How to Keep Them Quiet...? Guaranteed.

 This is an extract from Cucarachas or Cucuruchos: An English Teacher's Spanish Dilemma (2019) available from Amazon.

Finally, finally, finally (or, ¡por fin! as a Spaniard would say) I’ve found the Holy Grail: a fool-proof way of keeping my class quiet. And I do mean, absolutely silent. Why didn’t I think of this before? Why didn’t anybody tell me? It will certainly go in my book: Perfect Primary Practice. It’s going to be an international bestseller (this silencing trick should certainly work on children of any nationality). I could become an advisor for Ofsted – or whatever they’re called now-a-days. The Gestapo? I don’t know.

So, What’s the secret? I hear you cry, especially if you’re a primary-school teacher and it’s nearing the end of the summer term and you’ve got another riot brewing. Well, the secret is Blu-Tack, or tacko-blanco as we call it around here because it’s white. Here’s what to do: at the end of term when it’s time to clear the walls of all your timetables; dinner menus; bus-lists; after-school-club lists; pictures, poems or stories drawn or written by the children; and all the other detritus that you’ve stuck up over the last year – just pull them all down. It’ll take you three minutes. What about all the stray blobs of Blu-Tack and torn corners of damp pages? You can’t leave them all up there! Course you can’t. But you do. And you watch.

Before long a child at your desk (it’s María) will start pulling at a stray blob while they’re telling you about their new rabbit. They won’t be alone for long, and poor old new rabbit won’t be the focus of their concentration for long either. María will be joined by Paco and Rodri. Paco and Rodri will be joined by Paula and Laura; and Luís and – and before you know what’s happened the whole class will be engrossed in the most compulsive pass-time since the Rubik Cube took over the world.

I stand and stare (and listen) in amazement as they silently pluck and pull at the minutest pieces of tacko-blanco. They seem hypnotised by the task, showing (not telling) showing each other how it comes off more easily if you use one piece of tacko-blanco in your fingers to capture the smears and blobs on the walls. They work like very-hungry caterpillars cropping the sticky goo until there’s not a micron left. Then they turn and stare at me, looking slightly stunned that half-an-hour has disappeared without any of them uttering a sound. They look almost bereft, as if they have no idea how anything will ever capture their minds so fully ever again…

Tacko-blanco: it has magic powers.

If you like the blog, why not read the eBooks? Zen Kyu Maestro: An English Teacher's Spanish Adventure, (2013 Monday Books) available from Amazon. 

And the sequel: Cucuruchos or Cucurachas? An English Teacher's Spanish Dilemma, 2019 eBook or paperback from Amazon.

Two years in the life of an English teacher, teaching a class of lively Spanish seven-year-olds, in English, in Spain.

What could possibly go wrong?

“The detailed way Dean has described the atmosphere of this little city in Spain is magnificent.” Salford University, The Salfordian.

Click HERE for free sample chapters:

The Perils of the Infant Playground...

This is an extract from 'Cucarachas or Cucuruchos: An English Teacher's Spanish Dilemma', a year-in-my-life teaching Spanish primary children, in English, in Spain. What could possibly go wrong? You'll find another free sample on Amazon.

An infant teacher’s away today so I’m doing her playtime duty. I usually do duty in the ‘junior’ playground where footballs and skipping ropes dominate, although there are often also a fair number of football cards being swapped, dolls being dressed and undressed again, tops spun and cuddly toys dismembered. I know the score in the junior playground – well, as long as Toni hasn’t lost another football.

The infant playground is a whole new dimension. Here, I’m less at ease. Well, to be honest, I’ve not much idea what’s going on. Swarms of ridiculously small children bumble around, bumping into each other, like wind-up toys with pieces of their mechanisms missing. Every so often a bumbling child will collapse onto the tarmac as the wiring between brain and legs gets mangled somewhere near their belly-button. It’s my ‘duty’ to help, as Miss Dolly (who’s on duty with me) has gone to ‘powder her nose’…

‘Are you OK?’ I try gamely.

‘WAAAAAAAAHHHHH.’

‘Shall we get you up and go and see Miss María?’

‘WAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!’

A large crowd of small spectators gathers. ‘Do you know who this is?’ I ask the spectators. I might as well ask the trees. The children look at me like I’m an exhibit in the London Dungeon: they’re hugely interested but slightly frightened. I think it’s ‘cos I’m a ‘man’. They don’t get many men around here. I might not come back in a hurry.

The wailing subsides and damaged child sits up. There’s no blood, but a fair bit of snot.

‘Go to the toilet and bring me some tissue,’ I order no one in particular. They ignore me. Actually, one of them is stroking my head. I have quite a tight crop so I guess it might feel like a hedgehog. I turn to face the child who’s stroking me. It’s a boy. He smiles although he doesn’t have many teeth. He looks at me like I am a hedgehog, or any other dumb animal who’ll let you stroke them for as long as you like. He cocks his head to one side like he’s pitying my inability to sort things out. I smile back at him. Child on floor suddenly gets up and staggers away across the playground into the melee. He’s like a mini-Frankenstein fresh off the operating table stumbling blindly into everything in his meandering path. Now I’m left on the ground with a crowd of ten or fifteen children staring at me. Two of them are now stroking my head. One of them asks me a question. I can tell it’s a question from the intonation and the fact that they’re pointing at my head. The language they’re using, however, is a mystery. A small girl with curly hair has all her fingers in her mouth, like she thinks she’s sucking a giant lolly; I hope she’s not planning on stroking my head in the near future.

Suddenly two or three start to point. And laugh. Before I can say, ‘What the hell are you laughing at?’ they’ve lost all interest in me and are starting to walk behind me. I turn around and see my career disappear.

Behind me is the entrance to the school. It’s sealed by a metal-barred gate, about four-metres wide and two-metres high. Whenever someone wants to enter the school they buzz through to the office who’ll open the gate. The gate is opening now, sliding silently to the left, as a delivery truck waits outside with hazards flashing and engine rumbling. My problem is that six or seven children have climbed onto the gate and are enjoying a slow ride – towards a quite nasty-looking mechanism which includes some pretty large metal cogs and gears. It’s a bit like a James Bond film where James Bond is tied to a board which is moving towards a circular saw spinning at great speed. The children who have been watching (and stroking) me are now pelting towards the gate to join in the relatively-low jinks. Bloody hell!

‘Get off that gate!’ I yell, wondering if any of them are capable of such a feat without risking dislocated joints or broken bones. The gate isn’t moving that quickly but, as I’ve already seen, these kids can fall over if a cloud passes overhead. ‘Get off!’ I yell again, to equal effect (none). I rush over to the site of international incident involving possible death or maiming of dozens of small children under the care of J.J.Dean, and start plucking children off the gate from the side nearest the cogs and gears. While I’m doing this I shout at the other children who are approaching me on the gate as it continues it’s journey. The children are having a wonderful time, smiling and screaming back at me; they must think I’m just joining in the ballyhoo. One boy has a particularly tight grip on the bars. I have to peel his fingers off before setting him down on the ground and reaching for the next laughing child who is inches from death but doesn’t give a monkey’s. Within seconds there’s another boy with an equally strong grip – until I notice that it’s the same boy who’s just found another space on the gate and has jumped back on.

‘Again!’ he shouts, nodding towards his fingers which are turning white with the effort.

I’m finally saved when the gate stops, fully open. I breathe a long sigh before noticing my next problem. Luckily, the driver isn’t planning to drive his truck into the playground (I wouldn’t have bet against it), but what he is going to do is carry his packet to the office while the office staff leave the gate open until he returns. I stand in the middle of the entrance facing into the playground. A dozen children, twenty now, maybe thirty, line up facing me, staring beyond me into the orange groves on the other side of the road. I honestly can’t see what they’re staring at, they come in and out of this gate every day, it’s not like I’ve opened Narnia’s wardrobe for them to look into.

A girl points. I look around. There’s a dog.

Wild dogs – well, OK, strays – are quite common around here. This one is a brown 57 who doesn’t look dangerous. No, it’s worse. Much worse. He looks playful. His head is cocked to one side, a bit like the little boy who was stroking me five minutes ago when my problems couldn’t possibly get any worse. The dog takes a tentative step towards me. Oh god!

‘Get away!’ I say, ridiculously in English. ‘¡Vete!’ I try, which I’m pretty sure means get outa here you mangy mongrel. He prances towards me like I want him to play. ‘Goo on! Get ouda here!’ He jinks past me and is in.

Utter bedlam. Complete chaos. Imagine aliens invade a busy IKEA firing lasers. Kids are screaming in all directions, bumping and bashing into the trees and each other, tripping over balls and ants. Within seconds there are half a dozen on the floor nursing cut knees and god-knows what else. I’m powerless to do anything except guard the entrance to make sure none of them run out onto the road. Where the hell is Miss Dolly?

I spot the van driver coming back across the playground looking bemused at the carnage that is underway.

‘Perro!’ (dog) I say as he passes me, like this will explain everything. He raises his head in an ‘Oh, right,’ sort of expression. Then he puts his fingers in his mouth and whistles the loudest whistle I’ve ever heard. The dog appears from the mayhem and pelts towards him provoking another epidemic of tripping and bumping into each other. Driver gives me a little salute as he climbs into his cab. The gate starts to close.

Dolly saunters out as the bell goes and the gate clicks shut. She’s not exactly hurrying to begin with but her pace slows as she takes in the battlefield. There are children hobbling towards her pointing at their grazed knees and elbows and wailing like zombies. She looks at me. Her look says I leave you alone for five minutes…

Next time they’re looking for some sucker to do duty in the infant playground? I’ve got a dentist’s appointment for root canal.

If you like the blog, why not read the eBooks? Zen Kyu Maestro: An English Teacher's Spanish Adventure, (Monday Books) available from Amazon. 

And the sequel: Cucuruchos or Cucurachas? An English Teacher's Spanish Dilemma, eBook or paperback from Amazon.

Two years in the life of an English teacher, teaching a class of lively Spanish seven-year-olds, in English, in Spain.

What could possibly go wrong?

“The detailed way Dean has described the atmosphere of this little city in Spain is magnificent.” Salford University, The Salfordian.

Click below for free sample chapters:

Zen Kyu Maestro      Cucarachas 

eBook paperback

Yo Me Vacuno Seguro

You might find these three health education videos (from the Spanish Ministerio de Sanidad) useful for your students to translate:

Vera Enfermera

Juan Jubilado

Sonía Viróloga

If you like the blog, why not read the eBooks? Zen Kyu Maestro: An English Teacher's Spanish Adventure, (Monday Books) available from Amazon. 

And the sequel: Cucuruchos or Cucurachas? An English Teacher's Spanish Dilemma, eBook or paperback from Amazon.

Two years in the life of an English teacher, teaching a class of lively Spanish seven-year-olds, in English, in Spain.

What could possibly go wrong?

“The detailed way Dean has described the atmosphere of this little city in Spain is magnificent.” Salford University, The Salfordian.

Click below for free sample chapters:

  Zen Kyu Maestro      Cucarachas eBook paperback

What About All Those Long Holidays...?

An extract from Cucarachas or Cucuruchos: An English Teacher's Spanish Dilemma. Free sample chapter available HERE

TEACHING HAS ITS DOWNSIDES: one of the biggest always occurs when people find out what you do. Very few blurt it out immediately. They beat about the bush, asking you which subject you teach, or which age group; they tell stories about teachers they remember (for good or bad); they disclose their favourite subjects, the ones they were good at - and they often want you to know the ones they hated (it's usually PE); they complain about the amount of homework they got (too much) and the amount their own children get (not nearly enough).

But if you're a teacher, you know this is all preliminary. The hors d'oeuvre before the main course, the warm-up before the kick-off, the trailer before the feature. You know what they're going to say, at some point in the conversation (nearly always just after you've expressed a slight dissatisfaction about some educational issue or other): they give you a curt little nod of the head and a slightly accusatory fixing of the eyes before finally saying what they’ve wanted to say since they first discovered you were a teacher.

'Ah, but what about all those long holidays?'

They usually cross their arms at this point, like they’ve caught you telling porkies, or filching a couple of extra pencils from the stock cupboard. They might look sideways at another member of the group and nod another curt little nod like they’ve discovered a new prime number or solved the Irish backstop problem. They wait for me to put up a defence, to say that we need to recover from a full-on job, re-charge our batteries, prepare next year's materials. This is all true. But it's never the response I give.

Instead, I shake my head slightly wistfully, like I've just taken the first lick of a rum'n'raisin ice-cream, then I sigh a little sigh and quietly say, 'Yeah, fantastic. Thirteen weeks... How much holiday do you get...?'

They usually change the subject after that. 

Hey, Macarena - the Only Way to Teach the Times Tables...

 This is an extract from Zen Kyu Maestro: An English Teacher's Spanish Adventure, Monday Books, 2013, available from Amazon.

I CLICK THE ‘PLAY’ button on my laptop and my maths lesson is shattered by the chugging drumbeat and incessant bass line of an MP3 file I downloaded a couple of years previously. It’s a lesson idea I tried without a lot of success a few times back in the UK. I have an inkling that I might have more luck here.

A mass of heads jolt upright in startled disbelief as the tune gathers momentum. Pablo (the First) is the first to gather his wits. He joins in with the drumbeat using the flats of his palms on the desktop.

Carmen, Macarena and María Two are swaying rhythmically in their seats and (surprisingly quickly) synchronising a sort of hand-jive which takes them left, then right, then forwards, then backwards (but not yet out of their chairs).

I’m sitting at my desk pretending to be engrossed in the weekly spelling test results. The vast majority of the class are still looking stunned, thinking maybe that I’ve accidentally hit the wrong key on my laptop while simultaneously going deaf.

The vocal line starts, accompanied in perfect timing by at least a dozen of my more brazen flock, many of whom also send their chairs skittering backwards and jump to their feet, arms flapping in unison, hips swaying and gyrating in time.

My numeracy lesson begins. We’re (well, they’re) dancing the Macarena. Mac herself is blushing slightly as a dozen fingers point as they sing the chorus: ‘Hey, Macarena!’ But she’s safely flanked by Carmen and María Two so she dances on undeterred, her Latin blood obviously too strong to submit to any minor embarrassment.

I don’t really know the moves of the Macarena. It wasn’t my era, I was much more of a Le Freak man. But it’s not difficult to copy the movements ever so mutedly, as I continue to puzzle over a dozen permutations of the spelling of ‘wait’. There is near uproar. Pablo (the First) redoubles the enthusiasm of his hip-swinging, possibly afraid that I might be about to steal his limelight. This encourages most of the others to join in now, with the notable exception of Jake.

Jake is nailed rigidly to his seat with a look of horror chiselled into his features. He’s probably never seen a teacher dance the Macarena before, seated or otherwise. Not at the start of a maths lesson, anyway.

The song reaches its conclusion. Pandemonium. They’re hopping and squealing and hugging each other. ‘¡Otra! ¡Otra!’ (again, again) they chant.

‘If…’ I bellow, my hands up in the air, trying to regain the smallest modicum of control over this seething mass of junior excitement. ‘I’ll play it again if…’

‘Yes, yes, OK, vale!’

‘…if I can teach you some new words. Very easy words.’

‘Vale, OK!’

‘Right! Now watch and listen.’ I put my hands behind my ears and mime being unable to hear anything. This isn’t brilliant acting, the noise would drown out The Who jamming in the corner. Their furious shushing for quiet increases the volume by 10% and showers me with spittle, but they finally quieten. I grab a marker and scribble across the board, ‘3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 33, 36, Hey MACARENA!’ Then I hit the play button and they burst into life.

I quickly carve my way through the disco and crouch down in front of Jake. It’s clear this is never going to be his style. He’s got about as much Latin blood in him as a Pukka Pie. I could just about imagine him singing and dancing if Sheffield Wednesday were to win the Champions League, but we’d have a long wait for that.

‘Listen, Jake,’ I plead. ‘I need someone who’s brilliant at maths!’ He’s not, but that’s not the point. ‘Could you point at the numbers on the board as I sing them? This lot are never going to get it right if you don’t help me.’ I flick my eyes towards his gyrating classmates with a look that says, ‘Look, they’re crazy. I can’t manage them on my own!’

‘I no ’av to dance?’ he checks.

‘No, you don’t have to dance,’ I reply.

‘Vale!’ he says, making disturbingly better progress with Spanish than with his English.

We just about make it into position as the vocals start and I boom out the three-times table, drowning out whatever it is the singers are singing and nailing each number to the incessant beat that the hand (and hip) movements follow. Jake tries gamely to keep up with his pointing duties but he’s only made it as far as ‘18’ as the rest of us are bellowing, ‘Hey Macarena!’ and doing that neat little two-footed jump with 90 degree turn included. Luckily, Pablo (the First) is a whizz at maths, so he picks it up instantaneously. Carmen, Mac and María Two are also pretty sharp cookies, so I’ve soon got the three-times table drowning out anyone who is still trying to sing the original lyrics.

We reach the end and again, I have to use every trick I know (short of a large tin of Quality Street) to get them off cloud nueve and ready to listen. I’ve got an unforeseen problem when we get to 21. All the numbers before 21 have one or two syllables, perfect to fit in with the beat of the song; 21, sadly, has three syllables and the ones who know their three times tables this far can’t say it quickly enough for them to be ready to say ‘24’ on time, which is another three syllables. By the time we get to 27, a four-syllable number, they are so far off the pace that it’s degenerating into a fine solo performance (guess who) until we reach the punch line of ‘Hey Macarena’ when everyone joins in lustily, including, I’ve noticed with some surprise and pleasure, Jake.

I pray that Ofsted aren’t in the vicinity, as I do a quick demonstration of how boys who were brought up in Cricklewood learned how to say ‘Twenny’, using only one syllable, instead of ‘twenty’, using two. Before long I’m chanting, ‘Twenny-one, twenny-four, twenny-sevn,’ at them and they’re parroting them back perfectly using only two syllables for each. I do a similar, slight adjustment to 33 and 36 and we’re off and running again.

They barely miss a beat, although I manage to crash a verse by putting my hands on my hips when I should have put them on my head, but they give me pitying, raised eyes and we regain our composure and carry on regardless.

‘¡Otra!’ they yell.

‘It’s too easy,’ I yell back as I rub the 6, 12 and 18 off the board.

‘Eeeeesss EEEEEEEEEEZZZZZZZZEEEEEE!’ they respond and we start again.

It’s playtime but they don’t want to go out. Even more remarkable, it’s snack-time and they’re not interested.

‘OK, OK,’ I concede, feigning great reluctance, ‘We’ll do it again tomorrow, but only if you can sing it without any numbers written on the board!’ I clean the board theatrically. ‘Tomorrow, no numbers on the board!’ I repeat, for those who seem slightly to have lost the drift.

Bedlam. ‘¡We do eeet!’ they yell, leaping up and down and hugging each other.

I escape to the staffroom for a saline drip and return to the class to find a huddle of a dozen or so around a table. I edge closer to wig what they’re saying.

Macarena (appropriately) seems to be in charge. ‘Next ees 24 but you say twenny-four, den ees 27 and you say twenny-sev’n quickly, quickly, quickly!’

Scraps of paper are being scribbled on hurriedly. I mosey across.

‘What’s all this?’ I bellow, nearly sending Carmen into Earth orbit. ‘That’s cheating! You can’t take it home and practise!’

‘You no say we no can!’ Pablo (the First) responds dismissively. If I’ve not said they no can then I guess I’ve got no argument. I bluster on a bit but they quickly see that I’m not really going to try to stop them.

Then I notice that even Jake has a damp scrap clutched in his palm. And as they head for the playground, humming the tune and swinging their hips, even he makes a rather stiff-limbed attempt to join in.

It might not always be clear what I’m teaching them, but it’s becoming obvious what they’re teaching me (and Jake). They have such energy, such enthusiasm, they love to be involved. Linda and I are seriously doubting whether we’ll stick it out here for two years, but at moments like this I feel sure I’ll want to. They might have been learning the three times table; I’ve been learning how to teach, all over again.

I have used this lesson before, but never with such a response. It makes me think that, as well as needing a lot of spoken work, these children really do respond well to a more active style of learning. A second year would be an opportunity for me to develop things more in that direction.

I hear the three-times-table Macarena starting up in the playground, so I look out of the window. A dozen of them are in two lines (Macarena out front) swinging and jerking in perfect time. Well, nearly perfect time. For in the back row, at the far end, moving a split second after all the rest, is Jake. (He even seems to be having a good stab at the words!)

A note on copyright. While I’d love to be able to pretend that the idea for the Macarena Times Tables lesson was mine, sadly I can’t. There are very few primary lessons with a copyright attached. I saw this lesson idea in the Times Educational Supplement around about 2004 as a suggestion sent in by someone, somewhere. Whoever you are, thank you – and if you haven’t already had the chance, I hope one day you’ll be able to teach it to a class of Spanish children. But a word of warning… Make sure you fully warm up the muscles around your hips before you start!

Click on the image for a free sample chapter of Zen Kyu Maestro (Amazon.co.uk)