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| Bear Tree Park |
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| Me with the fifth grade boys: Adrian, Peter, Jacob and Tyler |
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| Me with the fifth grade boys: Adrian, Peter, Jacob and Tyler |
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| Fifth grade boys: Adrian, Peter, Jacob, Ethan and Tyler |
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| Fifth grade boys: Adrian, Peter, Jacob, Ethan and Tyler |
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| Fifth grade boys: Adrian, Peter, Jacob, Ethan and Tyler |
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| View from Bear Tree Park |
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| Ryu Hyun Jin who plays for the dodgers and is all over Korea |
Now that I had survived my first
weekend in Jochiwon it was time to start my first week of actual teaching. The
way my schedule works in Korea is that in the morning I teach classes with my
coteacher, Juny, to the 3-6 graders. Each grade is taught separately two to
three times per week for 40 minutes. Then in the afternoon there are optional
classes that students can sign up for that I teach completely by myself.
Afternoon is three times per week with the first and second graders together,
third-fourth graders and then fifth-sixth graders plus kindergarten twice a
week. For afterschool I can teach them whatever I want which is kind of nice.
So for the first lesson Juny and
I had both designed introductory powerpoints about ourselves for the students.
I thought mine was basic enough but when I started speaking and saw all the
blank stares I knew I was in trouble. The students didn’t understand anything I
said and knew a lot less than I had anticipated. For example when I showed them
a picture of my family they kept saying that Patrick was my dad, Lainie was my
mom and things like that. They could have just been playing around but still.
So that was the first lesson. The next day I tried planning with Juny but she
said she has some ideas of what to do so I would just follow her lead. Well we
say hello to the students when they come in and then she says “Okay, Julie will
take you through Listen and Speak (a segment in the textbook)”, uh???? I had no
idea what Listen and Speak was and no idea what she wanted me to do but there I
am standing in front of the class supposed to teach them this segment. I don’t
even remember what I did. Listen and Speak is basically a story the students
listen to and then repeat certain segments so I think I had them repeat some
stuff here and there but I had nothing planned and no idea what to do. Luckily
Juny stepped in and asked them questions and got them to understand. Whew!!
Luckily for after school I did
have some things planned. I wanted to do an assessment so I could understand
what the students knew and what I should focus on. My first graders were
supposed to arrive at 1:20 and around 1:25 five kids showed up, so I was
excited and started my lesson. But at 1:30, five more showed up and then five
more and five more. Before I knew it I had 23 little first and second graders
running around the room. They know no English and therefore had no interest in
listening to me or even pretended to listen. It was crazy and I was in way over
my head. Luckily class was over at 2 so I just sent them on their merry way
right at 2. This freaked me out for my later classes. They went better but not
by much. I tried having the kids make nametags with their English name and a
drawing of three things they liked. But that went terribly as they all forgot
their English names and instead of drawing what they liked, copied the model I
had provided. This was going to be an uber long year!!
The next couple of afterschool
classes that week were pretty much just as bad. In my first-second grade class
I spent most of it trying to get them to be quiet or participate in the games I
had planned. I wanted to teach them shapes so I got them up and wanted them to
lay on the floor and make a shape with their bodies. Well I got about 10
involved while the rest ran around the room. Here I am trying to manage the
ones on the floor making shapes while trying to prevent Yeo Han from jumping
out the window, get Seong Dong off from the table and get Meong Jae to stop
pelvic thrusting and punching other kids. It was utter chaos. Luckily I put on
a youtube ABC Dance which they loved so for the first week I just had them
dance to the song half the time and had them make shapes the other half of the
time.
The only bright side was that I
had a lot of fun with my kindergarteners. There were only 10 of them and they
were so sweet. Except 40 minutes with kindergarteners is much longer than I
ever thought. I had gone through my plan within 15 minutes when I got there
which basically included a “Hello Julie” song and emotions games. I thought I only had to teach them once a
week but on Friday I just finished running around with 1-2nd grade
when I get a class that Kindergarten is waiting for me, WHAT??? “Yeah you teach
them on Friday too!” Okay so no planning
time, no ideas and I have to teach 10 high energy kindergarteners who have no
idea what I’m saying. “Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes” became my best friend
that day and youtube saved me!
The other great thing about this
week was that I did have fun with my fifth and sixth graders before afterschool
one day. We basically just took selfies and they had fun using my iPhone. Plus
I got to take a video of them dancing to one of the most popular Kpop songs,
“Bar Bar Bar” by Crayon Pop. I can’t go a day without hearing this song
somewhere and my kids absolutely love it! So I put it on and got to see the
kids go crazy as they danced away to this song. It was actually a lot of fun
and gave me ideas for afterschool curriculum.
By the end of the week I realized
I had some work to do. I had to figure out what I was going to do with all my
afterschool classes including designing an appropriate curriculum, activities,
a discipline and attendance system. I really needed the discipline system
especially as I tried and failed miserably already. With my first and second
graders I sent them to the back of the room when they were being bad but then
they just got up and ran back to their seat. With my third and fourth graders I
did what my coteacher did and had them go stand facing the wall but when I
turned around another kid went up and dong-chimmed them (take two fingers like
a gun and poke the person in their a**hole!---people are obsessed with it here,
don’t ask).
The only saving grace was that
the weather wasn’t too bad so I got to take some lovely evening runs after work
and I had nice plans on the weekend.
On Saturday I went to Cheongju to
meet up with my friend, Abby, to go to a Korean
class offered by the YMCA.
It was just an introductory class but we went over some simple phrases
that were actually quite useful. Afterwards we wandered around Cheongju doing
some shopping and going out to eat. Still unsure of what we ate but it was so
awkward. We ordered stirfry with chicken and they come and put a big pan on the
grill on your table and then dump on the ingredients. But our waiter never came
to stir it and we weren’t sure if we were or not. We kept looking around at
others and everyone else was being tended by a waiter. Our waiter was no where
in sight and then I saw him actually coming back into the restaurant from a
break or something. Talk about being an
outsider, lol. It was also weird shopping because the store clerks follow you
around as you shop which is terrible as they are there to help you but when you
don’t know the language it’s just awkward. Then at bigger shops they don't
follow you around but it’s unclear if you can try things on or not. We found
what looked like a dressing room and tried stuff on but then one of the clerks
came over, gave us dirty looks and just took the clothes away from us. I have
no idea why she took them but needless to say, we left. However while shopping
I was introduced to Konglish, a mixture of Korean and English. A lot of
clothing here has the most random English words on it, in an order that makes
no sense with misspelled words. OR it will English but random. I found a
sweatshirt that said “Montana University” and then one that said “Hooters
University.” Just weird!
I also got
to participate in a foreigner scavenger hunt. Some of the people who had been
in Jochiwon for a while came out with the new people and together we
participated in a scavenger hunt where you had to run all over town finding
certain landmarks. It was a great way to get to meet some of the people and get
better acquainted with Jochiwon. Plus afterwards we went out for tonkatsu which
is Japanese food but is basically fried chicken. Delicious!!
On Sunday I got to go with some
foreigners to Bear Tree Park. Bear Tree Park is a
beautiful park about 20 minutes by taxi from Jochiwon. We
wanted to have a picnic in the park but it turns out we weren’t allowed so just
munched on our snacks outside the gates. This was another cultural wake-up call
to me. We decided to all just bring picnic food but seeing as how I’m am
American I assumed we were all just brining our own food. But the others,
although they are Americans, I think they have become accustomed to the Korean
Group Culture and they all brought something to share. I felt terrible that I
hadn’t thought about the others and reminded me once again that in Korea, you
really have to think about the group and sharing. Anyways, we spent the day
wandering around the park which is basically beautiful gardens and seeing the
Bears. Except it was so sad as they had so many black bears all squished into
these really small cages and gave people food to throw to the bears. I just
felt so bad for all those bears as the enclosures were small, pure concrete and
dirty. It kind of spoiled the beauty of the park and put a damper on the day.
I was so
excited to have a nice weekend because who knew what lie ahead with
afterschool!
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