School Daze

I have many, many things I could write about.  I've had good intentions to blog but, seeing as I'm still without wifi in my home, I can either blog during my office hours at school or while I'm using the signal at Paris Baguette.  I'm far too busy streaming Korean Dramas at Paris Baguette to blog, so I write this entry from my desk at school.

Third Graders gathered at the entrance of Ulsan Grand Park

Two of my students sharing a bicycle

My mentor teacher and students

My mentor teacher and me

I love teaching.  I'm surprised at how quickly I've fallen in love with my new life situation; surprised, but deeply happy.  In spite of being hired as a Guest English Teacher through the EPIK program, I was apprehensive about my ability to handle teaching middle school students in a language that is not their first.  When I began teaching, I wondered whether or not the Korean English teachers even approved of my methods.  All this uncertainty changed for me, though, the day of the third grade picnic at Ulsan Grand Park.  I found myself sitting with Gloria.  Out of all of my co-teachers, I had found Gloria to be the most reserved; I had no idea what she thought of me or my teaching abilities.  At any rate, she shocked me by delivering the best compliment I could have hoped for regarding my teaching: "I think you were born to be a teacher.  Maybe you... what's the word... inherited the DNA for teaching from your teacher parents.  I know it's your first year but you seem like you have 6 or 7 years of classroom experience.  It usually takes a whole year for a foreign teacher to learn the students' level, but I think you know it already."

I was very, very touched by those words.  Gloria went on to explain that I am the third foreign teacher in her two years at 다운 Middle School.  If I feel some distance from the other teachers, it's likely because they had been close to the preceeding waygook teachers and are reluctant to open up to someone else who will most likely exit through the revolving door of foreign teachers.  Or, at least this is what she feels is the case.  While I haven't felt particularly blown off my anyone, I appreciated Gloria's sensitivity in telling me this.  And I felt exponentially more confident about my role as a teacher.

Since my school doesn't have a curriculum for me to follow, I have unlimited freedom in what I teach.  I also only need to design and write two lessons every week; I have the time and resources to devote a lot of effort into each lesson.  The lessons I've taught include: describing food, landmarks in the USA, the American Civil Rights movement, the 4th of July, sports culture in Minnesota, and a literary analysis to the lyrics of Green Day's song "Wake Me Up When September Ends."  (I used the song analysis for my "open class," a semi-annual event in which parents observe classes).  

I said I love teaching, and I do.  However, it's not always a picnic in Ulsan Grand Park with these students.  The success of a lesson largely depends upon the class dynamic.  I have engaged and forthcoming students, passive and bored students, and I have some real pains in my ass.  I've had problems with students hitting each other (it's hard to tell what's friendly from what's not... they will slap and hit but hold hands and hug the next minute), problems with students sleeping and, above all, problems with students speaking loudly in Korean while I'm speaking.  My co-teachers have helped to curb many of these problems in most classes, but I have major behavioral problems in one section of first grade and one section of third grade.  In all fondness, I sometimes privately refer to these classes as "my little demon monsters from Hell."  It's most unfortunate for the students in these classes who are distracted and interrupted by the loud, rude, and disruptive few who make both teaching and learning very difficult.  I have one third grader who I can't even refer by name because he never brings his English nametag to class.  He sits right next to my desk and is apparently immune to my frequent threatening looks because he shamelessly blurts out (what I assume to be) snarky comments in Korean while I am teaching.  After several warnings last week, I sent him out into the hallway for part of class.  Yesterday he was expelled to the hallway again and, after his return, took a lengthy nap on his desk (along with his entire section of the classroom).  He's certainly caused me headaches as a teacher and yet...

My most notorious trouble-maker takes a nap alongside several of his classmates.

The class leader poses for the camera as I snap a picture of one student using his friend's back as a pillow. The paper is falling off his face in this picture, but just a minute before he was using the reading assignment I handed out to shield his eyes from the light as he slept. Resourceful.

...I can't bring myself to dislike him.  That goes for all of my trouble-makers.  I've always had a soft spot for children with behavioral or emotional problems.  And I've noticed that my colleagues are the same way with the notorious students.  We might yell at them or send them into the hallway to hold a chair while kneeling or make them do squats in the back of the classroom (for the record, I've only ever sent students to the hallway; I haven't made them to any physical punishment... yet) but when these students show up in the Teacher's Room or see us in the cafeteria or walking in or out of the school building, they bow, say hello, and smile.  And we smile back.  It's kind of beautiful.

There have been silver linings to even the worst days in class.  Towards the end of the most appalling, frustrating class session in my admittedly short tenure here, I loudly expressed to my students that I did not leave my home and relocate 6000 miles away for that.  A few minutes after dismissal, about eight girls from the class came back with sincere, repentant eyes: "I'm sorry, Teacher!"

Most of my classes are a breeze compared to the difficult ones, and several are consistently fulfilling.  I taught my third graders about the American Civil Rights movement last week and was impressed with the maturity and respect they displayed as I gave my presentation.  After showing a video clip of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech, I gave each student a worksheet to facilitate their own speech.  Some students were apathetic towards the activity but I noticed many making an effort to complete the worksheet.  Two students read their speeches for the class, making me very teary and proud in the process.

The first student wrote about being free from school.  I haven't been in Korea long, but the terrible pressures forced on students through the Korean school system are already evident.  Suicide among teenagers in Korea is often fueled by school-related stress. 

I have a dream that one day this nation will have freedom for students.  

I have a dream that one day students won't have to go to school.   

I have a dream that one day students don't have to test.   

I have a dream that we have a freedom.  I have a dream today.   

I have a dream that one day study doesn't needed anymore.  I have a dream today.   

I have a dream that one day we can play all day.   

This is my hope and faith.  With this faith we will be able to change everything!  

This will be the day when we change it!

The second student to share his speech wrote about the reunification of North and South Korea, a sentiment echoed often during this assignment.

I have a dream that one day this nation will be reunited.   

I have a dream that one day North Korean[s] will travel [to] South Korea.   

I have a dream that one day we can go and travel to North Korea.   

I have a dream that our children will play with North Korea's children.  I have a dream today.    

I have a dream that one day I can go to Pyongyang and eat cold noodles.  I have a dream today.  I have a dream that one day I can go to Geumgang Mountain.  

This is my hope and faith.  With this faith we will be able to [be] reunited again peacefully.   

This will be the day when we gather our hope and power.

Most other classes responded well to this activity; I had students with a dream to be married and have children, a dream to be a doctor in a developing country, a dream to study abroad.  (I even had one girl who wrote "I have a dream that one day I will lose my virginity," though I didn't make her share that with the class!)

Even a year ago, I would not have believed that I would be in a classroom, listening to a teenager read his dream for his country's unification to me and his classmates.  I couldn't have planned for my life to be where it is today, but I'm so happy that I'm here.  Class of little demon monsters and all.