Case Studies

Case One

Phil is my foreign teacher. He is very nice and friendly to me and he often asks us to have free talk in his apartment. One day, I decided to give Phil a gift to express my appreciation of his help in my oral English. I called him but the line was busy. So I went to Phil’s apartment directly. He opened the door looking surprised, but didn’t let me in. I stood in the corridor and said a few words of thanks, and gave my gift to him and left quietly with great disappointment and puzzlement.. How could he be so cold to me? All my gratitude and fondness of Phil seemed to have gone. ..

Case Two

I could never forget my experience of an oral exam with our American teacher Mary. After reading the passage I chose on the spot and answered her questions about the reading material and I asked her how I did in the exam. She said I had done a very good job and my oral English was quite good. I left the examination room happily. But to my great astonishment, I wasn’t given a high score for what her praise of me. I felt kind of being tricked and couldn’t understand why Mary appeared to be so hypocritical. Similar things happened to my classmates, too.

Note: Have you ever had such an experience as the above two students? What do you think causes their trouble? Is it because their English was not good enough? Do you agree that Phil was cold to the student and Mary was hypocritical? How can we avoid such unhappy moments? Do you have any stories to tell about your contact with foreign teachers or foreign friends?