HolyShitKorea!

I’ve been missing Michigan more and more over the last few weeks. I think a lot of it has to do with this being my first Christmas away. No grandparents, no tree, no keeflers, no cousins, and worst of all, no snow. While Northern Michigan is buried under its whitest winter in years, I’ve been strolling to school in balmy 50 degree temperatures under sunny skies. (Stop, please, I can feel your sympathy from here.) Pleasant, sure, but never cursing at the weather just didn’t feel right. That’s why I’m happy to report that on Sunday afternoon it started to snow, and by Monday morning the whole town was snowed in. I woke up to a phone call from our co-teacher informing us that it was a snow day. We still had to come in, but there would be no kids and no classes!

The walk to school was amazing and surreal, the way it always is after a big snow. Everybody was walking in the road, since most of the cars were still buried and the sidewalks were impassable. Koreans carry umbrellas in the snow, which made for some great people watching. Once we got to school we saw little groups of male teachers working to clear the driveway up to school. Mike started getting excited about the prospect of helping, and I crossed my fingers, hoping for the one other woman that would make it socially acceptable for me to help too. And there she was! Thanks, female technology teacher! We dropped off our bags and picked up shovels and spent the next hour working in the sunshine. A few other women even came out to help, though they didn’t last long. Around 10:00am the principal came out to thank everybody and assure me (the last lady standing) that I could go inside now. Mike got to stay out for another half an hour.

After everybody came in, we headed downstairs for tofu, kimchi, dumplings and makalee (sweet rice wine). The principal AND the vice principal each poured me a glass, thanked me (in English, even!), and drank with me.  Mike got the same treatment, and then we all took photos together, which turned into taking photos of everyone, which quickly degenerated into the who-can-ruin-the-most-photos-by-snow-balling-the-subject game. The whole day had a playful, fun atmosphere, and I think that it was kind of a bonding experience. I felt a lot closer to the other teachers, especially without the kids around.

The work day was officially over around noon, so Mike and I dropped our stuff off at home and ventured out to see the city and finish some Christmas shopping. This city has the most beautiful light, especially in the morning and evening. We took loads of photos…some are below, and some over on Mike’s blog. Enjoy! And if I don’t speak to you before the big day, have a very Merry Christmas!

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The week before exams I tried out a variation on Running Dictation, a game that has apparently been an ESL staple for a long time. The basic idea is that you have two partners - a writer and a runner. The writer is stationary, while the runner has to run (surprise) to a piece of writing on the other side of the room, memorize it piece by piece, and feed it to writer who (you guessed it) writes it down. It elicits lots of communication in English between the students, which doesn’t happen much. (They communicate in English with me, of course, but rarely with each other, as my school is not big on group work.) It also lets them use a lot of pent-up energy after spending every waking moment studying at a desk. Overall it’s a great game, and since the students had exams coming up, I didn’t want to burn them out on new material. The biggest problem for me is that my classes are just under 40 students each, and I am not fool enough to think I can control 20 students running around at the same time.

So, I turned the game into a relay. Five teams, one writer, lots of group cooperation. The prize was candy or chocolate (this is apparently a VERY important distinction) for the winning team, which means instant motivation - these kids will cheerfully murder each other for a Hershey’s Kiss or a sucker, and they LOVE American candy. I gave a bonus point to the first team to finish, and one point for every accurate sentence. If they made a mistake, I pointed it out and explained why it was wrong (usually they knew and noticed it before I did). I subtracted points for cheating and horsing around in line. I also offered a bonus point to any team who could solve the riddles they were transcribing. Here are the two I picked:

One night, a father and his son were hungry.
They went to their favorite restaurant.
They ate dinner together in the restaurant.
They ate sushi, spicy noodles, and rice.
The son drank cider, but the father drank a lot of soju.
Soon the father was a little bit too drunk.
He did not think he could drive his car.
So the son decided he could drive the car.
Unfortunately, the son was not a good driver.
He crashed the car into a tree.
The son was very hurt, but the father was okay.
The father took his son to a hospital.
The doctor saw them both and said:
“Oh no! What happened to my son?”

Who is the doctor?

A man lived alone in an apartment.
His home was on the very highest floor.
Every morning he rode the elevator down.
He usually rode the elevator alone.
Then he walked alone to his work.
Every night he came home from work.
He waited near the elevator on the first floor.
He sometimes waited a very long time.
He waited for another person to com.
He never rode the elevator up alone.
If another person came, they rode up together.
If no one came, he walked up the stairs.
On rainy days, the man carried an umbrella.
With an umbrella, he could go up the elevator alone.

Why could the man ride down alone, but not up?

They used a lot of target language we’ve been working on all semester, like location/direction words, frequency adverbs, “if” clauses, and simple past tense. I also had a simpler version for lower-level classes. The class in these photos is my favorite in the whole school. They are extremely bright, extremely good-natured, and eager to please. This particular lesson was a lot more laid-back than it was with my other classes, since these students are also very good at following directions. I didn’t even have to take points away!

Getting into teams (and each other's laps).

Team One!

Team Two!

Team Three's leader is a dedicated teacher's pet that the other kids still like anyway. I want to pinch his cheeks and give him lollypops.

Team Four!

Team Five's leader wants you to know that he doesn't care and you can't make him.

I also have a ton of video of this game, but somehow I can’t get any it to play. I’ll see if Mike can fix it and try to get it up as soon as possible. I also want to point out that this class was held in the “English room,” rather than in one of the regular classrooms. I don’t usually use it because there are no desks.

It’s only 1:30pm and I’ve already had a fantastic day. I’ve taught two second (8th) grade classes and one first (7th) grade class, all in a row, and all surprisingly cooperative. I was dreading coming to school today because exams are over now, and I was told that for the next three weeks the students will be very difficult to manage. Basically, the kids here are focused on test prep, and if there’s no test to prep for, there’s no focus. (Why the final exams are this early is completely beyond me.)

I had been planning on teaching some movie vocab to the second graders this week (plot, setting, character, etc.) since I’d done a filler worksheet on it after exam review, and there seemed to be some interest. I was completely blown away by how into it they were. We talked about genre, directors, favorite scenes, favorite actors, and then outlined some of their favorite movies on the board. For example:

SPIDERMAN

• Genre: Action, Sci-Fi, Romance, Comedy
• Setting: New York City, Now
• Characters: Peter (star), MJ, Green Goblin, Grandfather, Grandmother, Goblin’s Son
• Plot: spider bite, get powers, grandfather die, so sad, get girlfriend, fight Green Goblin, Spiderman wins
• Favorite Scenes: kissing scene (had to teach them “upside down”), holding bus, WWE, flying

The highlights were one student who NEVER speaks requesting the movie 8 Mile and carefully outlining the entire plot (since he was the only one who had seen it), and one class working together to list every single character from Harry Potter. I’ve decided that next week we’re going to watch a short movie, or part of a movie, and then they will outline it (maybe in groups, if I’m feeling brave) using their new vocabulary. They have completely earned a movie day.

The first graders were the ones who really surprised me. This class is the one that I’ve complained about before. They are usually completely uncooperative, especially the ones who speak well. To top it off I couldn’t really think of anything exciting to do, so I went with a lesson that a foreign teacher from another school told me about. She read her students “Snow White” and then had them finish the story. I was skeptical, especially about my kids, but I was out of ideas, so I took a shot. I wrote a short, simplified version of “Little Red Riding Hood” that stopped just as the wolf said “MY TEETH ARE BIG SO I CAN EAT YOU!” (”all the better to eat you with” might have gone a bit over their heads). I chose a student to read each paragraph and we talked about the meaning and checked for comprehension (when I asked what a “wolf” was they all howled at me…so, so good). Then they divided into groups of four and finished the story. A few even had illustrations that I really wish I could show you. Here are some of my favorite endings so far: “Little Red Riding Hood screamed and ran outside…”

• Suddenly, her grandmother is open the wolf’s stomac and she take AK-47. So wolf kneel down to grandmother and wolf said “grandmother…I’m so sorry but I love you…” and wolf see Little Red Riding Hood take bomb. And wolf so surprise. And she said “We’re legend” and BOMB!!!

• She takes a gun and she shots gun to the wolf but wolf take a shild so wolf came to her and wolf slap her face and wolf said “are you crazy? I don’t eat you!” She said “I’m sorry!” but wolf eat her but she cut wolf’s head. So wolf is dead. Finally, she shots to the wolf. Wolf go to heaven. The end.

• Little Red Riding Hood ran in the forest. She saw to chase a wolf so she ran more fast. Suddenly, she saw wood cutter over there. “Help. Help. Wolf will kill me. Help.” Little Red Riding Hood said. “Yes.” wood cutter grasp ox [axe] then he hit a wolf head.

• Why is a wolf eating Little Red Riding Hood? He kill grandma.

• But wolf catched her. By the way wolf crush at the first eyes ["first sight"] to her. So they got married and have a good time.

How great is that? I am incredibly pleased. There was one little creeper who had the wolf “falling on her and he say ‘trust me’ ” but the rest of his group very vehemently opposed it.

Now I only have one class left to go, but I’m not the lead teacher. I’m kind of excited to go, because I heard that one student from this class was caught cheating during his last exam, and I want to see who it was. I’ll admit, I have my suspicions. I kind of feel bad for him though, too. His academic life is over and he’s only in 7th grade.

[Edit: It wasn't who I thought it was.]

Last Sunday, to celebrate Thanksgiving, we had pumpkin duck for the THIRD time. I love this place. The restaurant is near Gyeongpo Beach, not too far from our house. The building is not like most you’d see around here…it actually kind of looks Mexican. The garden around it is lovely, even in the winter. One of my favorite photographs in the world hangs outside the door. Inside there are traditional masks and weird sculptures all over the place. The table is set with more side dishes than I’ve seen anywhere else (cucumbers and ginseng in orange sauce oh my GOD) and within a few moments the main dish is brought out in all its steaming glory. The basic idea is a delicious greasy duck cut up into cubes and cooked INSIDE a “pumpkin.” (Actually, it’s a squash, but in Korean they don’t differentiate between different kinds of squashes/gourds.) The squash makes the duck less greasy, and the duck makes the squash tender. They split the whole thing open so that it kind of blooms, and since you have to order it a few hours in advance, it’s ready when you are. They serve it with spicy bean paste, peppers, garlic, vinegar, lettuce, and sesame leaves (like sam gyap sal) so you can make little wraps, but it’s so good on its own that we usually don’t bother. I wish I had a picture of the carnage left on the table, and the empty shell of the squash to show you.

This one is blurry because I couldn't stop stuffing my face long enough to take the picture.

That's better. I must have been chewing.

One more plus: since we eat there so often (and really because Mihyun has been bringing foreigners to this place for years), we didn’t have to pay for beverages, and the owner himself drove us downtown for coffee so we wouldn’t have to take a cab. I love this city!

On a completely unrelated note, I thought I might try to get your take on exactly what this truck is for:

????

We’ve seen it around town and near our apartment complex. Is it some sort of magical moving truck? Or is it just a frog riding his friend the unicorn into infinity? Here, have a close up:

Even more inexplicable at close range.

Best explanation gets to request a photo post that I may or may not follow through on!

Now I’m off to eat more birthday cake. The adorable math teacher’s dad sent her the green-tea-with-chocolate-chunks kind. Why oh why do we not have chocolate green tea cake at home?

Geez, guys. Sorry about taking so long to post again. It’s exam week and I’m drowning in the ennui of not having anything to do AT ALL. It’s gorgeous outside, sunny and unseasonably warm, and I’m at my desk noticing things like how crooked my pointer fingers are. I wonder if anybody would notice if I snuck outside and ran laps around the building?

Part of my delay is that I’m having trouble uploading pictures and video, and I really, really, REALLY want you all to see the wedding Mike and I went to a week ago. There was a light show and a fog machine and karaoke…in the CEREMONY. It was also the most no muss, no fuss wedding I’ve ever been to. I think you’ll get a kick out of it, but more on that later.

We had pumpkin duck for Thanksgiving, and I’ve finally got a few pictures of how incredible that is. Those are coming too.

I did a fun reading relay lesson with my second graders last week, and I got some videos of my favorite class running around in their socks. Hilarious AND educational!

In non-photographic news (at least, not yet) Mike and I have been informed that we have to perform a “pop song” at our school’s winter festival. We tried to get out of it by saying we’re nervous to get on stage, but my coteacher looked like I’d shot her dog or something. So we regrouped and decided that we could think of something, and she (and the vice principal, and the music teacher…) cheered right up. Awesome. Neither one of us is thrilled to sing, but I figure we can get the students to do something with us. If all else fails, we can always lip-synch/act out some song, like that scene in Dirty Dancing where they sing “Loverboy” at each other…but maybe with less crawling around on the floor. Apparently the students get really excited when teachers perform (according to the teachers). Besides, this is the country of sober karaoke. Standards are probably not that high. Although, the performance that Nathan, Stephanie, Kasia, and Marta put on is going to be a rough one to follow. Any ideas for mostly painless songs that we can do without knowing how to moonwalk?

So that’s what’s new here. In the next few days I should have a couple of massive photo posts up with lots of commentary. Stay tuned!