As I’m writing this I’ve just arrived in Poland for my first ever workshops here. ย And before everything got started I had a rare day off to look around the town.
Warsaw is a beautiful city. It feels just like Rome, beautiful streets, vistas and views round every corner.
Traveling to different cities, talking to the people and visiting the museums, you realise that this is of course all brand new.
Not long ago this city used to lie in complete ruins. Totally destroyed.
Seeing how wonderful it looks today shows that, just like in Hiroshima, any city can be rebuilt.
Or, just like in Cambodiaย or Syria, this destruction can happen to any city, anywhere. At any time.
Why I started ….
Recently I’ve been concentrating on the economics of what we do, on how the skills we teach can help theย poorest wrestle their way out of poverty.
But the reason I started Genki English was because I saw my students being forced to parade to marshall music in military uniforms. Being taught to obey without question, to never learn about history.
I thought that if I could give my kids the skills and opportunities to talk to their peers in other countries, then in the future if some madman would say to them to attack their neighbors they would reflect and think “well, I remember talking to kids from there at school and they were just the same as me.”
That was what I wanted to achieve.
Sometimes we play games, sometimes we act silly or stupid.
Actually teaching the way we do can be the most fun you can imagine.
But the reason we do what we do is as serious as it can be.
I am so grateful for the world I am so fortunate to live in and the opportunities it provides.
And that is something I want all of us to enjoy.
Let’s see what the teachers are like tomorrow!
Be genki,
Richard
Hello Richard,
Yes, Warsaw is a wonderful city and it’s quite nice at this time of year.
I love your photos of Warsaw.
Hi Richard!
Lovely pictures! Made Polish sparrows a texture for my splash screen. A very beautiful city, indeed! Never been there, though.
You’re absolutely right speaking about similarities all children (and people) have. The main of them is that everyone wants to live in peace. And it is so weird that wars happen this days! Hope that people in the next future will be clever enough not to damage the world. And if we teachers can contribute to world peace we definitely should do this! That’s why we teach our kids to speak English, or any other foreign language. And the better we teach the more friendly our kids will be to each other and to other kids around the world.
Best regards to everyone!
Oh, yeah!
May I just share this video link, of a skype-exchange between my students and Turkey:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yB5gFgQ3aGo
The kind of shocking thing for me was, that when I told them that we were going to do this on that day (it wasn’t planned, and I hadn’t prepared them in advance), they all went “Oh no!!! No no no, Turkey is so scary! No! I am not going to do this” (these are 7 year olds)
Of course there was no real REASON behind it except for the name of the country in the middle of news about” IS”.
Well, as you can see, I was able to get them on the screen and once the connection worked they were so excited and just going on how cute these little friends in Turkey are.
I am looking forward to next week’s Skype.