9/13: VIP and Exploring Suwon

Aerial Shot of the Toilet Museum in Suwon

Suwon

Hosting the VIP English Festival at YeonDong Elementary School

Toilet Museum in Suwon

My Sixth graders preparing to perform an English Skit (SangHyok, AhYoung, AhRon, SaeEun)

Hosting the VIP English Festival

Suwon Fortress Gate

Food Culture Festival in Suwon

Toilet Museum in Suwon

Suwon Fortress



Toilet Museum in Suwon

Seoul was awesome and was a well-needed vacation. Although it was exhausting it helped with the troubles I was having at school. School wasn’t really getting much better in terms of the kids. They were still very difficult to control, especially my third and fourth graders.

   One day the kid who made me cry last week started with again: Jayden from fourth grade. I gave them paper to use for some project and before I know it he has the paper on his crouch and has poked a circular hole. I’ll leave it at that-you can picture the rest. Well when I saw what was going on he got sent to the back of the room along with HyoJoung (Emily) for being very disruptive. Well there in the back of the room they start making inappropriate noises and dances. I was so shocked that I couldn’t think of what to do so instead just ignored them. Luckily Juny happened to be coming into the room for something and asked how the kids were doing. I told them what had happened and boy did she get mad. She took them out to the hallway and after giving them a lecture took them to their homeroom teacher, Mr. Handsome Man (he was the teacher when I first met him people kept asking me if I thought he was handsome). Now Mr. Handsome Man is usually a pretty chill guy but Juny told me she had never seen him so mad at the kids. They later came and apologized and that was one of the last problems I had with them. I was still having trouble keeping them engaged with the sports theme but I wasn’t ready to abandon this lesson plan yet.

I was close, however, to abandoning my lesson plan with the first and second graders. I was teaching them shapes and thought of so many activities but nothing was working. They hated the song I chose to play them, they weren’t into the video, they didn’t like physically making shapes (they did love getting up and running around hitting each other though), they were over coloring, I had no idea what to do. I talked to my mom and she told me about “Sounds in Motion” a program developed by the speech therapist at her school to teach the kids phonics. So I was beginning to think of abandoning my shapes plan all together and going with sounds of motion plan.

I also had low hopes for my movie themed after school class with the fifth and sixth graders. Their level was a lot lower than I expected and my teaching abilities were a lot lower than what was needed. I was still trying to figure out what to do and how to do it. I was having the hardest time having them remember the vocab I taught them. However, the highlight was that I learned that they love BINGO, thank god! Something we can play in class that has some educational value. I also learned that they love to play UNO. And I mean LOVE UNO! They play it constantly. It was so funny, I was playing with them and one sixth grader says to his friend, “I’m sorry man” as he puts down a “Draw 4” card. It was hilarious. The kids barely can speak a whole sentence and yet he says “I’m sorry man.” From that point on, this kid, the sixth grade Ryan became my little American. He was a little chubby and he would speak American slang like man, bro, what’s up so he reminded me of an American student.

Along with some fun games of UNO, I was getting to know some of the sixth grade students better. The Sejong City Office of Education was having a competition in October where students from the elementary school would participate in an English competiton. There were 12 themes and at the competition one theme would be drawn and students would have to create a 3-5 minute dialogue. However all schools knew the 12 themes so could spend some time preparing possible scripts for the themes. Therefore I wrote a couple of scripts and Juny and I would practice with the four sixth graders who would be competing. They were pretty cute and a lot of funny little moments happened during practice. Like one time, Evan, the cashier was supposed to say “Thank you and here is your change” but him being the smarta** that he is said “Thank you. Here is your not change” and from them on would always just say “not change.”

Along with preparing for the competition, the students would have to present one of their skits at the VIP English festival that was going to happen over the upcoming weekend. We practiced every morning and one day during practice we were called into an all school assembly. The assemblies would randomly occur and I never knew why or when one would be. But all of a sudden there is an assembly and about halfway through the assembly the sixth grade team is called up onstage and they have to present the skit! I was totally taken off guard and I think they and Juny were as well. But that is Korea, surprises around every corner. Luckily the kids did fantastically.

As mentioned this upcoming weekend was the VIP English Festival which is basically a show that happens once a month for various elementary schools in Sejong City. The English teachers have to run it and it consists of a games/quiz portion, a dance, a skit and a performance from the students. I was on the games/quiz portion and actually had to MC the first half of the show along with running a quiz for all these kids. We had a rehearsal on Wednesday night and I still had no idea what my role really was or what the heck I was supposed to do.

So Saturday rolls around and I head off for the VIP English Festival. Luckily it was being held at my school this time (it rotates) which helped me feel a little more comfortable. There were about 100 students there from about three or four elementary schools and I actually really enjoyed the festival. My sixth grade students had to perform the skit they had been practicing and they did great! I was so proud. Then later we all got to do the Cha Cha Slide. My kids really hated it because it wasn’t explained that well but I had a great time dancing around. It was the first time my kids had seen me let loose a little and they really had a great time watching me, laughing. Plus another good thing about VIP is that afterwards the Office of Education takes the teachers out for lunch. We went to this beautiful restaurant in the mountains and had a great fish and duck meal! Free meal=score=Julie happy!!

                Afterwards I headed to HomePlus which is basically like a target and the reason for mentioning this was that it was the first time I took the bus to HomePlus and the first time I used enough Korean in the taxi ride home to get the taxi to go straight to the apartment. I had bought so many things so it was kinda a matter of life and death and I was forced to use Korean. I was really proud of myself!

                Sunday was another busy day as I was going with Maggie to explore the city of Suwon. Suwon is just about an hour away from Jochiwon by train and is famous for a huge fortress and toilet museum. Even though it was a rainy miserable day, Maggie and I boarded the train and an hour later were walking around the city of Suwon. We were lucky because as we neared the fortress we stumbled upon a food festival! It was really busy and active with some great food. I got mandu which are dumplings along with hoppang (white bread filled with red bean paste). We munched our way through the festival and then headed to the fortress. It wasn’t so much a fortress as a huge wall that just surrounds the city. We walked along it for some time before deciding we had seen enough and tried heading to the toilet museum.

                It took forever to get to the museum. We weren’t really sure which bus stop to get off at and ended up going almost to the end of the line, basically the last ones on the bus, and the driver basically pushing us off. We were in the middle of nowhere and wandered until we found a gas station where the attendant was able to point us in the right direction. But that’s all we had, the right direction. We walked and walked and were still no closer to finding it. Eventually we walked into a CU who told us it was right behind us and sure enough, it was. It was pretty easy to spot then as it is in the shape of a giant toilet! I told you Koreans really liked poop. Apparently this guy who helped to transform the public sanitation system in Korea built himself a house in the shape of a toilet and when he passed away it became a museum outlining the history of Korean toilets as well as becoming a poop sculpture garden. It was so bizarre! I enjoyed it but it was a really small museum and I don’t think worth all the hassle of getting there. Oh well! I was so happy to get to see Suwon and on the way back was able to stop for Krispy Kreme donuts for my teachers. And there ended another busy and fun weekend in Korea!