The new principle wants me to come to her with a list of topics that I plan on using for my conversational English class. I’m having trouble coming up with the 20 topics that she asked for. It’s harder than you might think… There are some obvious topics that can’t be brought up due to the culture here, there are a whole slew of topics that are just too controversial here (women’s rights/roles, Palestine/Israel, etc.), but the category that is giving me real trouble is the one encompassing all of the things that are outside of their knowledge due to a lack of education and insular culture. Talking about what kind of foods they like would be a short conversation, as would where they have travelled, pets, romantic relationships, etc.
Tami ran into a similar problem with her class. One day she asked them to bring in some pictures for the class to talk about, they all brought ID or passport pictures… She was expecting vacation pictures, pictures of relatives, anything really, but she got ID pictures instead…
So I’m struggling a little. I’m sure that once we start talking, the conversations will naturally flow, but in the meantime I need some topics to hand into the principle…