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It’s kind of a hard thing to prepare what I’ll teach in my next lesson. I had no problem on earth with regular students, since I also had a curriculum to follow. But here on Erid things become a bit harder. I still constantly find myself crossing off topics, thinking it will be too much, then I realize I’m basically teaching kids who suck information in, like sponge water. IF you teach them the right way that is...
Spotless memory isn't worth a penny, if you have a short attention span. In order to remember something you still need to focus, even if you are a human, or a little space monster.
And oh boy did I have a hard time on my first lessons. I thought straight up bombing the kids with the info would lead to the wanted outcome, just to realize how stupid that idea was. I did the lightning question round at the end of my lesson, just like on earth, and saw that 90% of the kids had a hard time answering.
I accidentally made them feel stupid, which no teacher should ever do. So what I did was cut the lesson into 15 minutes segments, and after each segment, I did 2 minutes of questioning around. AND after the lesson I did one big round. That finally had the effect. I thought there still would be 1 or 2 kids who didn’t get something so I was ready to offer an after lesson course just in case, but they surprised me. Everyone answered enthusiastically (And correctly I might add) to every question.
I also wanted to add some ‘bonus’ system, like back on earth, but I was told it would be hard to do. Plus as I learned points, which they could ‘cash in’ for something wouldn’t make them more enthusiastic about the lesson. I still wanted something to give them. I wanted to be more than just an ‘alien’ teacher who did it’s job. I wanted it to be more personal. I wanted to be the ‘cool’ teacher they like to remember later in life. I know I’m taking it too seriously and I got some weird looks back at home too, for actually WANTING to get on the kids' good side, but what can you do? At least here I can just wave it off and say ‘Human thing’.
So anyway. What turned out to be the rewarding system for them? It’s a bit funny, but fun facts about Earth. That’s it. The mind controlling aliens are planning to invade Earth. Either that or they are just curious. One of the two.
So I started to experiment on how it’s the best to implement. Is it good, if after every answer they get to ask me one thing? The lesson became too long and we ended up discussing things about earth during the whole lesson. The best time is after the major lightning question round. That way, they can have a bit of fun and I don’t slip behind with my lesson plan. Win-Win.
So now whenever I ask my last question, they get overly excited. Of course, they have the respect to wait for me to say. 'Ask away' and a bunch of claws get swung in the air.
"Okay, okay." I play the notes on my piano at the end of my lesson, chuckling at the sight of raised cases, "Ask away.”
Immediately, I see a bunch of claws in the air. I seemingly pick one randomly, even though I know I have a trusty system, to have everyone ask something. “Theodore?”
I can’t really translate their names, so every time something new comes up I have to give them one. Either that or remember the notes. Now of course, at the start I gave my companions names like Isaac, or Neil. All famous human names. But let me tell you, coming up with names like that, gets harder after a while.
For kids, Erid has a unique way of naming. They basically don’t get their ‘full' name for a while so their names are way shorter than adults. For my students, I tried giving names that sound the same as their original one. Theodore for one has a name that goes something like ♪♩♩
Short note followed by two longer ones. It’s not exactly rocket science. The-o-dore ♪-♩-♩. Easy. Of course it is a bit of a dumbed down technique, but gets the job done. I can remember the notes more easily if I have something to connect it to.
Now Theodore just chimed ‘What is the personal experience with white frozen water?’
They do this more and more frequently. Asking me about personal experience about a specific thing. Well, they basically have the whole internet already, so if they want any scientific information either about the atmosphere or the earth itself, they can just ‘look it up’.
In the first years, the access was seriously restricted, which I also found necessary. I didn’t want any fake, or even worse, any dangerous information to spread about humanity. The Hail Mary’s internet was a mass upload. I’m about 99% sure articles about the flat earth, or similar controversies got there too, and god knows what else. Let's not make the impression on the aliens that we are stupid. So the ‘Public’ only gained access after a few years of filtering.
So yes, since they know most of the scientific things I suppose the next step is asking for the experience of living there.
“White frozen water?” I play the notes a bit unsure while thinking about what liquid freezes in a white color.
“Yes! Falling from the sky.”
I’m still a bit dumbstruck for a few seconds when the realization hits me. “OH! You mean snow!” I exclaim. Of course they want to know about snow. Even though water’s boiling temperature is rising with higher pressure, the freezing point doesn’t. What’s more, it becomes slightly lower. So I suppose the idea of frozen water is the same as liquid oxygen on earth. They know it exists, probably made it in laboratories, maybe even using it in some places, but that’s about it.
So a planet that has small ice fragments falling from the sky is probably hard to imagine in a place where you don’t even see ice that often.
“Well…” I gather my thoughts. I had quite the experience with snow. Not only in California, but in Russia too, during the Hail Mary’s development. “It's beautiful at first sight. People are even disappointed sometimes if it doesn't fall in winter but it can get overwhelming in big amounts. Kids especially love it, due to its properties. They can easily form it into round shaped snowballs, or even build smaller fortresses and since it’s slippery it’s a good way of having fun. They use smaller… Ahh how do you say it… Sleds but… what would be the…” This is when I realized I’ve been speaking English the whole time and the kids just stared at me confused, yet amused. I chuckle under my nose and tap my piano. “Sorry about that. I got very very very personal.”
I received a bunch of high pitched whirls which is basically the Eridian way of laughing and repeated myself, now tapping the piano. I tried to give a fulfilling answer then looked at the raised claws again.
“Emanuel?” (You already know my naming methods. ♪♩♫. It's surprising how many different variations you can find there. Sure simpler names like Peter, or Adam are out of the question but I can find my way around those.)
“Can you speak more in your language?”
Another unusual request. They are my third class since I started teaching here, yet they can still surprise me with their questions. “Do you want to waste your question on that?”
With a bit of a lowered case, Emanuel nervously tapped his claws together. “Is it stupid question?”
Now I feel a bit bad for using the ‘waste’ word. If he is interested in my language, I suppose I shouldn’t ridicule him for it. Our scientists would probably go nuts by the fact that an alien is curious about the English language. The least I can do is speak and tell them what the words mean. “I told you at the start of the year. There aren’t stupid questions. If you want me to talk in my language, I can talk.”
“Yes yes yes!” He excitedly raised his case. Sometimes I forget that even though they are 30-35 year olds, who learn astrophysics from me, they are still on the level of a 12 year old human kid. Well… I exaggerated a bit. Kind of hard to compare. They have the ‘brain’ of an 18 year old, but the ‘innocence’ of a 9 year old… No, it still doesn't quite match up… It’s hard to compare.
"Alright, alright. I can talk." I say and think about any topic. "What do you want me to talk about?"
"Anything!" I get the immediate answer, which doesn't really help me at all. I don't want anything with special words, It's too much explaining to do. I also didn't want to pick a long sentence. So having no ideas, I glanced at my notes, and read out loud the first sentence I saw.
"The binary X-ray sources are excellent candidates for stellar black holes. They are thought to be formed when a massive star explodes as a supernova at the end of its fusion lifetime and the compact remnant collapses to a stellar hole." I look up, to see all of my students curiously listening to whatever I have to say, even though I doubt they understood anything. "Well?" I play on my piano, and immediately see even more claws in the air. "Alexander?"
"Can you speak more?" He chimes, followed by the approving trill of the others. Looks like I'm forced to give a foreign language lesson at the end of my astrophysics class. I can definitely try…
In the next 10 minutes or so I had to read out parts of my note and translate it to them. It's funny how quickly they got used to it, and managed to roughly guess which part of the lecture I quoted for them.
One of the kids even proposed the idea that I should keep the lesson in my language after a while, but I'm not sure if their 'elders' would be comfortable with that. Thinking about it… I'm not even sure if I'm allowed to talk to them in English at all… The entities are quite allowing when it comes to my teaching methods, and they highlighted only a few things to be taboo. But I'm not sure if teaching in a totally alien language would be okay with them. I guess I'll just ask someone next time I have the opportunity.
This thought process however made me a bit more cautious so I cracked my knuckles and started playing on my piano. "Alright enough of this. Any different requests or questions?"
Again, I see a bunch of claws in the air, but visually less than before. However, now I spot a tiny claw in the air too, that I never really saw raised before during this part of the lesson. He is technically the smallest and youngest one of them all, in his early 30's (My oldest student is 35) who is also the shyest. So no wonder he is got my attention as soon as I saw his unsure, half raised claw.
"Benjamin?"
As I played the notes, the kid quickly lowered his arm, like someone who just got electrocuted. Maybe even he was surprised that I chose him.
"It is a bad question." He quickly whirred deeply, which just raised my curiosity even more.
"I told you… No stupid questions. Ask away."
He cautiously rocked his case back and forth, probably thinking how to ask his question, but in the end he just did anyway. "Will Earth and Erid be…" he stopped again, expecting me, or anyone else to stop him, but as I just kept on listening, he finished. "...Allies?"
I stood there for a few seconds. I've heard the 'allies' phrase only on a few occasions, when other Eridians were explaining their tragic part of history. Long story short, they had a major war, about 2000 years ago, which lasted for 235 years. They almost made their whole species extinct just by fighting with each other. There were 5 clans, in which 2 didn't like each other, dragging the remaining 3 into war too.
For them this war isn't an everyday chat topic. They get to hear the story once, when they get old enough, and they don't talk about this ever again, only when explaining the same thing to another kid.
They made an exception with me. I was allowed to ask questions, and even got answers too, every time I asked something. They weren't entirely comfortable with showing their aggressive past to me, but they still tried their best, while frequently telling me that they have changed a lot since. So this kid most likely got the 'adult talk' about their war.
I already mentioned taboo topics I can't discuss with my class. Their war belongs to that part. As an outsider I'm forbidden to discuss any details about the massacre, and I respect their choice. I suppose humanity wouldn't like an Alien teaching a human kid about our world wars either. They have only a few rules but that's the most important one, which they never failed to highlight to me, so I have to answer without bringing it up as an example…
"Well…" I start playing, but have no idea how to follow it up. I know I have to answer something. This is one of those situations where no word means much more than a thousand. I should just say 'Yes of course we will be allies' but first of all, they are not stupid, and second, they are also walking lie detectors. They can ‘see’ my heartbeat, and even though they probably don’t know what to make out of it, they'll know something is off with my answer.
The truth is: I'm not sure what’s going on back home. It's been a while since I left earth. God knows which country became stronger after they fixed our sun, IF they fixed it, that is. I'm still unsure about the success of the beatles.
So if a military heavy country decided to take the leadership over the whole earth, it's the best time after a forced ice age. Every country is weak, and most likely focusing on fixing their own government. I doubt any leaders would send troops to another country, knowing they would stay without any protection. Sure, world domination might not happen in 10 year time, but who knows what will happen in 100 years or heck maybe 500. And considering the fact that these kids will most likely be alive, after 500 years, it's their most burning question. Can they trust humans? Are we going to be allies or enemies?
We surely won’t be enemies, right? Right?
Suddenly the lesson ends without me being able to give a proper answer. Everyone quietly starts packing their things, thinking about what I said… Or more like about what I didn’t say…
“Wait!” I tap my instrument again, grabbing the leaving kid’s attention. I can’t let them go away without giving a proper answer to an important question like this. “The truth is… I can’t be sure. There is a chance total trust would never be reached with humanity… It might take more time for us to get to the same unity sense, where Erid is now, IF we will get there at all. However… I do like to hope that two intelligent species can form a strong alliance that could outlast generations. So to answer your question… Yes. With enough time, I believe Earth and Erid will be allies.”
I give a smaller sigh. I’m just overthinking everything. There is no way humanity becomes an agressive, military based species. If something, we are reasonable. We won’t become enemies with Erid just for the sake of it. I’m optimistic that we can have a good relationship with our interstellar ‘Neighbors’... For the kids…