Actually, I would say that I prefer inquiry to accusation. I'm not really that great of a negotiator, nor do I care much for confrontation. I firmly believe and have experienced throughout my life that when things get to the point of confrontation it is often because one party or the other has been accusative. It's pretty hard to negotiate a peaceful settlement if things have already reached that point.

When dealing with self absorbed individuals, especially students who may have been subjected to a great many confrontational attitudes in the past, I find it a lot easier to simply ask if I have done something to antagonize or irritate them. What I've noticed about Chinese students is that deep down they are eager to please and are quick to realize when they have behaved in a way that creates displeasure. I guess it could be said that they are quite sensitive. Perhaps it's that deep sensitivity that is the foundation for this whole question of face. Therefore, if I appear as reluctant to create disharmony within the classroom while at the same time manifesting a sense of seriousness, I seem to get more results. Truthfully, I have a reputation for fairness but also one of strictness. The Chinese have a saying; "A strict teacher, is an effective teacher." However, this does not mean that one needs to be a bully. As in all things, one needs to find a balance.

Your colleague who labels her students as dummies and calls them out in that way is quite misplaced as a second language instructor. The fact that she "knows her stuff" is irrelevant. So, again, I don't mind saying that I would fire her in a hot minute, even if it meant replacing her with an individual who was not as well versed in the language as she, but had an understanding of human nature and especially the trials faced by young people as they reach for adulthood. There's a good reason why many employers, not only in the field of education, ask for good interpersonal communication skills.

I guess I should add that there is an issue that pops up quite often in Chinese schools and that may be relevant in terms of the student in question, and that is the sense of entitlement and/or privilege that is an obvious offshoot of the one child policy. Those young people who have never had to face a challenge and who have been coddled and doted upon by their parents and grandparents are the most difficult for me to deal with. Basically, I tend to keep them at arms length until such time as individual assessment becomes necessary. At those times, I give them a lot of room to prove to me that they don't feel themselves better than the rest. If that doesn't work, so be it. I'm not going to waste my energy on them when its best reserved for those who deserve it. They'll find out later in life that they're not as great as they think they are.

Recently, one such student came to my office and complained that she felt she deserved a score higher than the 83% I had given her on a book report in my Extensive Reading class. In fact, I had found at least two sentences in her report that were outright plagiarized. I had warned them in previous lessons about plagiarizing and had explained quite thoroughly how to avoid plagiarizing and how to attribute source material. Nevertheless, I chose not to confront her on the issue. Nor did I inquire as to whether or not she had strictly used her own words. Why? Because she had demonstrated more than once, prior to this situation, that she has that sense of entitlement. I simply don't want to get involved with straightening out a problem that took 20 plus years to create. Therefore, I just calmly told her that if she continued to argue with me about it, I would lower her grade. I'm sure she complained to the Dean about it, but I simply don't care - he's a two-faced, crooked sob anyway, and knows absolutely nothing about English training that would warrant his being given the job as a college Dean. He's strictly old school, no doubt got his doctorate through special privilege and his current position - being way past the age of retirement and in fact having been brought out of retirement - through guanxi. But I digress.

Finally, Silverboy, I applaud you for the fact that you stated you would research Krashen's theories. By the way, that's "affective filter" not "effective filter." I wouldn't say that Krashen is the where all and end all of second language acquisition theory, but his work can be an excellent starting point toward the development of or justification for your own methodologies.