The teacher and the terror

My lessons have been going well recently but I faced a problem this morning, one which I have faced before and have not found an adequate solution to.

At the heart of this problem is the huge difference in level between students in a class - some are semi-fluent, a handful of which you simply can’t shut up, and others can barely string a sentence together.

I like doing an exercise where I ask a question, and then have a strong student answer it. For example this morning I asked a student, I always start with a strong student, “Where are you going for Chuseok?” The question led to a simple dialogue. Once we completed the dialogue the student took my role and led another student, of their choice, through the dialogue.

I really enjoy the exercise since students enjoy the element of choice which increases their enthusiasm, gives the class a sense of ownership of the lesson and definitely increases general attentiveness.

Of course the bit that sucks is that I surrender control of who does the dialogue to the class. Once in while the students throw one of their classmates, and myself, a curve ball by picking a low student to model the conversation.

So what does one do? Dive in and pass the role onto another student? Sit back and watch the student struggle? Try and nudge them through the exercise to their intense embarrassment and shear terror?

Any advice? What would you do?

Recent News

Hello everyone!

Jess and I have been back in Korea for 3 weeks now. I’ve taught plenty of lessons, and they have generally gone well.

We now have less than two weeks to go until the end of our first contracts. I feel as if we are edging towards a mile stone. Now is definitely a time for reflection, but I won’t bore you - suffice to say that I have had some rotten moments, some brilliant moments and everything in between.

I’ve spent quite a bit time working on my blog of late, and have finally figured out how to upload pictures quickly and easily. So I’ll upload more pics in the future and hang back on the long winded diatribe side of things.

Recent additions include a slide show of 101 photos of Sangju, pics from a recent outing with some teachers and two videos. One of the videos is a promotional video for Sangju, it’s slightly dated but definitely worth a watch. Please note though that Sangju is the center of (South) Korea and not the center of the universe. The video is unclear on this point.

My students wrote exams last week, which meant the teachers got to go home early on Thursday and Friday. On Wednesday the teachers of my school, including myself, visited a temple an hour or so South of us. One of the halls had a 1000 miniature Buddha statues. While viewing the statues one of my co-teachers sidled up to me and told me that only one was different, and that if I managed to spot it I would be blessed with good luck. I found it in less than a minute which impressed my cot-eacher. I felt smug, but the truth is it was easy.

Since the students had exams last week I took the opportunity to tidy up my class room and stick up some new pictures. Oh and I have started a blog for my English club - please check it out: www.namsanmiddleschoolenglishclub.blogspot.com. It’s really basic at the moment but I have high hopes for it.

Last weekend Jess and I went hiking with a friend in a nearby national park. We arrived at the park late on Saturday afternoon after visiting some local sites and then overnighted in a tiny “hikers’ inn”. On Sunday we climbed to a famous rocky outcrop called Munjangdae. At just over 1000m it is one of the highest points in the area. The view was fantastic. The only drawback were the many hikers that we had to share the stunning forests with. Hiking is very popular in Korea and many hiking clubs had clearly decided to take advantage of the cooler weather.

The route to the top was difficult. Our path went straight up the mountain ignoring all possible contour paths. I’m unfit and at times I struggled. The incredible thing is that on the way up we passed several restaurants. These restaurants can only be resupplied by means of the path that we hiked up. I was taken aback when at the first restaurant I saw large gas canisters neatly stacked against the wall.

Last night we had a braai on the banks of the Nakdong river in celebration of Heritage day. It was well attended and included a mixture of some of the ‘older’ (as in they have been here a while) westerners, newer westerners and some Koreans. I’m really glad a few Koreans joined us, I don’t want us westerners to form an isolated community.

On Friday night Jess and I discovered a new restaurant which has outdoor seating. Ok, so the outdoor seating looks onto a parking lot, but it is still outdoor seating.

So things are looking good at the moment. My only bad news is that our iron is on it’s way out. That’s the last time I buy a Locust (brand) iron, bloody hell.

Keep well.

I've started a spot for post cards. I would love it if you would send me a few. Email me and Ill send you my address.

I'm trying to improve the students' knowledge of Africa.

Flash cards from one of my lessons.

If I remember correctly I added the text to this poster, not that it actually has any affect.

Pics from teachers outing

Teachers Outing 23 September

I went on an outing with the teachers from my school recently. We went to see a temple near Gimcheon. I enjoyed the outing, but my poor Korean held me back on the socialising.

Here's a video that the art teacher produced afterwards.

PS - Clicking on the image navigates away from this page, do any of you computer geniuses know how I can embed so that it plays without opening a new page first? I haven't investigated the YouTube options yet, but I'm not that keen to either. Please let me know if you have any ideas.

An announcement you do not want to wake up to.

Here's an announcement you simply do not want to wake up to:

"Hi Teachers,

There will be some Holidays coming up like Chuseok and Korean New Years. If you are planning to go outside of Korea. You will be Quarantined when you return. If you are quarantined, you will be using your sick days. (You have 15 days sick leave)

Schools may ask you to not go outside Korea because of the Quarantine week. Because you are leaving outside of Korea, schools will be missing an English teacher for that time being.

Jon Pak
Program Coordinator"

Eish. I'm not sure what the legal definition of 'sick leave' is over on this side, but I always thought that sick leave is something to do with an inability to teach that is related to your health. If you are healthy then you don't take sick leave.

EPIK is welcome to take (reasonable) steps to look after the health of Korean students, but that does entitle it to infringe on teachers contractual rights.

At least GEPIK (Gyeongsangbuk EPIK) presently does not regard quarantine as 'sick leave'.

Oh - and consider this: Korea has roughly 10 000 cases of Swine flu. Just how much more likely are you to contract Swine flu if you travel outside the country?

Thanks to the folk at Expacked (http://expacked.wordpress.com/) and Brian Deutsch (see my links) for the heads up.