My name is Amir Ghiassi. As I wrote before, I think only by good education we can forward. With other words as long as we do not have enough academic people we cannot be in the same level of Wes in technical science and general and especial science. We need very well educated people We need good engineers, but we also need technical people to work with them. We need between highly educated people also middle educate people so we can cooperate. The technical life for example in Germany should be our model. All people go to school to learn to do a good job. In Iran we learn by ourselves or in private shops. I believe in Humanity and unity of people. We should love each other and teach each other our experience. In the past we did not have good school so as the scientist persons died his knowledge died with him/her also. In Germany the master or teacher invited the students to his house and they lived with him or her and help him and learned from him/her. The student was called famulus. Something like spiritual child who live with the professor or teacher help him/her and learn from him/her. They could work in the house and if the professor had a big farm or garden, they worked there. In this way after few years, the student (famulus) was almost in the same level as professor. In this way after the death of professor, her/his student continues his/her way. I tried to do the same thing in Orlando. I bought a farm and a lot of room so that the students could live there and work there and also learn. I think that is a very good method of learning, only it is very expensive and if you do not have support; it is very hard to continue. I loved to be teacher in university in Iran, but sorrowfully I could not stay there. My school is named Iranian S American Language and Boarding School; it is in Orlando, Florida. Some people see it as a business and to teach other people even free for them is business. Instead of helping me; they were against me. I want to teach and the last years I lost even 120,000 dollars; how can it be a business. School and university are always supported by government of churches in USA. I had no support at all and have to pay high taxes. The county dabbled my taxes. If you believe or not that was only for help and humanity and Education. Here is some of my experience. I wish I could write fall my experience in web site, so the students have access to it. Free teaching. As in Iranin.com the people write free their experiences or stories for the people. Even for this free work, so people are jealous and try to stop you. We need Education, cooperation, Understanding each other and Love and Unity. I am a certified teacher in Florida. I was teacher in an American Community College for German, Turkish, Persian, politics and Arabic. I was teacher in different High School for German and Latin. I was University teacher in Iran and teacher in seven different countries. I was born in a family with two religions Moslem and Baha’i and because I had problem in Moslem public schools in Iran, I continued my study in Christian, Zoroastrian school system and later I was teacher there. Any way 1993 I was persecuted by the government of Iran, because I denied writing articles in the newspapers against other religions. Since October 1996 I am in the USA and try to be a useful person here. My last position in Iran was Consultant translator to the State Secretary for Education and Telecommunication, teacher in German in High School, and university teacher in the University of Islamic Freedom in Tehran.
My first experience as a teacher was in a
German Kindergarten School in Kiel Germany . As I loved the children very much; I started my work in a kindergarten. The student that I had, were five years old.
I wrote the German alphabets for them in very big form and let them colored the pictures or the drawings. They add eyes, nose and other funny material to the alphabets and they did them very nice and beautiful, funny and colorful. I hang up the drawings, pictures in the class room and every day as they came into the classroom they looked at them and had fun to speak about them. For example, they told me look Mr. Ghiassi Mr. Bee is laughing so nice.
After few months they knew all alphabets and parallel with alphabets I taught them every day a word and a little sentence, too. For example for fork, I draw a fork with a pencil for them and they copied the draw and colored it. Later they wrote simple sentence like I have a fork.
To fix the alphabets in their mind I covered with a piece of paper all letters of a word accept one letter, which they could see, and they should call the name and the sound of this letter. The children learned very well and after few months they knew all letters and they could read simple sentences.
After two years of teaching in the kindergarten I continued to teach in the elementary school in
Germany . I was teacher in fifth grad. Now I must help them to know more and write better. I taught them grammar terms like adjectives, adverbs and so on.
For exercise they must find in a story all verbs, nouns and other Grammatik materials and they should be able also to explain why it is an adjective. For example if they told me that is an adjective, I asked them why it is an adjective. They should say, because it explains a noun. I fixed in this way all the Grammatik terms in their mind.
As a child in the seven grad; I read a lot of books, because I wanted to know about every question that the people would might ask me. In that time to read books and have a good vast knowledge about literature and other science was very impressive and the children wanted to learn more and more about the life. In
Iran at that time the children were mostly with the parents and as my mother was a teacher; she was working and she could not let me alone at home for the whole day, after my school was finished, so she took me with herself where ever she had to go.
I was with her in the women liberation organizations and I should listen to all those arguments, discussions and speeches; my mother was also a very active Baha’i and she was a member of the spiritual assembly in
Tehran . My father was a very stricter Moslem a colonel in the police forces and he was seldom home. He was at home one night a week, so my mother had a lot of time to have all these activities. And I was with her. That is clear; I was between lots of academic women and have to listen to them. Later I wanted to read more to understand them better and even take part in their discussions. I did not like to be passive there and just listen to them and they were also happy when a child could give them his opinion.
That reading of lot of books gave me a good back ground to know a lot of stories and good materials about freedom, religions and societies. By reading more and more books in my mother language, I had mastery about Persian language so as I was in the eight grad I wrote my first play, which had been played in my school by the students who were in 11and 12 grades and I had to guide them and give them advice to act in my written play. That was a very great success for a boy being only 13 years old and advice the students older than him to play in his written play.
I was also in the same time the member and head of the school magazine. Sorrowfully this action of mine was guided me to a lot of jealously by the older students. In addition to this problem also my father died in the same year, so I must change my school. But because I read a lot books I had no problem to keep a lot of information in my mind in Persian language.
By reading more books I got such mastery in Persian language that the newspaper owners printed my stories in their magazines. I was 15 years old. With these examples I wanted only to mention that by reading; we can have mastery about a language.
After some years teaching in an elementary school, and because of my language professions; I was invited to teach in a high school. I used my experience for reading activities and I asked my students should read a book in one week and write a summary of it and read the summary in the class. In this way, my students had to read a lot of books and they wrote good summaries about them. Later I ask them to see a nice famous picture and write their impression about that picture.
About 30 years ago,
Iran was between traditional conservative religious people and the modern people. Most schools in Iran at that time were boys or girls separate schools. The private section and government of the king of Persia wanted to introduce more western culture. So they opened private and government schools with boys and girls mixed in those schools. In addition the other countries had the permission to open schools in Iran . Many countries like Germany , Great Britain , and USA … had nice huge schools in Tehran , with over 4000 students. America alone had four huge schools and Germany had three big schools in Tehran .
I was teacher in these types of schools. My students were generally mixed children, from Persian fathers and other nation mothers or they had Persian mother and foreign father. In
German School , I had a student; her mother was Persian and her father was from Sweden . The parents speak to each other in English and they spoke to their daughters in their mother language also Swedish and Persian. The children were in German school and one of their grand parents was Russian. So the 8 years old Jasmine and 9 years old Leila had to learn, Persian to speak with the mother, Swedish to speak with the father, Russian to speak with the grand mother whom was living with them, English because the parent speak with each other English and they wanted to know what is going on,
German because they were in German School and they should learn also French, because in German school you had to learn German, English and French. Also the little girls should know Persian, Swedish, English, German, Russian and French. Six languages for small girls. Some times they spoke all these languages in one sentence. I remember one time the Jasmine said to me. Herr Ghiassi, be man Matushka Kuchen gave at bekhoram.
Matushka Russian, Herr German, Kuchen German, gave English, ta bekhoram Persian Preposition and verb.
The other day, a girl was crying in the school. I do not remember her name, her mother was a Persian attorney and her father was German, but they were divorced. I asked “why you are crying”, she said she cannot very good Persian and she cannot good German, too. I said to her, “You should work more and harder, read more, listen more to the radios and televisions you will have mastery about both of them soon”.
I made my entire lesson plan in two languages, half of the paper from top to the bottom were written in German and the other half were written in Persian, Latin, Arabic, Turkish or English. They should even underline the words in the different languages with different colors or different lines, one or two lines or different zigzag lines, in both sides of the papers. In this way and with the time they knew exactly what the words were in the other language, the translation of them, and what the entire sentences mean.
I think when a child or a person can read one book properly and deep, he or she can read other books easily. So I asked always, the grammar materials in each sentences and the exact translation of the sentences and the grammar explanations. For example if they read one sentence, they should tell me which word was noun, subject , verb, adjective, adverb and also they should know the tense of the verbs and be able to explain why. Why this verb is simple past, they should be able to answer because the verb is the second part of the verb. Why this verb is present continuous, they should be able to answer because it is the first part of the verb; with to be verb before it and ing after the verb.”Am going”.
If the Persian speaking people want to learn English; they have special difficulties. First the irregular verbs, then the auxiliary verbs; they are extra difficult for them. In Persian the verbs are regular. So the concept to have irregular verbs is hard for them to understand. For German student; it is not hard as they have irregular verbs. But both of them have difficulties with “not” or negative forms. In Persian and German language; you do not need to introduce an auxiliary verb to make your verb negative. You put after the any verb “not” and you have negative forms. I go; I do not go in English but in Persian and German you say “I go not”. So I must fix the irregular verbs, auxiliary verbs and their function in the sentences, in their mind.
I will try to write here why I think people should learn foreign languages. As a foreign language teacher I had a lot of students from different countries in different school systems. I thought the different subjects in seven different school system and countries. The German students learn very easy the English language. First their language is relative to English language. Both of them are Indo German language. A German professor told me that in the past the Iranian came with a ship to north
Germany and they stayed there. So the Plat Deutsch has come out from their language namely the Persian language. Than he had a list of Plat Deutsch words which were very similar to Persian. Example botsche in Plat Deutsch and in Persian Batsche as you see just a changed to o. The word Gir and Girig in Plat Deutsch or German has the same root in Persian Gir mean to hold and in German mean somebody who wants a lot. Than he said they went from north Germany Firisisch similar to
Persisch to Ireland the land of Iran or Iranland. He said there two island in Ireland , Iren and Iran and the sign of Lion is their sign as it is and was a Persian sign. Hasht in Persian is 8 and in German it is Acht. That means even in the past the people have moved from one country to other. A Kroshian student told me that in their history book they learn that Kroshian they come from Persian. As in the past the people were curious and wanted to see other places so they moved to other places. The Persian came from south Russian because there was cold and they need grass for their ships and horses. They came down to the warmer places and found a government for themselves. Generally the warmer countries the people are more relax and may be lazy, as they do not need to work hard. They can survive even if they do not have work. The food grows and because the land is warm they do not need warm places for winter or cold time. In cold countries if you do not have a warm house or
> a place to live in the very cold time, you will die. In south Persian and in many hot countries you can sleep even in free places without any roof or wall. So the cold environment forced the people to work and save for rainy days and have a shelter for the cold days. In Iran the students are so willing to learn, but the entrance for university is so difficult that they should to other countries with a lot of difficulties for the study.
