I play a game with my students at school. I call it ‘Conversation Questions’ and the point is to get them thinking and talking in English. Some of the questions are real stumpers like, “If you could be any animal, what would you be?” or “How would you describe your best friend?” But my personal favorite is, “If you could ask God one question, what would it be?”
In the most atheist country in the world, where the majority of young people don’t know about God, much less believe in him, this one little question can be tricky.
From my seventh to my ninth graders, answers have spanned from, “What will my future be?” “Am I pretty?” and, amid the laughter of his friends, “Who is my future wife?”
Today, seventh grader Lenka drew the question from our conversation box. She leaned back in her chair with a half-cocked smirk and quizzical eyes. Her girlfriends whispered suggestions to her in Czech – one I understood was, “Jak se máš?” which is informal Czech for, “How are you?” Kinda like, “Hey God, what’s up? How’re you feeling today?”
Finally, Lenka sat up straight and gave me a square look.
“I would ask him how old he is,” she said.
Thousand Spires 