My Late Monday Class

I really feel sorry for Korean kids. They are pushed much harder than any kids back home. Granted there is nothing wrong with ambition and making your child study hard. However my last class on Monday between 9.00pm and 10.30pm is with a 11 year old kid.

Her English is really good and I actually think she is a really nice, bright girl, but her and many other Korean kids spend all their childhood studying. These kids go to school at the regular time of 9am until 3pm; but after they head home for dinner they are usually back out in private academies until 10 or 11 at night. In addition they have to fit in their homework somewhere and they will usually be at school and academies on Saturday too. It's a tough life and It is meant to be (from our point of view) the least stressful days of your life.

I understand for most Koreans employment relies on a degree, much more heavily than in the UK, and that is a major reason for the pressure on kids. I have been thinking a lot about the Korean system and how different it is from the UK. I think I will write about it in a separate article later.

English Camp

As I mentioned before I was working an English camp this month. The camps vary from forest retreats to an extra Saturday studying. This one was at a countryside school but it was kitted out well with 2 large LCD HD TVs directly connected to a PC hub and internet. I decided to incorporate this into my lessons and add some fun to the day. I had to start early at 9am, leaving at 7.30am, and work till almost 4pm. In reality though I only taught four 40min classes and they were just a lot of fun.

As you can see I taught the the intricacies of the Act of Union and then gave them a project to do.

My teaching assistant Mr. Bean!
After teaching present continuous, I am Verb+ing, I used the videos and asked the students 'What is he doing?'

Musical chairs
After this we played musical chairs having to perform the verbs they learned. Running, hopping, dancing and eventually the Moon-walk ;)
(to the tune of 'There's a Moose Loose Aboot this Hoose'

Add a tweed jacket, a pot-belly and less hair and that could be me lecturing on Marxism in 10 years time!

My weapon of choice for unruly students!

Ceilidh Dancing
I only really know the Gay Gordans so I decided to give it a bash as the finale, and they seemed to like it. Prizes if you can guess what song it is, the clue is in the picture!!

<------------I think we done some thing right
they went from petrified to smiles!------------>

Slow Start

Slow start this month with only two posts. However I have been a little busy. I have 3 new classes at work. Three TOEFL writing classes twice a week. Now most people from English countries have never heard of TOEFL, however it the standard test for any student who wants to go to university. It measures your ability to read, write, speak and listen in English in an academic environment. After teaching the writing course a few times I also think it forces student's ability to analyse and write essays.

I also worked a camp in the countryside this weekend which was fun if a little tiring. I'll put up a separate post about that when I get some photos.

Skype Teaching

Children's Day

Tuesday the 5th in Korea is 'Children's Day'.

It is like a mix between a bank holiday and Christmas. No tinsel or puddings, but a day off for all the kids and guess what! me too.

Take this opportunity to add an extra night out to the week.

Next week, on the 15th, is 'Teacher's day'. Where traditional kids would give presents to their teachers to say thanks. Unfortunately the whole thing got so out of hand a few years ago with parents using teachers day as a chance to bribe teachers tat the government actually made it illegal to give gifts to them. :(

Maybe something will pop up unexpectedly.

Mentalist

Man this kid is nuts!!! He is singing and keeps shouting 'game over' in a squeaky voice while frothing at the mouth.

And I have to teach him English.