Career Day

On Friday, December 3rd we had a career day. We had four speakers come in and talk to the students. The Principal picked out the speakers. The students were in two groups because we can't fit all of them into one room. I was in with the high school students. Our first speaker was a Pharmacist. Her presentation was ok. The next speaker was from a local college who came to talk about getting a degree as English as a Second Language major and the different careers that one can do with that. I think she must be used to students who don't speak much English. I felt like she was talking to the students like they were in Kindergarten. At one point she asked why the students were so quiet and she asked me if that was normal. I told her that in my class yes, the students were quiet. She was like "oh." Then she had this game she called Bingo. I call it the get to know you box activity. Anyway there are like 30 blocks and each has a statement, for example, likes chocolate, gets up at 8:00 a.m., has one sibling, etc. Each student is supposed to go around and find someone who can sign for that box. She had it where if a student got one column completely filled that person was the winner. She went though each box and asked the students how they would ask someone if that statement if them. She would say how to you change likes chocolate into a question, and our students would reply "do you like chocolate".  Sometimes she would change it into a grammatically incorrect question to see if they knew it was wrong. They did each time. She spent so long doing that that we had no time for them to play the game which she had promised them that they would do.
The third speaker was from Proctor and Gamble. She was really good and she brought in myriad products that they make and produce. I had no idea they did some many products. They do Swiffer floor and Swiffer duster, Pringles, Bounce dryer sheets, Oil of Olay, Downey fabric softener, batteries, Crest toothpaste, razors(Gillette, I think), laundry detergent (Tide, I think), etc.
The fourth speaker was from Taylor University. She talked to the students about attending college in America. They also have a program here called ADP where students can go to college for two years and it is like going to an American college or University and then they can transition over to America.  She basically only talked about Ivy league schools and how they are the old universities to go to and others probably won't give the students a quality education. She also gave the students prices which were high because they were mostly from Ivy League schools. I feel the University I went to gave me a quality education for my majors and for what I wanted to be. She got her information from some Ivy League website and her one friend who went to college in America.  I was disappointed in her presentation. Even though I have only gone to one University I have lots of friends and family that have gone to many more than the one that I went to and some even went to Ivy League schools. I could have done a better and more accurate presentation.
Each presentation was at least 45 minutes. That was a long time for the students to sit without really talking or getting up and moving around. By the last presentation they were talking quite a bit and not paying attention, but I can see why. I had to stay in the same spot the entire time because I was in charge of taking pictures for yearbook and it would have been obvious if I had left at all. By the time we were done I had a headache from sitting still for so long. We had one class period after they all finished up, but the students were really in the mood to do anything and neither were the teachers. Plus, by the time we would have gotten them all rounded back up, and they got all their stuff and gotten everything ready it would have been time to go. So, they pretty much just visited about the speakers.