Another great weekend. Sadly, Friday I didn't meet up with my teammates to teach them English because one one of them was not feeling well. So I stayed in, rode my bike, and had another friend over my apartment and we studied, hung out, and ordered out some awesome food. That was the first time I have ordered out in Korea, and it is very interesting! They give you actual dishes (like ceramic - is that what they are called?), and you eat, and then you put the dishes outwide of your home and the take out place comes to pick up the dishes...it is great! And eco-friendly :) So that was a fun night.
I'm not sure if I wrote about going to the cinema Thursday..? So I will mention it briefly. I went with Chol. It was very interesting! To get a ticket there, you take a ticket, and the counter displays the ticket number when it is your turn to get a ticket. I expressed my surprise at this situation, and C was like, why, what happens in America? And I said, we have to wait in line! So old fashioned. Haha. Crazy technology! So he chose the movie - I was all up for a Korean movie - but he picked Mamma Mia. I feel bad....he thought it was a comedy - which...it was comedic...haha. No it wasn't too bad, but it was definitely a strange feeling for a movie - I think most musicals are, because people just randomly start breaking out into song. But with him already being very tired and with the added surprise of the musical nature of the film, he slept for probably half of the movie. I felt like the girl who makes her boyfriend go to a chick flick against his will...haha...especially since I was an American with a Korean guy - I feel like people were probably thinking...oh man, stinks for that guy...hahaha. Naw but he chose it so I don't feel that bad. (I still felt kind of bad...haha). But that also was a weird experience because it was the first time I saw an English film here, and I felt like I was in the States while I was in the movie theater (there were Korean subtitles but they weren't very noticeable (many times they were in white writing)), and I'm with someone who speaks pretty good English...but after the film got out - I felt very strange. I'm walking out of an American movie, an American, with all these Asian people surrounding. Out of the month and a half since I have been here, I felt like I stuck out more here than anywhere else. Maybe I didn't stick out, but I was very aware of my Americanness. And I also felt a little responsible for the movie not being fantastic...like I was representing my country and I somewhat failed the Asian people with this film (I'm not saying it was horrible - it is just the nature of the musical and the cinema together that often leaves a lingering awkwardness...). But it was a great experience :) After that we went to Haeundae and walked around - we went to the place where my team always runs and swims on Sunday - it was great to see it at night with all of the lights. Very beautiful!
Saturday I rode my trainer again for a while and discovered the CNN chanel on my TV so I got to catch up a bit on the election debates and such. It was weird watching people speak fluent English though...and it was weird to see American personalities too...haha. So I stayed at home until swimming practice which was at 4p. When I got there, the hotel (we swim Saturdays at the Grand Hotel, which is a big fancy hotel in Haeundae, one of the most expensive (if not the most expensive) place in Busan) was all decked out with red carpets and such (the hotel already always has one or two big chandeliers in its lobby, so with all of that and the red carpets and the men in nice suits, it looked very fancy. When I got there I was able to walk right in though, although the men looked a little tentative about letting me up the elevator, but I saw another guy do it so I figured it was fine.
So we swum, showered and such, and then went downstairs to meet. Normally we all meet in the lobby and then go to dinner. But tonight Coach was not there because he is in Japan with his family, doing some triathlon stuff (I think his son is racing or doing a camp because he borrowed my bike bag to take his son's bike on the ferry). Anyway - the couches which are normally in the middle of the lobby were pushed off to the back, and there were lots and lots of people in the lobby, all dressed really nice. I just chilled on the couches and waited for everyone else to come down. But occasionally there would be a lot of people screaming, and photographers running aside some Korean people, I'm assuming movie stars and/or singers, etc. One guy looked like a Korean Snoop Dog kind of - the people went crazy for him. It was great :). The other people just looked very dressed up and important by the way others treated them. When the other guys got down from showering, they told me, "Korean stars." Haha. And we looked for a bit. They also told me that the Wonder Girls, a very famous Korean girl singing group (I'm thinking popularity like the Spice Girls when they were popular) were there. I don't think I saw them though. I don't know, maybe they were some of the girls I saw go upstairs before the guys came down. Anyway. That was very interesting :) Next time I go to practice there I will try and take some pictures to show you what the lobby looks like - even with no red carpet it is really fancy. Oh - so the reason everyone was there - haha - every September/October there is the International Film Festival in Busan, and I think that they were there for the premiere of a movie, because there was a big billboard-sized poster of a movie in the lobby. So that was that. Very interesting :)
Like I said before, normally we go out to dinner afterwards, but since Coach wasn't there we didn't. I had planned to meet up with some English speaking friends after dinner, thinking it would be around 8 or 9p. But we got out at 6:30p, and my friends weren't meeting up until 9p, and today was literally the first day I did not bring my Korean books with me. Actually. Growl. So I thought about just chillin for two hours and meeting them at a nearby subway where they were all going to meet, but I decided to go home instead. And by the time I got home it would have taken me at least another hour to get there, and I would barely have made it...and then would be really tired...so I just gave up on that and stayed home and studied/made some CDs. So that was a bummer about not meeting up with my friends but I think I needed to stay home and chill - although it would have been nice to go out. Maybe next time.
Today - we met as usual at the Yacht Club at 10am (the youth tri tream is just finishing up their bike ride). S, G (the other triathlete who coaches the youth team -he always swims with us at the pool but hasn't been training with us much otherwise until this weekend - I think he is going to start doing most of the weekend workouts with us from now on :) ) and I go off to Haeundae, and jump in the water. We swim for about 10 minutes, and then S suggests swimming a bit and then running back on the beach. I was all for that! So we all decided to do circuits of that and agreed that if we did 5 circuits then we wouldn't do a 40-50min run afterwards like we normally do. So we did that...ahhh it was sooo much fun!! On the last circuit, my arms were pretty sore. And the running on the beach was awesome - hard! I thought they would want to jog back and just do a continuous circuit with no stopping, but we actually would jump back into the water after running and wait a minute, and then start up again - so the run was more intense. But there were a lot of other people on the beach that day, strangely -I think maybe it had something to do with the film festival, for the main venue for the festival is actually right on the beach - but anyway, we were in our caps and goggles running about 500m across the beach every 10-15 minutes or so...haha....it was awesome. We looked so cool. Hahaha. Ahhh that was soo much fun!!!
So that was my day. I am kind of tired, not having been sleeping as much as I would like, so I think I might take a nap now. Na-jjam-ja-da - take a nap :) Something else noteably happened today but again, I can't write that here, so that will take the form of an email later on. Let me know if you are interested in hearing that... :)
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Brevissimo Ma Dulce (Very Short But Sweet)
Ah! So in the last post I mentioned the coin that one of my students gave me...I figured out what it is!!!! I looked up 'Asian Scripts' and got to this website: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/9594/brahmi.html - Scripts descenced from Brahmi, which is a script that was used in Asia in the 3rd century BC, perhaps even as far back as the 6th century (assording to wikipedia so that may not be entirely accurate) (Also it says that Brahmi influenced Hangul!!!! Ahhh!) Anyways back to the website- I looked through these alphabets (by no means all of the alphabets in Asia but just some of the most popular) and I looked at the letters on the coin and tried to match them up with one of the alphabets. (I also used my knowledge of the sounds that certain letters in Tamil make, and would check the listed velars, palatals, etc respectively, to try adn save myself some time (if this is confusing, check out the website, it will become more clear). Anyway - even though the writing on the coin in a little hard to figure out, after about 20 minutes I thought that it bore quite a resemblance to the Thai alphabet, so then I looked up "Thai coins" - and sure enough - that is what I have!!!! I have a 5 Baht coin!!! Ah!! I am soo excited that I just did some mini research to figure out which alphabet I was looking at and then was able to find where the coin is from and what denomination it is. Oh man. I love languages. Ah. It's my calling, I think. :)
Crazy Kids; Status of IM China
C: Good morning!
S: Good morningggg
C: How are you today?
S: Iiiiii'm fiiiine/So-soooo.
C. Gooood. How's the weather?
S: It's sunnyyyy/It's cloudyyy (depending on the 10 minute period - it fluctuates like crazy here..)
C: Yes, it's sunny! Yayyy (Big smile). What day is today?
S: It's.......Mon..Fri...Wednesday! Thursday!
C: (What day IS it? Crap...I shouldn't rely on fifth graders learning English to convince me which day it is...)
A bit of an insight into my daily life. Don't worry - my classes aren't as boring as I make them sound here - but this is the daily greeting that I do with every class every day. Sometimes I sing parts of it to make it more interesting...but that is mostly to amuse myself...haha...just kidding. I do whatever I can to get the kids more involved. Sometimes I dance a bit too. I think they like that/like to make fun of me thinking I am cool. Whatever gets them involved in any way possible is cool with me.
I jotted down a few things that happened in class today so I could have a few things to say about class. Normally, no matter how entertaining, I always forget the day's amusements by the time I get home. The three things that made my A list today were the wet-head, the womanizer, and the boy who gave me money. You know, and today wasn't all too much different from any other day. I actually have some really fun experiences. Although things like the wet-head...I don't get to enjoy too much, because the other teachers don't think it is as funny as I do...granted they have to discipline them (not that I don't, but they have their ways and I don't feel comfortable imposing mine until they seem to be comfortable with me doing that...my method will probably be either pushups or wall sits - I got the wall sits idea from a fellow EPIK teacher (Thanks Lilani!)) but I don't think this was a situation where I would dole out punishment. If it got out of hand I would make him do pushups maybe - because then he wouldn't/shouldn't have enough energy to act out. ANYWAY. Why don't I just tell you about it rather than dancing around the subject. It's not much of a story actually. Some kid in my 4th or 5th period class comes into the room with his hair soaking wet. Make that his entire head and face. He was dripping...water all over his glasses. It was amazing. He is a special one - a few classes ago when he was standing in the back of class (I think for being late) and we were singing a song, he busted out some pretty sweet dance moves. He is a cutie. Haha. But he may end up being abnormally strong by the end of my time there if I have to start disciplining. Which I hope is the case. I hate just standing by while my co-teachers give out punishment. I feel lame. Plus it's not as fun. :)
The womanizer. Haha. We are in the middle of class, and some kid (I actually know his name - one of the 4 or 5 kids whose name I know, because part of it is the word for 'swimming' in Korean) says "hey, woman!" HAHAHA. I'm sorry. If someone said that to me in the States I would stare at the in the eye (anyone - not just a 5th grader but a man of any age) and give them a long, hard dirty, confused look, and then maybe smile and walk away. But this kid - hahaha - I mean, at least he is using English... I couldn't not laugh. But then I said, no! That's bad! Don't say that. I am still smiling and laughing though...so I make an 'X' with my arms and say 'no', and then I forced my lips into a frown with my fingers...haha. That was fun. "Hey, woman!" Hahaha. Where do these kids get these things? The thing is, that he isn't hearing that from adults or other kids...he either heard it from TV or a movie, or he just made it up on his own. I hope it is the latter. Especially if that is the case, he probably didn't mean it in the womanizing sense that women might take it to be in the States (of course it depends on the tone accompanying the comment), so it's cool. Haha. Good times.
This one isn't really funny, just freaking awesome. One of the kids in my 3rd or 4th period class came up to me and my co teacher before class with a handful of money. I saw a Euro (I thought...it might have been a coin around the Korea-area that looks like a Euro) and was wondering what was going on...and saw he had coins from all over the world. I was soo excited!! He opened his hand and says "America money!" and points to a nickel. Apparently his neighbors (or parents, I couldn't understand what they were trying to explain to me) just got back from a trip around the world (partly around the world). He motions for me to look at the coins, and then my co-teacher tells me that he wants me to have one..!! So I am looking...there is one from Hong Kong, a few others from other Asian countries (I kind of skipped past a bunch of them, looking for ones that looked compeltely foreign to me...plus we didn't have much time until class started...) there was one from Malaysia!!! I wanted to take that one...but then I saw one with an alphabet which I didn't recognize. It might be ...hmm, I was just thinking the alphabet looked a bit like cyrillic but looking at it again it definitely isn't...but I took this coin because I was intrigued and wanted to find out where it was from and what the alphabet was...so that will be my adventure for tomorrow... :) But how amazing is that!!! This boy gives me and my co-teacher a coin from another country from his parents' or his neighbors' trip around the world! Geez. I am so lucky!!! What a sweet day. :)
So...IM China... (Oh I forgot to write in my last blog - I wrote in the title about my coach being an IM director - yea...apparently for the last 9 years he directed Ironman Jeju...but resigned last year because the IMG (International Management Group...I think...), which is the corporation (corporation? I am guessing here) which takes a LOT of money from Ironmans which are Ironman Hawaii Qualifiers. Basically, they allow athletes from these Ironmans to qualify for the World Championship in Hawaii every October, and because of that, they take lots and lots of money. And apparently my Coach decided that they couldn't keep paying IMG because they just weren't making enough money to be able to pull it off. So this year is the first year in 9 that IM South Korea is not a Hawaii Qualifier. BOO!! I was wondering why that happened! But it is SO crazy that my coach was the director of that race!! Wow. Craaaazyyyy. Man. Wow. )
Anyway. I talked to my co-teacher today about taking time off for the Ironman. I didn't write about this conflict earlier because...well, I didn't. But basically I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to take time off for the race...because teachers in Korea basically don't take any personal days unless their families are extremely sick or something extreme like that. I thought it said in my contract that I had 7 vacation days during the school year and 7 during vacations, but I checked the contract yesterday and apparently it is 7 during winter vacation and 7 during summer vacation...!!! Ahh! So I checked to see if any other Ironmans were offered during my breaks...and...I can't believe it, but there aren't any! MAYBE Ironman Switzerland will fall on the summer break but I think it might be before vacation starts. Even so, that would be almost 10 months away, and I don't want to have to wait that long...might as well wait until I get back to the States and then I wouldn't have to pay an insane amount of money to travel from Korea to Switzerland for a few days... But I talked to my co teacher today and said I went over the contract and realized that I was mistaken. I was about to tell her that I would talk to the principal and forego my 14 days of vacation for 3 days in April so I could do this race (I could get by with 2 but that would be pushing it, and if I am going to give up all of my vacation days I might as well try for 3 days)...but then she said that it shouldn't be too much of a problem (actually they had pulled out the contract earlier that day and were discussing it...just to make sure that everything was being abided by...and that I knew of the terms in the contract...so contractual conversation had been taking place about a half hour ago with my co teacher and the Vice Principal). She said that even though things are written in the contract, the Principal has discretion to allow or not allow certain things that are not stated in the contract. I just don't want to push anything. I really like my schools and the people there and I don't want to get a bad reputation. I mean, it would be fantastic if I could just substitute vacation days for the days I want to go to China, but I am fully prepared to give up all of my vacation. Pasha. Vacation. Who needs that? I don't - if it means that I can go to China and have the time of my life and kick butt in my second Ironman, and not let all of my training go to waste. Anyway.
The cutest thing just happened to me but I can't write it here...sigh. (I actually just sighed and put my hand on my heart. I have been doing that a lot here...sigh, again.) Anyway. I'm off to go suck up some more Korean culture on this wonderful Thursday night, because I don't have school tomorrow because of the national holiday. YAY. :)
S: Good morningggg
C: How are you today?
S: Iiiiii'm fiiiine/So-soooo.
C. Gooood. How's the weather?
S: It's sunnyyyy/It's cloudyyy (depending on the 10 minute period - it fluctuates like crazy here..)
C: Yes, it's sunny! Yayyy (Big smile). What day is today?
S: It's.......Mon..Fri...Wednesday! Thursday!
C: (What day IS it? Crap...I shouldn't rely on fifth graders learning English to convince me which day it is...)
A bit of an insight into my daily life. Don't worry - my classes aren't as boring as I make them sound here - but this is the daily greeting that I do with every class every day. Sometimes I sing parts of it to make it more interesting...but that is mostly to amuse myself...haha...just kidding. I do whatever I can to get the kids more involved. Sometimes I dance a bit too. I think they like that/like to make fun of me thinking I am cool. Whatever gets them involved in any way possible is cool with me.
I jotted down a few things that happened in class today so I could have a few things to say about class. Normally, no matter how entertaining, I always forget the day's amusements by the time I get home. The three things that made my A list today were the wet-head, the womanizer, and the boy who gave me money. You know, and today wasn't all too much different from any other day. I actually have some really fun experiences. Although things like the wet-head...I don't get to enjoy too much, because the other teachers don't think it is as funny as I do...granted they have to discipline them (not that I don't, but they have their ways and I don't feel comfortable imposing mine until they seem to be comfortable with me doing that...my method will probably be either pushups or wall sits - I got the wall sits idea from a fellow EPIK teacher (Thanks Lilani!)) but I don't think this was a situation where I would dole out punishment. If it got out of hand I would make him do pushups maybe - because then he wouldn't/shouldn't have enough energy to act out. ANYWAY. Why don't I just tell you about it rather than dancing around the subject. It's not much of a story actually. Some kid in my 4th or 5th period class comes into the room with his hair soaking wet. Make that his entire head and face. He was dripping...water all over his glasses. It was amazing. He is a special one - a few classes ago when he was standing in the back of class (I think for being late) and we were singing a song, he busted out some pretty sweet dance moves. He is a cutie. Haha. But he may end up being abnormally strong by the end of my time there if I have to start disciplining. Which I hope is the case. I hate just standing by while my co-teachers give out punishment. I feel lame. Plus it's not as fun. :)
The womanizer. Haha. We are in the middle of class, and some kid (I actually know his name - one of the 4 or 5 kids whose name I know, because part of it is the word for 'swimming' in Korean) says "hey, woman!" HAHAHA. I'm sorry. If someone said that to me in the States I would stare at the in the eye (anyone - not just a 5th grader but a man of any age) and give them a long, hard dirty, confused look, and then maybe smile and walk away. But this kid - hahaha - I mean, at least he is using English... I couldn't not laugh. But then I said, no! That's bad! Don't say that. I am still smiling and laughing though...so I make an 'X' with my arms and say 'no', and then I forced my lips into a frown with my fingers...haha. That was fun. "Hey, woman!" Hahaha. Where do these kids get these things? The thing is, that he isn't hearing that from adults or other kids...he either heard it from TV or a movie, or he just made it up on his own. I hope it is the latter. Especially if that is the case, he probably didn't mean it in the womanizing sense that women might take it to be in the States (of course it depends on the tone accompanying the comment), so it's cool. Haha. Good times.
This one isn't really funny, just freaking awesome. One of the kids in my 3rd or 4th period class came up to me and my co teacher before class with a handful of money. I saw a Euro (I thought...it might have been a coin around the Korea-area that looks like a Euro) and was wondering what was going on...and saw he had coins from all over the world. I was soo excited!! He opened his hand and says "America money!" and points to a nickel. Apparently his neighbors (or parents, I couldn't understand what they were trying to explain to me) just got back from a trip around the world (partly around the world). He motions for me to look at the coins, and then my co-teacher tells me that he wants me to have one..!! So I am looking...there is one from Hong Kong, a few others from other Asian countries (I kind of skipped past a bunch of them, looking for ones that looked compeltely foreign to me...plus we didn't have much time until class started...) there was one from Malaysia!!! I wanted to take that one...but then I saw one with an alphabet which I didn't recognize. It might be ...hmm, I was just thinking the alphabet looked a bit like cyrillic but looking at it again it definitely isn't...but I took this coin because I was intrigued and wanted to find out where it was from and what the alphabet was...so that will be my adventure for tomorrow... :) But how amazing is that!!! This boy gives me and my co-teacher a coin from another country from his parents' or his neighbors' trip around the world! Geez. I am so lucky!!! What a sweet day. :)
So...IM China... (Oh I forgot to write in my last blog - I wrote in the title about my coach being an IM director - yea...apparently for the last 9 years he directed Ironman Jeju...but resigned last year because the IMG (International Management Group...I think...), which is the corporation (corporation? I am guessing here) which takes a LOT of money from Ironmans which are Ironman Hawaii Qualifiers. Basically, they allow athletes from these Ironmans to qualify for the World Championship in Hawaii every October, and because of that, they take lots and lots of money. And apparently my Coach decided that they couldn't keep paying IMG because they just weren't making enough money to be able to pull it off. So this year is the first year in 9 that IM South Korea is not a Hawaii Qualifier. BOO!! I was wondering why that happened! But it is SO crazy that my coach was the director of that race!! Wow. Craaaazyyyy. Man. Wow. )
Anyway. I talked to my co-teacher today about taking time off for the Ironman. I didn't write about this conflict earlier because...well, I didn't. But basically I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to take time off for the race...because teachers in Korea basically don't take any personal days unless their families are extremely sick or something extreme like that. I thought it said in my contract that I had 7 vacation days during the school year and 7 during vacations, but I checked the contract yesterday and apparently it is 7 during winter vacation and 7 during summer vacation...!!! Ahh! So I checked to see if any other Ironmans were offered during my breaks...and...I can't believe it, but there aren't any! MAYBE Ironman Switzerland will fall on the summer break but I think it might be before vacation starts. Even so, that would be almost 10 months away, and I don't want to have to wait that long...might as well wait until I get back to the States and then I wouldn't have to pay an insane amount of money to travel from Korea to Switzerland for a few days... But I talked to my co teacher today and said I went over the contract and realized that I was mistaken. I was about to tell her that I would talk to the principal and forego my 14 days of vacation for 3 days in April so I could do this race (I could get by with 2 but that would be pushing it, and if I am going to give up all of my vacation days I might as well try for 3 days)...but then she said that it shouldn't be too much of a problem (actually they had pulled out the contract earlier that day and were discussing it...just to make sure that everything was being abided by...and that I knew of the terms in the contract...so contractual conversation had been taking place about a half hour ago with my co teacher and the Vice Principal). She said that even though things are written in the contract, the Principal has discretion to allow or not allow certain things that are not stated in the contract. I just don't want to push anything. I really like my schools and the people there and I don't want to get a bad reputation. I mean, it would be fantastic if I could just substitute vacation days for the days I want to go to China, but I am fully prepared to give up all of my vacation. Pasha. Vacation. Who needs that? I don't - if it means that I can go to China and have the time of my life and kick butt in my second Ironman, and not let all of my training go to waste. Anyway.
The cutest thing just happened to me but I can't write it here...sigh. (I actually just sighed and put my hand on my heart. I have been doing that a lot here...sigh, again.) Anyway. I'm off to go suck up some more Korean culture on this wonderful Thursday night, because I don't have school tomorrow because of the national holiday. YAY. :)
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Wait,...What?; Teaching Strategies
I have no idea what is going on with my blog right now. I'm not sure if I have spoken about my weekend. But it's pretty much the same as any other weekend...lots of exercise, etc. Although I'm leaving Friday details out because it just makes me sad...I passed up a great opportunity accidentally...bah. And we didn't bike Saturday because my Coach had important things to do. And my team was recovering from a really fun night which I was supposed to have participated in. Moving on...ugh.
Tuesday. I love singing in class. It's awesome. I'm getting more comfortable with the kids and am ad-libbing more as time goes on, and I think that helps the kids pay attention and also I think it makes it more fun for them. For example, I will give them a rest of listening and repeating to what I say to tell them things like, "In the States, one expression that we use (using the present progressive, -ing verbs, because that is what we were learning that day) is "What's going on?" What's goin on? Wuz goin on man?" And I'll just kind of go into a mini dialogue with myself...they may think I am crazy but they laugh and look much more interested. And I am giving them good information too. They would fit right in. I'm such a good teacher. Haha. But seriously. I will also add in cultural things, like when we are listening to a dialogue, I know it is boring for them, so I will take a break from them repeating me say each line of the dialogue and ask them - do you know what song Jenny was playing on the piano? So they can change their train of thought from -God this is boring- to...wait, what? (That has nothing to do with the title of my blog by the way, it is just coincidence - the title is more about me not knowing the state of the entries of my last week) Piano song? What was the song again? And have them actually exercise their minds in a way which isn't as tiring and frustrating to them. And then I throw in, "Fur Elise" is a very popular piano piece in the States. Most intermediate piano students know this piece. They may not grasp everything that I am saying (although I say it in three different levels difficulty, thus also losing some context with the less involved explainations) but I think they are learning something. And if they aren't learning immense language skills, at least they will take come cultural lessons out of it, which helps the comprehension of language. So there.
Tuesday we had a track workout with new people. Actually one of the students with whom we were supposed to run didn't join us because he had a date with his new girlfriend...PASHAAA! Laaaaaame. No but he seems cool, I met his and his friend and they seem very nice. That is just a lame excuse. Take her to watch and then go out after! Booooo. But we had a good workout and two other students joined us up at the track. They seemed really nice. I felt bad when I pushed the pace on the last lap - although Coach seemed all about it because he ran with me and then got ahead of me for a little bit - I was just putting in the final kick - and then Coach was saying today that yesterday's workout was supposed to be easy but I was going really fast. !!! Haha. He is funny. I hope the other runners weren't frustrated with me for doing that. But Coach went with me! It seemed like he was inciting it too, maybe not as fast as I went - we were running in the 5th lane, and I didn't start to pick it up until about 50 meters into the last lap, and we ran it is 85 seconds...so that is kind of fast for the end of a 40 minute run...equating definitely a sub-80 second lap. Hey. It's cool. But that was fun running with new people. Ah. Everyone is so nice!
I think I may have experienced my first openly critical reception at the track today (Wednesday). It was the end of the workout, and Coach and I pushed the pace the last lap (he definitely started it this time) (we need to get him a new stopwatch...he doesn't know what pace he is going without it...it is really funny actually - he has been saying "today we are going slow - I expect you to keep a steady pace" and then he will bolt at certain moments...haha - I don't know if he means to do it so sometimes I go with him and then die later...haha), anyway - and he was beating me coming down the straightaway - I was creeping up on him but he was still ahead - and someone said in English something like, "Hey, wait for me!" I don't think that was actually the comment but it was definitely in somewhat of a mocking voice. Haha. Whatever. They wish they could run with Coach - they are just jealous. :) Just kidding. But it didn't bother me at all. Sometimes I feel a little self conscious running around all of the Korean athletes but once I get into the rhythm its all just me, Coach, my teammates, and white noise.
Today I also made my first worksheet, on the present progressive. I got some sweet pictures off line to post on the handout. One of the sentences was "The triathletes are _______ in the ocean." (swimming... :) ) And had a picture of the swim portion of a triathlon (I initially was looking for a picture of people swimming at the beach but most of the pictures I found online were like personal pictures and I felt weird about putting a picture of "Katie and Jen at the Rhode Island shoreline" (I don't think that was an actual caption but you get the point...too creepy, having someone's picture that they put online on a worksheet in Korea for the present progressive..) so I found a picture of triathletes...with caps and goggles and water splashing...and then I can also impose my culture on them. :)
Ah. Time for bed. Sleeeeepy time. I can't wait til Friday's tutelage with my favorite Korean... :)
Tuesday. I love singing in class. It's awesome. I'm getting more comfortable with the kids and am ad-libbing more as time goes on, and I think that helps the kids pay attention and also I think it makes it more fun for them. For example, I will give them a rest of listening and repeating to what I say to tell them things like, "In the States, one expression that we use (using the present progressive, -ing verbs, because that is what we were learning that day) is "What's going on?" What's goin on? Wuz goin on man?" And I'll just kind of go into a mini dialogue with myself...they may think I am crazy but they laugh and look much more interested. And I am giving them good information too. They would fit right in. I'm such a good teacher. Haha. But seriously. I will also add in cultural things, like when we are listening to a dialogue, I know it is boring for them, so I will take a break from them repeating me say each line of the dialogue and ask them - do you know what song Jenny was playing on the piano? So they can change their train of thought from -God this is boring- to...wait, what? (That has nothing to do with the title of my blog by the way, it is just coincidence - the title is more about me not knowing the state of the entries of my last week) Piano song? What was the song again? And have them actually exercise their minds in a way which isn't as tiring and frustrating to them. And then I throw in, "Fur Elise" is a very popular piano piece in the States. Most intermediate piano students know this piece. They may not grasp everything that I am saying (although I say it in three different levels difficulty, thus also losing some context with the less involved explainations) but I think they are learning something. And if they aren't learning immense language skills, at least they will take come cultural lessons out of it, which helps the comprehension of language. So there.
Tuesday we had a track workout with new people. Actually one of the students with whom we were supposed to run didn't join us because he had a date with his new girlfriend...PASHAAA! Laaaaaame. No but he seems cool, I met his and his friend and they seem very nice. That is just a lame excuse. Take her to watch and then go out after! Booooo. But we had a good workout and two other students joined us up at the track. They seemed really nice. I felt bad when I pushed the pace on the last lap - although Coach seemed all about it because he ran with me and then got ahead of me for a little bit - I was just putting in the final kick - and then Coach was saying today that yesterday's workout was supposed to be easy but I was going really fast. !!! Haha. He is funny. I hope the other runners weren't frustrated with me for doing that. But Coach went with me! It seemed like he was inciting it too, maybe not as fast as I went - we were running in the 5th lane, and I didn't start to pick it up until about 50 meters into the last lap, and we ran it is 85 seconds...so that is kind of fast for the end of a 40 minute run...equating definitely a sub-80 second lap. Hey. It's cool. But that was fun running with new people. Ah. Everyone is so nice!
I think I may have experienced my first openly critical reception at the track today (Wednesday). It was the end of the workout, and Coach and I pushed the pace the last lap (he definitely started it this time) (we need to get him a new stopwatch...he doesn't know what pace he is going without it...it is really funny actually - he has been saying "today we are going slow - I expect you to keep a steady pace" and then he will bolt at certain moments...haha - I don't know if he means to do it so sometimes I go with him and then die later...haha), anyway - and he was beating me coming down the straightaway - I was creeping up on him but he was still ahead - and someone said in English something like, "Hey, wait for me!" I don't think that was actually the comment but it was definitely in somewhat of a mocking voice. Haha. Whatever. They wish they could run with Coach - they are just jealous. :) Just kidding. But it didn't bother me at all. Sometimes I feel a little self conscious running around all of the Korean athletes but once I get into the rhythm its all just me, Coach, my teammates, and white noise.
Today I also made my first worksheet, on the present progressive. I got some sweet pictures off line to post on the handout. One of the sentences was "The triathletes are _______ in the ocean." (swimming... :) ) And had a picture of the swim portion of a triathlon (I initially was looking for a picture of people swimming at the beach but most of the pictures I found online were like personal pictures and I felt weird about putting a picture of "Katie and Jen at the Rhode Island shoreline" (I don't think that was an actual caption but you get the point...too creepy, having someone's picture that they put online on a worksheet in Korea for the present progressive..) so I found a picture of triathletes...with caps and goggles and water splashing...and then I can also impose my culture on them. :)
Ah. Time for bed. Sleeeeepy time. I can't wait til Friday's tutelage with my favorite Korean... :)
Monday, September 29, 2008
Korean Lesson #2; In the Classroom
I just got back from my second Korean lesson with Gil (my tutor) and my co-teacher Sujeong. It was FANTASTIC. I was so tired today and felt a bit dubious about going because of that...but I'm so glad I did. I learned SO MUCH. And I have so much to study in order to retain it all. Oh man it's amazing. I could go on about it but I will wait until tomorrow or Wednesday because I need to go to bed.
I will now acknowledge the fact that I have not been talking much at all about teaching. The main reason for this is...I am afraid of what to say. I realize that everything I write here could be read by any and everyone, and so I am just wondering how appropriate it would be to write about the things I remember from class. Everyone who has taught before knows that many times teachers will complain about the kids in their classes, and I don't feel comfortable doing that here if that situation were to arise... :) Also, if I were to describe my feelings or certain cultural things from an American point of view (even an openminded point of view) I am afraid I might offend some people. Basically I just need some time to think about ways of expressing facts in a neutral way. In general, though, I love my classes. Many of the classes take a lot of energy out of me, but that's ok. I just hope the kids are getting something out of it. I know some kids are complaining that the classes are boring, and I am trying to work with my co teachers to eliminate that element. But there must be a balance between teaching the curriculum and sticking to class structure previously implemented by the teacher and introducing many new experimental methods. But my co-teachers and I are trying to think of ways to create a happy medium.
Anyways, I must go to bed so I can wake up and study Korean :) Tomorrow is a track workout with some new people! I'm very excited :)
I will now acknowledge the fact that I have not been talking much at all about teaching. The main reason for this is...I am afraid of what to say. I realize that everything I write here could be read by any and everyone, and so I am just wondering how appropriate it would be to write about the things I remember from class. Everyone who has taught before knows that many times teachers will complain about the kids in their classes, and I don't feel comfortable doing that here if that situation were to arise... :) Also, if I were to describe my feelings or certain cultural things from an American point of view (even an openminded point of view) I am afraid I might offend some people. Basically I just need some time to think about ways of expressing facts in a neutral way. In general, though, I love my classes. Many of the classes take a lot of energy out of me, but that's ok. I just hope the kids are getting something out of it. I know some kids are complaining that the classes are boring, and I am trying to work with my co teachers to eliminate that element. But there must be a balance between teaching the curriculum and sticking to class structure previously implemented by the teacher and introducing many new experimental methods. But my co-teachers and I are trying to think of ways to create a happy medium.
Anyways, I must go to bed so I can wake up and study Korean :) Tomorrow is a track workout with some new people! I'm very excited :)
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