Weekly round up

Weekly round up

Hey everyone, here’s my weekly round up.

So I was sick on Monday, as in genuine sick at home sick. Not that I know any other type of sick; but I was worried that the teachers at school may have thought that I was not sick, but rather skiving off. So I deliberated taking the day off but in the end my not wanting to pass on the germs and genuine sick feeling won out.

Anyway it was one of those 24hour bugs where you make a miraculous recovery very quickly, so I was back at school on Tuesday.

School has been going very well for me of late. My lessons have been going well and I feel that I am achieving something in class. On Tuesday I helped the students at my rural school prepare for ‘show and tell’ which is taking place this coming Tuesday. I really enjoyed helping them with their pronunciation and correcting their grammar. I didn’t simply correct their speeches/talks that they were preparing, I kind of led them through the problems - you know made them puzzle out the solutions which I felt was helpful to them. I really felt like a proper teacher at the end of the day, rather than someone fumbling about in the class room.

My birthday lesson has been going very well, and it only took me half an hour to dream up - this is how it is meant to be. It’s so simple. First I go through the numbers 1 to 20 with the students, getting them to say ‘first, second, third’ etc. The students already know the language, so it’s more like a refresher which is really what I aim to do in class. I want to refresh and reinforce rather than teach new language.

After this I lead them through the language that I would like them to use. They have to say “That was your X/Y/Zth birthday” when looking at photographs of my birthdays. It’s a simple sentence but the students find it difficult to remember. If the students guess how old I was correctly they win a ticket, so the exercise is also competition which adds an element of excitement. The really cool thing is that as the pictures change every couple of minutes the students don’t get bored. I’m also pleased that as the weaker students hear the same sentence over and over they begin to pluck up the courage to have a bash themselves.

After this exercise I hold up a bag which contains my birthday presents and get the students to guess what gifts I was given. Since the students are warmed up from the previous activity they listen to my clues and make guesses.

The best thing about all of this is that I finally feel that I am engaging the more hyper students, I feel like I am channeling their energy.

The poetry competition has been a great success and lots of students have made submitted poems, + students have been visiting the blog that I created which is fantastic. Of course I am now going to have to mark the poetry and update the blog, but I really don’t mind since the pay off is that I am engaging the students. Of course the students aren’t just writing poetry out of a love for poetry, they want to win tickets for the draw.

The draw is sooo popular, everyone wants to win tickets. The students shake the box (containing the tickets that have already been entered) to mix up the tickets and examine it carefully to see if they can spot names on the tickets.

So I’m a happy but very busy teacher.

Next week Jess and I are going on an EPIK sponsored trip to the DMZ (demilitarized zone) between North and South Korea. The trip starts on Friday, so we get Friday off. Yay!

In terms of other trips our long train trip is slowly beginning to take shape. My friend Guy is set on joining us which I am thrilled about. I’m hoping Clint will join us as well so that we take up a full cabin on the train; but even if it is just Guy and us it will still be great. Clearly Guy doesn’t feel like a spare wheel with us which I would hate. Blech, I really don’t dig couples that make you feel like a spare wheel.

We hope to go to Japan in November. Friends have invited us to watch Sumo wrestling with them. We only intend going for a weekend, but it is going to be awesome.

And finally, last - but far from least - Jess had a piece published in the Korea Times. See: “New Songdo city - How eco-friendly is it?” She worked long and hard on the article, and deserved to have it published.