She said what?!

December 18, 2010

This week I had to teach my 9th graders about reported speech. Are
you yawning yet? When I opened the textbook and saw that unit, I was
certainly ready for a snooze! But first I had to look up what in the
heck "reported speech" was. Good thing I'm an English teacher! (FYI-
"He said he would go to the store" is a reported speech version of "He
said, 'I will go to the store.'")

I dreaded that class. But English as a Second Language doesn't have
to be boring, right? I mean, the English-speaking Neanderthals in days
of old came up with reported speech for a reason. Surely they didn't
create this just to torture high school English students and teachers
for all future generations. So why do we use reported speech in real
life?

I thought. Then I had a plan.

I went to class and started planting rumors among my students. First,
they were boring and normal: "Sara will not come to school today
because she is sick" became, "Miss Flaker said Sara would not come to
school today…" As students got the hang of it, the rumors got more and
more bizarre. I whispered to one student and she quickly reported to
the class, "Miss Flaker said Pitbull would come to Kulan for New
Years!" The class was a buzz. "What?! Pitbull is coming here?!?!"
"When? In 2011?" "No way!" "Will he sing?" It was a total lie, but
suddenly, even the boys in the back (who are a total distraction to
the class) perked up their ears.

Then I pulled out the big one. I whispered to one of my trend-setting
students… She was astonished and half-whispered:

"Really?! Miss Flaker said Brad Pitt is her boyfriend!"

That's right, I said it!

In Kazakhstan, the mention of "boyfriend" in any language is worthy of
press coverage. It took a minute to settle in, then one of the kids
up front caught on… "No he's not! He's dating Angelina Jolie!" But
suddenly, every one in the room wanted to tell me who was dating whom.

Nursultan: Beyoncé! Beyoncé is my girlfriend!
Miss Flaker: I'm sorry, I didn't here that.
Shingus: He said Beyoncé was his girlfriend! Now me… Shakira is my girlfried!
Miss Flaker: Wait, what did he say?
Aidana: He said Shakira was his girlfriend. And I think Medina said
Tom Cruise was her boyfriend!

The whole class was laughing. The whole class was speaking English.
And the whole class was using the dreaded "Reported Speech."

Take that, Grammar! We're gonna learn English AND have fun!