Disclaimer: I have limited knowledge of and very little right to judge The Korean Education System.
Also, please note that when I say "The Korean Education System," I don't mean the teachers around me. A few of the teachers at my school have written off our students, but a large number of the teachers I know well are doing everything in their power to help our students succeed within the system they are required to teach. It's not their fault the system is faulty. (see disclaimer)
But when my favorite students - the diligent, considerate, funny, eager, creative, lovely ones - tell me how their education has failed them, I cannot forgive it. I cannot forgive the system that has made it impossible for my students to achieve their dreams - or, at the very least, has made them believe that it is impossible for them to achieve their dreams.
The Korean education system is changing, at least a little. There is a growing belief (or so I have perceived) that self-expression and active production (rather than massive amounts of rote memorization) are important elements of learning. But it's not changing enough or fast enough to open the door for most of my students.
신철 (Shin-Chul) and I take the same bus home, and his walk was slow and depressed when I caught him on the way to the bus stop today. He'd gotten 100% on his English semester exam - I'd given him chocolate - but the exams our school gives out are ridiculously easy compared to the college entrance exams he'll have to take in December, and he knows it. It doesn't matter that all his final exam scores were above 90%, and it doesn't matter that he's at the top of our school. The only thing (the only thing!) that matters is his score on the 수능, Korea's hell-version of the SAT.
He's so worried, so depressed about the little time he has left to study for the test (most Korean students start preparing for the exam 4 years in advance), and it makes me so sad, because he's such a lovely student and such a wonderful human being. He's told me that he wants to be a teacher, and that he wants to teach his students differently than he was taught, so that he can find out and encourage their dreams.
I want him to succeed so much. If any of my students have what it takes to pass the extremely competitive teaching exam (in which the chances are quite literally about 1 in 1000 of being selected as a public school teacher), it's 신철. But in all honesty, it's likely that he won't pass. He knows that, too - but he's still trying really hard. It's so unfair that this student - who has experienced for himself the ways in which The Korean Education System doesn't work, who wants to change the system to benefit future generations of Korean students, who knows what needs to be changed - probably won't be able to get past the exams required to participate in the system.
I have a ridiculous soft spot for 신철, I'll admit that to you. I might even idolize him a little bit. It's just that he's so good - though admittedly I probably don't know him very well on the whole - but I've never seen him be anything other than hard-working and kind and generous, with me, with his other teachers, and with his fellow students.
But 신철 is by far not the only student with this dilemma. If I were to put my students into groups, a lot of them would be in the 신철 group, the motivated-students group. There's 경준 and 희만 and 서정 and 승민 and 승화 and 홍범 and 무석 and 선우 and 성권 and others that I won't name and many others that I don't know by name and only by their oh-so-eager faces.
What can I do for them? (Not to negate the question of "What can I do for the other students, the ones who are not motivated [to study]?" - it's just that the motivated students are the ones most on my mind today.) I want them all to achieve everything they are working so hard for, how can I help them?
Today I put my signature on a contract for August 25, 2010 - August 24, 2011.
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Wednesday, 7 July 2010
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
not as perceptive as you think you are
My co-workers keep telling me how much I love my students these days. I think: but haven't I always loved them? But didn't I love them more those first months at school?
Here is the story in four stages:
Stage 1: When I first came to Seoul Electronics High School last September, the students were strange to me, and I was strange to them. Just catching sight of me was enough to throw them into hysterics, and the prospect of teaching a class full of them was a fearful thing for me. For a few months I had a sort of crush on all my students; I did not see their faults and only saw my own.
Stage 2: After a while, I started seeing things I didn't like about my students. I saw their homophobia and their fat-phobia and their bullying tendencies and their disregard for the people around them. (Obviously, these do not apply to all of my students, or in equal parts to the students they do apply to -- I am simply naming characteristics [which I see as negative] that are fairly common at my school.) I scolded/punished these things when they occurred in my classroom but generally tried to forget about them after the fact so that I could continue to be in love with my students.
Stage 3: When the second semester came, my after school class started, and with it the necessity of managing and punishing a group of (largely) very naughty students. At first, I tried to rely solely on positive reinforcement; that failing, I scolded them a lot and warned them a lot and then gave out a fair number of punishments. For a while, I partially succeeded, but also fell out of love with a number of my students in the process. I was tired of their rudeness to me in and out of class, and I was tired of hearing their false excuses for skipping class. And even though the majority of my students were not the ones causing me the stress, my frustration at my after-schoolers bled over a little into my attitude towards the entire student body.
Stage 4: I stopped fighting with my after school students. I came to the conclusion that without the help of their homeroom teachers, there was nothing more I could do to induce them to come to my class or to behave respectfully (to me and to their peers) during the class. I accepted that they had not wanted to sign up for the class in the first place, and I stopped paying attention to them, instead concentrating solely on the diligent students who did/do desire to study English with me.
From the point I stopped fighting, we have slowly progressed to now. I love my students, really. Almost all of them I love; there are only a few who are hard to forgive, whose faces I am not happy to see when I pass them in the hallways. There is also a small but not insignificant percentage of students that I still have crushes on, the sweet, sweet students who still get excited every time we meet, who wouldn't be caught dead not paying attention in class, who say "Sorry, Teacher" when their classmates won't quiet down.
The majority of the students, though, I do not have crushes on, but I am still happy to see them and happy to enter their classrooms. My love for them is a calm, well-rounded love. I know them better than I knew them before. I love them for their silliness and find the process of waking them up for class endearing, and I can recognize the things I dislike about them without hating them for it. I like this stage.
Here is the story in four stages:
Stage 1: When I first came to Seoul Electronics High School last September, the students were strange to me, and I was strange to them. Just catching sight of me was enough to throw them into hysterics, and the prospect of teaching a class full of them was a fearful thing for me. For a few months I had a sort of crush on all my students; I did not see their faults and only saw my own.
Stage 2: After a while, I started seeing things I didn't like about my students. I saw their homophobia and their fat-phobia and their bullying tendencies and their disregard for the people around them. (Obviously, these do not apply to all of my students, or in equal parts to the students they do apply to -- I am simply naming characteristics [which I see as negative] that are fairly common at my school.) I scolded/punished these things when they occurred in my classroom but generally tried to forget about them after the fact so that I could continue to be in love with my students.
Stage 3: When the second semester came, my after school class started, and with it the necessity of managing and punishing a group of (largely) very naughty students. At first, I tried to rely solely on positive reinforcement; that failing, I scolded them a lot and warned them a lot and then gave out a fair number of punishments. For a while, I partially succeeded, but also fell out of love with a number of my students in the process. I was tired of their rudeness to me in and out of class, and I was tired of hearing their false excuses for skipping class. And even though the majority of my students were not the ones causing me the stress, my frustration at my after-schoolers bled over a little into my attitude towards the entire student body.
Stage 4: I stopped fighting with my after school students. I came to the conclusion that without the help of their homeroom teachers, there was nothing more I could do to induce them to come to my class or to behave respectfully (to me and to their peers) during the class. I accepted that they had not wanted to sign up for the class in the first place, and I stopped paying attention to them, instead concentrating solely on the diligent students who did/do desire to study English with me.
From the point I stopped fighting, we have slowly progressed to now. I love my students, really. Almost all of them I love; there are only a few who are hard to forgive, whose faces I am not happy to see when I pass them in the hallways. There is also a small but not insignificant percentage of students that I still have crushes on, the sweet, sweet students who still get excited every time we meet, who wouldn't be caught dead not paying attention in class, who say "Sorry, Teacher" when their classmates won't quiet down.
The majority of the students, though, I do not have crushes on, but I am still happy to see them and happy to enter their classrooms. My love for them is a calm, well-rounded love. I know them better than I knew them before. I love them for their silliness and find the process of waking them up for class endearing, and I can recognize the things I dislike about them without hating them for it. I like this stage.
Sunday, 23 May 2010
Guys, I've gotten so much more confident.
Last Thursday we had a school picnic, and Friday was Buddha's birthday, so no school.
Here is my weekly schedule at school:
I don't know what exactly I'll do in my 1st grade classes this week, I just know it will involve "family." I don't know what exactly I'll do with my 3rd grade classes after they finish their speaking tests this week, I just know it will be some kind of game that has to do with "going to the doctor" vocabulary. But tomorrow (Monday) I have two free periods before I have to teach, and that's plenty of time to pin up my hair, check my twitter, have tea with Young-Gyung, have coffee with Kyung-Hwa, listen to a little bit of K-Pop, and then make the worksheets/game materials that I will need.
That may not sound like a big deal to you, but understand that this is not at all where I've been in the "lesson planning" process, ever. Usually it would take me a good few hours just to decide on a lesson topic, and I spent heinous amounts of time making worksheets and powerpoints. I think I would estimate that for every 1 hour lesson plan I prepared, it took me about 5 hours of preparation.
I don't know why it took me so long before (maybe because I didn't have any practice and didn't know where to find outside resources or how to use them?), but it takes me a leisurely hour now, or two hours if I'm making an extraordinary number of powerpoints/worksheets/laminated game cards. And it's not nearly as stressful as it was before. Maybe this is all an after-effect of having my weekly needed lesson plans increase from 2 to 6 with the after school classes - while spending 10 hours on lesson planning may have been feasible last semester, spending 30 hours on lesson planning is definitely not feasible this semester. I guess I adapted.
Here is my weekly schedule at school:
During my free time on Monday mornings, I make worksheets and make final edits for the week's regular lesson plans (2 hours of lesson plans, 1 for 1st graders and 1 for 3rd graders). On Tuesdays, I use my free time to prepare for Tuesday's after school class (2 hours), and the same goes for Wednesdays. Which means I usually use my free time on Thursdays and Fridays to prepare for the upcoming week.Which means I haven't prepared for the upcoming week. I'm preparing now. But oddly, what I'm preparing isn't the lessons for the upcoming week - it's the lesson for my observed class on June 7 (as part of my application to renew) that I want to talk over and edit with Shin-Jung this week.
I don't know what exactly I'll do in my 1st grade classes this week, I just know it will involve "family." I don't know what exactly I'll do with my 3rd grade classes after they finish their speaking tests this week, I just know it will be some kind of game that has to do with "going to the doctor" vocabulary. But tomorrow (Monday) I have two free periods before I have to teach, and that's plenty of time to pin up my hair, check my twitter, have tea with Young-Gyung, have coffee with Kyung-Hwa, listen to a little bit of K-Pop, and then make the worksheets/game materials that I will need.
That may not sound like a big deal to you, but understand that this is not at all where I've been in the "lesson planning" process, ever. Usually it would take me a good few hours just to decide on a lesson topic, and I spent heinous amounts of time making worksheets and powerpoints. I think I would estimate that for every 1 hour lesson plan I prepared, it took me about 5 hours of preparation.
I don't know why it took me so long before (maybe because I didn't have any practice and didn't know where to find outside resources or how to use them?), but it takes me a leisurely hour now, or two hours if I'm making an extraordinary number of powerpoints/worksheets/laminated game cards. And it's not nearly as stressful as it was before. Maybe this is all an after-effect of having my weekly needed lesson plans increase from 2 to 6 with the after school classes - while spending 10 hours on lesson planning may have been feasible last semester, spending 30 hours on lesson planning is definitely not feasible this semester. I guess I adapted.
Monday, 5 April 2010
the gossip girls want to climb Gwanak-san with me.
I reciprocate.
My after school class (2 hours after school on both Tuesdays and Wednesdays from now on) starts tomorrow. I finally got the attendance list today and was promptly disappointed by it. I'm disappointed in myself for that.
I'd assumed that my audience would be the really enthusiastic 2nd graders whom I've been missing these months. That's partly the case, and there's also a few really enthusiastic 1st and 3rd graders in there, of various English proficiency levels. There are a few 2nd grade faces that I'll be really happy to see again.
There are also a fair number of 2nd graders who were forced into signing up for an after school class by their homeroom teachers and who chose my class as the least of all the evils. They most likely won't be very enthusiastic.
There's also 하태원 (Ha Tae-Won). I taught him in 1st grade c-level last year; he's in 2nd grade now, still lowest level. And that's fine, I don't mean to deprecate the c-level students. And I don't actually mean to deprecate Tae-Won either. It's just that he's very hard to teach. His English level is undoubtedly the lowest of any of my students. He rarely understands directions and rarely utters an intelligible word in either English or Korean. If I ask him a question, he generally responds with an extremely quiet mumble, and most of the time I've no idea what he's saying. He's painfully shy. He always pays attention in class but doesn't usually seem to follow what's going on.
I co-taught c-level with Shin-Jung last year, and she really hated Tae-Won. I hope I will never feel that way about a student, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't relieved when I no longer had to teach Tae-Won. I think I'd be happy to work with him one on one, but he's so hard in a classroom setting. His pace is so much slower than his classmates, and they resent him for it. If I slowed down to his pace, I would lose the attention of everyone else in the class. What to dooooooooooo.
Choi Yena is teaching him this year (in regular classes, that is). I admire the way she interacts with him. She's so patient, and she seems to be able to get through to him and understand what he is saying in a way that I couldn't. He always comes to her desk during free time to practice for his speaking test. And so I think: He really does want to learn English, much more than most of his classmates. Surely I can be patient enough to help him. Surely I can find a productive way to incorporate him into my after school class.
Gah.
Anyway.
My after school class (2 hours after school on both Tuesdays and Wednesdays from now on) starts tomorrow. I finally got the attendance list today and was promptly disappointed by it. I'm disappointed in myself for that.
I'd assumed that my audience would be the really enthusiastic 2nd graders whom I've been missing these months. That's partly the case, and there's also a few really enthusiastic 1st and 3rd graders in there, of various English proficiency levels. There are a few 2nd grade faces that I'll be really happy to see again.
There are also a fair number of 2nd graders who were forced into signing up for an after school class by their homeroom teachers and who chose my class as the least of all the evils. They most likely won't be very enthusiastic.
There's also 하태원 (Ha Tae-Won). I taught him in 1st grade c-level last year; he's in 2nd grade now, still lowest level. And that's fine, I don't mean to deprecate the c-level students. And I don't actually mean to deprecate Tae-Won either. It's just that he's very hard to teach. His English level is undoubtedly the lowest of any of my students. He rarely understands directions and rarely utters an intelligible word in either English or Korean. If I ask him a question, he generally responds with an extremely quiet mumble, and most of the time I've no idea what he's saying. He's painfully shy. He always pays attention in class but doesn't usually seem to follow what's going on.
I co-taught c-level with Shin-Jung last year, and she really hated Tae-Won. I hope I will never feel that way about a student, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't relieved when I no longer had to teach Tae-Won. I think I'd be happy to work with him one on one, but he's so hard in a classroom setting. His pace is so much slower than his classmates, and they resent him for it. If I slowed down to his pace, I would lose the attention of everyone else in the class. What to dooooooooooo.
Choi Yena is teaching him this year (in regular classes, that is). I admire the way she interacts with him. She's so patient, and she seems to be able to get through to him and understand what he is saying in a way that I couldn't. He always comes to her desk during free time to practice for his speaking test. And so I think: He really does want to learn English, much more than most of his classmates. Surely I can be patient enough to help him. Surely I can find a productive way to incorporate him into my after school class.
Gah.
Anyway.
Thursday, 1 April 2010
you know, I've always hated april fool's day.
1. new Korean English teacher at school. I HOPE SHE'S COOL
2. I AM A LAMINATING MACHINE
3. health, happiness, joy (a butterfly). It's like you have all four seasons on your pencil case.
4. STRAWBERRIES, prune tea
5. teacher. TEACHER. I LOVE YOU.
6. I LOVE CHOCOLATE.
7. GIVE ME CHOCOLATE.
8. no. NO. we're taking a fucking speaking test.
2. I AM A LAMINATING MACHINE
3. health, happiness, joy (a butterfly). It's like you have all four seasons on your pencil case.
4. STRAWBERRIES, prune tea
5. teacher. TEACHER. I LOVE YOU.
6. I LOVE CHOCOLATE.
7. GIVE ME CHOCOLATE.
8. no. NO. we're taking a fucking speaking test.
Friday, 26 March 2010
질문 있어요?
I can't count the number of times I've asked "Do you have any questions?" in class. A lot of the time I mean "Do you have any questions about today's topic/vocabulary?" but a significant portion of the time (especially at the beginning of the semester) I mean "Do you have any questions about me?"
I know that many of them are really curious about me. Korea and myself in Korea no longer seems like a novelty to me (most of the time), and so sometimes I forget that my presence is still a strange thing for my students and some of my co-workers and many of the people I see on the streets. (It's a little weird to feel like you belong somewhere when you're seen as out-of-place by nearly everyone around you.)
I always answer personal questions when the students ask me. I've lost so many of my boundaries. As previously mentioned: if putting my insecurities on display makes my students more excited about learning, then I'll put them on a goddamn poster. The things that make me feel insecure have been on a goddamn poster for a long time. There's not a lot I won't tell my students to gain their attention (though I'll admit that I lie to them about some questions [e.g. "Why aren't you married?"] out of self-preservation).
And the students are curious about me, still - I learned that today. I stayed at school about an hour past the time I'm allowed to leave to prepare for speaking tests next week, and 5 of my students ran to catch up to me on the way to the bus stop and had so many questions.
They were really good questions, too, like "Live in Korea is hard?" "Why come to our school?" "Teaching our school students is difficult?"
I told them I love living in Korea (I thought that was common knowledge by now). I told them teaching students at our school is sometimes hard because the students talk loudly in Korean and I have to yell. I told them I didn't have a choice about which school I was assigned to, but that I am really happy that I was assigned to Seoul Electronics High School.
They told me about dance club, which is why they were staying late at school too. At the school festival (which happens SOMETIME) they will perform this dance. "Heartbeat" was all the rage amongst my students during the deep winter months/is sometimes still all the rage. I told them I'm excited to see them perform - that's true.
We all took the bus together to Sadang and then they waited for me while I recharged my Hello Kitty subway card and then we all took the green line west together. I was so impressed with their English and all the things they managed to talk to me about, I couldn't figure out why they'd never approached me before. Three of them were 1st graders, that's easy - they've only known me for 3 weeks. But 2 of them were 2nd graders (I don't teach them this year, they told me they miss me), they've known me for 7 months.
My stop was first, and they actually said "Please don't go" as I prepared to get off the subway. I wouldn't make that up.
I wonder what made them decide to approach me today. I wonder how the 3 1st graders will act when I see them in class again next week - quiet as usual? or newly confident about their English (which sometimes seems to happen)?
I'll definitely get on their nuts more in and out of class now that I know what they're capable of.
I know that many of them are really curious about me. Korea and myself in Korea no longer seems like a novelty to me (most of the time), and so sometimes I forget that my presence is still a strange thing for my students and some of my co-workers and many of the people I see on the streets. (It's a little weird to feel like you belong somewhere when you're seen as out-of-place by nearly everyone around you.)
I always answer personal questions when the students ask me. I've lost so many of my boundaries. As previously mentioned: if putting my insecurities on display makes my students more excited about learning, then I'll put them on a goddamn poster. The things that make me feel insecure have been on a goddamn poster for a long time. There's not a lot I won't tell my students to gain their attention (though I'll admit that I lie to them about some questions [e.g. "Why aren't you married?"] out of self-preservation).
And the students are curious about me, still - I learned that today. I stayed at school about an hour past the time I'm allowed to leave to prepare for speaking tests next week, and 5 of my students ran to catch up to me on the way to the bus stop and had so many questions.
They were really good questions, too, like "Live in Korea is hard?" "Why come to our school?" "Teaching our school students is difficult?"
I told them I love living in Korea (I thought that was common knowledge by now). I told them teaching students at our school is sometimes hard because the students talk loudly in Korean and I have to yell. I told them I didn't have a choice about which school I was assigned to, but that I am really happy that I was assigned to Seoul Electronics High School.
They told me about dance club, which is why they were staying late at school too. At the school festival (which happens SOMETIME) they will perform this dance. "Heartbeat" was all the rage amongst my students during the deep winter months/is sometimes still all the rage. I told them I'm excited to see them perform - that's true.
We all took the bus together to Sadang and then they waited for me while I recharged my Hello Kitty subway card and then we all took the green line west together. I was so impressed with their English and all the things they managed to talk to me about, I couldn't figure out why they'd never approached me before. Three of them were 1st graders, that's easy - they've only known me for 3 weeks. But 2 of them were 2nd graders (I don't teach them this year, they told me they miss me), they've known me for 7 months.
My stop was first, and they actually said "Please don't go" as I prepared to get off the subway. I wouldn't make that up.
I wonder what made them decide to approach me today. I wonder how the 3 1st graders will act when I see them in class again next week - quiet as usual? or newly confident about their English (which sometimes seems to happen)?
I'll definitely get on their nuts more in and out of class now that I know what they're capable of.
Monday, 22 March 2010
not such a big money
Sometimes, these days, I find myself craving green tea instead of coffee. Even black coffee, nevermind the instant stuff that suddenly makes me want to vomit. That's weird.
I've started a new system with my 1st graders, in which I give them miniature laminated U.S. dollars when they volunteer in class or win a game, and they have to bring the dollar to me after class or during lunchtime to exchange it for candy.
It works ridiculously well. You should have seen their faces light up the first time I brought the dollars out of my bag and gave them to the winning team. There are a few dollars that I haven't gotten back, and I don't know if it's because the students lost the dollar, are too shy to approach me after class, or simply would rather have the fake dollar instead of the offered candy. I know for a fact that one of my students likes to keep his dollars tucked away in his wallet for a few days before exchanging them for candy. I find this unbelievably adorable, and I refuse to threaten the students into returning the dollars like my co-teachers suggest.
This week, I have those gold coin chocolates, and my students get really confused when they give me a dollar and I give them two gold coins in return. They think they've exchanged fake money for more fake money, and I have to explain that it's chocolate. Noobs. All of my 3rd graders know full well by now what those gold coins are.
I've started a new system with my 1st graders, in which I give them miniature laminated U.S. dollars when they volunteer in class or win a game, and they have to bring the dollar to me after class or during lunchtime to exchange it for candy.
It works ridiculously well. You should have seen their faces light up the first time I brought the dollars out of my bag and gave them to the winning team. There are a few dollars that I haven't gotten back, and I don't know if it's because the students lost the dollar, are too shy to approach me after class, or simply would rather have the fake dollar instead of the offered candy. I know for a fact that one of my students likes to keep his dollars tucked away in his wallet for a few days before exchanging them for candy. I find this unbelievably adorable, and I refuse to threaten the students into returning the dollars like my co-teachers suggest.
This week, I have those gold coin chocolates, and my students get really confused when they give me a dollar and I give them two gold coins in return. They think they've exchanged fake money for more fake money, and I have to explain that it's chocolate. Noobs. All of my 3rd graders know full well by now what those gold coins are.
Friday, 19 March 2010
sleep is my way of thinking. Is that wrong?
Fuck, but I'm tired lately. All I ever want to do is take a nap. The weekends are great because I can nap.
I think next on my to-do list is to find someone to force me to do some kind of exercise on a regular basis. To complicate my weekly schedule further and to help me out of this lethargy that I've fallen into.
Other news: Kim Shin-Jung, my official co-teacher, told me today that she felt like a novice teacher because she doesn't know how to make the textbook (which is an improvement from last year's textbook, but still too hard for our students) fun and engaging. (I am so lucky I don't have to use the textbook in my classes. It would be so hard teach material that is too hard for the students in an interesting way.)
Shin-Jung asked me to help her think of ideas to make class interesting. (Why are all my co-teachers always insisting that I know what I am doing and asking me for advice? I'm the novice here, can't you see?)
I think next on my to-do list is to find someone to force me to do some kind of exercise on a regular basis. To complicate my weekly schedule further and to help me out of this lethargy that I've fallen into.
Other news: Kim Shin-Jung, my official co-teacher, told me today that she felt like a novice teacher because she doesn't know how to make the textbook (which is an improvement from last year's textbook, but still too hard for our students) fun and engaging. (I am so lucky I don't have to use the textbook in my classes. It would be so hard teach material that is too hard for the students in an interesting way.)
Shin-Jung asked me to help her think of ideas to make class interesting. (Why are all my co-teachers always insisting that I know what I am doing and asking me for advice? I'm the novice here, can't you see?)
Wednesday, 17 March 2010
oh no, I did something really wrong!
Remember the "OK!" and "I love you!" student?
I had him in class again last Friday, and he was rowdy as usual. He continued to be ridiculous ("I love you!" "Teacher, you are beautiful!" etc). I'm still not very good at dealing with those of my students who think the answer to surviving English class is flattering me to extremes. How can I make them stop being ridiculous without discouraging them from speaking altogether?
Anyway, the "OK!" guy is pretty hilarious, has a stable group of friends, and always comes across as very outgoing and confident about himself. On Friday, as he was having one of his usual bursts of rowdiness and demanded my attention once again, I felt it was safe to tease him a little. I do that occasionally with the rowdier students. (Is it wrong of me to do that?) My reasoning has been something like this: the rowdier students are sometimes/often being rowdy because they want attention from me. By teasing them, I am focusing my attention on them, and maybe that satisfies them. When they are being particularly rowdy, they often attract the attention of the entire class, and a slight tease usually makes everyone (including the person being rowdy) laugh, and it directs the classes attention back to me so that we can continue with the activity.
I never thought I'd said anything really hurtful. It was never my intention to make anyone feel bad, but simply to refocus the class. If a student says, "I love you!", for example, I might tease them by saying, "Oh, really? If you really love me, then give me candy" (holding out my hands in a cup to receive the candy). The response is something like "sorry!", at which point I feign disappointment and carry on with the class.
This strategy usually seems to work perfectly, and so it's become something of a habit. None of my rowdy students have seemed to be discouraged by it before.
So I teased "OK!" a little on Friday, and everything seemed fine. The class was split up into groups at the time, so the teasing was heard by him and the group of friends that he was working with. "OK!" laughed, his friends laughed, I laughed and redirected their attention back to the questions they were supposed to be asking each other. Everything seemed fine.
But today, "OK!" saw me coming out of the subway, didn't greet me and whipped his head around to avoid me. That's bad, rude even. School etiquette says he should have said "hello" or "안녕하세요" (which is how they would greet their Korean teachers). And usually, if "OK!" sees me in the hallways or in the subway or at my desk he always greets me and comes over to chat me up. So the fact that he ignored me means he is substantially angry at me.
Fuck, I thought, and then nearly started crying on the way to school. I really did wish he would stop saying "I love you!" constantly, but I never meant to hurt his feelings or make him angry or discourage him from speaking English. I'm sure I've annoyed some of my students before, but I didn't think I'd done anything to anger or hurt them. How do I fix it? What if I can't?
I had him in class again last Friday, and he was rowdy as usual. He continued to be ridiculous ("I love you!" "Teacher, you are beautiful!" etc). I'm still not very good at dealing with those of my students who think the answer to surviving English class is flattering me to extremes. How can I make them stop being ridiculous without discouraging them from speaking altogether?
Anyway, the "OK!" guy is pretty hilarious, has a stable group of friends, and always comes across as very outgoing and confident about himself. On Friday, as he was having one of his usual bursts of rowdiness and demanded my attention once again, I felt it was safe to tease him a little. I do that occasionally with the rowdier students. (Is it wrong of me to do that?) My reasoning has been something like this: the rowdier students are sometimes/often being rowdy because they want attention from me. By teasing them, I am focusing my attention on them, and maybe that satisfies them. When they are being particularly rowdy, they often attract the attention of the entire class, and a slight tease usually makes everyone (including the person being rowdy) laugh, and it directs the classes attention back to me so that we can continue with the activity.
I never thought I'd said anything really hurtful. It was never my intention to make anyone feel bad, but simply to refocus the class. If a student says, "I love you!", for example, I might tease them by saying, "Oh, really? If you really love me, then give me candy" (holding out my hands in a cup to receive the candy). The response is something like "sorry!", at which point I feign disappointment and carry on with the class.
This strategy usually seems to work perfectly, and so it's become something of a habit. None of my rowdy students have seemed to be discouraged by it before.
So I teased "OK!" a little on Friday, and everything seemed fine. The class was split up into groups at the time, so the teasing was heard by him and the group of friends that he was working with. "OK!" laughed, his friends laughed, I laughed and redirected their attention back to the questions they were supposed to be asking each other. Everything seemed fine.
But today, "OK!" saw me coming out of the subway, didn't greet me and whipped his head around to avoid me. That's bad, rude even. School etiquette says he should have said "hello" or "안녕하세요" (which is how they would greet their Korean teachers). And usually, if "OK!" sees me in the hallways or in the subway or at my desk he always greets me and comes over to chat me up. So the fact that he ignored me means he is substantially angry at me.
Fuck, I thought, and then nearly started crying on the way to school. I really did wish he would stop saying "I love you!" constantly, but I never meant to hurt his feelings or make him angry or discourage him from speaking English. I'm sure I've annoyed some of my students before, but I didn't think I'd done anything to anger or hurt them. How do I fix it? What if I can't?
Friday, 5 March 2010
oh, thank fuck, my students are still there.
I taught my first classes of the new year today. My first period was 1st graders and they were SO QUIET and they just STARED AT ME THE WHOLE TIME, I swear. I introduced myself, then we played a game, and then we took what was supposed to be a mock quiz (I mean, the person who gets the most questions right gets candy, come ON). They acted like the game was a test and took the quiz like their lives depended on it, which is good in a way (it means they were paying attention and will probably study hard), but gosh, I meant for the class to be FUN.
So that was rough, and it got me even more nervous than I had been before about teaching the rest of my classes, but it was all uphill from there. The next class of 1st graders was great, and then I had one period of my beloved 3rd graders, and I really can't emphasize enough how much better they made me feel. I know them, they know me, we are comfortable with each other, and I was truly happy to see their faces. Being in front of a class of 25 3rd graders feels ever so much more like my comfort zone than the 1st graders do. I told them about my vacation, they told me about their vacations, I tricked them into thinking I was a married woman now, and the whole thing couldn't have gone better. Even shy-girl engaged and spoke, I was so happy.
Then my last class of the day was another 1st grade, and they were positively RAMBUNCTIOUS. I couldn't believe that at the beginning of the day I'd been worried about my students being too quiet. One student's English was pretty much limited to "OK" and "I love you," but he would not stop saying those two things over and over whenever given the opportunity. He's going to be one of the "give me candy!" students, I can smell it.
So that was rough, and it got me even more nervous than I had been before about teaching the rest of my classes, but it was all uphill from there. The next class of 1st graders was great, and then I had one period of my beloved 3rd graders, and I really can't emphasize enough how much better they made me feel. I know them, they know me, we are comfortable with each other, and I was truly happy to see their faces. Being in front of a class of 25 3rd graders feels ever so much more like my comfort zone than the 1st graders do. I told them about my vacation, they told me about their vacations, I tricked them into thinking I was a married woman now, and the whole thing couldn't have gone better. Even shy-girl engaged and spoke, I was so happy.
Then my last class of the day was another 1st grade, and they were positively RAMBUNCTIOUS. I couldn't believe that at the beginning of the day I'd been worried about my students being too quiet. One student's English was pretty much limited to "OK" and "I love you," but he would not stop saying those two things over and over whenever given the opportunity. He's going to be one of the "give me candy!" students, I can smell it.
Tuesday, 2 March 2010
If I was still in BsAs I'd be going to sleep right now,
I guess I'll just blog instead.
When I walked out of the airport it felt like spring in Seoul, but the cold weather (read: 0-8 degrees C most days) is back now, I think that's for the best. For a minute I thought I'd skipped out on the end of winter, and was partly thrilled about it but also a little disappointed. I must have missed the cold weather, maybe I wouldn't do as well in a year-round warm climate location as I've always thought I would.
I spent the weekend getting over the cold I came down with mid-flight between BsAs and Johannesburg, and didn't really enter the world again until just this morning, the first day of the new school year at Seoul Electronics High School (Monday, March 1st was a national holiday - Independence Movement Day). For a long time I was completely calm about my approaching return to teaching, but I became incredibly anxious last night, briefly contemplated dropping everything here, flying to Chicago and spending the rest of my life crashing on Jamie's couch. Apparently I've returned to the pattern of my weekly Sunday night (or night-before-the-new-week-of-work) near-breakdowns. For some reason I thought my time away would change things in some way, I don't know how. But the old anxieties are still there, and I still feel infinitely calmer and happier at my desk at work than I do anywhere else in Seoul (except maybe at the top of a mountain, there isn't anything that makes me laugh the way the peak of a mountain does).
Everything's changed for the new year. Park Mi-Ran no longer sits beside me, and neither does Im Kyung-Hwa (frequently referred to as gossip girl #1). Shin-Jung seems to be stepping into her rightful place as my main co-teacher, and either I'll move desks, or Park Mi-Ran will no longer play as large a role in my life as I've become accustomed to.
I was expecting to be teaching 1st and 2nd grades again, but was told this morning that I'd be teaching 1st and 3rd grades instead. I start teaching Thursday, the new 1st graders were staring out the windows at me as I walked into school this morning and they either mumbled something to me in English or mumbled something to each other in Korean. I smiled and waved and stared back at them, they ducked back inside the window.
For some reason the instant coffee I just drank tasted exactly like I'd just vomited in my mouth, I hope that never happens again.
When I walked out of the airport it felt like spring in Seoul, but the cold weather (read: 0-8 degrees C most days) is back now, I think that's for the best. For a minute I thought I'd skipped out on the end of winter, and was partly thrilled about it but also a little disappointed. I must have missed the cold weather, maybe I wouldn't do as well in a year-round warm climate location as I've always thought I would.
I spent the weekend getting over the cold I came down with mid-flight between BsAs and Johannesburg, and didn't really enter the world again until just this morning, the first day of the new school year at Seoul Electronics High School (Monday, March 1st was a national holiday - Independence Movement Day). For a long time I was completely calm about my approaching return to teaching, but I became incredibly anxious last night, briefly contemplated dropping everything here, flying to Chicago and spending the rest of my life crashing on Jamie's couch. Apparently I've returned to the pattern of my weekly Sunday night (or night-before-the-new-week-of-
Everything's changed for the new year. Park Mi-Ran no longer sits beside me, and neither does Im Kyung-Hwa (frequently referred to as gossip girl #1). Shin-Jung seems to be stepping into her rightful place as my main co-teacher, and either I'll move desks, or Park Mi-Ran will no longer play as large a role in my life as I've become accustomed to.
I was expecting to be teaching 1st and 2nd grades again, but was told this morning that I'd be teaching 1st and 3rd grades instead. I start teaching Thursday, the new 1st graders were staring out the windows at me as I walked into school this morning and they either mumbled something to me in English or mumbled something to each other in Korean. I smiled and waved and stared back at them, they ducked back inside the window.
For some reason the instant coffee I just drank tasted exactly like I'd just vomited in my mouth, I hope that never happens again.
Wednesday, 20 January 2010
Saturday, 16 January 2010
some semblance of a plan w/o any semblance of motivation
Man, this is how it always happens.
I become sure of something without telling anyone about it, and then as soon as I let it out I start to question myself and my decisions.
Having told you all I'm thinking seriously about renewing my contract here, I am now questioning whether that's what I want to do at all, even a little bit. Haven't I felt inadequate and insecure the whole time I've been here? Haven't I been a more anxious person for the past 4 months than I've ever been before? Do I really want to sign up for another year of that? Can I even handle it?
Maybe it's just that I'm tired lately. I really need/want a vacation, I can't wait to leave for BsAs and not think about teaching for a whole month. (@warmandbarky let's never talk about teaching, ok? I mean, let's maybe talk about it just once, but then let's talk only about poems, ok?)
So I guess what I'm saying is: I've lost all of my motivation lately, all of it. I don't have the energy to study Korean, or to study the teaching methodology textbooks I borrowed from Park Mi-Ran just after Christmas, or to lesson plan, or to teach, really. And FUCK, if I don't have the energy to teach, then WHAT AM I EVEN DOING.
I'm also saying that I'm really hoping I get my motivation back after having a break. I really liked it when I was in love with learning Korean and teaching my students and never wanted to stop. I mean, I always hated lesson planning, but that's normal, I think, no one likes lesson planning. I just want to go back to when I didn't dread going to classes.
One more week of winter camp, then a week of no-classes, then a week of goof-off classes and graduation. Then 35 hours on 3 planes and flying around half of the world to get to @warmandbarky. I CAN'T WAIT, I THINK ABOUT SEOUL --> HONG KONG --> JOHANNESBURG --> BSAS ALL THE TIME.
I become sure of something without telling anyone about it, and then as soon as I let it out I start to question myself and my decisions.
Having told you all I'm thinking seriously about renewing my contract here, I am now questioning whether that's what I want to do at all, even a little bit. Haven't I felt inadequate and insecure the whole time I've been here? Haven't I been a more anxious person for the past 4 months than I've ever been before? Do I really want to sign up for another year of that? Can I even handle it?
Maybe it's just that I'm tired lately. I really need/want a vacation, I can't wait to leave for BsAs and not think about teaching for a whole month. (@warmandbarky let's never talk about teaching, ok? I mean, let's maybe talk about it just once, but then let's talk only about poems, ok?)
So I guess what I'm saying is: I've lost all of my motivation lately, all of it. I don't have the energy to study Korean, or to study the teaching methodology textbooks I borrowed from Park Mi-Ran just after Christmas, or to lesson plan, or to teach, really. And FUCK, if I don't have the energy to teach, then WHAT AM I EVEN DOING.
I'm also saying that I'm really hoping I get my motivation back after having a break. I really liked it when I was in love with learning Korean and teaching my students and never wanted to stop. I mean, I always hated lesson planning, but that's normal, I think, no one likes lesson planning. I just want to go back to when I didn't dread going to classes.
One more week of winter camp, then a week of no-classes, then a week of goof-off classes and graduation. Then 35 hours on 3 planes and flying around half of the world to get to @warmandbarky. I CAN'T WAIT, I THINK ABOUT SEOUL --> HONG KONG --> JOHANNESBURG --> BSAS ALL THE TIME.
Thursday, 7 January 2010
I want to tell you about my students.
Sometimes I forget what I've written here vs. what I've only told a few people over Skype, and on the phone with someone last week I realized that some of you don't know as much about my students as I thought you did.
My students have had a rough time in the Korean education system. Sometime in either elementary or middle school, they fucked up, and they've been on the track to a technical high school ever since. Even if they know the material, they do poorly on standardized tests, and standardized tests are everything in Korea, even more than in the U.S. The Korean education system doesn't really give you a second chance; if you haven't managed to test well by the end of middle school, then you're going to a shit high school and probably never going to college. If you do go to college, it will probably be a 2-year technical college that isn't prestigious and therefore isn't respected. That's even assuming you have the money for college; most of my students just don't. In the U.S., if your parents don't have the money to put you through college, you can do it yourself on student loans and working. In Korea, student loans are only given out at exorbitant interest rates and have to be paid back in a much shorter time period: 2-3 years. Which means if your family can't put you through college, you're not going.
Like I said, no second chances.
Aside from that, most of my students are struggling with depression or attention disorders, or both. They have extreme mood swings: some are happy and active in class one day, exhausted and unresponsive the next - or sometimes, angry and violent towards their classmates, both verbally and physically. Sleep deprivation is a huge problem; most of them are addicted to videogames to such an extent that they will stay up all night playing them and then come to school. Some of them can't afford winter coats, most of them don't eat breakfast, a few of them eat their only meal of the day in the school cafeteria. Which, in an extremely depressing way, means that food - especially warm food - is the most effective reward I can give out. They will try infinitely harder if there is a snack on the line.
And most of my students are also wracked with insecurity. They have been doing poorly in the school system for a long time, and have been told that they are bad students, that they are stupid for an equally long time. Most of them don't receive much support from home.
It sounds corny, but you'd be surprised how far something like "You can do it! You're smart!" goes when I'm trying to get my students to learn something. The reaction is often immediate. "Oh, thank you! Okay, I can do it," they say, and sit up straighter. I try to be a constant fountain of positive reinforcement. It probably doesn't make much of a difference; after all, I only see them once a week. I am only their English teacher, I can't even speak their language. I am not the place they look for unconditional support.
Sometimes I get frustrated with my students, because they put forth so little effort. Sometimes I feel like I spend all my free time trying to think up activities that will trick them into engaging. Sometimes I leave the classroom thinking I am a terrible teacher, I am not what these kids need.
But most of the time, I love them. They are crazy, they sing "Good Morning, Pah-may-la!" in opera voices out the windows of their freezing classrooms. They sometimes burst into K-Pop songs during class. And they sometimes really try, sometimes the lowest-level 1st graders try so hard and do so well with things that I know are hard for them. And I leave class smiling and proud of my students and never having felt more like Pam-Mom in all my life.
Also, let me tell you about technical high schools. There's recently been a surge of technical high school native English-speaking teachers trying to get in contact with each other, and as a result of it I've started to think more about my school's place in the overall education system. And I'm starting to realize that part of why I've felt so unprepared for this entire experience is because this is not what they trained me for at orientation. Granted, a 9-day orientation is not enough time to figure out how to teach. But by the end of orientation, I had a lot of ideas. I'd been told that most of the students I'd be teaching would probably have had private English tutoring all their lives (most Seoul students do, unless their families are extremely low-income) and would be nearly fluent by now. I had a lot of ideas; I was excited to teach my students some of the nuances of English that I find interesting. Technical high schools were barely mentioned at orientation, and when someone brought them up they were usually dismissed with something like, "If you get a tech school, good luck." No real advice.
So I was shocked when I got to my school. I couldn't use the ideas I'd been given for higher-level high schoolers, because I would lose all of my students within 2 minutes, guaranteed. I couldn't use the ideas I'd been given for elementary schoolers, because (even though the content would be at the right level) my students would hate me for treating them like children. I found myself having to come up with all my own ideas, since none of the ideas other people were putting out there would work for me or my students. How unreasonable. How was I supposed to design my own curriculum with a total of 9 days of unhelpful teacher training? No fucking wonder I've been overwhelmed.
What I mean to say is: the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education (my ultimate boss) has written off technical high schools as a lost cause, and they are not making any real attempt to train the teachers they place in these schools. Supposedly, the turnover rate of native English-speaking teachers at technical high schools is nearly 100%, which isn't that surprising given that we are given NO PREPARATION for the situation - but it also means that (supposedly) there is no one experienced enough in teaching at a technical high school to be able to train us.
I'm not sure I buy this. After all, even if there aren't any experienced native English-speaking teachers, surely it would be similarly effective to have a Korean English teacher speak to us about the things we are likely to experience in technical high schools, and to give us some idea of how to approach the lesson material. Surely they could bring in a guidance counselor to tell us about some of the struggles (mental and otherwise) that our students are likely to be going through.
Have I conveyed to you how frustrated I am about all of this? It really makes me angry how much my students are continually written off by the education system and Korean society as a whole. I want to say: "They exist, okay? They deserve to be taught well."
And all of this is part of the reason I am thinking so hard about renewing my contract at my same school next year. Partly because I love my kids, partly because: Pam-Mom, partly because I have an amazing support network in the teachers at my school, partly because I will never be satisfied with myself until I learn how to teach these students effectively, partly because someone has to learn how to give these kids what they need, and who is going to do it?
My students have had a rough time in the Korean education system. Sometime in either elementary or middle school, they fucked up, and they've been on the track to a technical high school ever since. Even if they know the material, they do poorly on standardized tests, and standardized tests are everything in Korea, even more than in the U.S. The Korean education system doesn't really give you a second chance; if you haven't managed to test well by the end of middle school, then you're going to a shit high school and probably never going to college. If you do go to college, it will probably be a 2-year technical college that isn't prestigious and therefore isn't respected. That's even assuming you have the money for college; most of my students just don't. In the U.S., if your parents don't have the money to put you through college, you can do it yourself on student loans and working. In Korea, student loans are only given out at exorbitant interest rates and have to be paid back in a much shorter time period: 2-3 years. Which means if your family can't put you through college, you're not going.
Like I said, no second chances.
Aside from that, most of my students are struggling with depression or attention disorders, or both. They have extreme mood swings: some are happy and active in class one day, exhausted and unresponsive the next - or sometimes, angry and violent towards their classmates, both verbally and physically. Sleep deprivation is a huge problem; most of them are addicted to videogames to such an extent that they will stay up all night playing them and then come to school. Some of them can't afford winter coats, most of them don't eat breakfast, a few of them eat their only meal of the day in the school cafeteria. Which, in an extremely depressing way, means that food - especially warm food - is the most effective reward I can give out. They will try infinitely harder if there is a snack on the line.
And most of my students are also wracked with insecurity. They have been doing poorly in the school system for a long time, and have been told that they are bad students, that they are stupid for an equally long time. Most of them don't receive much support from home.
It sounds corny, but you'd be surprised how far something like "You can do it! You're smart!" goes when I'm trying to get my students to learn something. The reaction is often immediate. "Oh, thank you! Okay, I can do it," they say, and sit up straighter. I try to be a constant fountain of positive reinforcement. It probably doesn't make much of a difference; after all, I only see them once a week. I am only their English teacher, I can't even speak their language. I am not the place they look for unconditional support.
Sometimes I get frustrated with my students, because they put forth so little effort. Sometimes I feel like I spend all my free time trying to think up activities that will trick them into engaging. Sometimes I leave the classroom thinking I am a terrible teacher, I am not what these kids need.
But most of the time, I love them. They are crazy, they sing "Good Morning, Pah-may-la!" in opera voices out the windows of their freezing classrooms. They sometimes burst into K-Pop songs during class. And they sometimes really try, sometimes the lowest-level 1st graders try so hard and do so well with things that I know are hard for them. And I leave class smiling and proud of my students and never having felt more like Pam-Mom in all my life.
Also, let me tell you about technical high schools. There's recently been a surge of technical high school native English-speaking teachers trying to get in contact with each other, and as a result of it I've started to think more about my school's place in the overall education system. And I'm starting to realize that part of why I've felt so unprepared for this entire experience is because this is not what they trained me for at orientation. Granted, a 9-day orientation is not enough time to figure out how to teach. But by the end of orientation, I had a lot of ideas. I'd been told that most of the students I'd be teaching would probably have had private English tutoring all their lives (most Seoul students do, unless their families are extremely low-income) and would be nearly fluent by now. I had a lot of ideas; I was excited to teach my students some of the nuances of English that I find interesting. Technical high schools were barely mentioned at orientation, and when someone brought them up they were usually dismissed with something like, "If you get a tech school, good luck." No real advice.
So I was shocked when I got to my school. I couldn't use the ideas I'd been given for higher-level high schoolers, because I would lose all of my students within 2 minutes, guaranteed. I couldn't use the ideas I'd been given for elementary schoolers, because (even though the content would be at the right level) my students would hate me for treating them like children. I found myself having to come up with all my own ideas, since none of the ideas other people were putting out there would work for me or my students. How unreasonable. How was I supposed to design my own curriculum with a total of 9 days of unhelpful teacher training? No fucking wonder I've been overwhelmed.
What I mean to say is: the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education (my ultimate boss) has written off technical high schools as a lost cause, and they are not making any real attempt to train the teachers they place in these schools. Supposedly, the turnover rate of native English-speaking teachers at technical high schools is nearly 100%, which isn't that surprising given that we are given NO PREPARATION for the situation - but it also means that (supposedly) there is no one experienced enough in teaching at a technical high school to be able to train us.
I'm not sure I buy this. After all, even if there aren't any experienced native English-speaking teachers, surely it would be similarly effective to have a Korean English teacher speak to us about the things we are likely to experience in technical high schools, and to give us some idea of how to approach the lesson material. Surely they could bring in a guidance counselor to tell us about some of the struggles (mental and otherwise) that our students are likely to be going through.
Have I conveyed to you how frustrated I am about all of this? It really makes me angry how much my students are continually written off by the education system and Korean society as a whole. I want to say: "They exist, okay? They deserve to be taught well."
And all of this is part of the reason I am thinking so hard about renewing my contract at my same school next year. Partly because I love my kids, partly because: Pam-Mom, partly because I have an amazing support network in the teachers at my school, partly because I will never be satisfied with myself until I learn how to teach these students effectively, partly because someone has to learn how to give these kids what they need, and who is going to do it?
Monday, 4 January 2010
새해 복 많이 받으세요!
Today was the first business day of the new year, which means even though most teachers are technically on vacation right now, a lot of people, and especially the head teachers, were supposed to come to work today. There was a celebratory lunch, with persimmons and rice-cake/dumpling soup and sake and wine, and all around me, all day: 새해 복 많이 받으세요! (sae-hae bok manee badeusaeyo! = Receive a lot of luck this year! = Happy New Year!)
Winter classes commenced this morning, as did approximately 30 cm of snowfall - which is highly unusual for Seoul. I've been told that the last time Seoul got more than 10 cm of snow TOTAL over the course of an entire winter was 10 years ago. 30 cm in one day is absolutely unheard of. But despite that, very few schools canceled winter classes. Since the roads were horrid and nothing was canceled, the subways were a warzone. I've gotten pushy about my subway etiquette, but twice I had to let a crowded train pass and wait for the next one. People propel each other on and off the trains, I was being pushed forward so quickly that I lost all balance or control of my steps, and had a moment of panic when I realized I was crossing The Gap Between the Train and the Platform and not able to Mind it in the least (i.e. I couldn't see where I was stepping, but knew that somewhere down there was a gap big enough for my foot to fall through). It was terrifying, and it put me in a really bad mood. Luckily, there was a 10-minute walk through the snow to calm me down.
3 students showed up to students' English camp, which technically starts at 8:30 am but doesn't really start until 9 am. That means 13 students woke up, saw the snow, and decided it wasn't worth it. I don't really blame them.
But only 1 teacher was absent from teachers' English camp, and that was fun. A few teachers that I truly didn't know could speak English are attending, and their grammar is perfect and their vocabulary is huge and I really can't figure out why they haven't spoken to me before, since their enthusiasm today showed that there are a lot of questions they want to ask me (about English, about life in the U.S., about my life in Korea, etc). Anyway, it was fun.
I haven't written on this blog in what feels like ages. I guess ages = one week when I'm addicted to telling you all everything (not everything, never everything, but I try) about my life here. It doesn't feel right for you to not know what is happening.
I just realized this is going to be a long post. Prepare yourself, or give up now, whichever you prefer.
I have 2 important things to tell you:
1. I've decided where I'm going for my 3-week February vacation: Buenos Aires, Argentina, to meet Audra-friend and be silly and dance tango together. Financially, I'm being a little irresponsible, and setting myself back about a month-and-a-half paying back my student loans, but I've been working hard here, and I have both the time and the money to make the trip, and a good friend to spend time with while I'm there, and I don't know when all those things will coincide again, and anyway what I mean to say is I just really want this, and so I'm going. I've bought the ticket: Feb. 6, Seoul --> Hong Kong --> Johannesburg --> Buenos Aires, 35 hours total in transit. I can't wait.
2. I was talking to Park Mi-Ran the other day, and she was telling me about some changes our school might be making to their admissions process for the 2011 school year, which would allow students from all over Korea to apply, whereas right now only students who live in Seoul can apply. In theory, that would mean that instead of admitting a group of underprivileged and largely unmotivated students who have done poorly in Seoul's middle schools, my school would admit a group of students from rural Korea who have never before had a chance to receive a big-city education and who would (probably) be highly motivated. It would be exchanging one group of students who never had much of a chance in the Korean education system for another group of students who never had much of a chance in the Korean education system. But Park Mi-Ran really hopes the change happens, because she is excited to be able to see the students working hard and to be able to watch their English improve. With our current group of students, it's sometimes hard to see improvement. With a few exceptions, they're not very motivated to learn English.
Anyway, I am getting close to the important thing I have to tell you. About half-way through my conversation with Park Mi-Ran, I realized that she was telling me about these possible changes to try to convince me that I should renew my contract at Seoul Electronics High School. It made me really happy to know that she wants me to stay, that she wants to continue working with me. What she doesn't know, and what you maybe don't know, is that with or without the projected changes to school admissions, I really really really want to stay, I think, I really really really want to renew my contract. The time hasn't come to make the final decision, yet, and it won't come for at least another 5 months, but you should know that I'm seriously considering staying in Korea for another year beyond my current contract, maybe even longer. I'm in love with my school, both the teachers and the students, and I have a lot of goals here. I don't think I'll be ready to leave until I'm satisfied that all of them are complete: 1. become proficient in Korean, enough that I can carry out any necessary conversation without resorting to English; 2. become a confident English teacher, to both high school students and adults (subgoal: get my TEFL certification); 3. travel the Korean countryside extensively, climb a lot of mountains; 4. travel to places that are more convenient to travel to from Seoul than from other places I am likely to live in the future: China, Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, New Zealand, maybe India.
In conclusion, I feel (and have felt for a while) that I am in this for the long haul. That feeling is subject to change, of course, as my time here continues and my perspective shifts, but right now, I'd put the cap on my time here at somewhere around 3-5 years.
Are these 2 important things I have told you making you unhappy? I hope not. Realize that I am doing both of them not to hurt or avoid any of you, but because I feel that these decisions are what's best for me right now, these are the things that are making me happy.
Winter classes commenced this morning, as did approximately 30 cm of snowfall - which is highly unusual for Seoul. I've been told that the last time Seoul got more than 10 cm of snow TOTAL over the course of an entire winter was 10 years ago. 30 cm in one day is absolutely unheard of. But despite that, very few schools canceled winter classes. Since the roads were horrid and nothing was canceled, the subways were a warzone. I've gotten pushy about my subway etiquette, but twice I had to let a crowded train pass and wait for the next one. People propel each other on and off the trains, I was being pushed forward so quickly that I lost all balance or control of my steps, and had a moment of panic when I realized I was crossing The Gap Between the Train and the Platform and not able to Mind it in the least (i.e. I couldn't see where I was stepping, but knew that somewhere down there was a gap big enough for my foot to fall through). It was terrifying, and it put me in a really bad mood. Luckily, there was a 10-minute walk through the snow to calm me down.
3 students showed up to students' English camp, which technically starts at 8:30 am but doesn't really start until 9 am. That means 13 students woke up, saw the snow, and decided it wasn't worth it. I don't really blame them.
But only 1 teacher was absent from teachers' English camp, and that was fun. A few teachers that I truly didn't know could speak English are attending, and their grammar is perfect and their vocabulary is huge and I really can't figure out why they haven't spoken to me before, since their enthusiasm today showed that there are a lot of questions they want to ask me (about English, about life in the U.S., about my life in Korea, etc). Anyway, it was fun.
I haven't written on this blog in what feels like ages. I guess ages = one week when I'm addicted to telling you all everything (not everything, never everything, but I try) about my life here. It doesn't feel right for you to not know what is happening.
I just realized this is going to be a long post. Prepare yourself, or give up now, whichever you prefer.
I have 2 important things to tell you:
1. I've decided where I'm going for my 3-week February vacation: Buenos Aires, Argentina, to meet Audra-friend and be silly and dance tango together. Financially, I'm being a little irresponsible, and setting myself back about a month-and-a-half paying back my student loans, but I've been working hard here, and I have both the time and the money to make the trip, and a good friend to spend time with while I'm there, and I don't know when all those things will coincide again, and anyway what I mean to say is I just really want this, and so I'm going. I've bought the ticket: Feb. 6, Seoul --> Hong Kong --> Johannesburg --> Buenos Aires, 35 hours total in transit. I can't wait.
2. I was talking to Park Mi-Ran the other day, and she was telling me about some changes our school might be making to their admissions process for the 2011 school year, which would allow students from all over Korea to apply, whereas right now only students who live in Seoul can apply. In theory, that would mean that instead of admitting a group of underprivileged and largely unmotivated students who have done poorly in Seoul's middle schools, my school would admit a group of students from rural Korea who have never before had a chance to receive a big-city education and who would (probably) be highly motivated. It would be exchanging one group of students who never had much of a chance in the Korean education system for another group of students who never had much of a chance in the Korean education system. But Park Mi-Ran really hopes the change happens, because she is excited to be able to see the students working hard and to be able to watch their English improve. With our current group of students, it's sometimes hard to see improvement. With a few exceptions, they're not very motivated to learn English.
Anyway, I am getting close to the important thing I have to tell you. About half-way through my conversation with Park Mi-Ran, I realized that she was telling me about these possible changes to try to convince me that I should renew my contract at Seoul Electronics High School. It made me really happy to know that she wants me to stay, that she wants to continue working with me. What she doesn't know, and what you maybe don't know, is that with or without the projected changes to school admissions, I really really really want to stay, I think, I really really really want to renew my contract. The time hasn't come to make the final decision, yet, and it won't come for at least another 5 months, but you should know that I'm seriously considering staying in Korea for another year beyond my current contract, maybe even longer. I'm in love with my school, both the teachers and the students, and I have a lot of goals here. I don't think I'll be ready to leave until I'm satisfied that all of them are complete: 1. become proficient in Korean, enough that I can carry out any necessary conversation without resorting to English; 2. become a confident English teacher, to both high school students and adults (subgoal: get my TEFL certification); 3. travel the Korean countryside extensively, climb a lot of mountains; 4. travel to places that are more convenient to travel to from Seoul than from other places I am likely to live in the future: China, Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, New Zealand, maybe India.
In conclusion, I feel (and have felt for a while) that I am in this for the long haul. That feeling is subject to change, of course, as my time here continues and my perspective shifts, but right now, I'd put the cap on my time here at somewhere around 3-5 years.
Are these 2 important things I have told you making you unhappy? I hope not. Realize that I am doing both of them not to hurt or avoid any of you, but because I feel that these decisions are what's best for me right now, these are the things that are making me happy.
Monday, 28 December 2009
My anus is unhappy with me these days.**
The head teacher of my department (not the English department - the extracurricular activities department), also known as Mini-Me by her not-so-affectionate underlings, asked me today if I could use chopsticks.
Um. YES. What do you think I've been DOING in the school cafeteria all this time?
In other news, I'm constipated for the first time in 4 months. Turns out, that 3-day weekend where I cooked most of my own food wasn't so good for my bowels. The 3-pound chunk of cheddar cheese Mom sent me for Christmas might also have something to do with it. Tell me, please, what is it about Korean restaurant/cafeteria food that gives me the most satisfying poops of my life?
I've just finished the planning (minus making all the worksheets I'll need) for the winter English camp I'm teaching to students. Now, I have all of 2 days to throw together 15 lesson plans for the teachers' winter English camp. I HATE LESSON PLANNING. Also, I'm super-stressed about the teachers' camp. While I wouldn't say I'm confident at all about my teaching skills, I've long since reached the point where standing in front of a class of 25 students and telling them what to do is a comfortable place to be. It doesn't intimidate me anymore.
What does intimidate me is the prospect of teaching English conversation to 7 co-workers, none of them terribly good at English, all of them older than me (I've told you that age is a huge deal here, right?), 5 of them very experienced teachers (the other 2 are support staff at the school). Their levels of English are extremely different. Sung-Min (tech guy) is probably at the highest level (and coincidentally, also the youngest person in the class, at 30 years old). While the conversations I have with him are slow-going, he is able to communicate most of the things he wants to after a bit of mutual brainstorming and (sometimes) dictionary consultation. On the opposite end of the spectrum is Kim Yeon, the supercilious teacher I've told you about before. Her English consists of "Hello" "How are you?" "I'm fine." and "Touch later!" I've tried telling her that "Touch later!" isn't a common expression (or at least, I don't think it is? Sometimes I get so used to how people use English here that I lose sight of how most of the native speakers I've been around use English). But try though I might, I couldn't convey to her that she should say "See you later!" instead. She still says "Touch later!" every time she leaves my presence. She's 65, and if this is all she's absorbed of English at this point despite studying it through university, I have serious doubts about whether I'll be able to teach her anything substantial in a 3-week camp.
The point is: how can I teach all of these people effectively? Surely I have to make the lesson material simple enough that the lower levels will be able to follow it, but what if it seems too childish to them or makes them feel condescended to? What if they finally realize that I am a terrible teacher?
**I use "these days" to excess these days. Every Korean speaker of English loves to say "these days," and I'm ridiculously hooked on it. Part of that is that I often purposely alter my natural speech into expressions that I know are more likely to be understood (i.e. "lately" --> "these days"), but part of it is that I have always absorbed the language usage I hear from people around me really naturally. It's inevitable; I knew it coming here, and as much as the people I am here to teach want me to speak "authentic" English, I cannot help but be influenced by what I hear here. And anyway, I refuse to correct people every time they use an expression that I've never heard before but makes sense anyway - after all, isn't the different ways that language can be used what got me interested in it in the first place?
Um. YES. What do you think I've been DOING in the school cafeteria all this time?
In other news, I'm constipated for the first time in 4 months. Turns out, that 3-day weekend where I cooked most of my own food wasn't so good for my bowels. The 3-pound chunk of cheddar cheese Mom sent me for Christmas might also have something to do with it. Tell me, please, what is it about Korean restaurant/cafeteria food that gives me the most satisfying poops of my life?
I've just finished the planning (minus making all the worksheets I'll need) for the winter English camp I'm teaching to students. Now, I have all of 2 days to throw together 15 lesson plans for the teachers' winter English camp. I HATE LESSON PLANNING. Also, I'm super-stressed about the teachers' camp. While I wouldn't say I'm confident at all about my teaching skills, I've long since reached the point where standing in front of a class of 25 students and telling them what to do is a comfortable place to be. It doesn't intimidate me anymore.
What does intimidate me is the prospect of teaching English conversation to 7 co-workers, none of them terribly good at English, all of them older than me (I've told you that age is a huge deal here, right?), 5 of them very experienced teachers (the other 2 are support staff at the school). Their levels of English are extremely different. Sung-Min (tech guy) is probably at the highest level (and coincidentally, also the youngest person in the class, at 30 years old). While the conversations I have with him are slow-going, he is able to communicate most of the things he wants to after a bit of mutual brainstorming and (sometimes) dictionary consultation. On the opposite end of the spectrum is Kim Yeon, the supercilious teacher I've told you about before. Her English consists of "Hello" "How are you?" "I'm fine." and "Touch later!" I've tried telling her that "Touch later!" isn't a common expression (or at least, I don't think it is? Sometimes I get so used to how people use English here that I lose sight of how most of the native speakers I've been around use English). But try though I might, I couldn't convey to her that she should say "See you later!" instead. She still says "Touch later!" every time she leaves my presence. She's 65, and if this is all she's absorbed of English at this point despite studying it through university, I have serious doubts about whether I'll be able to teach her anything substantial in a 3-week camp.
The point is: how can I teach all of these people effectively? Surely I have to make the lesson material simple enough that the lower levels will be able to follow it, but what if it seems too childish to them or makes them feel condescended to? What if they finally realize that I am a terrible teacher?
**I use "these days" to excess these days. Every Korean speaker of English loves to say "these days," and I'm ridiculously hooked on it. Part of that is that I often purposely alter my natural speech into expressions that I know are more likely to be understood (i.e. "lately" --> "these days"), but part of it is that I have always absorbed the language usage I hear from people around me really naturally. It's inevitable; I knew it coming here, and as much as the people I am here to teach want me to speak "authentic" English, I cannot help but be influenced by what I hear here. And anyway, I refuse to correct people every time they use an expression that I've never heard before but makes sense anyway - after all, isn't the different ways that language can be used what got me interested in it in the first place?
Sunday, 6 December 2009
The guy I got raw on hasn't stopped participating, by the way.
A significant portion of the English language selection at the local Bandi&Luni's bookstore.
I only want to eat clementines these days.
The positioning of this family tree intrigues me.
demon tree?
My students are insane. That is not a TREE, that is a HAND.
lolz.
Thanksgiving week, some of my 2nd grade classes were ahead of schedule. So we talked about the differences between American and Korean Thanksgiving/Chuseok, and these are the results. It would have been easier to just transcribe the funny sentences, but I felt like transcription couldn't do them justice.
Aww. Hugs!
I love this student. He is so nice and funny and tries so hard. And he came up with the words "appreciate" and "oxygen" all on his own!
Foolproof way to get the immediate attention of 95% of my students: mention sexy girls. They love talking about sexy girls.
Not sure why this student wrote "delicious" next to his name, but I like it.
This girl is awesome. She loves Britney Spears and everyone knows it. "happy good smile ^o^"/ "Idol is bling bling very new Idol comeback eyes happy" :)
This is shy-girl.
I love #2.
"Dog b/c dog is cute"!
Bana milk is a Korean drink brand. "Korea b/c Korea is peaceful"!
This guy is funny. It sounds kind of bad, but he explained it to me as approximately: "I am thankful for my friends surrounding me because it means I don't have to use guns." So, being surrounded by friends is a kind of power.
My students love it when I say, "blah blah blah," and they love parroting "blah blah blah" back to me. :)
Finally, the suck-ups. That day I was wearing baggy washed-out construction jeans (w/ 9 pockets). I guess that makes me stylish. Like a New Yorker.Saturday, 5 December 2009
weekly pop music profile #1? (@bird_esque)
Maybe this will become a thing, we'll see.
This past week I did a "describing celebrities" lesson with a lot of my classes. I taught them how to describe appearance & repertoire (he/she sings ______, etc.) and then we played guessing games with Korean and American celebrities for the majority of the class.
The result of this is that I know way more about current Korean idols than I did before, a) because of the internet researching I did while lesson planning, and b) because of all the other celebrities that my students described to me.
All of this, to tell you that I've found a new boy band to be obsessed with: DBSK, or Dong Bang Shin Gi, which apparently translates to "The Rising Gods of the East."
Listen to my favorite song (so far) here.
Reasons why I think I like this song/video more than I like the other songs/videos I've watched (and let's be honest here, I watched DBSK videos for about 3 consecutive hours today):
1. BONDAGE IMAGERY. And it's the MEN who are being bound, at various points in the video, but notably at 1:00-1:02 and starting at 1:12.
2. Weird power dynamics. I'm creeped out by the ethereal woman-figure with gauze over her face, but she seems to be dominating all the men in the video. I think I'm interested in seeing (for once) men being made physically vulnerable by a female force (mysterious and face-less though she may be), instead of always the other way around. (See this video that Nora recently posted on the fb for why I've been thinking about women being threatened by a mysterious male force lately.)
But then, she's faceless! And towards the end of video, she's running away from them but then disappears! "My infinite crystals flow through your veins"/"I've got you under my skin." Both the "you" and the "I" in the song hold power over the other? The lyrics say "You can't escape me"/"You're my slave." Who is the "you," and who is the "I"? I can't tell. So, weird power dynamics.
3. Crucifixion imagery, wtf?
4. I don't know, maybe I like all the splashing of water that's going on?
Korea thinks the phrase "I got you under my skin" is inappropriate for minors, here for more.
The more I learn about Korean pop music, the more I discover that SM Entertainment is the immovable force behind the vast majority of top Korean hits. Super Junior, Girls' Generation, DBSK, BoA... most of the super powers of current Korean pop, all produced by SM Entertainment. The band members don't even come together on their own; they are recruited from mass auditions that SM holds and then built into a massively advertised performing machine. It creeps me out a little. (But I'm still obsessed with them.)
In other news, I saw snow in Seoul for the first time ever today! It didn't stick or anything, but the windy gusts were super fun to watch from the open window of my cozy 4th floor room.
This past week I did a "describing celebrities" lesson with a lot of my classes. I taught them how to describe appearance & repertoire (he/she sings ______, etc.) and then we played guessing games with Korean and American celebrities for the majority of the class.
The result of this is that I know way more about current Korean idols than I did before, a) because of the internet researching I did while lesson planning, and b) because of all the other celebrities that my students described to me.
All of this, to tell you that I've found a new boy band to be obsessed with: DBSK, or Dong Bang Shin Gi, which apparently translates to "The Rising Gods of the East."
Listen to my favorite song (so far) here.
Reasons why I think I like this song/video more than I like the other songs/videos I've watched (and let's be honest here, I watched DBSK videos for about 3 consecutive hours today):
1. BONDAGE IMAGERY. And it's the MEN who are being bound, at various points in the video, but notably at 1:00-1:02 and starting at 1:12.
2. Weird power dynamics. I'm creeped out by the ethereal woman-figure with gauze over her face, but she seems to be dominating all the men in the video. I think I'm interested in seeing (for once) men being made physically vulnerable by a female force (mysterious and face-less though she may be), instead of always the other way around. (See this video that Nora recently posted on the fb for why I've been thinking about women being threatened by a mysterious male force lately.)
But then, she's faceless! And towards the end of video, she's running away from them but then disappears! "My infinite crystals flow through your veins"/"I've got you under my skin." Both the "you" and the "I" in the song hold power over the other? The lyrics say "You can't escape me"/"You're my slave." Who is the "you," and who is the "I"? I can't tell. So, weird power dynamics.
3. Crucifixion imagery, wtf?
4. I don't know, maybe I like all the splashing of water that's going on?
Korea thinks the phrase "I got you under my skin" is inappropriate for minors, here for more.
The more I learn about Korean pop music, the more I discover that SM Entertainment is the immovable force behind the vast majority of top Korean hits. Super Junior, Girls' Generation, DBSK, BoA... most of the super powers of current Korean pop, all produced by SM Entertainment. The band members don't even come together on their own; they are recruited from mass auditions that SM holds and then built into a massively advertised performing machine. It creeps me out a little. (But I'm still obsessed with them.)
In other news, I saw snow in Seoul for the first time ever today! It didn't stick or anything, but the windy gusts were super fun to watch from the open window of my cozy 4th floor room.
Thursday, 3 December 2009
There is too much to tell you, how can I say it all?
1. I had an open class with Park Mi-Ran this Wednesday, which means: people watching me teach, all my co-teachers watching me teach, 3-4 other teachers watching me teach, the principal and vice-principal watching me teach, no parents watching me teach (for which I am infinitely grateful). Which means: forcibly inserting myself into Park Mi-Ran's good time, no longer waiting for her to make space for me as a leader of the classroom. Because if I wait for her to hand control over to me, she will take control and then the class will be over and no one will know I was there.
2. These days, my relationship with Park Mi-Ran reminds me of my relationship with my mom before I moved out of the house. She is maybe the most significant person in my life here. She arranges my schedule and protects me from unfair treatment and makes me feel so powerless sometimes. She has so much control over my life, she choreographs my entire life within the school and a significant amount of my extracurricular activities; I want to rail at her and assert my independence. But (instead of the explosive fights I had with my mom) the tension here remains all under the surface. Park Mi-Ran is my immediate boss; she has 30+ years of teaching under her belt. If I create a conflict with her, it would essentially guarantee that virtually the entire staff would be hostile towards me for the remainder of my contract. Irony of ironies: sometimes I feel as trapped here as I did during my days at Grandville High School.
3. I've been eating nothing but clementines for hours.
4. I know that it's December now, but I can't quite make myself believe it. No snow no snow no snow no familiar Christmas tunes no Christmas lights lining the streets. What will I do for my 3-day Christmas vacation? What will I send you for Christmas?
2. These days, my relationship with Park Mi-Ran reminds me of my relationship with my mom before I moved out of the house. She is maybe the most significant person in my life here. She arranges my schedule and protects me from unfair treatment and makes me feel so powerless sometimes. She has so much control over my life, she choreographs my entire life within the school and a significant amount of my extracurricular activities; I want to rail at her and assert my independence. But (instead of the explosive fights I had with my mom) the tension here remains all under the surface. Park Mi-Ran is my immediate boss; she has 30+ years of teaching under her belt. If I create a conflict with her, it would essentially guarantee that virtually the entire staff would be hostile towards me for the remainder of my contract. Irony of ironies: sometimes I feel as trapped here as I did during my days at Grandville High School.
3. I've been eating nothing but clementines for hours.
4. I know that it's December now, but I can't quite make myself believe it. No snow no snow no snow no familiar Christmas tunes no Christmas lights lining the streets. What will I do for my 3-day Christmas vacation? What will I send you for Christmas?
Friday, 27 November 2009
it is harder and harder to get out of bed these days.
I have dreams sometimes lately. (This is really unusual for me. As long as I can remember, I have rarely dreamt, or at least have rarely remembered having dreamt.) My dreams now are often about teaching; sometimes, I wake up certain that I have overslept a class or that a certain class went really well or that a certain class went really poorly. More often than not, my dreams are filled with anxiety. This doesn't surprise me; after all, I have a lot of anxiety about teaching.
Last night I had a dream/nightmare about a lot of people that I didn't know very well in Ann Arbor. Lauren Keils, for example, featured prominently in my dream. The plot of the dream is blurry, but the main setting was definitely Orchid Lane in Ann Arbor, and Lauren was definitely the protagonist. There was a serial killer on the loose, and a lot of other people that I only knew vaguely in Ann Arbor were the victims. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, I think there was a team of serial killers on the loose. Maybe they were siblings. Maybe there were three of them. Maybe only two.
Lauren was the owner of Orchid Lane (which was where all of the people were being killed), and maybe she decided to track down the serial killers in a mysterious and carefree sort of way. I have no recollection of what my own role was. There was a lot of blood in the dream, a lot of corpses.
My first thought when I woke up this morning was "what the FUCK" promptly followed by "oh FUCK, I've overslept." I rushed around to get ready for work, arrived at school, taught five classes and spent most of my in-between-classes time being depressed and deciding that I am a failure. And now I have finished my last class of the day, and my first thought when I sat back down at my desk was "I had a dream last night, what the FUCK."
My dreams bewilder me. I bewilder myself.
Last night I had a dream/nightmare about a lot of people that I didn't know very well in Ann Arbor. Lauren Keils, for example, featured prominently in my dream. The plot of the dream is blurry, but the main setting was definitely Orchid Lane in Ann Arbor, and Lauren was definitely the protagonist. There was a serial killer on the loose, and a lot of other people that I only knew vaguely in Ann Arbor were the victims. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, I think there was a team of serial killers on the loose. Maybe they were siblings. Maybe there were three of them. Maybe only two.
Lauren was the owner of Orchid Lane (which was where all of the people were being killed), and maybe she decided to track down the serial killers in a mysterious and carefree sort of way. I have no recollection of what my own role was. There was a lot of blood in the dream, a lot of corpses.
My first thought when I woke up this morning was "what the FUCK" promptly followed by "oh FUCK, I've overslept." I rushed around to get ready for work, arrived at school, taught five classes and spent most of my in-between-classes time being depressed and deciding that I am a failure. And now I have finished my last class of the day, and my first thought when I sat back down at my desk was "I had a dream last night, what the FUCK."
My dreams bewilder me. I bewilder myself.
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