Teaching, Turkish, and Tavla

This one goes out to Will Dinneen, who cares about these things a lot like I do.

Six weeks have passed since I determined the necessity for this post, but I haven't had the time to do it proper justice and I don't know that I ever will. But I came home from Antalya feeling revitalized in myself and in the goals I hope to achieve.

And I am experiencing greater urgency: last Sunday marked my two months here, and I know I haven't learned as much as I would like to in that time.

Considering my long term plans, I have some really absurd dreams (in my head, I hear Maggie's voice on the Lykian hike: "I love it when people aren't reasonable about their dreams."). As per Derek Sivers's TED talk, I won't share them here. I'll keep them close.

However, I have a few ways in which I can measurably improve: teaching, Turkish, and tavla (backgammon to you, Wolf Pack!).

Teaching
Already I can see how this experience is shaping my attitudes toward pedagogy.
I came into the experience feeling ambiguous about the goals of global English teaching as a native speaker, and my awareness of the sensitivity of this issue is heightened.
I continually question the agenda of the textbook (we're using Macmillan's Global coursebooks) and my own conveyance of the materials. How are these in tension with each other? Am I serving the all the needs of my students, or am I focused too much on the material I know will be in their end-of-year exam? Can I teach critical thinking through English language learning in an environment where I don't speak the dominant language?
I can't reiterate how lucky I am in my university work environment: I have colleagues with whom I co-teach and cooperate, others encourage me to observe their classrooms, and still another has invited me to join one of his classes for a speaking and pronunciation session. I have been asked to read interesting papers and share my thoughts on curriculum and pedagogy. I teach elementary level students, and I manage a speaking club for several hours a week.

Did I mention that the windows in my office show me an incredible view of the mountains? I never bring my camera to work, but I've got to share this view with the folks back home. It's deep green and orange here right now-- just stunning.

And certainly there are challenges. One of these is a different cultural logic: things that make sense to me having worked several years in a private high school and in a community college in the States seem quite strange to people who have worked in the secondary school and university system here, and vice versa. But time and patience are leading us to each other, I think.
The greatest challenge for me is still language. There are so many people I'm [desperate] to communicate with in greater depth than just saying good morning and asking how one's day has gone. I'd really like to know who my coworkers are in their mother tongue.

Turkish
I'll bring you up to speed on what I know of the language in a later post; what I can say now is that I don't believe I have the time in just seven more months to reach the capacity in Turkish that I'd like. It's a beautiful, friendly-sounding language. Look up vowel harmony for starters.
But after expanding my teaching skills and my developing greater contact and communication with my students, Turkish language learning is absolutely the most important thing I can be doing here.

Tavla
"This isn't chess!" Murat tells me when I'm thinking too hard about backgammon strategy. And he's right. With chess, there's no chance, there's not the same possibility for utter chaos. True, dice tend to follow certain universal rules that are manifested in statistics, but there's always the possibility that you'll keep rolling ones and twos and never get double-six-lucky.
I love this game. It's fluid, and it's about both numbers and human psychology. Sometimes, because of the dice, you actually have to give up on a strategy you've been pursuing. And sometimes you give it up because of the person sitting across from you.

I made the commitment to a set from a shop near Ankara's citadel, and I couldn't be happier in my choice. Now that Claire's gone from our home, I occasionally bring the box out and practice. Murat Telli, of course, also gives me advice. He loves to pick up the dice before I've even had a chance to read them, and I'm hurried along in my decisions so that I'll have to start feeling the 'statistics' and the consequences of my decisions more intuitively. I'm not fast enough yet, but I tell you I will be.

"Oh, don't go there! I don't want to win if you're going to play that way!" I have never been marsed so often as I have been in this country, and it's a delightful thing to learn from utter failure and know that the highest stakes are who's going to buy the next round of tea.




Training
In ten days, I run the 15km in the Istanbul (Eurasian Intercontinental) Marathon. I've been running a lot, and frequently. I took a couple days off after the encounter with Kate Clow and ten hours of hiking in Antalya, but my blisters have healed up and I'm back on track.
It's incredibly gratifying to know that my body can do most of what I ask it to do.

Text
Writing home-- the way that I'd like to, as meaningfully as possible-- is taking quite a lot of time and mental energy. I'm so grateful when I get the opportunity to sit down and imagine all of you reading this. What do Aunt Nancy and Tiana think of my pictures of ruins? I wish I could get more. What does Mom think when she finds out that I'm almost stranded by my bus? What would Matt Epp think if he found out that I have a strange contingent of students who are really into Dr. Who? Yes, writing home and doing that well takes time away from my life here, but I want to remain as present as possible to those of you whom I love at home.

I think of you.