Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Between the presidential elections and the plethora of specifically American holidays since my arrival in France, I've never been at a loss for material for my classes. I've been teaching classes on Thanksgiving all week, and by "teaching classes" I mean playing bingo and talking about what we have to be thankful for. Considering my students' level of English (and maturity) I've avoided Thanksgiving vocabulary words like "colonization," "small pox," and "genocide," preferring to stick instead to words like "pumpkin pie" and "cranberry sauce" (which, for the French, may actually be more inconceivable...)

How would you answer the nearly existential question, "What is a cranberry?"

How would you convince a person from a country lauded for its fine cuisine that, indeed, a pie made of squash and cinnamon and cream is delicious?

The lessons have been some of the most fun that I've taught so far. I start class by showing them some pictures that I took last Thanksgiving of all of the traditional dishes. The video clip I have of Thanksgiving a couple years ago with some of my extended family around a Huge table yelling "Happy Thanksgiving" has been the big hit. My girls today said: "Oh! It's just like Little House on the Prairie!" and "Mademoiselle, you really do that? You're sure that your family isn't acting? It's just sooo cute!"

Then I have them push all of the tables together to make one big table and I hand out slips of paper with names of my family members on them. Much to Lauren's dismay, I've taken all of our empty tupperware dishes, the salt and pepper shakers, our decorative gourds, pie pans, cake pans, the ladle, etc., and labeled them with the names of different dishes. We all sit down at the table and play act Thanksgiving dinner chez Brianne. "Sandi, uuuu, Mum, can yoo please pass zee gravy?" "Yes, of couse! 'ere you go." "Zank you" 'You're welcome" ... Everyone speaks, everyone laughs, and, somehow magically, pretending to be a family makes everyone less shy and more willing to participate. At first they're all shocked when I begin rearranging the classroom, when I ask them to sit in a circle facing each other, when I join them. It's as if, by disrupting the physical organization of the classroom, the French magisterial mentality gets broken too.

For the last fifteen minutes of class, we go around the table and each person says one thing that she or he is thankful for. Responses include: family, friends, having enough to eat, Barack Obama, and..... dolloping whip cream on my day ....
"I am sankful for zat Brianne comes to France." :)

Of course, what they actually mean by that is that they're thankful that they didn't have to do any real work for a whole class period....but my ego would rather bask in the warmth of being liked (undeniably one of my biggest faults)! It is encouraging though to see students who normally sit with their arms folded, eyes rolled, and cell phones out actually excited to participate.
Technically (so they tell me) my 'job' is to improve my students' conversational English, but I feel successful if I've made them think (if even for a fleeting second) "hey, English is fun."

So, this Thanksgiving, I'm thankful for a year of fun and rest. I'm thankful to be in France with good friends and loads of Christmas decorations (hey, since there isn't any Thanksgiving to mark the transition to Christmas, they're allowed to be out here!) And, I'm thankful for you (since you are most likely a family member or close friend ;)

I hope you all bask in togetherness, gravy, and afternoon naps.