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Q: correct your students privately or embarass them in front of the whole class?
when i come across a student who cheated i call them up to talk to them during the break. i show them their speech and the speech i found on the net. and i explain to them that they are going to fail. now anywhere else on this planet this would be a good thing and cause no problems.
but this is china where where lieing , cheating and scamming are hardwired into the locals.
the result of me being kind and considerate is students lieing about why they failed. some students tell other students that they only used 2 common sentences or various other silly excuses. one student even told me that they heard i hate students without an englishh names.
now i'm thinking that i should just show the entire class the proof so there would be no further discussion.
When it comes to cheating, I do so in front of the whole class.
That includes, downloading from the internet, photographing another students homework and then taking a photo to look it up in their phone when asked, manually copying every single sentence from a classmate making it the same, etc.
Then, if there is a repeat, I fail them.
After the term is over, and I am forced to "retest them", I fail them again.
Note: I know that in their last year, they will find a new teacher to test them (as I will only be here one more year) and as he does not know them, he will give them a dumb test and pass them. "Mei Ban FA"....
I once read on this forum a post of a teacher, (I think it was Crimo) who had his students invent a country". One of my students made a PPT presentation of an island, with a flag, map, culture , etc.
The problem? I know the place! It was the island of Malta. Both islands.
So much work cheating! If he had done HALF the effort in an invented country, he would have gotten the highest score!
What a waste!
youngsters deserve a second and third chance ...... teenagers deserve failure
I work with Chinese English teachers who mispronounce words all the time. During a meeting a couple of weeks ago, the principal actually said that he wants me to teach them how to pronounce the words correctly. Because I speak with a very british accent not directly linked to any particular county or city etc.
So the other day I was doing days of the week. The teachers kept saying Wensday. They would not believe me when I told them it was Wed nes day!!! Or more so pronounced Wed nnns day kind of anyway. I actually had to spell the word out for them on the board before they would believe me.
English really is quite something...................I'm Canadian, but I reall have a hard time watching an Australian show on TV sometimes, not all the time.............or a British bunch of BS ... Sometimes it is hard for me to get it, and of course on a TV show, no second chance.
In front of the class. I teach university level students. and they want to go OS for further study. By showing the whole class, it lets EVERYONE know that I'm not stupid, and they will be dealt with in a way they'd really rather not like 
A little embarrassment now might save them a hell of a lot of embarrassment and shame in a year or so when they get kicked out of their overseas university for the same shit!
As for things like pronunciation errors, or a really unfortunate turn of phrase (eg the 'I play with myself' girl), I do that in front of the whole class as well, but then, I let them laugh at my bad Chinese and I think they understand that we all make mistakes, and it's ok to not take it too seriously 
Shining_brow:
Yeah, I thought so, but I put in the other anyway.... :)
Never embarrass a student in front of the class. That is one of he basic rules of teaching. What you are doing at the moment is the right way.
You will not change their attitude towards cheating, as it is too ingrained. All it will do is make you enemies.
crimochina:
i understand your point and i think your point which is actually what i believe is only applicable in civilized societies.
in china , i must think about protecting my reputation. anything a chinese says against a foreigner is believed without question. school officials will believe these lies without even asking to see my findings/ proof.
the goal in doing it publicly is to make lieing about less possible. make it clear to students what is cheating and what is not cheating, some students truely do not know because they were taught to plagarize from very young by their chinese teachers.
Peer assessment worked well for me, though it was for maths and science, and classes of 12.
I had a small booklet for each student, that had all the students names in little boxes, three to a page. Each student had to prepare and present a two minute talk about the topic we were discussing (eg Fractions and Mixed Numbers). Every student would write 2-3 sentences about every other students presentation, in the boxes.
After photocopying the assessment sheets, I would cut them up, and give each student their own feedback from the other students (without identifying who had written what). I would then discuss the speech with each student, as well as their writing about the other students, in private.
It tested many things, they found it enjoyable and it had tremendous results. It also built comraderie, noticeably lacking in Chinese schools.
crimochina:
chinese schools encourage cut throat competition so students are less likely to unite and rebel
Traveler:
Yet it worked wonderfully. They spoke in public and worked together so well in a group that they managed to win the Zhejiang province English acting competition. I've posted the YouTube link to this before.
It overcame a lot of hurdles of teaching in China. Maybe not possible in larger classes though.
GuilinRaf:
My experience was diffent. Even though i too used the anonymous assessment, every single student was marked as "excellent" except for the two students who really were good.
However, i must point out that unlike you, my classes are rather big.
If you told them once privately and they turn around just continue to lie/cheat then at that point yes you need to stop caring about your feelings. They obviously don't care about your's and have no problem trying to make you look bad by lying about you when you were polite and tried to help.
What's that saying "Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me"
GuilinRaf:
In my experience, they dont care.
Students I fail just manage to "retest" the next term.
When the school administration questions me for failing a student and I tell them that it was because they cheated/plagiarized the administration just laughs it off and tells me that this is normal in schools. The asistant director of my department told me that for her thesis, she simply gave the school the one her sister wrote, substituting her name.
Last year, I had a boss who DID back me up on this (he studied in the UK) but sadly for me he retired.
First make sure if it's true that they lied about you not liking people without English names. If you can prove that it is infact true then I think you have an obligation to call that student up to the front of the class and have him explain why he thought it was ok to 1) Cheat and then 2) Lie about the teacher and try to make the teacher loose face.
He/she will lose a lot of face, but it will teach them a valuable lesson that if you start lying and cheating it will result in losing face. It's better to be honest and learn from your mistakes.
crimochina:
i failed over 15 students for cheating last semester. i do not have them this semester . i'm not gonna a federal case out of it. the students who told me about this told me in a manner of surprise, they worked very hard and got high scores . i asked them why they were so surprised then they told me. i will never ask a student to rat out another student.
You asked this same exact question like a year ago. Whatever you did before didn't seem to work so you better learn from your mistakes and try something new. That's all I got to say about that. (
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