Back to Blogging!/Class Updates

Sup guys:

Thanks for keeping up with me, I enjoy your comments on this blog. Recently, I believed I could not write in this blog as often as I would like because of the Incheon Metropolitan School Board's Internet censoring system. They blocked this site, YouTube.com (which I can see why), MySpace.com, and en.wikipedia.org, which the last one hurting the most. It is all about questionable content, in their opinion, so they decided to block these from my computer. Great. However, I bypassed the blogger.com bug by just typing in the normal URL of my blog, and bam, I'm back again. Now on with the show.

The other day I found out that the school next to ours, Yeonhwa Middle School, has a foreign teacher, whom I met during the Incheon Foreign Teacher's Conference two weeks ago. We kept in touch just as friends, but I had no idea that he taught in the school right next to me. We just found out the other day while having dinner in Bupyeong (in central Incheon) that we taught right next to each other, and surpise, his apartment building is down the street from mine!

The guy's is 25-year old James St. Clair, and he hails from Sacramento, California, so a left-coast dude. He graduated from Wyoming University, and got his master's in political science at UC-Davis. He's a big, blonde-haired, slow-spoken man with a spaced-out face, but he is really smart individual and a good sense of humor. I have really enjoyed hanging out with this guy, because he has a very laid-back personality and friendly attitude. You can feel comfortable with this guy instantly. That's the kind of friends I usually have; people whom I can feel at rest with.

So with a master's degree, how did he end up in Korea? Same deal like me, unable to find a "real" job back at home, so he decided to get some adventure time abroad. Obviously, he makes slightly more salary than I do because of his master's degree. We both discussed the irony about how we can't find jobs in our home country and we have to become "migrants" to another nation...funny indeed.

But, its actually a good deal to find a friend who works in the public school system rather than a Hagwon, because Hagwon teachers tend to be more stressed out about their work because of their school's business interests. James and I are blessed to be in a public school system because we work for the state, who pay us on time and give us benefits. We also have consistent schedules, and the only reason we have never crossed paths before, even though we knew each other, was because his start time is at 8:30PM, and with me its at 9PM. Now I have someone with whom we can share lesson plans, ideas about discipline, and swap horror stories of classroom noise together. Our stories tend to be different than Hagwons because we both have to teach 40 kids in one class as opposed to Hagwons, which have 10-20 at the most.

What are my classes like? Well, that's like asking me about the NBA's 30 invidividual basketball teams and trying to condense it into one paragraph. So for your interests, I'll do it like this: I'll describe it by homeroom. I teach 15 freshmen classes, one per homeroom, and each has a different co-teacher and each has its classroom personality. It makes for one fun ride each week, and I hope you enjoy each of their fun traits and quirks: (Listed is the grade level, followed by homeroom class, which there are 15 per grade. Grade levels in high school are not 9-12 like in the United States, but 1, 2, and 3, three being the seniors, there are no sophomores) I teach one homeroom once per week.

1-1: Teacher - Mrs. Pak Hyun-sook. I teach them on Wednesdays, and they are one of my best classes. The kids are smarter and pay attention more. They follow instructions well, so I usually have a smooth time with them. The reason for this was because when I taught them my first time, I came in their class with energy, authority, and a loud voice, so they immediately knew I meant business. They are a joy to teach, because alot of them are smarter than the average bear. As for teacher, Mrs. Park, she is a short, short-haired woman with glasses with a nasaly voice, but she has a command of the students because of her charisma. She is highly regarded at Yeonsu High for her teaching technique and her humor in the classroom. She also has one of the best speaking abilities among teachers.

1-2: Teacher - Ms. Kwon Hee-eun. My morning Friday class, they are the wild card. One Friday, they were really wild and talkative. Last Friday, they were quiet and respectful. I don't know what to expect from these guys, but overall I enjoy them. Ms. Kwon is a soft-spoken woman who is a hard teacher, and she is known to lay down the law on her students who don't study well. Her English ability is limited, but she has an honest heart and does her best to keep control and help me in the classroom.

1-3: Teacher - Mrs. Kim Ja-yong. My early morning Wednesday class at 9:10AM, they are usually dead tired when I walk in. It takes them literally 10 minutes just to get their notebooks out. My only superstar in the class is a boy named Bong-su, who has the best English ability in the school. Usually, Korean groupthink would prevent him from speaking out too much in class (due to teasing after class), but this boy does not care and he regularly talks to me during class. The reason he speaks English so well was because he did a homestay in North Carolina, and you can really benefit from that when you are young. His accent is very American, as he sounds like other Korean-Americans. As for the teacher, Mrs. Kim, she is a slender, long-haired, soft-spoken woman whom students consider TOO nice. Yup, one time, she hit one of my students hard on the back for goofing off in class...while smiling. Yet, she is a good teacher who works hard on her material, and she often comes up to me for grammar questions and spoken English situations.

1-4: Teacher - Choi Ju-mi. I have these boys right before lunch on Wednesdays, and because its right before lunch, they are hungry, and since they are hungry, well, think about teaching 40 teenage boys who have nothing in their stomachs. Craziness. However, I actually like this class, because even though they tend to be loud, they are not loud in a disrespectful way, and they want to try, but it takes them a while to get what I'm saying. Mrs. Ju-mi is a great co-teacher because she explains the HARD stuff of my lecture into Korean and explains it in a way so they can get my point, and not just translating like an UN translator. I don't mind teaching these boys because they tend to be fun and energetic. Also, Mrs. Ju-mi is a great teacher because of her kind personality, and she also is a born-again Christian. Yet, I better cherish my moments interacting and teaching with her...she'll be dropping a baby in 8 months.

1-5: Teacher - Ms. Kimmie. Ms. Kimmie's class is weird like Ms. Kwon's: one week they'll be like angels and another week they are a bunch of baby boys. Yet, like Ju-mi's class, they are respectful and they try hard. Ms. Kimmie is unique in that she is the only one who never speaks Korean in the classroom; when I ask her to explain what I say, she just repeats what I say in English. She does this because she wants these boys to be in an English-only environment, which I respect.

1-6: Teacher - Mr. Go. Mr. Go is a short, stocky man with glasses. Being short does has its disadvantages, because its hard to impose your authority when you are short of stature like he and I are. But, we make a good team as he brings the pain if some kids will not stop talking, and I am pretty good at controlling the kids who tend to talk more. But, his class is relatively problem-free because they try and pay attention. I like this class because it is my last one on my short Fridays, and I usually end the week with them on a good note.

1-7: Teacher - Mrs. Ha. 1-7 is tied with class 1-13 for worst class award. Yup. Its always a challenge to go into her class as on Thursday mornings. Its ironic my main co-teacher is Mrs. Ha, but her class is tied for worst. Remember, these students are randomly put into homerooms, so I get the luck of the draw, and these boys are not luck. Its just loud when I walk in there, and some of the kids just do not shut up. It takes them 10 minutes to get their notebooks, plus another minute just to get what I'm saying. Mrs. Ha does a decent job of getting the kids attention, but most of the time she just re-explains what I said into Korean, which kind of defeats the purpose of listening comprehension. Yet again, the students levels in 1-7 are poor. Yet, the key factor is to be patient, and be firm with the noise makers, and you got yourself a decent class.

Alright, I'll finish the rest of the class profiles in the next blog, but for now, enjoy your week back in the States, and enjoy your Spring back in the United States.

Next time, I'll write about the story of the "Way-goog-in" sticker...its hilarious.

Marky