Monday. I felt a little sick, but luckily, I didn’t have to teach. Monday is a scheduled day off for me, though because of TKD and a Teacher’s Conversation Class I’ve decided to continue in Dana C. (the last ATE)’s absence, I probably will not use this day to its full traveling potential this semester. At any rate, this Monday, I came into the office for two reasons. First, I wanted to check the internet, which took a fair amount of time. Second, I wanted to finish lesson planning. I had been told my co-teacher that the children are just plain curious about me at this point, so maybe I could just introduce myself for my first lesson. Sounded good to me, although it meant making a PPT about myself, my family, and St. Louis because I wanted to use pictures. This took forever.
On Tuesday, I still feel a little sick. This is not good as Dana C. ended up being sick for six months, my co-teacher informs me, and Jacob, the ATE before Dana, was sick for a couple months, my host family has informed me. At any rate, I promise my co-teacher that I will seek medical attention if the symptoms persist until Thursday. I’ll be ok though, because on Tuesdays I only teach one class anyway. It’s at 8:30 in the morning and then I’m done for the day. I can go home and rest. At least, that’s what I think.
I find out from the English teacher who lives next door to me during the week, and who has graciously offered to give me a ride to school, that there was a schedule change because one of the other English teachers had to go out of town to attend his friend’s dad’s funeral. Oh, ok. That’s fine. So what will I be teaching today? Will I be teaching at all? Can I just go home now? She doesn’t know, but assures me she will find out as soon as we arrive.
[Cultural note: At Korean schools, if a teacher has to take a leave of absence, the powers that be change the teaching schedule, sometimes until it is topsy-turvy. Contrast this with the American system where a substitute teacher is called in. The Korean system has its advantages, of course. You don’t have to worry about someone who is not really qualified to teach a particular subject basically playing baby sitter for an hour. On the other hand, the American system of substitute teachers ends up being a training ground for future educators as well as avoids the administrative hassles that accompany schedule changes. I think, in either case, communication is key, and since I can’t read the daily announcements that pop up so cheerily on my school’s instant messenger, I hope the staff can remember to keep me appraised in the future…]
It turns out I have two classes that day instead of the one I planned on. No biggie. I’m doing the same lesson all week anyway.
Since it was my first day teaching, I got my initial gauge of how good the student’s English is. They may be reading Harry Potter in English, but they sure can’t talk about it, or understand an English speaker if they’re talking about it. “Hello, how are you?” is hard for them. So, it looks like I’ll have to start from square one, speaking wise. Even worse, I’ll have co-teacher supervision for a while. This is because the vice-principal walked in on my class while a couple of students slept, which I took care of as soon as I noticed it. Oh, well. The English teachers will sit in and be bored, unless I can convince them to take part in the activities too.
The rest of the lessons get better as the week goes on and as I get a gauge for how the students are reacting to different parts. This is good, as I felt worse and worse with each one because of the sickness taking hold of my sinuses and bowels. I essentially broke the lesson up into two parts. Part one talked about what I expected from the class and what they could expect from me:
Class Expectations:
1. Speak English.
2. Show respect.
3. Have fun!
Teacher Expectations:
1. Speak English (the alternatives being Korean or, more likely given my training, Spanish).
2. Speak slowly (just in case I get excited).
3. Talk about America (a little bit… they could really use more practice in speaking and listening as far as I’m concerned…)
There were some dismayed faces when I told them it would be an English only class. (Or maybe they were more confused… or stunned that they had a teacher with brown hair, hazel eyes, a red beard, and a short stature and thus somewhat resembling Gimli from The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.) So, I had to explain that practicing speaking English was the only way to get good at it. I’m good at it because I’ve practiced my entire life. They’re good at Korean because they’ve practiced it. I suck at Korean because I haven’t, etc. They understood then. Still, I think I sense some skepticism about their abilities to do this.
As for show "respect," no one knew this word, so I related it to insa. When they saw a teacher in the hall, what did they do? They bowed to the teacher and greeted them using the polite-informal style, of course. This is respect. Being nice to each other. OH! Heads nod.
And “Have fun!”? I included this because, as I told them, English class is hard. There is no way to make it easy on them. It is going to be in essence hard to speak a language that they have never spoken and probably will not practice when they go home. Thus, they need a good attitude about it. If they go into class thinking, I will be angry about learning English because I hate learning English, then class will be very, very, very hard, as it was for me learning Korean. If they come into class thinking, English is hard, but I will try my best and have fun learning it,
then English class will only be hard, and that’s easier than very, very, very hard.
The second part of the presentation was an introduction to myself and my family and my hometown. Here, I could throw in a few jokes. I told them that my dad was fat, but they shouldn’t tell him I said that because it would make him angry. (Incidentally, Dad, if you’re reading this, you are fat, but you have good cholesterol and blood pressure, so I won’t
bother you about that. Sorry for disrespecting you, but thank you for understanding.) I asked them who they thought my mom was. A surprising amount said that she must be my older sister. Then, when I asked about my younger sister, they thought she was also my older
sister, or perhaps my girlfriend, or even, as one very confused and embarrassed boy shouted out, my boyfriend. I told them that, while it’s true that my sister is bigger and taller than me, she is my younger sister. BUT, because she is bigger and taller than me, if we fight, I have to run away. Lots of laughs for that. I still held the higher ground though. I told them that because I am so fast, I can hit her, run away, run back, hit her again, run away, etc. In the end, therefore, “I win.” (Futurama quote. Anyone? Anyone?)
I was also able to incorporate Spanish into every presentation. As I took them on my whirlwind tour of the places I lived in the United States, I told them that many people in Los Angeles speak Spanish, not English, as their primary language. I then rattled off something Spanish, which some the kids liked and others were just plain confused about as they couldn’t understand most of what I said anyway.
Finally, I was able to get a few good reactions out of my “Pirates of Penzance” makeup picture, the Arch, Ted Drewes’, Forest Park being free, and the magnificence that is the Cathedral
Basilica, my favorite attraction in St. Louis. The lessons went well, according to the English
teachers, despite the fact that the students could not understand most of what happened. (They usually preface my lesson with a short Korean speech to the students. I think they’ve been telling the kids, “If you don’t understand him, it’s ok. Listening to the foreign guy is good
practice for you anyway.” In other words, the teachers are just happy to have me around.)
I’m fairly popular with the kids, at any rate. They think I’m funny, and maybe next week
they’ll be more willing to approach me. After all, I’ve already gotten a marriage proposal this week from a student who apparently thinks I’m quite handsome. Hopefully not all of their bravery in the face of the bearded man will be other this type. But the bravery in itself will be a blessing.
I have one goal for this year—to inspire confidence. I do not intend to teach these children anything drastically new. Rather, they have been studying my native tongue for at least three
years, if not more. When I’m through here, I’d like them to be at least willing to try saying what they can already read. If they sound like Koreans, that’s fine. They are, and the idea that some people want perfect diction out these kids is preposterous. (There are more English speakers
in India than in the United States, so if you want to talk about standard dialect, don’t look at U.S.) I just want them trying. They know more than they think. They’re just scared shitless of looking bad. Hopefully, I can make them look “bad”, they’ll realize that it’s not so “bad”, and then they won’t care about looking “bad”. This is my intention.
To do this, I want to use James Asher’s TPR (Total Physical Response). It’s a language education methodology based on the idea that as babies we learn language through performing the correct action for commands and thus receiving affirming praise (e.g. “Smile for Aunt Mildred!”). It worked well for me with Spanish, as I was able, after only one year of instruction, to skip Spanish 2 and enter into Spanish 3. It builds vocabulary like crazy, helps the student gain fluency with the words he or she knows (meaning the ability to comprehend and generate novel
sentences instead of just parroting dialogues), and thus inspires confidence in the student. Apparently, it has a following in South Korea, and one of the ATE extendees actually has been
encouraged time and time again to use it in the classroom. Since I think comprehension is going to have to come for these kids before production, I’ll start with some simple command exercises using TPR and work from there.
Despite a game plan, though, I still have things to be fairly apprehensive about. TPR might flop, for one thing, and I might have to backpedal to something else. That’s just the essence of teaching without any experience I guess. For another thing, I have not seen ALL of my students. As I said earlier, I’m planning on teaching a conversational English class for the
non-English speaking H.S. teachers. I’m assured that this is very casual however. They just want survival English, from what I can tell. Another group of students I have to worry about, though, is the community members who I will have to teach twice a day. There is one class of about 5 advanced students who are able to discuss newspaper articles. (In all seriousness, that should be tremendous fun!) The rest of the classes are lower level than my H.S. students,
so I’ll probably just do TPR with them as well.
It’s unknown territory though, so, girded with my knowledge of English and keen sense of wit, I press onward, hoping that the bright, but flickering light of the Program which I guard will not sputter and die as it shines into the linguistic ignorance of the hamlet's populace. (Homer, eat
your heart out.)
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