I have not been a very good blogger of late, and for that I do apologize to my regular reader. I do have a few reasons/excuses, just as a preamble to today's post:
1) Nothing big to blog about of late, things have mostly trod along on an even keel;
2) School and job-related activities have picked up, what with school going back into session, my extra class for Nambu district requiring some evenings and most of Saturday;
3) Other projects in the sitting at the computer and writing vein, having reduced my will to continue at the same for blog purposes.
And here we are again; nothing much to report, except I had a bit of a fracas with one of my co-teachers last week. As background, let me remind the reader that one of the key classroom management techniques I use here is "the stopwatch", something suggested by Dave Deubelweiss during my initial training by SMOE--so it has the imprimatur, as it were, of my employer. We have fifty minutes of class; when class begins, I start the stopwatch, and when the stopwatch (a big red one with one-inch digits) reads 50:00, class ends. If students won't stop talking, are misbehaving, egregiously off-task, etc., I stop the stopwatch (beep) until they get back to what they should be doing.
Another management technique I've picked up is the "exit pass" or "exit check", where students have to show they completed the written work before exiting the classroom; my co-teacher and I each cover a door and mark them off as they leave.
One of my co-teachers has a tendency to leave class either right at ending time or even a few minutes early. On Wed., he left so early he didn't know I was doing an "exit check" (this is usually only done when a class is not being diligent), putting me in the position of checking all forty students' work alone, and making some of them late for their next class. Unfair.
I happened to catch him in the hall on Thursday and mention to him that he left early, leaving me to do the check alone, etc., etc. He said, he needed his break time before the next class, that he thinks I should only follow the bells, and he recommends that I not use the stopwatch method.
I pointed out that this was the technique I had used since coming to Korea, and no other co-teacher had suggested it was a problem, what was ...--
He said, he could not adjust to my teaching style and if I had anything else to say, I could say it to the Principal! He walked off, leaving me to marvel anew at the psychic treat that is the passive-aggressive.
We co-taught three periods together all last semester, I asked him for his comments and suggestions on my lessons on several occasions, he has my email and phone number, but never once made a suggestion or comment. We were to teach first period together the next day, so I went round to his office when I arrived at school, bearing a blueberry pastry and a bottle of OJ from Tous les Jours. I asked if there was a time we could get together to discuss the problem he told me about, since after all we have practically a whole semester left, and I wanted to make sure he knew how important his contribution was ...
So we sat down after first period and I asked him to help me figure out what we could do about the issues. His only problem, at least that he is admitting to, was not following the bell schedule. I pointed out that since the construction of the new gym outside my very windows, we could no longer hear the bells anyway, so I used the classroom wall clock as a guide.
I asked him to consider the teaching situation from my point of view: I have no power over my classes. If I use the discipline techniques that other teachers use, I could easily be deported for assault. I do not assign grades, and the conversation that is the key aspect of my teaching is not even covered in testing. Just about all I have is to make them stay after class a few minutes when they misbehave.
I agreed with him that yes, it is an inconvenience to the co-teacher, but no more than it is to me, and the whole point of it is to be an inconvenience to the students. Hopefully, they'll remember staying after class and losing their break time, and won't repeat the behavior that led to that outcome.
Besides, I asked, more or less rhetorically, how often have I kept a class late? It's pretty rare, he agreed. He also agreed that he was displeased with his students' behavior in my class sometimes, but he could not stop it. The problem is, he explained to me, while I choked on irony, is that some students are able to get along perfectly well in my class, but some of them do not understand anything I say. They are bored and act out. Wouldn't it be better if each class has students of similar ability?
I sighed. Yes, yes, that would be better.
Showing posts with label co-teachers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label co-teachers. Show all posts
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Saturday, June 25, 2011
This Week in English B
This week my classroom was converted into the Exhibition Hall of the Young-il Job Fair. This is one of my favorite lessons, and one of the students' as well. It comes from BogglesworldESL, but it has to be beefed up for my classes since I need 10 HR reps and 31 job-seekers in order to accommodate 40+ students.
The activity is essentially the same as described at the website, but I increase the range of skill sets, and sneak in a lot of names that Koreans aren't used to pronouncing--lots of l, r, f and consonant blends. I also use a wider range of companies, including Korean chaebol like Hyundai Heavy Industries and Dongwon FB, and some internationals like DDB Agency and Chevron. Each company has two job functions to fill, so the interviewers have to use the information they learned from the applicant to decide which job to tell them about.
I made a couple of "Welcome to the Young-il Job Fair" type banners, and arranged the classroom as you see in the photos. My co-teacher chooses 10 students to man the interview booths, and gives instruction to the job-seekers in the hallway while I go over the duties of the company reps. "The success of this activity," I intone, "is all up to you. If you are serious, and if you make the others speak and listen in English, this will be a great lesson." Even high school boys respond well to being put in a position of trust and responsibility.
Once that is done, the lesson runs itself, except for guarding the entrance door to ensure an orderly process, monitoring conversations, and checking that interviewees are writing the information they learn correctly and in English--spelling doesn't matter in my class, but not writing in Hangeul does.
Monday 5th period was the Open Class for my contract renewal process, and I was told to expect several members of the administration as well as English Department members to observe. Only the vice principal showed up, walked around for about ten minutes, and left. I was told he was "very pleased". He is rising to become principal when Mr Jun retires in August, so that's a good sign.
The activity is essentially the same as described at the website, but I increase the range of skill sets, and sneak in a lot of names that Koreans aren't used to pronouncing--lots of l, r, f and consonant blends. I also use a wider range of companies, including Korean chaebol like Hyundai Heavy Industries and Dongwon FB, and some internationals like DDB Agency and Chevron. Each company has two job functions to fill, so the interviewers have to use the information they learned from the applicant to decide which job to tell them about.
I made a couple of "Welcome to the Young-il Job Fair" type banners, and arranged the classroom as you see in the photos. My co-teacher chooses 10 students to man the interview booths, and gives instruction to the job-seekers in the hallway while I go over the duties of the company reps. "The success of this activity," I intone, "is all up to you. If you are serious, and if you make the others speak and listen in English, this will be a great lesson." Even high school boys respond well to being put in a position of trust and responsibility.
Once that is done, the lesson runs itself, except for guarding the entrance door to ensure an orderly process, monitoring conversations, and checking that interviewees are writing the information they learn correctly and in English--spelling doesn't matter in my class, but not writing in Hangeul does.
Monday 5th period was the Open Class for my contract renewal process, and I was told to expect several members of the administration as well as English Department members to observe. Only the vice principal showed up, walked around for about ten minutes, and left. I was told he was "very pleased". He is rising to become principal when Mr Jun retires in August, so that's a good sign.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
A Fable of Aesop
One day, an ESL Teacha was thinking of ways to make his conversation students actually speak English in class. The Teacha thinked and thinked until he was all thunk out. "Oh well, I guess I will just repeat the Aesop's Fables lesson plan I have done before. It wasn't too bad, and some students did actually speak English." In the lesson, teams of students performed one of Aesop's fables in front of the class.
The Teacha also knew that this lesson plan forced students to wrestle with English comprehension in a way that was new to them--they had to simplify the language of an old-fashioned story and make it clear and easy-to-understand.
The time came for the lesson to be implemented. In the first session, teams of students got an Aesop fable of their own to read and simplify, and make into a script. The story was already in English and students were told to rewrite or restate complicated words and sentences in easy English.
Alas, some of the ESL Teacha's helpers "helped" students to rewrite their story in Korean and then translate it back into English. Using "grammar-translation" like this impedes fluency and should rarely be done according to modern language teaching theory. When the Teacha found out, he chewed up the bad assistant helpers into small pieces, spit them out, and buried them behind the library in a kimchi pot, never to be seen again.
In the second session, the students presented their stories in front of the class. As the teacha expected, some of the teams just stood in front of the room and took turns reading parts of the original story without much change. But many of the teams stripped away arcane language, found the key parts of the story and acted it out so other students could understand it! Also, they enjoyed themselves a little bit.
The moral of the story: "Aesop's fables are still accessible today--2500 years and 10,000 miles away!"
I've montaged together one of the stories above, the Bear and the Two Travelers, and will do the same treatment to two or three others if I have the energy. However, I would appreciate feedback on whether you were able to hear and understand the story as told this way--does it need subtitles or captions? Thanks.
For the record, I started with a version of each story at www.aesopfables.com/, then did some amount of editing and simplifying myself before printing out two copies per team. I chose stories on the basis of: 1) did I like it? 2) did it have some action, not just dialogue? 3) did it have some dialogue, not just action? 4) is it short? 5) could it be staged sensibly, with just a desk, a chair and some paper plate masks? 6) did it have 4 characters? (I also have one story with 3 and one with 5 to cover my bases.)
The Teacha also knew that this lesson plan forced students to wrestle with English comprehension in a way that was new to them--they had to simplify the language of an old-fashioned story and make it clear and easy-to-understand.
The time came for the lesson to be implemented. In the first session, teams of students got an Aesop fable of their own to read and simplify, and make into a script. The story was already in English and students were told to rewrite or restate complicated words and sentences in easy English.
Alas, some of the ESL Teacha's helpers "helped" students to rewrite their story in Korean and then translate it back into English. Using "grammar-translation" like this impedes fluency and should rarely be done according to modern language teaching theory. When the Teacha found out, he chewed up the bad assistant helpers into small pieces, spit them out, and buried them behind the library in a kimchi pot, never to be seen again.
In the second session, the students presented their stories in front of the class. As the teacha expected, some of the teams just stood in front of the room and took turns reading parts of the original story without much change. But many of the teams stripped away arcane language, found the key parts of the story and acted it out so other students could understand it! Also, they enjoyed themselves a little bit.
The moral of the story: "Aesop's fables are still accessible today--2500 years and 10,000 miles away!"
I've montaged together one of the stories above, the Bear and the Two Travelers, and will do the same treatment to two or three others if I have the energy. However, I would appreciate feedback on whether you were able to hear and understand the story as told this way--does it need subtitles or captions? Thanks.
For the record, I started with a version of each story at www.aesopfables.com/, then did some amount of editing and simplifying myself before printing out two copies per team. I chose stories on the basis of: 1) did I like it? 2) did it have some action, not just dialogue? 3) did it have some dialogue, not just action? 4) is it short? 5) could it be staged sensibly, with just a desk, a chair and some paper plate masks? 6) did it have 4 characters? (I also have one story with 3 and one with 5 to cover my bases.)
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Can We Make A Difference?
At a get-together a few nights ago, one of my fellow English teachers here in Korea was feeling frustrated: after nearly three years of teaching here, he has not been able to really make a difference in the way his school works; by extension, we foreigners will never be able to make positive change in the Korean educational system.
I feel his pain. After three years, I still can't get my co-teachers to speak English in my presence at English Department meetings--well, at least not until sam-cha (third round), when the libations have loosened lips somewhat. Each new department head has asked me for my opinion on what the school can do to improve my effectiveness. My answer is: 1) give me smaller classes; or 2) more class hours per week with my students; or 3) at least stream the classes by English ability levels; and 4) periodic, regular meetings with my co-teachers. So far, none of those things has been implemented.
The Korean educational system, not unlike education bureaucracies anywhere, seems particularly entrenched. Although one can trace numerous attempts by national administration after administration to decrease the reliance on after-school academies (hakwons), to change the memorization-based, rote-learning culture of instruction, to encourage creativity, and to raise the level of education for the poor and middle class, most who follow education policy here would agree that nothing has really gotten better.
An article in the JoongAng Daily a few days ago illustrates this point, with a a story titled The widening educational divide. Acceptance rates to Korea's most prestigious universities is proportionally much higher for so-called autonomous or special-purpose schools than for "ordinary" high schools. Of course, that's one of the goals of the autonomous school idea. Key grafs:
But can we make a difference in our little realm? After all, many of us are given minimal guidance on our curriculum and classroom activities--what we may see as an annoyance can be an opportunity to make a difference. Think outside the box, focus less on grammar and more on communication; have students move and act rather than sit passively; create a scene or a stir (in a good way, of course), let the powers-that-be know you're here and you're serious about teaching.
My friend has done just this at his school: he reads storybooks at lunchtime; he teaches an afterschool science class; and so on. In fact, his school recently won an award from the city for its outstanding English program! I think it's fair to say he has made a difference. Alas, the presentation of the award, and some great perks, were lavished on the Korean faculty members, and he was completely ignored. Such thoughtlessness is inexcusable, of course, so I won't try to excuse it--still, this isn't the first time a foreigner has been slighted in this way, and it won't be the last. Hurts your feelings, naturally, but it doesn't decrease your impact.
Teaching in Korea can be frustrating; cultural differences like han and nunchi cause us to stumble and misunderstand things, to create rifts of which we are unaware, and to offend or be offended where no offense is meant. Open criticism is not something familiar to Korean, or indeed Asian, culture, at least on a one-to-one basis. When my lesson has not gone well, my co-teachers will not critique it for me; lacking a meeting protocol where they would be comfortable in critiquing me, I have had to figure out ways to ask for their input whereby I am not directly on the line. When I need them to change their ways, I approach them with I am having trouble with so-and-so; what do you think it is? Perhaps you can help me by doing such-and-such.
I would guess most foreign teachers would point to the testing culture as the biggest problem with Korean education--a student's entire future seems to boil down to one nine hour period on a Thursday in November of their senior year, the Korean SAT, or 수능 suneung. In order to get into prestigious universities, Korean students must forego sports, dating, and fun to attend cram schools, spend untold hours in "self-study rooms" and, in too many cases, contemplate suicide.
But so would Korean teachers. They are just as frustrated with their inability to change the system as we are. Well, much more.
Despite all the English grammar and vocabulary they are taught, the average high schooler has great difficulty putting together a simple English sentence expressing their own thoughts.
So I no longer worry about the "average high schooler"--I confine myself to my own, the ones at my school. Through practice and repetition, by giving them need and means, I will make it easier and easier for them to express a simple thought well in English. Then a slightly more complex one. And so on.
Of course, it's neither simple or easy. And I'll never change the system. But the occasional success is reward enough to keep me going, and the paycheck doesn't hurt, either.
I feel his pain. After three years, I still can't get my co-teachers to speak English in my presence at English Department meetings--well, at least not until sam-cha (third round), when the libations have loosened lips somewhat. Each new department head has asked me for my opinion on what the school can do to improve my effectiveness. My answer is: 1) give me smaller classes; or 2) more class hours per week with my students; or 3) at least stream the classes by English ability levels; and 4) periodic, regular meetings with my co-teachers. So far, none of those things has been implemented.
The Korean educational system, not unlike education bureaucracies anywhere, seems particularly entrenched. Although one can trace numerous attempts by national administration after administration to decrease the reliance on after-school academies (hakwons), to change the memorization-based, rote-learning culture of instruction, to encourage creativity, and to raise the level of education for the poor and middle class, most who follow education policy here would agree that nothing has really gotten better.
An article in the JoongAng Daily a few days ago illustrates this point, with a a story titled The widening educational divide. Acceptance rates to Korea's most prestigious universities is proportionally much higher for so-called autonomous or special-purpose schools than for "ordinary" high schools. Of course, that's one of the goals of the autonomous school idea. Key grafs:
A closer look at the numbers shows that the overall number of students accepted by the best universities in the country from normal high schools started to decline beginning in 1974 - when the standardization of high schools began. One school in Seoul that sent 67 students to Seoul National University in 1981, had only six successful applicants last year.If the Korean government can't fix it over a period of thirty-five years, I don't think a few thousand foreign English teachers will do it within our typical two to five years tenure.
The standardization of high schools was implemented by the government in an attempt to narrow the gap in the quality of education received by the rich and the rest, and root out memorization-based education methods. This meant getting rid of all entrance exams that high schools utilized prior to 1974 and assigning students to random schools.
But what was meant to broaden the quality of education, ended up having the opposite effect. Indeed, the Korean education system has never been more polarized, and a memorization-based approach to learning prevails throughout Korean schools.
But can we make a difference in our little realm? After all, many of us are given minimal guidance on our curriculum and classroom activities--what we may see as an annoyance can be an opportunity to make a difference. Think outside the box, focus less on grammar and more on communication; have students move and act rather than sit passively; create a scene or a stir (in a good way, of course), let the powers-that-be know you're here and you're serious about teaching.
My friend has done just this at his school: he reads storybooks at lunchtime; he teaches an afterschool science class; and so on. In fact, his school recently won an award from the city for its outstanding English program! I think it's fair to say he has made a difference. Alas, the presentation of the award, and some great perks, were lavished on the Korean faculty members, and he was completely ignored. Such thoughtlessness is inexcusable, of course, so I won't try to excuse it--still, this isn't the first time a foreigner has been slighted in this way, and it won't be the last. Hurts your feelings, naturally, but it doesn't decrease your impact.
Teaching in Korea can be frustrating; cultural differences like han and nunchi cause us to stumble and misunderstand things, to create rifts of which we are unaware, and to offend or be offended where no offense is meant. Open criticism is not something familiar to Korean, or indeed Asian, culture, at least on a one-to-one basis. When my lesson has not gone well, my co-teachers will not critique it for me; lacking a meeting protocol where they would be comfortable in critiquing me, I have had to figure out ways to ask for their input whereby I am not directly on the line. When I need them to change their ways, I approach them with I am having trouble with so-and-so; what do you think it is? Perhaps you can help me by doing such-and-such.
I would guess most foreign teachers would point to the testing culture as the biggest problem with Korean education--a student's entire future seems to boil down to one nine hour period on a Thursday in November of their senior year, the Korean SAT, or 수능 suneung. In order to get into prestigious universities, Korean students must forego sports, dating, and fun to attend cram schools, spend untold hours in "self-study rooms" and, in too many cases, contemplate suicide.
But so would Korean teachers. They are just as frustrated with their inability to change the system as we are. Well, much more.
Despite all the English grammar and vocabulary they are taught, the average high schooler has great difficulty putting together a simple English sentence expressing their own thoughts.
So I no longer worry about the "average high schooler"--I confine myself to my own, the ones at my school. Through practice and repetition, by giving them need and means, I will make it easier and easier for them to express a simple thought well in English. Then a slightly more complex one. And so on.
Of course, it's neither simple or easy. And I'll never change the system. But the occasional success is reward enough to keep me going, and the paycheck doesn't hurt, either.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Tuttle Update
Well, week one of classes for the 2011 school year is finally over. Nineteen to go.
A few observations about the new crop of "freshyear" students: they seem on the whole a better prepared lot, in their English at least, though also freer, more talkative and less scared than previous groups; of 560 of them, 26 or maybe a few more are left-handed, a percentage which seems to be increasing every year; alas, nary an interesting pencilbox to be seen.
I have almost an entire new crop of co-teachers, only one returning from last year. One of the others has been at the school for a while, but never co-taught with me before. The rest are all new teachers. This is good and bad: good in that they have no baggage about what they should do and don't seem inclined to sit at the back and "take a rest" or read the newspaper; bad in that I cannot necessarily rely on them to keep me in the swing of what's going on at school--cancellations for standardized testing, meetings and such.
For the next month or so, my lessons will run from Thursday to Wednesday, so I have two new lessons tomorrow: first grade (remember that means 10th grade to USAns) will create our class rules; and second grade will learn about dating--Korean girls are more attracted to boys who can speak English, according to a survey. Part of this lesson is watching a video and answering questions about it.
Alas, my classroom sound system wasn't working on Monday (though it was fine on Friday afternoon), so the dude came to fix it this afternoon. During a class. And failed.
One of my new co-teachers, Mr Kim (who also works part-time for the tech desk, he told me), tried to switch out the amplifier with the one in the other, seldom-used, English classroom. But that didn't do the trick either. So my Plan B was just to hold 2nd grade classes in that room until the problem could be worked out, and Mr Kim returned the amplifier.
Now, that classroom has a much more complex sound system (though the identical amp running the PA) because it is essentially a listening lab, with student headsets and microphones wired up. Once he hooked everything up again, we now had two non-operational sound systems. Plan C, find some speakers and run them directly off my classroom computer. (Plan D would be make up a new lesson.)
While Mr Kim trotted off to find some ordinary computer-type speakers, I double-checked his work and found he had plugged the speaker cord in the microphone jack. Back to Plan B, I guess, and there's 45 minutes of my life I'll never see again.
Still, it's hard to fault a guy for trying to help, and I can say that he has great promise as a co-teacher, having in one week shown himself very quick to pick up on when to speak, when to move, how to interact with me as well as the students.
Also, did I mention the "touch" part of my big touch-screen is on the fritz?
A few observations about the new crop of "freshyear" students: they seem on the whole a better prepared lot, in their English at least, though also freer, more talkative and less scared than previous groups; of 560 of them, 26 or maybe a few more are left-handed, a percentage which seems to be increasing every year; alas, nary an interesting pencilbox to be seen.
I have almost an entire new crop of co-teachers, only one returning from last year. One of the others has been at the school for a while, but never co-taught with me before. The rest are all new teachers. This is good and bad: good in that they have no baggage about what they should do and don't seem inclined to sit at the back and "take a rest" or read the newspaper; bad in that I cannot necessarily rely on them to keep me in the swing of what's going on at school--cancellations for standardized testing, meetings and such.
For the next month or so, my lessons will run from Thursday to Wednesday, so I have two new lessons tomorrow: first grade (remember that means 10th grade to USAns) will create our class rules; and second grade will learn about dating--Korean girls are more attracted to boys who can speak English, according to a survey. Part of this lesson is watching a video and answering questions about it.
Alas, my classroom sound system wasn't working on Monday (though it was fine on Friday afternoon), so the dude came to fix it this afternoon. During a class. And failed.
One of my new co-teachers, Mr Kim (who also works part-time for the tech desk, he told me), tried to switch out the amplifier with the one in the other, seldom-used, English classroom. But that didn't do the trick either. So my Plan B was just to hold 2nd grade classes in that room until the problem could be worked out, and Mr Kim returned the amplifier.
Now, that classroom has a much more complex sound system (though the identical amp running the PA) because it is essentially a listening lab, with student headsets and microphones wired up. Once he hooked everything up again, we now had two non-operational sound systems. Plan C, find some speakers and run them directly off my classroom computer. (Plan D would be make up a new lesson.)
While Mr Kim trotted off to find some ordinary computer-type speakers, I double-checked his work and found he had plugged the speaker cord in the microphone jack. Back to Plan B, I guess, and there's 45 minutes of my life I'll never see again.
Still, it's hard to fault a guy for trying to help, and I can say that he has great promise as a co-teacher, having in one week shown himself very quick to pick up on when to speak, when to move, how to interact with me as well as the students.
Also, did I mention the "touch" part of my big touch-screen is on the fritz?
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