Como se dice...

We got one of those Don’t Do What I Did e-mails from a fellow teacher. Evidently, she was sending notices home with her ESL students to give to their parents. The problem was that she was using one of those free on-line programs to translate, and well, those tend to do a literal translation and miss the context in which a word is used. She said some parents got “quite upset.”

So let this be a lesson to you teachers. Don’t use one of those Web translators to talk to ESL parents about stuff like:

An assignment on the dikes in Amsterdam

Keeping their pocket translator turned-on

Going to the clinic because for a finger prick

Throwing balls in students’ faces during P.E.

If you do, then just make sure I’m there to see their reactions.