My favorite French thing isn't a word or a food, it's a hand gesture. It doesn't mean anything, but it means everything. The closest translation is "oh man!" or maybe just an exclamation point.
Yesterday my class of 7-year-olds was copying down the numbers eleven through twenty in their English notebooks. Things were going pretty well. They were all quietly using their little rulers to write in perfectly straight lines, and struggling to read my handwriting. The first time I wrote something they thought I used a different alphabet. Ouch.
I was writing "sixteen" on the board in my very best penmanship when a boy in the front row raised his hand and asked what color they should be using. The teacher said blue and he started squirming. "But I've been writing in red, is that bad?"
"Yes." she said. "That's VERY bad. Why would you use red, what were you thinking? Now you need to tear out that page in your notebook and start over completely. And your notebook will be missing a page, so you've basically ruined the whole year."
I smiled because I thought she was joking. Then I realized she wasn't. Time for a French hand gesture to sum up the situation.
yikes from Brooke Barker on Vimeo.
The day has come. I am commenting.
ReplyDeleteI freaking love your blog. Also you. And I kind of want to cry a little for the french boy and his red pen. Your life is awesome.
Dang, seriously? Poor little boy. Poor French education system. Maybe they should focus more on the students actually speaking rather than the color they use in their notebooks... Maybe they'd be better at foreign languages then... just my opinion...
ReplyDelete