An End of an Era: Good Students

"If you love truth, everybody say Ahhh yea! Ahhh yea!"
Mr. Soni raps at his last, ill-fated rap show of 2010

So, I officially finished taught my final class for the year and for my final campaign of 2009-2010. To be honest, my last classes were mainly a presentation of my time in the State of Israel and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. In classes where no co-teacher was present, I actually did my best (of course, I "biffed" it a few times in my lecture) to present the lecture in Korean. My pronunciation was not the best, but I hoped my students understood about my time in the Middle East and that this could be a stepping stone into making presentations into foreign languages in the future. It was actually a huge achievement from where I have come from to make statements in Korean.

Here are some students I would like to brag about for their accomplishments this year and them making my year much more memorable:

1. Jung Yu-jung, Class 1-12: Happy-go-lucky, she never complains or whines. She has a funny sense of humor and is at the same time a receiver alot of jokes from her compatriots in class 12 (she was called "Willy Wonka" by her mates). Always helpful and participating, she does a good job in class to try the English provided to her and participating in every activity. A healthy smile, a positive heart, and a 'can-do' attitude, teaching her and her class was easy and fun. Good for her.

2. Hillary (Chun Hye-yeon), Class 1-5: one of the most intellectual minded ladies I've met at this school. Highly talented in English, but she has an aptitude for other subjects as well. One of my fondest memories was when during exam study period I actually had the chance to actually use my major, economics! The students were studying the basic foundations of trade and production, and so in came the famous economists David Ricardo and Adam Smith, two English pioneers of trade and economic thought. Dusting off that old store-self book from my mental library, I had the chance to tutor Hillary and her friends about when it is appropriate to trade between two countries. Result: her social studies' grade improved. It was real cool for me to actually affect their studies outside of just conversational English. She was so sweet that she sent me a Christmas card filled with thanks taking the time to tutor her and her friends. What shocked the students when I was lecturing about topics like trade and inflation was that I wasn't one-dimensional in being the typical English monkey. Sometimes we're boxed to just speaking English, and that's not a good thing. This was a show that I have a thought life outside English. Hillary and her friends responded to the challenge.

3. DJ Ju Min-hee, Class 1-10. Actually, I didn't like her at the beginning of the year. Nope. Her class was notoriously loud and she was one of the ringleaders. Then throughout the year, she started to change. Even though teaching her class was not so successful, at least I started to understand their humor and I started to match their loudness with mine. Since I taught their class at the end of Mondays (great job, Mrs. Schedule Fixer Lady), that's the only option I had as my yelling, Southern Gospel-preaching style was the only way I could get their attention. Min-hee and her gang (girls Ari, Nam-hee, and Kyung-min) were always goofing off...until one day I played hip-hop music. They were just grooving and jamming to my iTunes selections, especially with my Holy Culture Radio DJ podcasts, with head bobbings, DJ air-cuttings, and fist pumpings. These girls were just a riot and hilarious! Using that, I remember using my semi-pro hip-hop skills to do a rap for the girls as a listening exercise. Min-hee and her crew were very appreciative. As a result, from one girl I always had to yell at to be quiet became a very useful ally and friend.

4. The Little Fox (Kim Hyun-ha), Class 1-13

Nicknamed "the Little Fox" by her class 13 crew, she was tough to handle at first when I first met her class. Her class was notorious throughout the 1st grade to have bully girls with strong personalities. She was one of them. In my first day of class, she displayed a little bit of an attitude problem, thinking my class would be a pushover (if they figured out there was no grade, I would think it would be a pushover). My co-teacher and I were concerned that she could be a headache to deal with along with some other girls. Yet two cool things happened that changed the whole dynamic of her class: 1. I broke three of her colleagues when one of them tried to be cool and make fun of me, 2. Little Fox developed a crush on me. Now, not bragging I'm one of those charming, cool teacher-types, its usually a high school girls' emotions thing combined with a lack of a pool of good Korean gentlemen that you have no choice but to like me. (Sigh*) Yet, through "love letters" program that our counseling department encourages students to write to their favorite teachers to express their emotions more expressively, Fox wrote to me how she liked my new style and way of teaching. I appreciated that. So from the Month of May to the end of this month, I never had one more problem with her. She tried, practiced, and did well. She expressed that she was hoping that I would stay till her graduation in 2012...but the Lord has other plans, and I pray that the Lord has His way with her to draw her near the Truth.

5. Korea's Top Model, (Lee Song), Class 1-5. In general, Koreans are short. I'm an example of one of them. Yet what is phenomenal these days is that the stereotype of Asians = short is slowly changing. I had the privilege of last year teaching a future model. She was tall, I would say probably 6'2". We had a girl in the 3rd grade last year about 6'4", I'm not kidding. Her head almost touches the bus roof. This girl here in the picture, is about 176 cm (don't ask me to convert that), and she just towers over the entire pack of kids, who are average around my height. I always make a joke: its got to be the new-powered kimchi that's producing these giants (even at the boys school there were some future b-ball players). This girl, named Song, typifies a Korean girl as well as the difficulties of standing out for being tall: shy, reserved, but kind. When most girls are usually the same height, she feels awkward and speaks very shyly to me. I always encouraged her, not in a stereotypical way, to be actually be a model. I tell her now and then that she is "pretty." Usually saying such comments are very taboo in a girls' high school because a teacher can usually draw the ire of students. Yet now and then, because girls in this society don't get much encouragement for their appearances, or praise from that matter, so I'll drop a "you look nice today" or "you look pretty." I think its good because some students usually tell me they wish they were more this, that, and the other. So while Song has this sheepish smile, an awkwardness to her step, yet I always try to tell her to be confident and kind. She is very popular among her friends, and ironically, her best friend is one of the shortest girls in the class. It makes for a good team.

So, this is one of the first sets of blogs about my time wrapping up my period of teaching here in Korea. Its been real fun.