Silent Treatment

I was forced to work all day on Sunday, and while in principle I don't mind working weekends, it generally means we're teaching day kids. Unlike the week kids who quickly become comfortable with each other as they're eating and sleeping together, the day kids never have this chance to get to know each other properly, and hence are often very shy about speaking up and risking humiliation in front of each other. The 'police station' class I had after lunch yesterday was the worst example of this I have had yet. It was as though they'd made a pact before entering the class that they would not speak to me under any circumstances. For the first 20 minutes of the lesson I faced a wall of impeneterable silence. They were like SAS commandos under interrogation. I tried making them laugh, I tried begging: nothing worked. I was trying to teach them the word 'steal' (which I knew they knew) but nobody would even venture a guess. I decided to resort to hangman, but even that was torturous. I gave them S _ _ _ _ to start, but still nobody would even say a letter. I went round the class asking each in turn just to say one letter of the alphabet. "A! B! C! D! E! Just pick one!" Finally one of them cracked and gave me an N, and thank god a few others followed along in his wake. They still didn't get the word though. I was about ready to hang myself by the end of the lesson. Torture.