ETAs in Russia can certainly attest to this, but for those of you who don't know, Russian students are notoriously bad at doing homework.  Not that they can't do it, just that they don't. Ever. Sure, there's one or two of the really good students in each class who always do every bit of homework and go above and beyond what's expected, but in general it ain't happening.   I was hoping this semester would be differently precisely for those reasons listed above, but I was disappointed. I let optimism get the better of me and didn't follow the age old maxim of 'no expectations, no disappoints'.

Well today, as I said, pushed a button.  Being Black History month in the US, I had assigned me students to do a presentation on Martin Luther King, Jr.  I gave a lesson on him, assigned this to them two weeks ago, gave them the option of doing a power point or writing a paper, gave them a rubric with parameters that I felt were well within their English capabilities. Well today came and out of the 45 students I teach, 10 turned in presentations.  This upset me a bit, but wasn't what really set me off.

Here's what set me off. Monday was President's Day in the US so naturally I chose that as my topic for Tuesday's lesson. We had a good time and did some activities and at the end I gave them this homework assignment: complete this sentence with what you would do: 'If I were President of the USA I would (do)....". I gave them a simple prompt and asked only one sentence of them and how many did this? 7. Seven students, including just 1 from my highest level class for whom this was an extremely easy lesson.  Needless to say, I was disappointed, let down, heartbroken. I had devoted this time and effort and nothing came of it.

I was, and am, sad about it, but as the title of this blog reads, this is due, in my believe to differences in educational cultures.  While I was upset with the students for not doing their homework, it wasn't really them I was mad at. It was me for hoping I stroll into their classroom, with my well-planned lessons and change how they think and how they study and learn in a matter of weeks.

I get asked by students, quite often actually, if I think Russian students are more hard-working than American students.  Often times, my Russian students are of the opinion that they are, in fact, certainly more hard working and I usually end up having to dodge this question because from a teaching perspective, I get upset and know that if I don't dodge it, I'll say something regrettable. Not necessarily because I believe it, but just out of frustration.

I don't think Russian students are more 'hard-working' than American students, nor do I think the American students to be more 'hard-working', but I think you have to look at the idea of what a hard worker is within the constructs of each individual and of each culture.

The first big difference, again as any ETA or anyone who's ever taught in Russia can tell you, is the idea of discussion is non-existent.  Ask students, teachers, anyone in a class to have a discussion, whether as a class, in groups or with a partner, and you'll get a bunch of blank stares like you're standing there completely naked...even if they understand you perfectly.  In schools in the US, at all levels, one of the major focuses is on student-oriented learning; getting the students to take control of their own learning, teaching them to be responsible for it and learn to enjoy it, while we, as teachers, are there to provide some information and guidance along the way.

This is not a widespread concept within Russia. The Soviet style of teaching here is still popular where the teacher talks and talks and talks and drills students and instills the fear of God in them (yes I see the irony in this), berates, calls them 'stupid' (sometimes to their face) and evokes a terrifying image that can easily cause a student to shell up. Not all teachers are this harsh and this was a slight exaggeration, but you get the idea. This method is changing, but it still has a long way to go.  And as far as discussion in concerned? Not a chance. I've heard this is part of Soviet system as well, but less educationally and more of a fear of sharing one's opinion for fear of repercussion from the authorities.  That kind of true fear can certainly make a large impact on culture.

What does this mean for an American teaching in Russia though? It means you have to adapt in different ways because if you're like me, you can't stand there and talk for an hour and a half, you don't want to even if you could and you don't think anyone gets much from it (I personally get 10 or so of a lecture before I pull out my phone and play games or generally tune out).

• It means you have to be creative and learn to fill (lots) of down time in your classroom because these 'discussions', 'group work' things are going to go by in a flash because there's not a lot of discussion really going on.  
• It means your students must truly be able to relate to the content you're teaching them or they must find it very interesting.  The more the students connect with you're teaching them, the more likely you are to find a common ground between the activities, exercises you'd like them to do and a place that's comfortable for them within (or just outside) of what they normally do.  Here, in Elista, students are very proud of Kalmyk culture and I usually find that it's a good activity to relate my lessons back to this in some way.  
• It also means you have work extra hard to foster this idea of discussion. I also run evening classes a couple times a week and the students who show up every week have become accustomed to my style of teaching and now when asked to work in groups, they set off and get going right away. They are absolutely brilliant at it. Sure, the conversation might be all in Russia, but that's okay because 1) their English may or may not be advanced enough to do this and 2) the end result of the task will require them to create, speak, write, perform or do something in English so they will have to focus on that. This evening class has shown me that, over time and with perseverance, these habits can be changed.

So in this sense are Russian students harder working? No. Are Americans? No. Neither Americans nor Russians would have an easy time if simply plucked out of their classrooms and set down in one in the other country.

Let me discuss the homework differences in this first post since it was one of, if not the main, reason for my writing this. I haven't been to a school (primary/secondary) school here in Russia so I can't attest to homework in those settings, so I'm going to discuss what I see at the university level.

Students here are often given homework, but as with my classes, most of it does not get done.  I've seen this as an outsider, but also took over a teacher's lessons for 3 weeks and not an extraordinary amount of homework got done.  And why should it? At worst, the usual repercussion of failing to do so is actually being forced to do so.  I hate saying this as a teacher, but I'm also saying it because I've been a student, still am a student and have much more experience being a student: part of doing homework comes from the idea that something bad will happen to your grades if you don't.  This idea is not the same in Russia.  In Russia, from what I've seen they don't often have presentations, certainly they don't have the idea of mid-terms and as such littler tests, etc are also not very common.

The big thing in Russia are final exams at the end of the semester, most of which are oral (perhaps all, but I'm not sure).  When there are tests or homework, cheating is extremely and as for researching or doing a project, plagiarism is the name of the game (we'll get to that in the next post, it deserves it's own section).  These things, combined with virtually zero weight being attributed to homework means that it doesn't get done or it doesn't get done on time.  I've also noticed that many of students, when it comes to turning in homework, want to speak out orally and do it; the idea of turning in homework (with my Access students anyways) seems completely foreign to them.

Anyways, all of this is extremely frustrating for me and I haven't figured out a way around it yet.  Really guiding students, giving them options, making topics relatable, none of it seems to work.  I'm certainly not assigning these topics to punish them, but to, at least in my mind, help them process the information I'm giving them and help them with their English, but it's not working.  As with discussion, the idea of being 'right' here in Russia is what most teachers look for and what most students want to give, so when it comes to homework I give, part of it clashes with this cultural idea of always being right and plays a role in the homework not getting down, but then again what do I know....

So again, is one or the other more 'hardworking'? No. i think Russians would be overwhelmed in America and Americans would be terrified in Russia.

Stay tuned, Dear Readers, for part 2 coming up in a day or so.  But for those of you might actually take the time to read this long piece, I'd love your feedback, thoughts, insights, corrections, judgments, opinions, etc because I feel I may have taken a few too many liberties with this idea of Russian educational culture and what I think it is.

The First Day of the Rest of My Life

Today, I had the first of my "real" lessons and I think it went pretty well.  Twice a week I'll be doing "optional" classes for students who want to improve their language where we speak in English and talk about different topics in American Culture.

Today was the first of these classes and a majority of the class time was spent doing my introduction (which I happened to think was well done as well as quite brilliant and witty) and the students introducing themselves, during which we played two truths and a lie.  It was pretty fun and the students seemed to enjoy it, though the varying levels of English provided different levels of discussion depending on who was speaking at the time.

Our next topic was Independence Day.  Saturday, September 18th is День Города (Day of the City) here in Elista, which is a celebration of the day the city was founded and as such we discussed, briefly due to time constraints, Independence Day in the US.  I explained to the students what Independence Day is, what it means to Americans, how it is celebrated, etc.  All around, it was a great time, but then came the best part of the lesson.

My task to the students (thanks Melanie!!!!!!!!) was to have them create a holiday of their own. The students were asked to create a new holiday, create 2-3 traditions associated with the holiday, the date that it is celebrated and why people celebrate it.   In order to get them started, I provided my students with my own example.  Here is mine (and the students' holidays):

My example holiday was "The National Day of New Socks", which is celebrated on December 4th of every year.  On this day, each person puts on a brand new pair of white socks.  People also go out and buy the ugliest pair of socks they can find and give them, as a gift, to a family member.  I decided that this holiday is celebrated due to the heroics of Alexander J. Sockerson who gave out millions of pairs of socks during the Great Depression so that with no money, food or jobs, Americans would not go sock-less and have cold, dirty feet.  So was my example.

The first group created the "National Ice Cream Day" which is celebrated the 1st of June in order to make sure everyone feels happy and gets a chance to meet new people.  On this day people are only allowed to eat ice cream, wear clothes that resemble ice cream and throw ice cream at a stranger's face.  There is also an ice cream eating contest!

The second group had "The Day of Extreme Luck" which is a day for students who hope for lots of luck as they prepare to take their exams.  This holiday is on January 6th, the traditional day when exams begin in Russia after fall semester.  Students offer a prayer of sorts before the test and hope they have amazing luck during the test and that the questions they are asked to answer are the ones to which they know the answers.

The third group created "The Eggs Day".  This day is on January 1st and is there to celebrate...well I'm not entirely what they were celebrating...sort of a celebration of the Egg and of life itself I think.  They described how Jan. 1st is the day when the first hen apparently laid the first egg; how eggs are prepared in many different ways and perhaps most importantly, how eggs are a sign of fertility.  To celebrate this holiday, people run around and throw eggs at each other and the more eggs you end up getting pelted with the happier you should be!

Finally, the last group presented and  were, above and beyond, my personal favorite.  I was worried this group wasn't going to create anything since they were falling far behind other groups and we were running out of time, but they surprised me, boy did they surprise me.  This group created the "Beer Bellies Day", a day celebrated the last Sunday of each June whereupon the people drink unfathomable amounts of beer, wear shirts that showcase their beer guts and have beer drinking contests.  As if this wasn't enough, the group created a legend around how the holiday began, I'll do my best to retell it:

Once upon a time (Жили были...), long ago, there was a village where the people loved to drink beer.  They loved it more than anything else in the world, it was their sustenance and their life support.  But one day, one most unfortunate day near the end of June, just as the weather was reaching its peak for the summer, the village ran out of beer.  The villagers were completely distressed.  They would not drink water, nor juice, nor kvas.  All they wanted was beer, but alas, they had none and they knew what to do not.

But luckily for them, there exists a man of extraordinary capabilities.  Did you know that Santa Clause has a brother?  Yes he does and his name is Santa Beerman and unlike his cheerful, good-natured brother, Santa Beerman hates winter and Christmas, but loves summer and beer.  So on this most ill-fated of days in the village, appeared a man, a man most glorious and a man loved to this day.  This man was Santa Beerman and to the villagers he came with tidings of kegs and beer (unlike comfort and joy...pshh) and restored the village to it's legendary beer-drinking status.  To this day, the city still celebrates the coming of Santa Beerman through its "Beer Bellies Day" the last Sunday of each June.

This was the gist of the story my students told (okay I added a few descriptive words of my own for emphasis, but whatever, the story was theirs and theirs alone).  I was absolutely shocked by this "legend" and so happy they came up with it.  It was, perhaps, the most creative thing I've seen students ever do and thoroughly enjoyable.

Overall, I believe my first "optional" class went quite well and I hope the students enjoyed themselves and that they return for more of them (fingers crossed).  One disturbing thing, however, is that I offered my students cookies, which they didn't seem to want.  I had cookies set out and all ready to go and I ended eating most of them myself.  I was disappointed with their cookie appetites; I thought university students loved cookies, but it seems I was mistaken.

So, Dear Readers, goes my first class.  While I won't be blogging about every class I hold, I found this particular one special because it was my first and I was terribly nervous about it and I do hope there will be more.  So until next time!