Getting Testy

On Monday, I heard through the grapevine that our school was going to hold it's yearly tests for the rest of the week.  Naturally, I heard about this last minute from another teacher.  I guess Laum forgot to send out that memo.  Oh wait...Laum doesn't know what a memo is.  Later, I was heading over to teach my 2nd graders when I noticed a bunch of teachers sitting in the office with Mr. Thang.  I asked if it was a meeting.  Mealea said yes.  I asked if I should be there.  She said yes.  Uuhhh...ok. 

It was a typical meeting.  What could have taken place in 10 minutes took 40 minutes.  Cynthia was already teaching in her classroom, and nobody bothered to get her.  Three of the teachers spent the entire time playing with their phones.  Nobody was really paying attention, and there were side conversations going on the entire time.  (So, not much different than a meeting at an American school, only everyone spoke in Khmer).  At one point, Mealea told me that I would be proctoring the exams for Grade 8A (which is not one of my classes).  Why wasn't I assigned to one of my classes?  Who knows?  Who cares?  You may wonder what were our students doing this entire time?  Well, they were hanging out in classes, doing nothing, of course. 

There are four days of testing.  The first day is English: reading, vocabulary, writing, and grammar.  I decided to take the tests myself.  They were a nightmare.  The directions were vague, and confusing.  Many of the students didn't know what to do, so I had to specifically explain each section.  They contained incorrect spelling and grammar.  Some questions had multiple correct answers, didn't have a correct answer choice, or were totally incomprehensible.  A couple sections didn't even assess the appropriate concept. 

After administering the first test, I went into the office and announced that along with trying to keep the students from cheating off each other, I corrected all the errors on the test.  Rana, one of the teachers exclaimed, "I wrote that test!"  She grabbed my paper to examine all the marks and comments I had scrawled on it.  (Oh shit.  I assumed someone outside of our school wrote them.) 

One of the reading selections was a recipe.  Rana insisted that the word, potato, was correct in her reading passage.  I told her that if you have 1 potato, it's potato.  If you have more than one, it's potatoes.  The recipe called for 4 potatoes.  She argued that when the potatoes were mashed together, it is called potato.  I explained that even if they are mashed, there is still more than one potato being used.  It's mashed potatoes; not mashed potato.  I could tell she didn't believe me and got all huffy, so I dropped it.

I continued to correct the remaining three English tests throughout the day.  After each class, we take the tests and put them on the table in the office.  I noticed that each time I placed mine down, Rana ran over to see what I had written on the test.  I knew she was irritated, but I couldn't help myself.  They were soooooo bad.  At the end of the day, Cynthia and I told Laum that in the future, he needs to have the native English speakers edit the tests.  He laughed, looked chagrined, and agreed with us.