Teacher Gifts
Posted by Stuart at 11:04 AM on June 21, 2003"Thank you for giving me an A."
"You gave me a B+ instead of an A. Mai bpen rai (no problem)"
"You gave me an F. My GPA is low. Can you please give me a D?"
Over the past few weeks, my students from last semester have received their grades and several have come to talk to me about them. I am glad that they care about their grades, but I don't understand why the attitude is always "Thank you for giving me" or "Why did you give me..."
Of course the proper phrase is "I earned" not "you gave". I just dont know if it is a language issue or something deeper in the psyche of Thai students. From what I can tell, it is the latter -- it's just the way the students look at the situation.
I'm afraid I can't delve too deeply into this issue without coming down too hard on Thai society in general. So I think I will let it go, for now...
Oh don't worry, I say things like that all the time, as do all of the other teachers here. I tell them that they have to work a little bit, that they have to study to get good grades. School is not difficult if you put a little effort into it.
Yet it is amazing how many students come to us at the end of the semester to thank us for a good grade or to complain to us about a bad one. Both cases are not neccessary, I think. No need to thank me: I didn't give it to you, you earned it. No need to complain, either. When you don't go to class and you fail all the tests, you are going to get an F. It's not difficult to figure that one out.
Or things in Thailand have changed? My friends and I never come to teachers to thanks for what we tried for it. Some went straight to teachers room for the clarification in case they got what they didn't expect. or it's about institutional culture?
You could be right A. That's why I didn't start extending generalties to the entire culture. And yes, it could be just the type of students at my particular school... but again, I'll not take that bait. In any case, it is an annoyance that every teacher at my school has to deal with.
This is why some of my teachers said at the beginning of classes that "All of you get "A"s from me today but it's all depends on you to keep it through the semester or not", "Hard work will pay off" or "You'll get for what you try".
And again, I think it's about a language issue. I think they just want to know why they "got" BUT they used the word you "give". When I was in CU, teachers often clarified when some students wondering why they didn't get grades they'd expected(why B+ instead of A) Believe me Stuart, you may have to do that too...maybe next semester.