Reflections on TFLTA Conference

So, I went to the Tennessee Foreign Language Teaching Association conference last month and I got some interesting ideas from teachers and a free bag that looks too much like a purse to use. There weren't any sessions for ESL teachers which was a downer, but I was able to attend most of the Spanish sessions and they were somewhat helpful.
Almost immediately as I walked into the conference area I was struck by how weird and awkward some language teachers can be. I mean, a lot of times I could spot a French teacher from three miles away by their clipped up hair and look of disdain for anything that moves and doesn't parlez francais. This is not to say that Spanish teachers fared much better. Wearing their ponchos and trying to speak Spanish to every Spanish speaking hotel worker was not a very clever disguise. I have to say that the only teachers I could not pick out were the German teachers (does Tennessee even know that German is a language?) and the Latin teachers who were surely debating correct verb conjugations in some poorly lit back room.
Cold coffee and stale doughnuts was our lot as we made our way through curriculum tables where peddlers tried to sell their wares. There was a look of urgency and desperation in their eyes which their false festivity could not hide. My best guess is that they were paid on commission to some degree and conferences like these were their cash crop. I do not know whether it is a stodgy individualist streak that I have or whether I truly believe I can do better, but I think that if I teach I would like to design my curriculum as I go. Perhaps that is what motivated me or maybe it was my lack of mad money that made me steer away from those tables as much as possible. Plus, I will be an ESL or EFL teacher and we all know how well funded they are. My curriculum will probably be some dusty old book from the 20's. "Alright class, let's translate the next sentence about Sally Joe and Billy at the speakeasy. Gee-golly wiz, that hooch sure is the bee's knees!"
Sadly the main difference in most of the sessions was the socioeconomic status of the students in the classes of the presenting teachers. The sessions ranged from a couple of public school teachers' ideas for using items from Dollar Stores in the classroom to an all girls Catholic school AP Spanish teacher's ideas for using authentic texts in preparation for reading exercises on the AP test. The flyswatter vocabulary game vs. meaningfully interacting with a real world news article. Dollar store items vs. a computer in the hands of every student. I would have loved to be in the Spanish class of the AP teacher who only used Spanish with her students and would make them translate in correspondance with their parents. That is a little more interesting than swatting the correct vocabulary word from the board.
I will probably never have the opportunity to teach in a setting where I will have much more funding than the dollar store teachers. I hear the stories of ESL classes held in janitorial closets taught by teachers who travel to eleven different schools a day for thirty minutes a piece and I wonder whether I could ever put up with teaching in the state of Tennessee.
Perhaps I should start buying flyswatters now.