jobs

so this week we've been talking about what jobs the students want when they get older. interestingly, older is a difficult concept to get across. so i've started saying, "in the future." the answers are across the board. CEO, boss, and managing director (i had three of the latter in my most recent class) are the most popular. when asked why, the answer is inevitably, money. though rachel had a kid in her class say that he wanted to be a boss because he wanted a secretary who could make him friends. interesting, to say the least. there were a fair share of football players (soccer--they are taught out of an english english book), musicians, writers, lawyers, artists, pilots, drivers. then came the ones from the book, butcher, shop assistant, milkman. after hearing any of those, i'd ask them to close their book.

what was interesting to me were the jobs that drew laughter when they were suggested. cleaner, housewife, farmer. after they laughed, i would ask what they thought was funny. there would never be an answer. i pointed out that i used to be a farmer, but they were never shocked about that.

after a good list had been written on the board, i would ask them questions. "which jobs make you famous?" artist, footballer, singer, boss. i would ask how a boss would be famous, and inevitably, bill gates would rear his head. i would ask what jobs make you rich, and i'd get the same answers, with engineer thrown in as well. a few students would say farmer, and i would ask them how. they would clarify--they meant american farmers. very interesting.

it's interesting to see the values of these students. it seems, right now, that money is number 1.