1) I woke up this morning to find a restaurant advertisement sitting in a frying pan on my gas range. Someone had pushed the flyer through the 1-inch crack in window above thee gas range, and it landed in my frying pan. Everyday my door is covered in ads for restaurants, internet or cable subscriptions, etc. I seldom take a second glance at these ads and usually there is a team of trash collectors that go down the street every few days to clean the advertisements off the street or tear them off the doors of uninterested residents.
That's one thing I've noticed in Korea - the excessive use of paper ads. Walking down the street everyday, I see young men or women flinging dozens of advertisements on the ground outside businesses, and I've even scene cards lying on the sidewalk advertising prostitutes or strip clubs. (On a related note, trash cans are far and few in between on the streets, so I typically see Koreans drop their trash onto the street).
Even though the street looks messy, and one could reasonably condemn Koreans for littering on a massive scale, somehow the streets are clean and paper-free the following morning.
2) I'm reading Chekhov's "Three Sisters" again. Here are some thoughts:
-Why do so many of Chekhov's characters turn into teachers and school administrators?
-Chekhov's plays are about the very act of living, how daily tasks, our everyday jobs and obligations wear us down.
-Is Natasha a symbol of time and modernism, slowly eating its way at the lives of the three sisters, pushing them out of the picture? Why does she gain so much power and at the same time the sisters descend into misery?
-What has changed between the first and second acts?
-What is the significance of the silly conversations in act two, such as the argument between Solyony and Chebuytkin on whether a Chehartma is a plant or a meat dish? Repetition figures into these arguments.
-Why hasn't Andrei become a professor yet? Is he burdened by his new wife and growing family?
I was thinking about the school teachers theme with respect to my own job. There is a lot of repetition involved in school - one teachers the same lessons year and after year, and one wonders if it really matters, will anybody actually remember it at all. Will my students remember me? And work in education is very taxing work, physically as well as intellectually, as one is always up and performing in front of a class. One must constantly live and focus all their energy into each moment to keep the class moving, and this can wear you down.
I think about the teachers at my school in Korea and especially the director and his wife. They work such long hours. Every month they attend special conferences in Changwon to discuss improvements to the Jung Chul curriculum and ways to become better teachers. Every Tuesday they have a special adult English class in the early afternoon. In preparation for the big national tests, they all work on Saturdays. And on top of all these long, almost 12 hour work days, they take very few, almost zero days off a year, with the exception of national holidays, of which there are about 10 a year. So ten days off per year.
And this hogwon has been in operation for about eight or ten years?!? How do the director and his wife stand the repetition, thee constant turnover of teachers and students, the mind numbing exercises in the classroom, the daily labors of pushing/fighting with/cajoling/threatening each student to retake a spelling test until he/she passes? How do they get through each day within collapsing under the weight of everyday life?
It's a natural environment to ponder the existential questions frequently asked by the characters in Three Sisters. And plus it was common for single women in 19th century Russia (and in America) to work as schoolteachers. It was one of a few respectable jobs available to them.
3) My students like to eat raw ramen noodles for snacks every day. First they smash the noodles up inside they bag, they shake in the salty seasoning that are so bad for you, then they pop chunks into their mouth like some people eat potato chips.
21.6.11
10.6.11
Observation 6/9/2011
1. Over the past year, I've often been greeted by clumps of feces on my walk to work. It's a fifteen-ish minute walk to work, through a couple alleys, past a big apartment complex, across a few main streets, but I can almost always count on a few clumps of feces. Of course there's bird feces, but sometimes I see unusually large clumps that look altogether too familiar --- maybe a dog, maybe (oh God I hope not)..human? It happens with such regularity, and I can almost always see these steaming piles of dung sitting by a bag of rotten kimchi. Together, it might be the grossest smell I've ever come across. And it might be days (one time almost a week!) before the poop gets cleaned up -- so day after day it's a like an old friend greeting me on my way to work. There are no dumpsters here in Korea -- people leave their garbage in bags on the side of the street for the garbage collectors to take away.
2. Doug Lemov's 49 Technique to become a champion teacher is a great read. He has spent years studying what actually makes great teachers great, and his findings show that teaching is not an innate gift that some people have and other don't, but it's a craft that takes years of practice to learn. I like his approach, one that always asks the simple questions: "What do you do when a student says 'I don't know'? What's the best course of action to take?"
3. It's that time of the year again! Well year no, maybe month. The middle school students are in for yet another months of intense prepping to get ready for yet another epic national test at the end of the month. SO my middle school classes have been transformed into test prep classes. My job? Help students memorize passages out of their textbook, passages that will appear on the big test. The idea? If the students have the passage memorized, they will be able to answer the questions and/or translate whatever is given to them without even thinking.
2. Doug Lemov's 49 Technique to become a champion teacher is a great read. He has spent years studying what actually makes great teachers great, and his findings show that teaching is not an innate gift that some people have and other don't, but it's a craft that takes years of practice to learn. I like his approach, one that always asks the simple questions: "What do you do when a student says 'I don't know'? What's the best course of action to take?"
3. It's that time of the year again! Well year no, maybe month. The middle school students are in for yet another months of intense prepping to get ready for yet another epic national test at the end of the month. SO my middle school classes have been transformed into test prep classes. My job? Help students memorize passages out of their textbook, passages that will appear on the big test. The idea? If the students have the passage memorized, they will be able to answer the questions and/or translate whatever is given to them without even thinking.
8.6.11
Observations 6/15/2011
1. Korean carrots are huge and cucumbers are skinny (and spiky). Shocked me a bit when I first walked into a grocery store here.
2. Saturday I made another trip up Palyoung Mountain. It's only a ten minute walk from my house, followed by a 50 minute trek to the top, so I like to visit every two weeks or so. A random Korean stopped me on my hike down from the top. He knew basic English very well and asked me the normal round of questions (where are you from, where do you work, etc). I think most Koreans are surprised to see a foreigner on the mountain, as it's usually middle aged married couples making the hike to the top. It must also seem strange to see a person hiking the mountain by himself. This is a culture of couples, and you almost always see people walking about in groups of two or more.
I was reminded of how many positive experiences I've had hiking this mountain. In fact, I've only ever had positive experiences -- there's almost always been someone who says hi to me or offers me a relaxing coffee and/or banana.
I go to the mountain to clean out my mind. It's a spiritual journey to the top, often accompanied by symphonies and songs by Mahler, and there's always more released from body than a layer of sweat -- the journey grounds me, makes me feel like I'm in one piece, reaffirms my mission in Korea. It's so easy to get bogged down by stress or monotony that this cleansing ritual becomes important every two weeks or so.
3. Culture of hitting.
Today I had a conversation with one of my middle school students, Kyle, about hitting in Korean culture. When I first arrived in Korea, I was shocked and frightened to see how physical the students are with themselves and with their teachers. At school, it's a common sight to see students smacking each other, rolling around on the ground, jumping into the air, on top of each other, etc...it happens so often most of the time the teachers only shout "Stop it!" from across the room and leave it at that. The truth is, about 90% of the time this 'fighting' is harmless, good-natured, and even cute, like puppy dogs playing in the backyard.
Teachers have a physical relationship with the students as well -- teachers will grab students' backpacks or sweatshirt hoods to keep them from running off without doing homework, raise their fists at sassy students, pull students' hair or cheeks if they don't do their homework. Of course, there is the whipping stick (or 'stick of love'), which usually solemnizes the tone of the class, but generally this is playfully too.
I've heard that Korean friends are very touchy feelly, including groups of guys, and it's not uncommon on the street to see grown men playing slapping each other on the street. We're so much more conscious of personal space in the USA. Also, it's not an uncommon sight to see grown men walking down the street holding hands.
Getting back to the conversation I had today with Kyle, he told me about fights he has with his younger brother (another one of my students)over who should turn the bedroom light off. The their mother gets involved, in it all turns into this great comedic fistfight. That was funny.
This was not. I asked Kyle about hitting in the schools and he told me that students hit the teachers, but not in a playful way, but to humiliate them. Many students are rude to their teachers and take pleasure in making a joke out of them during class (while they're not snoozing). Students ignore attempts by their teacher to wake them up, or will shout out "What are you doing teacher?!? Go back and teach! GO! GO!" They hit the teacher with their fists, chuck erasers at him, ddongshim him (look it up, and their 50-60 year old teacher does nothing.
I know what I would have done--quit. I can handle verbal abuse, but physical attacks do not belong in the classroom. I don't understand this, but this is not the first time I've heard of the recent problems of students behavior in a 21st century Korea.
2. Saturday I made another trip up Palyoung Mountain. It's only a ten minute walk from my house, followed by a 50 minute trek to the top, so I like to visit every two weeks or so. A random Korean stopped me on my hike down from the top. He knew basic English very well and asked me the normal round of questions (where are you from, where do you work, etc). I think most Koreans are surprised to see a foreigner on the mountain, as it's usually middle aged married couples making the hike to the top. It must also seem strange to see a person hiking the mountain by himself. This is a culture of couples, and you almost always see people walking about in groups of two or more.
I was reminded of how many positive experiences I've had hiking this mountain. In fact, I've only ever had positive experiences -- there's almost always been someone who says hi to me or offers me a relaxing coffee and/or banana.
I go to the mountain to clean out my mind. It's a spiritual journey to the top, often accompanied by symphonies and songs by Mahler, and there's always more released from body than a layer of sweat -- the journey grounds me, makes me feel like I'm in one piece, reaffirms my mission in Korea. It's so easy to get bogged down by stress or monotony that this cleansing ritual becomes important every two weeks or so.
3. Culture of hitting.
Today I had a conversation with one of my middle school students, Kyle, about hitting in Korean culture. When I first arrived in Korea, I was shocked and frightened to see how physical the students are with themselves and with their teachers. At school, it's a common sight to see students smacking each other, rolling around on the ground, jumping into the air, on top of each other, etc...it happens so often most of the time the teachers only shout "Stop it!" from across the room and leave it at that. The truth is, about 90% of the time this 'fighting' is harmless, good-natured, and even cute, like puppy dogs playing in the backyard.
Teachers have a physical relationship with the students as well -- teachers will grab students' backpacks or sweatshirt hoods to keep them from running off without doing homework, raise their fists at sassy students, pull students' hair or cheeks if they don't do their homework. Of course, there is the whipping stick (or 'stick of love'), which usually solemnizes the tone of the class, but generally this is playfully too.
I've heard that Korean friends are very touchy feelly, including groups of guys, and it's not uncommon on the street to see grown men playing slapping each other on the street. We're so much more conscious of personal space in the USA. Also, it's not an uncommon sight to see grown men walking down the street holding hands.
Getting back to the conversation I had today with Kyle, he told me about fights he has with his younger brother (another one of my students)over who should turn the bedroom light off. The their mother gets involved, in it all turns into this great comedic fistfight. That was funny.
This was not. I asked Kyle about hitting in the schools and he told me that students hit the teachers, but not in a playful way, but to humiliate them. Many students are rude to their teachers and take pleasure in making a joke out of them during class (while they're not snoozing). Students ignore attempts by their teacher to wake them up, or will shout out "What are you doing teacher?!? Go back and teach! GO! GO!" They hit the teacher with their fists, chuck erasers at him, ddongshim him (look it up, and their 50-60 year old teacher does nothing.
I know what I would have done--quit. I can handle verbal abuse, but physical attacks do not belong in the classroom. I don't understand this, but this is not the first time I've heard of the recent problems of students behavior in a 21st century Korea.
Observations 6/7/2011
1. The morning, which is the most memorable season of the day, is the awakening hour. Then there is least somnolence in us; and for an hour, at least, some part of us awakes which slumbers all the rest of the day and night.
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn
These two quotes are from Walden by Henry David Thoreau. I was leafing through bits of Walden today and came across these quotes that had special relevance for me. There is no feeling quite like the one I get from watching a sunrise – I love the morning. I feel cleansed, refreshed– it’s a spiritual moment for me (this is why I go hiking every other weekend and listen to Mahler at the top – it’s a cleansing ritual for me). new beginning for the world, and I’m part of that. The moon does a great job of making me feel tiny and insignificant, but the sun makes me feel large, heroic, and connected to the world around me.
Unfortunately I have very poor sleeping habits and it’s rare that I get to witness perhaps the most important moment of the day.
2. With only little over two months left in Korea, thoughts of home and plans for my next adventure in Georgia have dominated my thoughts. I’m so anxious to revisit my home and friends, and everything familiar. In the long run, time moves quickly, but from moment to moment, it moves so slowly.
3. I gave my younger students (my problem class) a group activity today. The task was to draw a new planet using several of the geographic features we had been discussing in class, then write a small paragraph describing your planet. This class is a rowdy one, mostly 10 year old boys, and they have enormous problems with attention, manners, and respect. But I couldn’t believe my eyes today –they took real interest in the activity, discussing with each other, brainstorming, respecting each others' suggestions, then making an attempt on the paragraph that made me feel proud. All it took was a creative activity, group work, some background vocabulary, and the expectations. Good work today.
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn
These two quotes are from Walden by Henry David Thoreau. I was leafing through bits of Walden today and came across these quotes that had special relevance for me. There is no feeling quite like the one I get from watching a sunrise – I love the morning. I feel cleansed, refreshed– it’s a spiritual moment for me (this is why I go hiking every other weekend and listen to Mahler at the top – it’s a cleansing ritual for me). new beginning for the world, and I’m part of that. The moon does a great job of making me feel tiny and insignificant, but the sun makes me feel large, heroic, and connected to the world around me.
Unfortunately I have very poor sleeping habits and it’s rare that I get to witness perhaps the most important moment of the day.
2. With only little over two months left in Korea, thoughts of home and plans for my next adventure in Georgia have dominated my thoughts. I’m so anxious to revisit my home and friends, and everything familiar. In the long run, time moves quickly, but from moment to moment, it moves so slowly.
3. I gave my younger students (my problem class) a group activity today. The task was to draw a new planet using several of the geographic features we had been discussing in class, then write a small paragraph describing your planet. This class is a rowdy one, mostly 10 year old boys, and they have enormous problems with attention, manners, and respect. But I couldn’t believe my eyes today –they took real interest in the activity, discussing with each other, brainstorming, respecting each others' suggestions, then making an attempt on the paragraph that made me feel proud. All it took was a creative activity, group work, some background vocabulary, and the expectations. Good work today.
7.6.11
3 Observations 6/6/2011
I've been fighting off a cold for most of this three day vacation so I decided to spend a quiet Monday at home. There's nothing worse than trying to teach while sick.
1. I watched several documentaries today on the widening gap between the rich and the poor in America. One critic likened the current class situation in America to that of imperial Britain. We do have a class system in America, but we don't like to talk about it. All my life I have been taught that hard work will guarantee success and it is terrifying to see blue collar workers push themselves to the extreme working several minimum wage jobs, jobs that requires focus, memory power, quick decision making, etc, and at the end of the day, these people have nothing. Why do they put up with it? If you work hard, avoid the short cuts, and keep a positive attitude, you should be successful.
2. I re-read Chekhov's "The Cherry Orchard" last night for the first time in over a year. I love Chekhov but I have a tough time drawing conclusions from his works. His plays are the most mysterious I have read amongst modern playwrights, and it has taken time to begin to understand his odd, but beautiful plays.
Some questions that popped into my mind during this reading:
-does Varya love Lopakhin? How much free reign do Anya and Varya have in choosing a husband?
--Why is Lopakhin so aware of time? What is the significance of the moment in Act Three where we learn that Lopakin had missed the train after the auction and had to wait several hours for the next?
--The adults behave like children and the younger generation do a poor job of trying to behave as adults.
--the orchard means something different to everyone in the play.
--For much of the play the characters talk about their memories of the past, but this seems absent in the fourth act, where most of the talk is about plans for the immediate future. Then, finally Firs, the embodiment off the past, walks out alone, sealed up inside the house, left to die. What does one do with the past in the face of great change?
3. I watched a Bill Moyers special today featuring the investigative journalist, feminist, and writer Barbara Ehrenreich. She spent several months exploring the world of working class America by taking on several minimum wage jobs, then writing a book about her experiences and findings. I love her work because I'm very interested in how other people live their lives and I'm excited that she actually tried to live their life for several months. In trying to understand a group of people, it's a good technique to try and live life as they do.
1. I watched several documentaries today on the widening gap between the rich and the poor in America. One critic likened the current class situation in America to that of imperial Britain. We do have a class system in America, but we don't like to talk about it. All my life I have been taught that hard work will guarantee success and it is terrifying to see blue collar workers push themselves to the extreme working several minimum wage jobs, jobs that requires focus, memory power, quick decision making, etc, and at the end of the day, these people have nothing. Why do they put up with it? If you work hard, avoid the short cuts, and keep a positive attitude, you should be successful.
2. I re-read Chekhov's "The Cherry Orchard" last night for the first time in over a year. I love Chekhov but I have a tough time drawing conclusions from his works. His plays are the most mysterious I have read amongst modern playwrights, and it has taken time to begin to understand his odd, but beautiful plays.
Some questions that popped into my mind during this reading:
-does Varya love Lopakhin? How much free reign do Anya and Varya have in choosing a husband?
--Why is Lopakhin so aware of time? What is the significance of the moment in Act Three where we learn that Lopakin had missed the train after the auction and had to wait several hours for the next?
--The adults behave like children and the younger generation do a poor job of trying to behave as adults.
--the orchard means something different to everyone in the play.
--For much of the play the characters talk about their memories of the past, but this seems absent in the fourth act, where most of the talk is about plans for the immediate future. Then, finally Firs, the embodiment off the past, walks out alone, sealed up inside the house, left to die. What does one do with the past in the face of great change?
3. I watched a Bill Moyers special today featuring the investigative journalist, feminist, and writer Barbara Ehrenreich. She spent several months exploring the world of working class America by taking on several minimum wage jobs, then writing a book about her experiences and findings. I love her work because I'm very interested in how other people live their lives and I'm excited that she actually tried to live their life for several months. In trying to understand a group of people, it's a good technique to try and live life as they do.
6.6.11
Observations 6/5/2011
1. An older Korean man came up to me today while waiting for the subway train in Pusan. He gave me a flyer for a Christian radio broadcast later that evening and asked me many questions about where I was from and my family. He seemed like a nice guy and I was thrilled that he tried so hard to communicate with me despite the little English he knew. What makes this strange was the way he first approached me: "OMG! Where are you from? You are very very handsome! Are you an actor? You look like Jim Carry!"
This is not the first time a stranger has stopped me on the street to worship my as-he-sees-it beauty. The first time this happened I was floored and wanted to run away, but I've gotten used to it. The is a tremendous importance on the outer in this culture, and while living in the Korean gaze, I will have to endure the stares, the gapes, and the occasional creepy admirer.
2. Lately I've gotten into the novels and short stories of Tolstoy. I was reading the beginning of "The Kreutzer Sonata" today and was struck by the opening conversation in the train compartment. Strangers gripped in a philosophical discussion on the nature of love. We don't do that anymore, do we? The art of conversing with strangers is gone, and it seems that people are afraid to break the ice these days. We seem even less interested in deep conversations and prefer the typical fluff intro conversations, then leave it at that. I wish people spent more time talking to each other.
3. I watched "Kung Fu Panda 2" with my Korean class today at the Nampodong cinema in Busan. I was entertained, but the film didn't make an impression on me the way "The Lion King" or "Pocahantas" made in my youth. They just don't make children's films like they used to. So much emphasis on plot and 3-D fights, so much moralizing, and so little content and interesting characterization.
This is not the first time a stranger has stopped me on the street to worship my as-he-sees-it beauty. The first time this happened I was floored and wanted to run away, but I've gotten used to it. The is a tremendous importance on the outer in this culture, and while living in the Korean gaze, I will have to endure the stares, the gapes, and the occasional creepy admirer.
2. Lately I've gotten into the novels and short stories of Tolstoy. I was reading the beginning of "The Kreutzer Sonata" today and was struck by the opening conversation in the train compartment. Strangers gripped in a philosophical discussion on the nature of love. We don't do that anymore, do we? The art of conversing with strangers is gone, and it seems that people are afraid to break the ice these days. We seem even less interested in deep conversations and prefer the typical fluff intro conversations, then leave it at that. I wish people spent more time talking to each other.
3. I watched "Kung Fu Panda 2" with my Korean class today at the Nampodong cinema in Busan. I was entertained, but the film didn't make an impression on me the way "The Lion King" or "Pocahantas" made in my youth. They just don't make children's films like they used to. So much emphasis on plot and 3-D fights, so much moralizing, and so little content and interesting characterization.
5.6.11
3 Observations 6/4/2011
1. I spent most of today exploring Louis Theroux's BBC documentaries on weird American subcultures. I love his work - he's able to keep such an open mind and operates on a real humanistic level so the viewer can really get a glimpse into the inside world. His work reminds me a lot of his father, Paul Theroux, the travel writer, famous for exploring off-the beaten trail places like Turkmenistan, Romania, Georgia, etc. I've been leafing through his book "Ghost Train to the Orient Star" and I really appreciate his objectivity -- no talk of "amazing experiences" or "life changing moments". Only the interesting and (quite often) the dull. "Travel only looks exciting in retrospect" says Theroux.
2. I dislike going out on Saturday nights in Korea because I get so many uncomfortable stares. I sometimes feel like it's taboo to walk around in Korea alone - actually, a group of hikers on the mountain once stopped me in surprise, wondering why I was by myself on the mountain. But Saturday night seems to be the prime night for girlfriends/boyfriends/groups of friends to promenade up and down the streets and I feel so uncomfortable walking by them. It's a tough physiological battle one faces --- what are they thinking? Are they wondering why I'm alone? Are they wondering why I don't have a girlfriend? Why are they gaping at me? Why can't they just mind their own business? Although I live in an area where I received more stares than if I lived in a major city like Seoul or Pusan, I think it's mostly a battle in my mind. You have to let go your suspicions of what people think about you. I do think I get stared at a bit too much, and there have been several times where Koreans have froze in mid-action (like picking vegetables out at the grocery store) to gape their mouths at me. I have to let it go and remember this is not always the case. Some people do stare at me and make me feel very uncomfortable,but there are plenty of Koreans who could care less.
3. You can buy peanut butter in Korea but it's a bit expensive (about $6 a jar). I've been told that many Korean don't like peanut butter as they find it "too sweet".
2. I dislike going out on Saturday nights in Korea because I get so many uncomfortable stares. I sometimes feel like it's taboo to walk around in Korea alone - actually, a group of hikers on the mountain once stopped me in surprise, wondering why I was by myself on the mountain. But Saturday night seems to be the prime night for girlfriends/boyfriends/groups of friends to promenade up and down the streets and I feel so uncomfortable walking by them. It's a tough physiological battle one faces --- what are they thinking? Are they wondering why I'm alone? Are they wondering why I don't have a girlfriend? Why are they gaping at me? Why can't they just mind their own business? Although I live in an area where I received more stares than if I lived in a major city like Seoul or Pusan, I think it's mostly a battle in my mind. You have to let go your suspicions of what people think about you. I do think I get stared at a bit too much, and there have been several times where Koreans have froze in mid-action (like picking vegetables out at the grocery store) to gape their mouths at me. I have to let it go and remember this is not always the case. Some people do stare at me and make me feel very uncomfortable,but there are plenty of Koreans who could care less.
3. You can buy peanut butter in Korea but it's a bit expensive (about $6 a jar). I've been told that many Korean don't like peanut butter as they find it "too sweet".
4.6.11
Daily Observation 6/2/2011
Inspired by a post on theater director Anne Bogart's blog, I would like to try out a new form of blog posts. It seems so satisfying to write a lengthy epic blog post, but there is a disadvantage: it's easier to procrastinate (as one can see from this blog).
Rather than one giant post every once in a while, I'd like to try writing three daily observations - these posts will not be lengthy, but I might write with more regularity.
1. Today one of the new teachers at JC School, Min, asked me to proofread an essay for a student's speech competition. The task was easy enough, and after she presented me a present of a small bottle of frozen orange juice. I'm reminded of the role of gift giving in this culture, and how simple, nature-made gifts (like an orange, given to me by one of my favorite students from a couple months ago) can move you more than an human-made material.
2. This week has been another experiment in using poetry in the ESL classroom. This week I used one of favorite poem, Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky. I've enjoyed using it because it teaches the students to make meaning out of what they do know, not what they don't. There are dozens of words in that poem that cannot be found in any dictionary, but at the same time, there are a couple of useful words in each line that when looked at together, carry a meaning. I encourage the students to draw pictures -- if they can draw a picture of it, they understand what's going on. This technique has also worked when teaching metaphors.
3. I don't see many people spitting on the street anymore. Last winter every time I stepped outside I was always greeted by the familiar sound of a Korean (almost always a man) gargling a hank of mucus in his throat before spitting it out on the street. This became such a common occurrence during the winter, I found it hard to believe that everyone was jst sick --- it must be some habit (like belching at the table) that's ok here but frowned upon back at home. ESL bloggers have attributed this unusual habit to the high levels of mold found in Korean homes. Spitting up muscus seems to be a habit amongst Korean children too; several students have stepped out of class to spit into the garbage and I've even had one (strange, braindead student) spit out onto the floor as if that were ok.
Rather than one giant post every once in a while, I'd like to try writing three daily observations - these posts will not be lengthy, but I might write with more regularity.
1. Today one of the new teachers at JC School, Min, asked me to proofread an essay for a student's speech competition. The task was easy enough, and after she presented me a present of a small bottle of frozen orange juice. I'm reminded of the role of gift giving in this culture, and how simple, nature-made gifts (like an orange, given to me by one of my favorite students from a couple months ago) can move you more than an human-made material.
2. This week has been another experiment in using poetry in the ESL classroom. This week I used one of favorite poem, Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky. I've enjoyed using it because it teaches the students to make meaning out of what they do know, not what they don't. There are dozens of words in that poem that cannot be found in any dictionary, but at the same time, there are a couple of useful words in each line that when looked at together, carry a meaning. I encourage the students to draw pictures -- if they can draw a picture of it, they understand what's going on. This technique has also worked when teaching metaphors.
3. I don't see many people spitting on the street anymore. Last winter every time I stepped outside I was always greeted by the familiar sound of a Korean (almost always a man) gargling a hank of mucus in his throat before spitting it out on the street. This became such a common occurrence during the winter, I found it hard to believe that everyone was jst sick --- it must be some habit (like belching at the table) that's ok here but frowned upon back at home. ESL bloggers have attributed this unusual habit to the high levels of mold found in Korean homes. Spitting up muscus seems to be a habit amongst Korean children too; several students have stepped out of class to spit into the garbage and I've even had one (strange, braindead student) spit out onto the floor as if that were ok.
22.4.11
Kill the robot
Every day in the classroom has its interesting moments. The joy of Teaching exists in the summation of tiny moments throughout the day - little victories, or little tragedies. It's exhausting work because you must commit to each moment, then follow through with the next moment, and keeping paying this detailed attention to your work until its time to call it a day. Like acting, it drains you, mentally, physically, and emotionally.
Christina has not been an interesting student to teach. She started with the academy several months ago and she hasn't made a peep since. Christina likes to sit in the back of the class and play with her phone (she's 14 years old). She'll put her phone away when I tell her to, but almost everything else she has ignored. She's never answered any questions, and always seems lost whenever we do a game or writing activity. She never says hi to me, and gives me a dead zombie look whenever I ask her how she is, or what her favorite hobbies or school subjects are.
This past month my middle school classes have been suspended and turned into prep classes for the big middle school tests at the end of April. Usually I'm handed a couple kids, given a passage from a textbook, and instructed to help the kids 'memorize' the passage. At first I thought this had to be a miscommunication. Do the teachers really want me to help the students memorize the passage word for word, as if it were a monologue for an audition. Yes, was my answer after interrogating the teachers. Apparently, the passages on the big middle school come from the middle school textbook, so to get a good grade all you have to do is memorize the passage and the direct English translation.
So this has been my job for the past month. No matter how critical I am of the system, this is the way things are done here in Korea, and if memorizing a load of meaningless info is what helps the kids do well, I need to help (and motivate them) do that.
Last night Christina walked into my room, and my initial thought was, uggh this will be a boring 50 minutes. We sat down together and I went through the usual motions: Hi, how are you, how is school....no response. Didn't even look at me. Mighty intimidating! So I decided to move onto the textbook. I've come with a rotating list of games to play around with the text, to make the time pass quicker and keep teacher and students from falling asleep. But after three games Christina still showed no life inside her - her robotic movement and voice only doing what was necessary.
I changed the topic.
"Christina, what are your favorite school subjects?"
No answer.
"Christina, do you like math?"
No answer.
"How about music?"
No answer.
"Do you like school?"
A slow shaking of the head - NO.
What do you like?
No answer.
I began to draw a pathetic sketch of Homer Simpson.
"You know the Simpsons? Do you like it?
No response. Damn, and I thought I had this one because I noticed her Simpson's themed pencil case.
I thought of this as a challenge -- how can I get Christina to speak? Then I had an idea. I fetched my Korean language textbook and began to flip through the pages.
For a moment, I thought she had no interest, but she suddenly took hold of the book and began leafing through the pages on her own. Then she started pointing out random Korean words in the book for me to pronounce. And then she started laughing.
I had never heard her laugh before! And before you know it, she was speaking to me, asking me what I know and don't know about the Korean language. We were laughing together.
Christina pointed to my textbook. "This is easy?"
"NO!" I replied. "It's very very difficult!"
She pointed to her English book. "This is hard", she said.
"I understand."
We did this for about 15 minutes before I knew it was time to return to the English text. She approached the material with a slightly higher energy, and didn't seem afraid of me anymore.
I want my students to know that I actually am interested in knowing what they have to say, how they are doing, what they like and don't like, what funny stories they have, etc. I discourage robotic responses to questions and I've actually posted a sign on the wall with a giant scribble over the phrase "I'm fine thanks, and you?" I hate that phrase. It's boring, meaningless, and no one in America actually uses the phrase "And you?". As an alternative I've posted a list of interesting answers, such as awesome, excited, tired, not good, terrible, ok, etc. with a drawing of a face matching the expression. I open ever class asking the kids how they are and I give out high five's matching their response:
I'm awesome=high jump high five
I'm tired=a lazy high five
I'm angry=a punchy high five
I'm so-so=a so-so high five
and so on.
I walked away that night really feeling like I had done my job. I've struggled over the past eight months to understand what exactly my role is at this school, and I've learned that I'm really here to combat students' fear. In some cases (especially with the super quiet teenagers) if they're speaking English, I've won, because that's an accomplishment in itself. Although I have many confident, outgoing students, those ones are a breeze to work with, and I see spend more energy and time trying to find ways to help the ones having trouble, or the ones with a bad attitude. It's not easy, and I've failed many times. But I will keep going, keep trying, and keep learning.
Christina has not been an interesting student to teach. She started with the academy several months ago and she hasn't made a peep since. Christina likes to sit in the back of the class and play with her phone (she's 14 years old). She'll put her phone away when I tell her to, but almost everything else she has ignored. She's never answered any questions, and always seems lost whenever we do a game or writing activity. She never says hi to me, and gives me a dead zombie look whenever I ask her how she is, or what her favorite hobbies or school subjects are.
This past month my middle school classes have been suspended and turned into prep classes for the big middle school tests at the end of April. Usually I'm handed a couple kids, given a passage from a textbook, and instructed to help the kids 'memorize' the passage. At first I thought this had to be a miscommunication. Do the teachers really want me to help the students memorize the passage word for word, as if it were a monologue for an audition. Yes, was my answer after interrogating the teachers. Apparently, the passages on the big middle school come from the middle school textbook, so to get a good grade all you have to do is memorize the passage and the direct English translation.
So this has been my job for the past month. No matter how critical I am of the system, this is the way things are done here in Korea, and if memorizing a load of meaningless info is what helps the kids do well, I need to help (and motivate them) do that.
Last night Christina walked into my room, and my initial thought was, uggh this will be a boring 50 minutes. We sat down together and I went through the usual motions: Hi, how are you, how is school....no response. Didn't even look at me. Mighty intimidating! So I decided to move onto the textbook. I've come with a rotating list of games to play around with the text, to make the time pass quicker and keep teacher and students from falling asleep. But after three games Christina still showed no life inside her - her robotic movement and voice only doing what was necessary.
I changed the topic.
"Christina, what are your favorite school subjects?"
No answer.
"Christina, do you like math?"
No answer.
"How about music?"
No answer.
"Do you like school?"
A slow shaking of the head - NO.
What do you like?
No answer.
I began to draw a pathetic sketch of Homer Simpson.
"You know the Simpsons? Do you like it?
No response. Damn, and I thought I had this one because I noticed her Simpson's themed pencil case.
I thought of this as a challenge -- how can I get Christina to speak? Then I had an idea. I fetched my Korean language textbook and began to flip through the pages.
For a moment, I thought she had no interest, but she suddenly took hold of the book and began leafing through the pages on her own. Then she started pointing out random Korean words in the book for me to pronounce. And then she started laughing.
I had never heard her laugh before! And before you know it, she was speaking to me, asking me what I know and don't know about the Korean language. We were laughing together.
Christina pointed to my textbook. "This is easy?"
"NO!" I replied. "It's very very difficult!"
She pointed to her English book. "This is hard", she said.
"I understand."
We did this for about 15 minutes before I knew it was time to return to the English text. She approached the material with a slightly higher energy, and didn't seem afraid of me anymore.
I want my students to know that I actually am interested in knowing what they have to say, how they are doing, what they like and don't like, what funny stories they have, etc. I discourage robotic responses to questions and I've actually posted a sign on the wall with a giant scribble over the phrase "I'm fine thanks, and you?" I hate that phrase. It's boring, meaningless, and no one in America actually uses the phrase "And you?". As an alternative I've posted a list of interesting answers, such as awesome, excited, tired, not good, terrible, ok, etc. with a drawing of a face matching the expression. I open ever class asking the kids how they are and I give out high five's matching their response:
I'm awesome=high jump high five
I'm tired=a lazy high five
I'm angry=a punchy high five
I'm so-so=a so-so high five
and so on.
I walked away that night really feeling like I had done my job. I've struggled over the past eight months to understand what exactly my role is at this school, and I've learned that I'm really here to combat students' fear. In some cases (especially with the super quiet teenagers) if they're speaking English, I've won, because that's an accomplishment in itself. Although I have many confident, outgoing students, those ones are a breeze to work with, and I see spend more energy and time trying to find ways to help the ones having trouble, or the ones with a bad attitude. It's not easy, and I've failed many times. But I will keep going, keep trying, and keep learning.
17.3.11
Creative Writing in the ESL Classroom
With bring new creative writing and speaking activities into my classroom comes a mystery. How will the students respond to the activity? Will they shut down and refuse to do it? Or will they go to the opposite extreme and take the activity with no seriousness at all and make a joke of the class? I've challenged my middle school students with activities they have likely never done before and I'm very interested in the results.
I approach my classroom as a laboratory. Since there is no curriculum, no syllabus, no homework, no grades that actually matter, and no tests, I see no difference between following the dull old textbook versus my own creative lesson plans. The students are bored to death with the textbook; they sometimes spend entire classes in utter silence staring at the floor, playing with their thumbs (that's only because the director has taken away their cell phones). I can't force someone to speak, can I? Isn't that a right a student keeps for themself? He or she can be forced to do homework, forced to do reading, but you can't force someone to speak, much less communicate with a foreigner.
I've learned that my job is not really to teach. True, I define vocabulary, correct pronunciation and grammar mistakes, point out skills in sentence construction and communication. But I'm not really teaching them English. They are here to practice English, meaning they should take what they know, what they've learned, and apply it in my classroom.
Upon this realization, I've started to a push for a more creative approach in my classroom. It's not about what you don't know, but what you do. I've learned that my students know more English than they let on. They are just afraid to use it, don't know how to use it, or they want to force a direct translation of what they want to say from Korean into English. When students try this, they run into vocabulary problems: they may not know the vocabulary or sentence structure to say what they want to say. Rather than try and use alternative words, synonyms, pictures gestures, the students freeze up and simply say nothing.
Perhaps this is a product of their "listen and repeat" memorization heavy environment. The students are accustomed to memorizing phrases that answer a specific question they have memorized. If you ask them a question that varies only a little bit from what they've memorized, they are completely in the dark.
This is the case with my middle school students, not with my elementary kids. Something very strange and bad happens to Korean children between the ages of 12 and 14, something that sucks the soul out of them.
Why can my eight year olds make better use of their incredibly limited vocabulary and still get their message across, while my older students, who have been studying for years upon years, can barely formed a sentence and struggle to remember words like "school", "fishing", and "tiger"?
As an experiment, I showed a flashcard picture of a gorilla cooking a banana over a gas range to two different groups of students.
First, the teenagers.
I showed the picture to a 14 year old teenage boy and asked "What happening?" No response. Pause. "What's the gorilla doing?" No response. Pause. I point to the gorilla. "What this?" .... .... ....finally, a response: "gorilla...banana...cook."
Same exact activity, but with 12 year olds.
Q: "What's happening?"
A: "The gorilla is cooking a banana on oven."
WHAT'S GOING ON?!?
Here are some sample stories taken from my middle school classes. This is one of a couple different activities I've tried -- story chain. I give the students a theme and some vocabulary (in this case, a fairy tale theme), and they have 1 minute to write a sentence, then pass the paper off to the next student. I've left the grammar and punctuation unedited.
1)One upon a time, There was a onions princess in vegetable world. A onion princess die. But next, the tomato prince kissed to a onion princess and she rise from the dead. But she didn't love anymore the tomato prince. So tomato prince killed a onion princess. But suddenly, tomato prince was married Pinocchio. But Pinocchio loved Cinderella. So Pinocchio divorce. Finally, the tomato prince was killed Pinocchio. And, Pinocchio was killed by God.
2)Once upon a time, there were 100 people in the world. They are very stupid and dirty. But next, they started study. But they didn't study hard, so they loved singers. They loved Big Bang (a popular Korean boy band)very much, x10000000. But suddenly, Big Bang visited them. Big Bang lived with 100 people. And Beast (another boy band) is come here, too. There was lived with Ashley, Britany. Finally, they were happy :). ^^Happy ending ^^.
3)Once upon a time, a princess lives in castle who is very tall. But a princess's face is like zombie. But next, she kills people. She found a tiger. And the tiger is her mom. But suddenly tiger died. The tiger go to the heaven. And a princess is crazy. Finally, she died. And, she go to sky.
4)Once upon a time. Pikchu shout fork, break head. But next, squirtle is heal the Pikchu. Pikchu becom a live. Pikachu is transformation. Pikachu is from North Korea. Pikhu ufc champion. But pikhu kill the person. Finally, pichu is suicide. And, he is a legend.
I think these stories, as listed here, get progressively worse. The final story in the list above is actually written by a middle school class of four boys, who are at a remarkably low speaking and writing level. It's strange because most middle school students hide how much English they actually know, usually because they are afraid of making a mistake. But not this class. They really don't know that much. Really.
Notice the common theme in all these stories: death, murder, and suicide. Korean students have a very morbid sense of humor. When a kid is late or missing from a class, I ask
"Where's ____?"
The kids answer, "Oh, he/she died."
"How did he/she die?"
"Car went bruuuuurak, then whhhaaakk, then CRAAAAACCKKKMMMMYAAAA, a ping ping ping, , and died.
I approach my classroom as a laboratory. Since there is no curriculum, no syllabus, no homework, no grades that actually matter, and no tests, I see no difference between following the dull old textbook versus my own creative lesson plans. The students are bored to death with the textbook; they sometimes spend entire classes in utter silence staring at the floor, playing with their thumbs (that's only because the director has taken away their cell phones). I can't force someone to speak, can I? Isn't that a right a student keeps for themself? He or she can be forced to do homework, forced to do reading, but you can't force someone to speak, much less communicate with a foreigner.
I've learned that my job is not really to teach. True, I define vocabulary, correct pronunciation and grammar mistakes, point out skills in sentence construction and communication. But I'm not really teaching them English. They are here to practice English, meaning they should take what they know, what they've learned, and apply it in my classroom.
Upon this realization, I've started to a push for a more creative approach in my classroom. It's not about what you don't know, but what you do. I've learned that my students know more English than they let on. They are just afraid to use it, don't know how to use it, or they want to force a direct translation of what they want to say from Korean into English. When students try this, they run into vocabulary problems: they may not know the vocabulary or sentence structure to say what they want to say. Rather than try and use alternative words, synonyms, pictures gestures, the students freeze up and simply say nothing.
Perhaps this is a product of their "listen and repeat" memorization heavy environment. The students are accustomed to memorizing phrases that answer a specific question they have memorized. If you ask them a question that varies only a little bit from what they've memorized, they are completely in the dark.
This is the case with my middle school students, not with my elementary kids. Something very strange and bad happens to Korean children between the ages of 12 and 14, something that sucks the soul out of them.
Why can my eight year olds make better use of their incredibly limited vocabulary and still get their message across, while my older students, who have been studying for years upon years, can barely formed a sentence and struggle to remember words like "school", "fishing", and "tiger"?
As an experiment, I showed a flashcard picture of a gorilla cooking a banana over a gas range to two different groups of students.
First, the teenagers.
I showed the picture to a 14 year old teenage boy and asked "What happening?" No response. Pause. "What's the gorilla doing?" No response. Pause. I point to the gorilla. "What this?" .... .... ....finally, a response: "gorilla...banana...cook."
Same exact activity, but with 12 year olds.
Q: "What's happening?"
A: "The gorilla is cooking a banana on oven."
WHAT'S GOING ON?!?
Here are some sample stories taken from my middle school classes. This is one of a couple different activities I've tried -- story chain. I give the students a theme and some vocabulary (in this case, a fairy tale theme), and they have 1 minute to write a sentence, then pass the paper off to the next student. I've left the grammar and punctuation unedited.
1)One upon a time, There was a onions princess in vegetable world. A onion princess die. But next, the tomato prince kissed to a onion princess and she rise from the dead. But she didn't love anymore the tomato prince. So tomato prince killed a onion princess. But suddenly, tomato prince was married Pinocchio. But Pinocchio loved Cinderella. So Pinocchio divorce. Finally, the tomato prince was killed Pinocchio. And, Pinocchio was killed by God.
2)Once upon a time, there were 100 people in the world. They are very stupid and dirty. But next, they started study. But they didn't study hard, so they loved singers. They loved Big Bang (a popular Korean boy band)very much, x10000000. But suddenly, Big Bang visited them. Big Bang lived with 100 people. And Beast (another boy band) is come here, too. There was lived with Ashley, Britany. Finally, they were happy :). ^^Happy ending ^^.
3)Once upon a time, a princess lives in castle who is very tall. But a princess's face is like zombie. But next, she kills people. She found a tiger. And the tiger is her mom. But suddenly tiger died. The tiger go to the heaven. And a princess is crazy. Finally, she died. And, she go to sky.
4)Once upon a time. Pikchu shout fork, break head. But next, squirtle is heal the Pikchu. Pikchu becom a live. Pikachu is transformation. Pikachu is from North Korea. Pikhu ufc champion. But pikhu kill the person. Finally, pichu is suicide. And, he is a legend.
I think these stories, as listed here, get progressively worse. The final story in the list above is actually written by a middle school class of four boys, who are at a remarkably low speaking and writing level. It's strange because most middle school students hide how much English they actually know, usually because they are afraid of making a mistake. But not this class. They really don't know that much. Really.
Notice the common theme in all these stories: death, murder, and suicide. Korean students have a very morbid sense of humor. When a kid is late or missing from a class, I ask
"Where's ____?"
The kids answer, "Oh, he/she died."
"How did he/she die?"
"Car went bruuuuurak, then whhhaaakk, then CRAAAAACCKKKMMMMYAAAA, a ping ping ping, , and died.
24.2.11
Sleeping habits
Lately, I've been addicted to dreams.
The habit started a little over a year ago during first semester senior year. I started having really vivid, colorful dreams, the kind that you wake up and never want to forget, but inevitably do. I usually wake up in a semi conscious state and drift away the next one or two hours daydreaming. No matter what activity I have planned for the morning, or what work needs to be done, I almost always make excuses: "O I can get that done in half an hour, I don't really need to get up now" "O I don't have to do that today..." I long for an extra moment to spend in an adventurous, imaginary world.
Here's what Anne Bogart learned from her new production of "Midsummer Night's Dream":
I think what I've learned is that when we go to sleep we all become fairies. That we lose the limitations of the body. So fairy is the other side of the day. That's what I've learned in rehearsal.
Perhaps this tells me something. I'm not happy with my present situation in the real world, so I long for fake one.
When I actually do get up (at the last possible minute), I feel an overwhelming sense of guilt and pledge to get up early tomorrow morning.
But the cycle repeats.
To make matters worse, I have this nasty habit of going to bed at 3 or 4am every night. There were days where the night seemed long and I thought of 5am as a deep part of the night that no one ever saw. But nowadays I am as familiar with 5am as I am with 5pm.
Although I blame myself, the hours of my job to have an effect on me. I come to work around 2pm and usually leave around 9 or 10pm. Naturally, I'm tired when I get home after working with kids all day. But taking a nap means death. If I fall asleep, that means my entire sleep schedule will suffer, and I'll be right back to going to bed at 5am, waking up at 1pm, losing half the day.
This must stop.
Last week I made a change. I've been exercising several times a week since December, usually at night after work. Finally realizing how crazy this behavior is, last week I forced myself to get up one hour early (11am) and exercise for 40 minutes. I did this four times last week and had an overwhelmingly good response. I entered work energized and with ceaseless positive attitude. Better still, I'm sufficiently tired by 1am, and last night I got to sleep around 2am. My ultimate goal is 10am and I think I can do it.
But I will still daydream. In an effort to pour more art into my life, I bought a poster of Van Gogh's "Starry Night" and hung it over my bed. I've spent well over an hour at a time staring at this painting, following my thoughts as I race through time, pondering memories of the past and present. Day-dreaming really has become a drug for me, ha.
The habit started a little over a year ago during first semester senior year. I started having really vivid, colorful dreams, the kind that you wake up and never want to forget, but inevitably do. I usually wake up in a semi conscious state and drift away the next one or two hours daydreaming. No matter what activity I have planned for the morning, or what work needs to be done, I almost always make excuses: "O I can get that done in half an hour, I don't really need to get up now" "O I don't have to do that today..." I long for an extra moment to spend in an adventurous, imaginary world.
Here's what Anne Bogart learned from her new production of "Midsummer Night's Dream":
I think what I've learned is that when we go to sleep we all become fairies. That we lose the limitations of the body. So fairy is the other side of the day. That's what I've learned in rehearsal.
Perhaps this tells me something. I'm not happy with my present situation in the real world, so I long for fake one.
When I actually do get up (at the last possible minute), I feel an overwhelming sense of guilt and pledge to get up early tomorrow morning.
But the cycle repeats.
To make matters worse, I have this nasty habit of going to bed at 3 or 4am every night. There were days where the night seemed long and I thought of 5am as a deep part of the night that no one ever saw. But nowadays I am as familiar with 5am as I am with 5pm.
Although I blame myself, the hours of my job to have an effect on me. I come to work around 2pm and usually leave around 9 or 10pm. Naturally, I'm tired when I get home after working with kids all day. But taking a nap means death. If I fall asleep, that means my entire sleep schedule will suffer, and I'll be right back to going to bed at 5am, waking up at 1pm, losing half the day.
This must stop.
Last week I made a change. I've been exercising several times a week since December, usually at night after work. Finally realizing how crazy this behavior is, last week I forced myself to get up one hour early (11am) and exercise for 40 minutes. I did this four times last week and had an overwhelmingly good response. I entered work energized and with ceaseless positive attitude. Better still, I'm sufficiently tired by 1am, and last night I got to sleep around 2am. My ultimate goal is 10am and I think I can do it.
But I will still daydream. In an effort to pour more art into my life, I bought a poster of Van Gogh's "Starry Night" and hung it over my bed. I've spent well over an hour at a time staring at this painting, following my thoughts as I race through time, pondering memories of the past and present. Day-dreaming really has become a drug for me, ha.
22.2.11
A difficult student
Here goes, my first case study on a problem student. My teaching abilities have grown exponentially over the past six months, and I'm very proud. But the experience hasn't been without its problem students, and I finally feel it's necessary to get my feelings on this student out of my system.
Korean middle school students don't really have any reason to take my class seriously. There's no homework, the grades are guaranteed to be an A- or higher (I don't stick to this practice), I can't call their parents, there's no such thing as a parent teacher conference, or even a conference with the academy director, and I'm not supposed to make the class any more interesting than what's written in the book. And it doesn't help that the book is murder for their minds. It's so boring.
I've found ways of bending the rules over the past six months, sometimes keeping my unorthodox lesson plans secret from the school staff. If the students are bored, I blame myself first. It's my job to motivate them. It's my job to bring variety and relevant material into the classroom. But sometimes you get a kid that no matter how hard you try, they won't respond to any of the tricks in your bag.
I have one class of middle school students that just feels impossible to teach. The class is made up of about 6 students, roughly half girls, half boys. With the exception of two girls, no one speaks in the class. They just sit there in dead terror and every question I ask is follow by a 10-30 pause. I don't know whether to just give them the answer or try in push them into the right direct, because that almost always scares them even more and they end up freezing right up.
I call these students the zombie students. They move at the pace of a snail, stare at you with blank dead eyes, and rarely answer a question within 30 seconds. I've built up a couple strategies to deal with these sorts of students, but I'm having far more trouble with the other kind: the sulky teenage girl.
I can never seem to keep these girls quiet. They're always talking, either to their friends or on their cellphone, which I repeatedly tell them to put away. If I separate them, they'll talk to each other in Korean from different corners of the room, even while I'm talking. I tried standing directly in front of them to block their view of their friends; it doesn't help - they talk right through me.
These students are also difficult because they are quite negative and snotty. They always come to class with a negative attitude and will counter any attempts at positive reinforcement with everything from snide comments to down-right insults, all conducted in Korean of course to further sting the blow. These students will answer your questions in Korean to your face, and call you names to your face, using the power they get from the language barrier to their full advantage.
Such was the case of Sara, a 14 year old student in this class. She completely ignored me from the start, never answering questions, always on her phone. Always making fun of me, always doing satires of my voice, never participating in the class. I would ignore her and focus on the other students, but her behavior was so loud and obnoxious that it was distracting to everyone. I noticed that she really hates confrontation and she would get really uncomfortable when I got up close to her and asked her what the problem was. What do you do with students that want to be ignored?
The first incident occurred when I took her phone away. After several warnings I just wrestled it out of her hand and set it on my desk, telling her she would get it back when the bell rang. Fifteen minutes later I handed her back her phone, and after giving me a dirty look she stormed out of the class. This clearly meant war. I treated her like a child in front of the entire class and I would have to pay the price. Of course, she doesn't need me in order to be perceived as a child; she does a fine job of that on her own. But from this day forth, she had no other objective than to make my life hell.
Over the next few weeks the snottiness intensified. Her flagrant behavior was all directed at me, to piss the hell out of me. She talked over other students as they answered questions. She called me names to my face. No matter what question I asked she set off on a torrent of belligerent Korean, avoiding my gaze, and speaking to her friend. I moved her to every corner of the room. I even confronted her with the question "Do you hate me? Why?" Maybe I got through to her, but she wouldn't respond.
Her Korean teacher was of no use. When I asked for advice on the situation, the Korean teacher simply said, "She acts that way in my class too." That was not helpful.
Finally I couldn't take it anymore. Classes are fifty minutes, and one day Sara finally rolled in, 40 minutes late. She came forty minutes late to a fifty minute class! Why she bothered to come, I have no idea. She ignored me from the unexpected moment she entered the room, barging in, and plopping herself right down next to her friend where she started a very loud conversation. I calmly walked over toward her and squatted in front of her desk.
"Why are you late Sara?"
I got a bunch of garbled Korean spat out at me.
"Sara, you are 40 minutes late. The class ends in 10 minutes. Why are you late?"
I squared me down in the eye and started saying something in Korean. I didn't know what, but it was very nasty.
"Sara, please leave." I pointed to the door. "Go, now."
I finally got some English out of her: "Really?"
"Yes. Leave."
"Good. I'm going home."
I never intended for her to go home, but that's exactly what she did, barging out of the classroom, screaming at the director, telling him she would never come to my class again. I only wanted her to wait outside in the lobby. Her friend Sierra ran after her. I didn't see tears at all - only hot anger.
The final incident took place the following week. Sara did come back to the class. She was 10 minutes late this time, arriving right in the middle of a spelling test. She barged through the door in her typical manner and began a loud conversation with her friend.
I told her three times to be quiet, as I was right in the middle of delivering a spelling test, and it was unfair to the other students. All I got were dirty looks. The third time I screamed at her to sit down and be quiet. No response. I marched out of the room, got the director's wife, and told her what happened, expecting some sort of punishment.
Nothing.
The director's wife didn't say anything to me, and quietly took Sara out of the room.
That was in November. Sara hasn't been inside my classroom since.
Today I said hello to Sara as I passed her in the hallways. I got a nasty look and a a mocking return on my hello, behind my back of course. I can't believe she still wants to fight me, four months after this battle.
I don't know if she will ever come back to my class, but it appears that the academy has given her the option of not attending my class. That means I may never teach her again. While I do think we needed a break from each other, in order for Sara to see that her behavior was unacceptable, and bitching and complaining will not get what she wants from the world, I want her to come back , especially now that I've had time to detoxify the students and improve my management of the classroom. But she may not come back; she doesn't have top. As long as the academy lets her do as she pleases, Sara's behavior won't change, and as she sees it, she's won.
Korean middle school students don't really have any reason to take my class seriously. There's no homework, the grades are guaranteed to be an A- or higher (I don't stick to this practice), I can't call their parents, there's no such thing as a parent teacher conference, or even a conference with the academy director, and I'm not supposed to make the class any more interesting than what's written in the book. And it doesn't help that the book is murder for their minds. It's so boring.
I've found ways of bending the rules over the past six months, sometimes keeping my unorthodox lesson plans secret from the school staff. If the students are bored, I blame myself first. It's my job to motivate them. It's my job to bring variety and relevant material into the classroom. But sometimes you get a kid that no matter how hard you try, they won't respond to any of the tricks in your bag.
I have one class of middle school students that just feels impossible to teach. The class is made up of about 6 students, roughly half girls, half boys. With the exception of two girls, no one speaks in the class. They just sit there in dead terror and every question I ask is follow by a 10-30 pause. I don't know whether to just give them the answer or try in push them into the right direct, because that almost always scares them even more and they end up freezing right up.
I call these students the zombie students. They move at the pace of a snail, stare at you with blank dead eyes, and rarely answer a question within 30 seconds. I've built up a couple strategies to deal with these sorts of students, but I'm having far more trouble with the other kind: the sulky teenage girl.
I can never seem to keep these girls quiet. They're always talking, either to their friends or on their cellphone, which I repeatedly tell them to put away. If I separate them, they'll talk to each other in Korean from different corners of the room, even while I'm talking. I tried standing directly in front of them to block their view of their friends; it doesn't help - they talk right through me.
These students are also difficult because they are quite negative and snotty. They always come to class with a negative attitude and will counter any attempts at positive reinforcement with everything from snide comments to down-right insults, all conducted in Korean of course to further sting the blow. These students will answer your questions in Korean to your face, and call you names to your face, using the power they get from the language barrier to their full advantage.
Such was the case of Sara, a 14 year old student in this class. She completely ignored me from the start, never answering questions, always on her phone. Always making fun of me, always doing satires of my voice, never participating in the class. I would ignore her and focus on the other students, but her behavior was so loud and obnoxious that it was distracting to everyone. I noticed that she really hates confrontation and she would get really uncomfortable when I got up close to her and asked her what the problem was. What do you do with students that want to be ignored?
The first incident occurred when I took her phone away. After several warnings I just wrestled it out of her hand and set it on my desk, telling her she would get it back when the bell rang. Fifteen minutes later I handed her back her phone, and after giving me a dirty look she stormed out of the class. This clearly meant war. I treated her like a child in front of the entire class and I would have to pay the price. Of course, she doesn't need me in order to be perceived as a child; she does a fine job of that on her own. But from this day forth, she had no other objective than to make my life hell.
Over the next few weeks the snottiness intensified. Her flagrant behavior was all directed at me, to piss the hell out of me. She talked over other students as they answered questions. She called me names to my face. No matter what question I asked she set off on a torrent of belligerent Korean, avoiding my gaze, and speaking to her friend. I moved her to every corner of the room. I even confronted her with the question "Do you hate me? Why?" Maybe I got through to her, but she wouldn't respond.
Her Korean teacher was of no use. When I asked for advice on the situation, the Korean teacher simply said, "She acts that way in my class too." That was not helpful.
Finally I couldn't take it anymore. Classes are fifty minutes, and one day Sara finally rolled in, 40 minutes late. She came forty minutes late to a fifty minute class! Why she bothered to come, I have no idea. She ignored me from the unexpected moment she entered the room, barging in, and plopping herself right down next to her friend where she started a very loud conversation. I calmly walked over toward her and squatted in front of her desk.
"Why are you late Sara?"
I got a bunch of garbled Korean spat out at me.
"Sara, you are 40 minutes late. The class ends in 10 minutes. Why are you late?"
I squared me down in the eye and started saying something in Korean. I didn't know what, but it was very nasty.
"Sara, please leave." I pointed to the door. "Go, now."
I finally got some English out of her: "Really?"
"Yes. Leave."
"Good. I'm going home."
I never intended for her to go home, but that's exactly what she did, barging out of the classroom, screaming at the director, telling him she would never come to my class again. I only wanted her to wait outside in the lobby. Her friend Sierra ran after her. I didn't see tears at all - only hot anger.
The final incident took place the following week. Sara did come back to the class. She was 10 minutes late this time, arriving right in the middle of a spelling test. She barged through the door in her typical manner and began a loud conversation with her friend.
I told her three times to be quiet, as I was right in the middle of delivering a spelling test, and it was unfair to the other students. All I got were dirty looks. The third time I screamed at her to sit down and be quiet. No response. I marched out of the room, got the director's wife, and told her what happened, expecting some sort of punishment.
Nothing.
The director's wife didn't say anything to me, and quietly took Sara out of the room.
That was in November. Sara hasn't been inside my classroom since.
Today I said hello to Sara as I passed her in the hallways. I got a nasty look and a a mocking return on my hello, behind my back of course. I can't believe she still wants to fight me, four months after this battle.
I don't know if she will ever come back to my class, but it appears that the academy has given her the option of not attending my class. That means I may never teach her again. While I do think we needed a break from each other, in order for Sara to see that her behavior was unacceptable, and bitching and complaining will not get what she wants from the world, I want her to come back , especially now that I've had time to detoxify the students and improve my management of the classroom. But she may not come back; she doesn't have top. As long as the academy lets her do as she pleases, Sara's behavior won't change, and as she sees it, she's won.
Growing Up
Today, just before running out the door, I downloaded Copeland's Appalachian Spring onto my mp3 player. I opened the door in a rush to get to the bus station and I was stopped silly. It's been cold for as long as I remember (since November) and even just last week the Korean winter dumped a load of snow onto Masan's streets. But today it was sunny, warm, and smelled of spring. Of course all the trees are dead, but it was WARM! For the first time in months I took off my black coat and stepped outside, feeling quite naked in my sweater and sports coat.
Every spring I look forward to this feeling: a renewed energy, a sense of space, free from the cramped cabin fever of winter, brilliant sunshine. I just want to rush outside, roll in some grass and listen to music with the windows wide open. Unfortunately there's still a bite of cold in the air, and there's no grass, as it's all dead from the winter.
As I got on the bus headed for Pusan, I started listening to Copeland's Appalachian Spring and the music hot me so hard. Copeland's music is distinctly American. Whenever I listen to this piece I always get a sense of wide open spaces and nature waking up from winter's slumber. I see rushing brooks, ice melting off trees and still pools of water deep within the forests. I felt a longing, a pain for home. This music takes me back to the woodlands of upstate New York and as I looked out onto the dead, brown Korean mountains, I thought of all the places I've been over the past eight years. Home has always been a suffocating place for me, but it's where I grew up, and I can't help but feel attached. I miss going on long walks trough the damp forest by my house, adventuring by the creeks and waterfalls, the open rolling grassy hills and the tall shady pine trees.
And it hit me suddenly how much I've changed.
In all my years of 'finding myself' I haven't once thought of the word 'maturity'. I recall coming back from my amazing London experience recharged, confident, and grounded. Carole remarked: "You got manly. You've really grown up." I didn't think much about her comment then, but a year and a half later it finally makes sense.
Returning back to the Hamilton bubble after my London experience was harsh. I felt trapped after spending months wandering the streets of London and nearby cities. I managed the first semester of senior year very well, but I fell apart the second semester: my fear and insecurity about my post-grad future dragged me down.
But I LET it drag me down. I look back and realize how immature I acted. This time in Korea has been exactly what I needed because it has re-done what London did for me two years ago: It forces me to behave like an adult. It forces me to challenge my current identity. Like a baby, I am re-learning how to interact with people, all over again. How does one make friends? How does one interact in society? How does one behave in a professional environment? Working and living in a different culture has given me the perspective to evaluate how I interact with people; rather than a fish stuck in a bowl (as I felt in America), I feel able to watch myself inside the bowl.
Here’s a quote from a book I’m reading called “The Learning Gap”, a study comparing education in Asian and American elementary schools:
Meaning often emerges through contrast. We do not know what it means to work hard until we see how others work. We do not understand what children can accomplish until we see what other children the same age do. So it is with cultures. Cross-cultural comparisons can help us discover characteristics of our own culture that we fail to notice because we are so familiar with them. Through such comparisons, our perceptions become clearer and sharper. (The Learning Gap, 16).
And I would add that not only can cross-cultural comparisons help us understand our own culture, but ourselves, the individual, as well.
Every spring I look forward to this feeling: a renewed energy, a sense of space, free from the cramped cabin fever of winter, brilliant sunshine. I just want to rush outside, roll in some grass and listen to music with the windows wide open. Unfortunately there's still a bite of cold in the air, and there's no grass, as it's all dead from the winter.
As I got on the bus headed for Pusan, I started listening to Copeland's Appalachian Spring and the music hot me so hard. Copeland's music is distinctly American. Whenever I listen to this piece I always get a sense of wide open spaces and nature waking up from winter's slumber. I see rushing brooks, ice melting off trees and still pools of water deep within the forests. I felt a longing, a pain for home. This music takes me back to the woodlands of upstate New York and as I looked out onto the dead, brown Korean mountains, I thought of all the places I've been over the past eight years. Home has always been a suffocating place for me, but it's where I grew up, and I can't help but feel attached. I miss going on long walks trough the damp forest by my house, adventuring by the creeks and waterfalls, the open rolling grassy hills and the tall shady pine trees.
And it hit me suddenly how much I've changed.
In all my years of 'finding myself' I haven't once thought of the word 'maturity'. I recall coming back from my amazing London experience recharged, confident, and grounded. Carole remarked: "You got manly. You've really grown up." I didn't think much about her comment then, but a year and a half later it finally makes sense.
Returning back to the Hamilton bubble after my London experience was harsh. I felt trapped after spending months wandering the streets of London and nearby cities. I managed the first semester of senior year very well, but I fell apart the second semester: my fear and insecurity about my post-grad future dragged me down.
But I LET it drag me down. I look back and realize how immature I acted. This time in Korea has been exactly what I needed because it has re-done what London did for me two years ago: It forces me to behave like an adult. It forces me to challenge my current identity. Like a baby, I am re-learning how to interact with people, all over again. How does one make friends? How does one interact in society? How does one behave in a professional environment? Working and living in a different culture has given me the perspective to evaluate how I interact with people; rather than a fish stuck in a bowl (as I felt in America), I feel able to watch myself inside the bowl.
Here’s a quote from a book I’m reading called “The Learning Gap”, a study comparing education in Asian and American elementary schools:
Meaning often emerges through contrast. We do not know what it means to work hard until we see how others work. We do not understand what children can accomplish until we see what other children the same age do. So it is with cultures. Cross-cultural comparisons can help us discover characteristics of our own culture that we fail to notice because we are so familiar with them. Through such comparisons, our perceptions become clearer and sharper. (The Learning Gap, 16).
And I would add that not only can cross-cultural comparisons help us understand our own culture, but ourselves, the individual, as well.
21.2.11
A Snowstorm in Masan?
It just occurred to me that I haven't posted any pictures from my time in Korea, or even from my adventure in Bangkok. I light of last week's out-of-the-blue snowstorm I've decided photos will do more justice than words. Although this storm was nothing like the nor-easters we get back home, these coastal city inhabitants were, for the most part, unprepared. I saw Koreans walking around in sandals (with socks of course), I slipped and fell multiple times on unsalted sidewalks...on a positive note it was easy to cross the road this time as cars were driving along at a snail's pace.
The kids were surprisingly unexcited for the four or five inches dumped onto us from the heavens. I started each class by pointing outside and asking the students "Is it raining?" I got a long, intoned, numbly "no, teacher" from the students, clearly unenthused. Surprised, I turned back to the schoolwork. The students have told me many times that it seldom snows in Masan, and I thought today's mini-blizzard would have them jumping off the walls with glee. But no, all I got were complaints about the cold.
14.2.11
A quick note on Thailand...
I’m in the middle of writing an epic blog entry on my trip to Bangkok, but I wanted to give a quick summary of my feelings about the trip before I launch into the ever growing details.
This trip was enormously necessary. I’m reading an excellent book on modern Korean history and culture by a British reporter who lived in Seoul for many years. In describe Korean attitude identity, he writes
The Koreans use the image of the frog in the well to explain their own parochialism. All the frog knows of the outside world is the distant patch of sky at the top of the well. The only reality is what happens in the well where it lives. (Breen, 18).
I, too, have felt like a frog stuck in the bottom of a well, and my ideas of Asia have been shaped by the strange culture of Korea. It was a good thing I climbed out of the well, even if it was only for a couple days. My experience in Thailand has given me the perspective needed to make better sense of Korean culture.
Bangkok and Attuhaya were very interesting places, but I would not call them strange. I saw widespread hedonism and liberated sexuality in the bars and alleys of Bangkok, I saw a poverty and dirtiness in Attuhaya that everyone seemed comfortable with, I saw androgynous Thai dancers dressed in full golden regalia. But what shocked me the most? I didn’t find anything strange. There were moments that shocked me, but in a playful, good-natured way. I remember stopping across a bridge in Bangkok to watch a band of men dressed as nuns in blonde wigs dance and sing on the sidewalk below. It was shocking, but I didn’t turn my face in disgust. I laughed and smiled.
In Korea I feel like the perpetual guest. Most people are very kind to me, always willing to offer help. But I would not say Koreans have been friendly to me; there always seems to be an invisible wall that separates us, a distance they keep. During my travels in Thailand I thought about how easy it would be to make Thai friends. In fact, many Thais did stop to talk to me. Sometimes they wanted money, of course, but they didn’t seem to have any trouble approaching people they wanted to talk to. Koreans are far more shy.
Thailand culture felt very extroverted. Everyone and everything was on display for me to see, from the golden spires of the palaces to the enormous feathered costumes of the dancers at the Chinese New Year celebration. It almost felt like there were two lives in Thailand: the performance of traditional culture and the performance of life in a modern world. But Koreans have woven their culture so well into modern life that it is difficult to separate the two. Korean culture IS the way of life in 2011. Perhaps this is why I feel that Korean culture is more internalized than Thai culture. Or maybe I’m not quite right, and Korean culture IS naturally more introverted than Thai culture. Korea was, after all, nicknamed “The Hermit Kingdom” during the 18th century, while Bangkok developed into an international crossroad for trade and culture.
I’m just throwing whatever ideas comes of my mind, but there is something about modern Korean life that is more psychological than the upfront, extroverted, larger than life performances I saw from people in Thailand. Are Koreans repressed? Certainly none of the sexual liberation I saw in Thailand exists in Korea, and if it does, it exists not in the open streets and alleyways, but behind closed doors. The need to conform is so great in this country, writer Breen said “There is probably no more homogeneous a country on Earth” (Breen, x). It’s rare to see something truly shocking in Korea. Even Korea youth, while they seem to stray away from older conservative attitudes, they still conform, only to their own codes of manners, dress, and behavior. I can’t say how many Koreans I have seen with the same exact pair of tight, faded blue jeans and black pea coat, topped with one of three or four choices of hair style.
My feelings are, probably, a bit skewed from visiting two popular tourist locations in Thailand, and I wonder if my feelings about Thailand would change if I had been able to travel deeper within the country. Thailand is a very chill place; Korea, very serious. But look how much the Koreans have accomplished since the 1970s, transforming their rubble covered backwards country into the world’s 11th largest economic power in just 30 years!
This trip was enormously necessary. I’m reading an excellent book on modern Korean history and culture by a British reporter who lived in Seoul for many years. In describe Korean attitude identity, he writes
The Koreans use the image of the frog in the well to explain their own parochialism. All the frog knows of the outside world is the distant patch of sky at the top of the well. The only reality is what happens in the well where it lives. (Breen, 18).
I, too, have felt like a frog stuck in the bottom of a well, and my ideas of Asia have been shaped by the strange culture of Korea. It was a good thing I climbed out of the well, even if it was only for a couple days. My experience in Thailand has given me the perspective needed to make better sense of Korean culture.
Bangkok and Attuhaya were very interesting places, but I would not call them strange. I saw widespread hedonism and liberated sexuality in the bars and alleys of Bangkok, I saw a poverty and dirtiness in Attuhaya that everyone seemed comfortable with, I saw androgynous Thai dancers dressed in full golden regalia. But what shocked me the most? I didn’t find anything strange. There were moments that shocked me, but in a playful, good-natured way. I remember stopping across a bridge in Bangkok to watch a band of men dressed as nuns in blonde wigs dance and sing on the sidewalk below. It was shocking, but I didn’t turn my face in disgust. I laughed and smiled.
In Korea I feel like the perpetual guest. Most people are very kind to me, always willing to offer help. But I would not say Koreans have been friendly to me; there always seems to be an invisible wall that separates us, a distance they keep. During my travels in Thailand I thought about how easy it would be to make Thai friends. In fact, many Thais did stop to talk to me. Sometimes they wanted money, of course, but they didn’t seem to have any trouble approaching people they wanted to talk to. Koreans are far more shy.
Thailand culture felt very extroverted. Everyone and everything was on display for me to see, from the golden spires of the palaces to the enormous feathered costumes of the dancers at the Chinese New Year celebration. It almost felt like there were two lives in Thailand: the performance of traditional culture and the performance of life in a modern world. But Koreans have woven their culture so well into modern life that it is difficult to separate the two. Korean culture IS the way of life in 2011. Perhaps this is why I feel that Korean culture is more internalized than Thai culture. Or maybe I’m not quite right, and Korean culture IS naturally more introverted than Thai culture. Korea was, after all, nicknamed “The Hermit Kingdom” during the 18th century, while Bangkok developed into an international crossroad for trade and culture.
I’m just throwing whatever ideas comes of my mind, but there is something about modern Korean life that is more psychological than the upfront, extroverted, larger than life performances I saw from people in Thailand. Are Koreans repressed? Certainly none of the sexual liberation I saw in Thailand exists in Korea, and if it does, it exists not in the open streets and alleyways, but behind closed doors. The need to conform is so great in this country, writer Breen said “There is probably no more homogeneous a country on Earth” (Breen, x). It’s rare to see something truly shocking in Korea. Even Korea youth, while they seem to stray away from older conservative attitudes, they still conform, only to their own codes of manners, dress, and behavior. I can’t say how many Koreans I have seen with the same exact pair of tight, faded blue jeans and black pea coat, topped with one of three or four choices of hair style.
My feelings are, probably, a bit skewed from visiting two popular tourist locations in Thailand, and I wonder if my feelings about Thailand would change if I had been able to travel deeper within the country. Thailand is a very chill place; Korea, very serious. But look how much the Koreans have accomplished since the 1970s, transforming their rubble covered backwards country into the world’s 11th largest economic power in just 30 years!
30.1.11
I'm scared of Department Stores
I'm scared of Shinsegae Department Store. I dropped in today with a big hope they might carry a few short sleeve shirts,an item I badly need for my trip to Thailand this week. I've been to this store a couple times already but I've always fled in terror within 15 minutes of stepping inside. The moment I walk in I feel overwhelmed by the largeness of everything, the thick smells of cologne and perfume, the endless cubicles of shopping items, and of course the barrage of employees, never failing to say hello and offer help. I know they're only being polite, but I get intimidated every time I walk down an aisle and have to pass through a dozen employees. Sometimes they just say hello, other times they approach me asking if they need my help. And if I ever stop within a cubicle to check out some clothes they stick by me like glue, staring down my shoulder, waiting for my next move.
And upon leaving the store I must walk through half a dozen 'greeter' employees, whose sole job, it seems, is to say goodbye to you as you exit the door. So trips to the department store always feel like running the gauntlet.
The truth is, I usually don't know what I want when I enter a store and I like to browse on my own, and if I need help, I'll ask for it. But based on my past experiences in America, I think I have a general fear of department stores. I can't say that I've ever worn popular clothes - I've only ever shopped at Wal-Mart and Sears, and so whenever I walk into a store full of really nice, high quality clothes, I freak out. I feel pressured to know what I want, pressured to be comfortable in a setting where other people take care of you. It all feels like foreign territory and I don't know how to behave. To deal with my fear, I always focus on my breathing, smile a lot, and stay focused on a task.
Koreans don't stare at me all the time, but it does happen often. I've gotten a myriad of stares, ranging from friendly smiles to downright scowls. Koreans don't usually smile at strangers, which can leave you feeling very unsettled when an elder Korean gives you an emotionless look. I think they're just trying to figure you out, and if it feels right, I try and give them a smile. More often than not, they smile back.
I think the worst look to endure is the laser stare, where the person's eyes open wide and they stand fixed to the spot. I encountered such a situation today while walking into a supermarket. A young woman, late 20s perhaps, just froze at the entrance and proceeded to stare me down. It couldn't tell if it was a look of shock or fear, but there was something very intimidating about the whole thing. I walked towards her very slowly, wondering when she was planning on getting out of the way so I could walk into the building. Eventually she moved, a little, and I had to squeeze by her, and as soon as I got into the store, I muttered to myself, "what the hell was that about?"
You learn to deal with the stares and accept it as part of the experience. Yes, I am indeed a foreigner, yes indeed I am handsome, now stare somewhere else!!! I think I've learned to laugh at the sillyness of the whole thing. It's easy to hide in a country as diverse as America, but in Korea, everyone looks almost the same, physically,and fashion-wise. So a foreigner will obviously attract more attention here.
So every time I walk the gauntlet at a department store, I lower my eyes and chuckle to myself as the dozen or so employees stare me down. You have to learn to laugh at these sorts of things, otherwise it'll make you crazy.
And upon leaving the store I must walk through half a dozen 'greeter' employees, whose sole job, it seems, is to say goodbye to you as you exit the door. So trips to the department store always feel like running the gauntlet.
The truth is, I usually don't know what I want when I enter a store and I like to browse on my own, and if I need help, I'll ask for it. But based on my past experiences in America, I think I have a general fear of department stores. I can't say that I've ever worn popular clothes - I've only ever shopped at Wal-Mart and Sears, and so whenever I walk into a store full of really nice, high quality clothes, I freak out. I feel pressured to know what I want, pressured to be comfortable in a setting where other people take care of you. It all feels like foreign territory and I don't know how to behave. To deal with my fear, I always focus on my breathing, smile a lot, and stay focused on a task.
Koreans don't stare at me all the time, but it does happen often. I've gotten a myriad of stares, ranging from friendly smiles to downright scowls. Koreans don't usually smile at strangers, which can leave you feeling very unsettled when an elder Korean gives you an emotionless look. I think they're just trying to figure you out, and if it feels right, I try and give them a smile. More often than not, they smile back.
I think the worst look to endure is the laser stare, where the person's eyes open wide and they stand fixed to the spot. I encountered such a situation today while walking into a supermarket. A young woman, late 20s perhaps, just froze at the entrance and proceeded to stare me down. It couldn't tell if it was a look of shock or fear, but there was something very intimidating about the whole thing. I walked towards her very slowly, wondering when she was planning on getting out of the way so I could walk into the building. Eventually she moved, a little, and I had to squeeze by her, and as soon as I got into the store, I muttered to myself, "what the hell was that about?"
You learn to deal with the stares and accept it as part of the experience. Yes, I am indeed a foreigner, yes indeed I am handsome, now stare somewhere else!!! I think I've learned to laugh at the sillyness of the whole thing. It's easy to hide in a country as diverse as America, but in Korea, everyone looks almost the same, physically,and fashion-wise. So a foreigner will obviously attract more attention here.
So every time I walk the gauntlet at a department store, I lower my eyes and chuckle to myself as the dozen or so employees stare me down. You have to learn to laugh at these sorts of things, otherwise it'll make you crazy.
29.1.11
A note on Beauty...
Koreans are great lovers of beauty. A couple weeks ago I was flipping through the channels on Korean television and came across an arts channel featuring traditional Korean dance. Dance after dance came on and I was glued to the screen, impressed with the dancers’ strength, grace, and commitment to each physical moment. Folk dances were woven seamlessly into the performance so that the dance took on a life of its own, neither folk dance nor classical dance (I’m thinking of ballet).
One dance in particular blew me away. The set was a cool summer night: dark blue background, bare stage, a bright moon projected onto the upper corner of the backdrop. The dancers came on stage, a young man and woman, dressed in traditional Korean clothes. The man and woman were lovers and spent the entire dance innocently flirting with each other, sometimes doing modest dances for each other, building to moments when the lovers would flash secret smiles to the audience and innocently kiss behind a paper hand fan. There was no plot to this story, but there was a story nonetheless, the story of two lovers sharing their love for each other and how they perform this for the audience, using cool passion and well placed moments (such as the kiss behind the fan) where you could swear to see a twinkle in their eyes, as if the lovers are pleased with how subtle they can be in front of an audience. My favorite moments were when the couple broke the fourth wall.
While visiting a palace in Seoul, I observed that Western palaces are decorated with art that copies nature, through statues, paintings, fountains, highly organized and planned out gardens, etc (I’m thinking of my visit to Versailles). But here in Korea nature seems to stand for itself. So I wonder what place beauty, art, and nature have in Korean culture.
I’m tremendously interested in the concept of beauty in Korean culture. I think Koreans are in love with beauty. Looking young and being healthy are very important things to this culture and you see this played out from TV commercials and boardwalk ads down to ordinary routines (I constantly see women applying make-up in even the smallest of moments).
When I first arrived in Korea, I condemned this all as fake. The barrage of advertisements, the importance of being well dressed at all time, the obsession with health and beauty products – I wonder if this was how I dealt with the culture shock, by condemning it in order to distance myself from it. I was most shocked upon my first day of teaching when upon meeting the director’s wife she pronounced “O good, he’s very handsome!” I thought, clearly they don’t get for my teaching abilities, as long as I’m good looking that’s good enough. I had a very negative reaction to this initial encounter with the Asian obsession with the outer.
Even today I was treated like a rock star by girls working at a McDonalds. After teaching for seven hours straight today I wanted to reward myself with a good meal of fast food. The moment I stepped up to the counter to place my order, all the workers, even the men, stopped what they were doing to stare at me. The girls all became very giggly, clumsy, giving me furtive, quick glances. I took it all very quietly, giving them a modest performance, smiling a lot, wondering what on earth I have done to deserve rock star treatment??? Meanwhile, I could hear the girls behind the counter calling for my order: “Where are burger and fries for handsome guy?” “Order for handsome guy!”
I think over time I’ve grown to accept this attitude. I get stared at everyday on the streets and once or twice random Koreans come up to my, shake my hand, and rant on and on about how handsome I am. Actually, back in September, an older man chased after me on my way to work just so he could stop me and tell me how handsome I was!
I think I’ve learned there’s nothing wrong with being healthy and looking your best. Only a year ago I was in college, where I could walk into a dining hall unshaven, messy hair, and in sweat clothes, and no one would care. I focused an awful lot on work, especially during my first two years at Hamilton, so my physical health and appearance took a back seat. Living here in Korea has reminded me to live a more balanced life.
Back to the idea of beauty -- What occurs to me is that America and Korea have different ideas of beauty. I’m curious to know what Korean women would think if shown a picture of Marlon Brando as Stanley in “Street Car named Desire.” Are sweaty muscley dark tanned-skin men beautiful? Are they sexy? Or do they prefer a clean cut, simple, innocent, fair skinned young man, as often portrayed in the media (and in the dance performance discussed above). Perhaps, in America we put beauty and sex together, whereas in Korea they are separate. Thoughts?
One dance in particular blew me away. The set was a cool summer night: dark blue background, bare stage, a bright moon projected onto the upper corner of the backdrop. The dancers came on stage, a young man and woman, dressed in traditional Korean clothes. The man and woman were lovers and spent the entire dance innocently flirting with each other, sometimes doing modest dances for each other, building to moments when the lovers would flash secret smiles to the audience and innocently kiss behind a paper hand fan. There was no plot to this story, but there was a story nonetheless, the story of two lovers sharing their love for each other and how they perform this for the audience, using cool passion and well placed moments (such as the kiss behind the fan) where you could swear to see a twinkle in their eyes, as if the lovers are pleased with how subtle they can be in front of an audience. My favorite moments were when the couple broke the fourth wall.
While visiting a palace in Seoul, I observed that Western palaces are decorated with art that copies nature, through statues, paintings, fountains, highly organized and planned out gardens, etc (I’m thinking of my visit to Versailles). But here in Korea nature seems to stand for itself. So I wonder what place beauty, art, and nature have in Korean culture.
I’m tremendously interested in the concept of beauty in Korean culture. I think Koreans are in love with beauty. Looking young and being healthy are very important things to this culture and you see this played out from TV commercials and boardwalk ads down to ordinary routines (I constantly see women applying make-up in even the smallest of moments).
When I first arrived in Korea, I condemned this all as fake. The barrage of advertisements, the importance of being well dressed at all time, the obsession with health and beauty products – I wonder if this was how I dealt with the culture shock, by condemning it in order to distance myself from it. I was most shocked upon my first day of teaching when upon meeting the director’s wife she pronounced “O good, he’s very handsome!” I thought, clearly they don’t get for my teaching abilities, as long as I’m good looking that’s good enough. I had a very negative reaction to this initial encounter with the Asian obsession with the outer.
Even today I was treated like a rock star by girls working at a McDonalds. After teaching for seven hours straight today I wanted to reward myself with a good meal of fast food. The moment I stepped up to the counter to place my order, all the workers, even the men, stopped what they were doing to stare at me. The girls all became very giggly, clumsy, giving me furtive, quick glances. I took it all very quietly, giving them a modest performance, smiling a lot, wondering what on earth I have done to deserve rock star treatment??? Meanwhile, I could hear the girls behind the counter calling for my order: “Where are burger and fries for handsome guy?” “Order for handsome guy!”
I think over time I’ve grown to accept this attitude. I get stared at everyday on the streets and once or twice random Koreans come up to my, shake my hand, and rant on and on about how handsome I am. Actually, back in September, an older man chased after me on my way to work just so he could stop me and tell me how handsome I was!
I think I’ve learned there’s nothing wrong with being healthy and looking your best. Only a year ago I was in college, where I could walk into a dining hall unshaven, messy hair, and in sweat clothes, and no one would care. I focused an awful lot on work, especially during my first two years at Hamilton, so my physical health and appearance took a back seat. Living here in Korea has reminded me to live a more balanced life.
Back to the idea of beauty -- What occurs to me is that America and Korea have different ideas of beauty. I’m curious to know what Korean women would think if shown a picture of Marlon Brando as Stanley in “Street Car named Desire.” Are sweaty muscley dark tanned-skin men beautiful? Are they sexy? Or do they prefer a clean cut, simple, innocent, fair skinned young man, as often portrayed in the media (and in the dance performance discussed above). Perhaps, in America we put beauty and sex together, whereas in Korea they are separate. Thoughts?
18.1.11
Water Update
An update on the water issue:
I just got back from work and everything's working (I was praying and saying positive things like "It WILL be working" on the entire walk back from work). Sink is fine, shower is fine, toilet is flush-able (Thank God, because the odors were starting to get to me, and it looks like I'll be doing an overdue load of laundry tonight.
I asked my director about my water situation today and he gave me a quick answer: talk to your landlady. I spent my free time today thinking about all the Korean I will need to say in order to speak to her: pipes, cold, freeze, kitchen, toilet, shower, days of the week, repairman, phone number....the list could go on forever. On a side note, I realized just how useless my Introduction to Korean Language book is! It's supposed to provide me with a beginner's introduction to the Korean language, but I've learned it's useless to know how to say "The mouse is under the refrigerator". What should I be learning? Numbers, colors, months, days, how to say the date, how to say how I feel, etc.
Anyway, I started each of my advanced classes today describing my home situation and asked if anyone had similar problems at their homes. Many students had no water yesterday and a couple still have no water. I felt better knowing this was a common problem with Korean families over the past few days. And I should count myself lucky. One student told me that a pipe burst! No flooding, fortunately, and all will be repaired this weekend.
I was curious about my own pipe situation last night. There is no access to the pipes inside the house (or any electrical boxes - not that I would know how any of that works anyway). But there is a creepy metal door that leads out from my bathroom into a sort of courtyard. After five months, I decided to explore this door last night and see if it would give me clues toward solving my water problem.
The door does indeed lead out into a kind of courtyard, certainly not the kind you where you would want to sunbathe. It's pretty narrow and there's a ragged tarp serving as a roof, lots of high walls, in short, a great place to get murdered (in fact, this courtyard/alley has served as the stage for all the cat fights I've heard outside my bedroom window for the past five months!) Attached to the wall are dozens of pipes and tubes going into and out of the wall. As far as I could tell, nothing looked frozen, but then the water inside the pipes could be frozen, as all the pipes are fully exposed to the outside elements. I went back inside after my mini adventure, none the wiser.
Ex-pats have let out their grief on ESL message boards all over the place, most notably Dave's ESL Cafe. I keep seeing the same rumor again and again - Korean's don't insulate their pipes for winter. I agree with most of the posts - Korean buildings aren't built for winter (my classroom certainly attests to that statement!). Again, these winters aren't exactly the Nor'Easters I get in upstate New York; it rarely snows here! And while it rarely gets below 20 degrees Fahrenheit, temperatures below freezing are not unusual.
So all quiet on the eastern front right now. I'll remember to leave a trickle of water in the sink every night until winter ends. I still haven't found the reason for this weekend's madness, but my hunch is that the water companies turned the water off to keep families' pipes from freezing. That explains why this water problem has affected so many people.
Goodness, I was so eager for the oppressive summer heat and humidity to end, and here I am wishing an end to winter, Ha!
I just got back from work and everything's working (I was praying and saying positive things like "It WILL be working" on the entire walk back from work). Sink is fine, shower is fine, toilet is flush-able (Thank God, because the odors were starting to get to me, and it looks like I'll be doing an overdue load of laundry tonight.
I asked my director about my water situation today and he gave me a quick answer: talk to your landlady. I spent my free time today thinking about all the Korean I will need to say in order to speak to her: pipes, cold, freeze, kitchen, toilet, shower, days of the week, repairman, phone number....the list could go on forever. On a side note, I realized just how useless my Introduction to Korean Language book is! It's supposed to provide me with a beginner's introduction to the Korean language, but I've learned it's useless to know how to say "The mouse is under the refrigerator". What should I be learning? Numbers, colors, months, days, how to say the date, how to say how I feel, etc.
Anyway, I started each of my advanced classes today describing my home situation and asked if anyone had similar problems at their homes. Many students had no water yesterday and a couple still have no water. I felt better knowing this was a common problem with Korean families over the past few days. And I should count myself lucky. One student told me that a pipe burst! No flooding, fortunately, and all will be repaired this weekend.
I was curious about my own pipe situation last night. There is no access to the pipes inside the house (or any electrical boxes - not that I would know how any of that works anyway). But there is a creepy metal door that leads out from my bathroom into a sort of courtyard. After five months, I decided to explore this door last night and see if it would give me clues toward solving my water problem.
The door does indeed lead out into a kind of courtyard, certainly not the kind you where you would want to sunbathe. It's pretty narrow and there's a ragged tarp serving as a roof, lots of high walls, in short, a great place to get murdered (in fact, this courtyard/alley has served as the stage for all the cat fights I've heard outside my bedroom window for the past five months!) Attached to the wall are dozens of pipes and tubes going into and out of the wall. As far as I could tell, nothing looked frozen, but then the water inside the pipes could be frozen, as all the pipes are fully exposed to the outside elements. I went back inside after my mini adventure, none the wiser.
Ex-pats have let out their grief on ESL message boards all over the place, most notably Dave's ESL Cafe. I keep seeing the same rumor again and again - Korean's don't insulate their pipes for winter. I agree with most of the posts - Korean buildings aren't built for winter (my classroom certainly attests to that statement!). Again, these winters aren't exactly the Nor'Easters I get in upstate New York; it rarely snows here! And while it rarely gets below 20 degrees Fahrenheit, temperatures below freezing are not unusual.
So all quiet on the eastern front right now. I'll remember to leave a trickle of water in the sink every night until winter ends. I still haven't found the reason for this weekend's madness, but my hunch is that the water companies turned the water off to keep families' pipes from freezing. That explains why this water problem has affected so many people.
Goodness, I was so eager for the oppressive summer heat and humidity to end, and here I am wishing an end to winter, Ha!
17.1.11
That's NOT really hot!
IT'S COLD!
Well, not that cold. This weekend it reached 18 degrees Fahrenheit, a record low, especially for a coastal city like Masan. I always feel a bit smug when I hear Koreans complain about the cold. This ain't nothin'! Back at my home in New York it drops to -16 degrees Fahrenheit, and that's with several feet of snow and ice piled on top.
It's been an experiment finding out how my heater works. My thermostat has several buttons and knobs, all labeled in Korean. Although I translated everything and have a line of post-it notes lined up on the adjacent wall for reference, I still don't know what anything does. I figured out how to turn the hot water on for the shower long ago, but everything else has been a mystery. Either I'm not waiting long enough for things to heat up, or I'm pressing the wrong button, or something's broke.
The shower's not always reliable however. Usually I have to wait 10-15 minutes for the water to heat up, and even then, it's sometimes the luck of the draw. Most of the time the water fluctuates between cold and lukewarm, so you get these nasty flashes of ice-cold water shooting over your body. And then there have been several times this winter where the shower has failed to produce any hot water at all.
Then this weekend, this unusually cold weekend, the water stopped all together. No sink, no shower, no washing machine, no toilet. Everything has come to a halt here and I've had to rely on bottled water for showers (if you can call them that)and washing dishes. This has happened two times before over the past month, but things usually go back to normal after a couple hours. I'm going on 36 hours here with no hot water.
If things aren't back to normal tomorrow, I'm going to alert my boss. I've considered asking for help from the lady who owns the building, and I know enough Korean to get my point across, but I fear she'll end up asking me questions I won't be able to answer due to the language barrier. We'll see how I feel tomorrow.
I'm not sure why this has happened. I haven't seen any activity in the apartments on either side of mine, and after reading a foreign teacher's blog post, it may be possible that the water company shut the water off for a couple days to avoid frozen pipes. This might explain why my neighbors have seemed to desert their homes. But I haven't been alerted by anyone--no phone calls, no messages on the door from the water company.
My other fear is that there's some sort of problem requiring repair (and my huge fear is that I'll have to pay for a repairman). After some searching today on Google, I found that it's not common to insulate pipes during winter in Korea. If this is true, it seems very silly to me. Apparently you are supposed to leave your heat on at night to keep the pipes from freezing, and at the same time leave a trickle of water coming out of your faucets. I don't know what to believe; no one has told me anything about living in Korea during the winter.
I'll admit I've been a bit of a Scrooge about money. The cold is cheap. Koreans mainly heat their homes using the ondol system, a heating system that heats the floor under your feet. It makes sense because most Koreans sleep on the floor, and it's a custom to take your shoes off before entering anyone's house.
I haven't really used the ondol system, and to be honest, I don't even know how to turn it on. I've stuck to the space heater. SO far it's been very effective, and I'm not complaining about the heat. I just worry that my frugality hasn't hurt the water pipes and cost me a fortune..
SO until this problem is solved, I'm taking showers using 2L bottles of water bought from the store. Gets the job done. Can't say it's pleasant.
Well, not that cold. This weekend it reached 18 degrees Fahrenheit, a record low, especially for a coastal city like Masan. I always feel a bit smug when I hear Koreans complain about the cold. This ain't nothin'! Back at my home in New York it drops to -16 degrees Fahrenheit, and that's with several feet of snow and ice piled on top.
It's been an experiment finding out how my heater works. My thermostat has several buttons and knobs, all labeled in Korean. Although I translated everything and have a line of post-it notes lined up on the adjacent wall for reference, I still don't know what anything does. I figured out how to turn the hot water on for the shower long ago, but everything else has been a mystery. Either I'm not waiting long enough for things to heat up, or I'm pressing the wrong button, or something's broke.
The shower's not always reliable however. Usually I have to wait 10-15 minutes for the water to heat up, and even then, it's sometimes the luck of the draw. Most of the time the water fluctuates between cold and lukewarm, so you get these nasty flashes of ice-cold water shooting over your body. And then there have been several times this winter where the shower has failed to produce any hot water at all.
Then this weekend, this unusually cold weekend, the water stopped all together. No sink, no shower, no washing machine, no toilet. Everything has come to a halt here and I've had to rely on bottled water for showers (if you can call them that)and washing dishes. This has happened two times before over the past month, but things usually go back to normal after a couple hours. I'm going on 36 hours here with no hot water.
If things aren't back to normal tomorrow, I'm going to alert my boss. I've considered asking for help from the lady who owns the building, and I know enough Korean to get my point across, but I fear she'll end up asking me questions I won't be able to answer due to the language barrier. We'll see how I feel tomorrow.
I'm not sure why this has happened. I haven't seen any activity in the apartments on either side of mine, and after reading a foreign teacher's blog post, it may be possible that the water company shut the water off for a couple days to avoid frozen pipes. This might explain why my neighbors have seemed to desert their homes. But I haven't been alerted by anyone--no phone calls, no messages on the door from the water company.
My other fear is that there's some sort of problem requiring repair (and my huge fear is that I'll have to pay for a repairman). After some searching today on Google, I found that it's not common to insulate pipes during winter in Korea. If this is true, it seems very silly to me. Apparently you are supposed to leave your heat on at night to keep the pipes from freezing, and at the same time leave a trickle of water coming out of your faucets. I don't know what to believe; no one has told me anything about living in Korea during the winter.
I'll admit I've been a bit of a Scrooge about money. The cold is cheap. Koreans mainly heat their homes using the ondol system, a heating system that heats the floor under your feet. It makes sense because most Koreans sleep on the floor, and it's a custom to take your shoes off before entering anyone's house.
I haven't really used the ondol system, and to be honest, I don't even know how to turn it on. I've stuck to the space heater. SO far it's been very effective, and I'm not complaining about the heat. I just worry that my frugality hasn't hurt the water pipes and cost me a fortune..
SO until this problem is solved, I'm taking showers using 2L bottles of water bought from the store. Gets the job done. Can't say it's pleasant.
4.1.11
Cheating and Plagiarism in Korea
What is considered cheating in a Korean classroom? I don’t know. I can only speak for my classes, and I can only speak from my experiences at this private academy, but I have seen some behavior that surely would not be tolerated in America.
To clarify exactly what my job is: I teach almost 200 students throughout the week, ranging in ages 8-16. There are five Koreans teachers that each have about six classes they regularly teach every day. Once a week the kids come to my class so they can practice applying what they’ve learned through writing, reading, and conversation. I see these kids once a week for 50 minutes, so it’s important to form a relationship with the students and be as immediate in the lesson as possible.
The students have tests every day. Sometimes they have Translation Tests in which they have to translate about ten sentences from Korean into English, but usually they have spelling tests. Surprisingly, the words in these tests are not grouped into any category. Recalling my experiences learning Spanish in high school, we learned words in a category (colors, numbers, clothes, zoo animals, etc), then had a spelling test. But these tests in Korea are filled with seemingly random words. I gave a spelling test to a class of 12 years olds today that included the words ‘microphone’, ‘party’, ‘consideration’, and ‘wrench’. There may be reasoning behind this, but I haven’t found it yet.
But that’s neither here nor there. The point is the handling of cheating. When I first started teaching four months ago, I noticed how much students talked amoungst each other during the test. I lashed out at them, threatening to rip up their test if they wouldn’t be quiet. But gradually, after seeing other Korean teacher deliver tests, I realized that this behavior was normal in all their other classes. One Korean teacher actually sits down and has conversations with her students while they are taking a test. I guess there is something to be learned here – it creates a relaxed atmosphere, which the students could use considering all the tests, classes, and homework pressures they have. And after test after test, day after day, the students become a little immune to the pressure. A couple weeks ago I blew up at a student who barged in late and disturbed the class during the test in such a disrespectful way, I felt I needed to remove her from the class, even after giving her several warnings…But that student deserves a blog post for herself.
But I can’t help but wonder if it’s ok to be this informal with students.
Last week the students in my advanced class asked me a question –Describe the typical woman you go for. I’m almost certain this question would be taboo in classrooms in America, but the Korean teacher actually facilitated this discussion between the students and me, so I guess it was ok. I didn’t feel comfortable. I pushed myself to be open about the whole thing, but it was going into a place I didn’t think was appropriate for the classroom. Later in the class the students wanted to know my monthly salary. This I would not tell them. I decided to be open about my feelings about women because it may create a more relaxed relationship with the students (and, based on my observations, teachers seem to be more open about their private lives here in Korea), but my salary was neither necessary for them to know, nor productive exchange for a better relationship. I guess that’s where I drew the line. And of course, or course, sexual habits are completely off limits for discussion, although to my surprise, I did have a teenager ask me about mine during class. I ignored the question.
So I got used to the talking during tests. Occasionally you’ll hear the students say the Korean definition for a word out loud, thinking I don’t know enough Korean to hear them cheat. True, I have only a small Korean vocabulary, but I know the alphabet well enough, and have the answers before me, that I can usually call the students out. If I catch them cheating, I give them a warning, and if they continue, I threaten to rip their test paper up – that really keeps them quiet!
Sometimes the students will whisper the answers in English. Why they try this I don’t know; it’s very stupid. If you’re going to cheat, don’t do it in English with me standing right there!
Turning this post toward the question of plagiarism, I have witnessed, on a couple occasions, teachers ordering students to copy the answers into their workbooks when the students get behind with their work. I have many students that miss class a couple weeks in a row, come back, and find they are pages behind everyone else, and of course, they have no idea how to do anything. When pressed for time, one Korean teacher took another student’s completed workbook, gave it to the troubled student, and ordered him to copy the other student’s answers into his own book. This is plagiarism, hardcore.
In this system, you must keep everyone on the same page, and when it’s time to move on to the next workbook, it doesn’t matter if they’ve learned anything, as long as their workbook is complete.
So I feel bad for my students. In the situation above, that one student (his name is Edward), is a very sweet kid. He has a learning disability, without any doubt, so he gets behind A LOT. There are no special education classes here in the private academy, so students who have learning disabilities have to fend for themselves like everyone else. As a teacher, you have to try and look out for these students and give them the help and encouragement they need. Edward is a great kid, a little weird, a great artist, and always talks to me and says hi. He’s not stupid and I feel bad that he’s getting pushed through this system at a pace he can’t keep up with, and all I can do is look on in disgust when another teacher chooses to deal with his problems by forcing him to plagiarize another student’s answers into his book just so he can move on to the next level.
Anyway, I was thinking about all of this today when I came across an article in the New York Time from 2002 about a high school biology teacher who gave 0s to 28 students after they plagiarized their semester long project. After listening to plenty of angry phone calls, the school board overrode her decision and the teacher resigned in disgust. The article is here: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/14/us/school-cheating-scandal-tests-a-town-s-values.html. This is an entirely different scenario than what I’m facing here in Korea, but it does make me wonder about the differences between education in Korea and the USA.
To clarify exactly what my job is: I teach almost 200 students throughout the week, ranging in ages 8-16. There are five Koreans teachers that each have about six classes they regularly teach every day. Once a week the kids come to my class so they can practice applying what they’ve learned through writing, reading, and conversation. I see these kids once a week for 50 minutes, so it’s important to form a relationship with the students and be as immediate in the lesson as possible.
The students have tests every day. Sometimes they have Translation Tests in which they have to translate about ten sentences from Korean into English, but usually they have spelling tests. Surprisingly, the words in these tests are not grouped into any category. Recalling my experiences learning Spanish in high school, we learned words in a category (colors, numbers, clothes, zoo animals, etc), then had a spelling test. But these tests in Korea are filled with seemingly random words. I gave a spelling test to a class of 12 years olds today that included the words ‘microphone’, ‘party’, ‘consideration’, and ‘wrench’. There may be reasoning behind this, but I haven’t found it yet.
But that’s neither here nor there. The point is the handling of cheating. When I first started teaching four months ago, I noticed how much students talked amoungst each other during the test. I lashed out at them, threatening to rip up their test if they wouldn’t be quiet. But gradually, after seeing other Korean teacher deliver tests, I realized that this behavior was normal in all their other classes. One Korean teacher actually sits down and has conversations with her students while they are taking a test. I guess there is something to be learned here – it creates a relaxed atmosphere, which the students could use considering all the tests, classes, and homework pressures they have. And after test after test, day after day, the students become a little immune to the pressure. A couple weeks ago I blew up at a student who barged in late and disturbed the class during the test in such a disrespectful way, I felt I needed to remove her from the class, even after giving her several warnings…But that student deserves a blog post for herself.
But I can’t help but wonder if it’s ok to be this informal with students.
Last week the students in my advanced class asked me a question –Describe the typical woman you go for. I’m almost certain this question would be taboo in classrooms in America, but the Korean teacher actually facilitated this discussion between the students and me, so I guess it was ok. I didn’t feel comfortable. I pushed myself to be open about the whole thing, but it was going into a place I didn’t think was appropriate for the classroom. Later in the class the students wanted to know my monthly salary. This I would not tell them. I decided to be open about my feelings about women because it may create a more relaxed relationship with the students (and, based on my observations, teachers seem to be more open about their private lives here in Korea), but my salary was neither necessary for them to know, nor productive exchange for a better relationship. I guess that’s where I drew the line. And of course, or course, sexual habits are completely off limits for discussion, although to my surprise, I did have a teenager ask me about mine during class. I ignored the question.
So I got used to the talking during tests. Occasionally you’ll hear the students say the Korean definition for a word out loud, thinking I don’t know enough Korean to hear them cheat. True, I have only a small Korean vocabulary, but I know the alphabet well enough, and have the answers before me, that I can usually call the students out. If I catch them cheating, I give them a warning, and if they continue, I threaten to rip their test paper up – that really keeps them quiet!
Sometimes the students will whisper the answers in English. Why they try this I don’t know; it’s very stupid. If you’re going to cheat, don’t do it in English with me standing right there!
Turning this post toward the question of plagiarism, I have witnessed, on a couple occasions, teachers ordering students to copy the answers into their workbooks when the students get behind with their work. I have many students that miss class a couple weeks in a row, come back, and find they are pages behind everyone else, and of course, they have no idea how to do anything. When pressed for time, one Korean teacher took another student’s completed workbook, gave it to the troubled student, and ordered him to copy the other student’s answers into his own book. This is plagiarism, hardcore.
In this system, you must keep everyone on the same page, and when it’s time to move on to the next workbook, it doesn’t matter if they’ve learned anything, as long as their workbook is complete.
So I feel bad for my students. In the situation above, that one student (his name is Edward), is a very sweet kid. He has a learning disability, without any doubt, so he gets behind A LOT. There are no special education classes here in the private academy, so students who have learning disabilities have to fend for themselves like everyone else. As a teacher, you have to try and look out for these students and give them the help and encouragement they need. Edward is a great kid, a little weird, a great artist, and always talks to me and says hi. He’s not stupid and I feel bad that he’s getting pushed through this system at a pace he can’t keep up with, and all I can do is look on in disgust when another teacher chooses to deal with his problems by forcing him to plagiarize another student’s answers into his book just so he can move on to the next level.
Anyway, I was thinking about all of this today when I came across an article in the New York Time from 2002 about a high school biology teacher who gave 0s to 28 students after they plagiarized their semester long project. After listening to plenty of angry phone calls, the school board overrode her decision and the teacher resigned in disgust. The article is here: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/14/us/school-cheating-scandal-tests-a-town-s-values.html. This is an entirely different scenario than what I’m facing here in Korea, but it does make me wonder about the differences between education in Korea and the USA.
1.1.11
Student Behavior in Korea
Perhaps the hardest thing about teaching in Korea is keeping the kids in line. Months ago I attended the 2010 Gyeongsangnam-do Foreign Language Instructor's Seminar where classroom discipline was a hot topic, at least among the students. I think this seminar is mandatory of all foreign language teachers, at least for this in the hagwons (private academies). Our speaker was an English professor from Gyeongsang National University. His lecture was divided into two parts: culture and classroom. Much of what he presented were basics things I already knew (some teachers in the audience had been in Korea for years), but we all listened respectfully.
But during his lectures on the classroom, students began to raise their hands when it became clear classroom discipline was not going to be covered. The professor had advised us not to hit our students, and to treat them with kindness. Well of course, that all goes without saying. But how on earth do you keep them in line? He couldn't give a straight answer and I over a matter of minutes I saw him crumble under the pressure from the student's questions. I walked out of the auditorium annoyed, but a little comforted in that I was not the only teacher who had difficult students.
In my classroom my students have:
+screamed at me
+kicked me in the shins
+taken off their shoes and beat me
+ran their fingernails over my arms
+refused to move to another seat
+beat their heads against the desk or wall
+ddungchimed me or other students (explanation below)
+spat into my hand when I give them a high five
+grab my fingers and suck onto them
+hurl desks across the room
+throw workbook pages out a third floor window
+refuse to speak in English and make fun of me in Korean to my face, with an evil smile
+bring exacto knives and/or box cutters to class in their pencil cases. On one occasion a student threatened another with an exacto knife, hidden in his pocket
...That might be about it, or at least the most outrageous things I can remember. That's not to say there aren't any good kids. There are plenty of really wonderful students here. And I even have affection for the crazy one that beat me with her shoe. But this would never happen in America, that's for sure.
In my first few weeks here I was having trouble with a young student, Ella, who always kicked me in the shins whenever I asked her to read out of her book. One day after I tried to get her to move to another seat, she took off her shoe, let out an Indian war-whelp and attacked me with her shoe. I wasn't going to stand for this; I fetched the director's wife (another teacher here) immediately. What happened? Ella got yelled at. She cried. I felt a little bad. Ella moved to another seat. Class continued.
What would have happened in America? Certainly a call home. Perhaps suspension. Perhaps a parent-teacher conference. But here the students just get a tongue lashing, and it's over. Not that that tongue lashing isn't scary - the director's wife scares the crap out of me with her presence! I guess the problem is that the students keep repeating their offense, and I've learned it's best to find my own solutions to the problems rather than run to the director every time. I want the students to see me as the person in control of my classroom, not someone else, and definitely not a student.
This is an on going struggle and I'm glad to say I hardly have any of the problems listed above anymore. But everyday has its own unique problems and you have to improv your way through it. More on this later.....
But before I finish writing, I must explain the ddungchim. Ddungchim comes from two Korean words, and translates as "shit needle". Like a twisted game of cowboys and Indians, Korean children will chase each other around the room, or more commonly, sneak up behind, and stick their fingers, shaped in a gun, up your ass. Hence the name--a syringe of poison, stuck up your ass.
Pleasant, yes?
This has only happened to me two times, thank god, and with only two students. It's not exactly painful, but very embarrassing. As with most things in the classroom, I haven't brought it to the attention of the director because I don't believe it would solve anything (perhaps I'm wrong). But when the students have done this to me, I usually turn around, give them a cold look, squat down in front of them with a firm grip on their hands, and tell them in a quiet, firm voice not to ever do that again. Sometimes I even tell them that it makes me sad--they seem to understand that and I've usually gotten sincere looks and even an apology.
But during his lectures on the classroom, students began to raise their hands when it became clear classroom discipline was not going to be covered. The professor had advised us not to hit our students, and to treat them with kindness. Well of course, that all goes without saying. But how on earth do you keep them in line? He couldn't give a straight answer and I over a matter of minutes I saw him crumble under the pressure from the student's questions. I walked out of the auditorium annoyed, but a little comforted in that I was not the only teacher who had difficult students.
In my classroom my students have:
+screamed at me
+kicked me in the shins
+taken off their shoes and beat me
+ran their fingernails over my arms
+refused to move to another seat
+beat their heads against the desk or wall
+ddungchimed me or other students (explanation below)
+spat into my hand when I give them a high five
+grab my fingers and suck onto them
+hurl desks across the room
+throw workbook pages out a third floor window
+refuse to speak in English and make fun of me in Korean to my face, with an evil smile
+bring exacto knives and/or box cutters to class in their pencil cases. On one occasion a student threatened another with an exacto knife, hidden in his pocket
...That might be about it, or at least the most outrageous things I can remember. That's not to say there aren't any good kids. There are plenty of really wonderful students here. And I even have affection for the crazy one that beat me with her shoe. But this would never happen in America, that's for sure.
In my first few weeks here I was having trouble with a young student, Ella, who always kicked me in the shins whenever I asked her to read out of her book. One day after I tried to get her to move to another seat, she took off her shoe, let out an Indian war-whelp and attacked me with her shoe. I wasn't going to stand for this; I fetched the director's wife (another teacher here) immediately. What happened? Ella got yelled at. She cried. I felt a little bad. Ella moved to another seat. Class continued.
What would have happened in America? Certainly a call home. Perhaps suspension. Perhaps a parent-teacher conference. But here the students just get a tongue lashing, and it's over. Not that that tongue lashing isn't scary - the director's wife scares the crap out of me with her presence! I guess the problem is that the students keep repeating their offense, and I've learned it's best to find my own solutions to the problems rather than run to the director every time. I want the students to see me as the person in control of my classroom, not someone else, and definitely not a student.
This is an on going struggle and I'm glad to say I hardly have any of the problems listed above anymore. But everyday has its own unique problems and you have to improv your way through it. More on this later.....
But before I finish writing, I must explain the ddungchim. Ddungchim comes from two Korean words, and translates as "shit needle". Like a twisted game of cowboys and Indians, Korean children will chase each other around the room, or more commonly, sneak up behind, and stick their fingers, shaped in a gun, up your ass. Hence the name--a syringe of poison, stuck up your ass.
Pleasant, yes?
This has only happened to me two times, thank god, and with only two students. It's not exactly painful, but very embarrassing. As with most things in the classroom, I haven't brought it to the attention of the director because I don't believe it would solve anything (perhaps I'm wrong). But when the students have done this to me, I usually turn around, give them a cold look, squat down in front of them with a firm grip on their hands, and tell them in a quiet, firm voice not to ever do that again. Sometimes I even tell them that it makes me sad--they seem to understand that and I've usually gotten sincere looks and even an apology.
1/3 Complete , 0 Blogs Since in Korea
I created this blog over five months ago, pledging to express how I've changed as a person during my time in Korea. As far as this blog goes, I've failed at recording anything at all. That's not to say I haven't been writing anything down. I've kept two journals over the past four months: a personal journal where I record my thoughts, feelings, and adventures, and a teaching journal, where I record my daily wins and losses in the classroom. So far I've kept a diligent record of most of adventures.
I think I prefer keeping a written journal to writing a blog. Writing in a journal seems more time consuming, but it feels more personal, and surely more private, than a blog. I feel like an explorer, picking up my leather bound book every night before bed, scratching away with my quill pen by candlelight.....
So as it's a new year (And I'm running out of room in my journal), I hope to keep a more up-to-date blog, writing a blog post at least once week. We'll see how this goes.
I think I prefer keeping a written journal to writing a blog. Writing in a journal seems more time consuming, but it feels more personal, and surely more private, than a blog. I feel like an explorer, picking up my leather bound book every night before bed, scratching away with my quill pen by candlelight.....
So as it's a new year (And I'm running out of room in my journal), I hope to keep a more up-to-date blog, writing a blog post at least once week. We'll see how this goes.
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