Not to point fingers, but I officially blame the Thursday bus. Something's rotten there because my Friday bus (the same one I catch Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday) showed up right on time. Another teacher in my apartment complex is at Seokseong Middle, and he takes cabs to work every day and he said we can share one if I want, so I think I'm going to take him up on that offer on Thursdays. One day a week won't kill me, but the stress of missing that bus every week might.
Joo gave me typed list of date reminders yesterday, and here's my favorite part:
4. All students have a school outing all day long to Gyerongdae where a military festival is held 1st October. Two options; to go to Seokyang if not joining the trip, or to go with us and have a great time.
Hmm... biased much? Hahaha. I told Joo I was definitely in for a good time on the field trip, and he's going to pick me up and take me to school so that there aren't any time issues with potential bus-missing.
Joo warned me yesterday that he wouldn't be in today because he's going to take care of his sick mother. So when I went into the teachers' lounge the VP told me to pull up a seat and told me Joo (Mr. Kim, Kim Cheongju seonsongnim) wasn't in today. So the VP and I proceeded to have about a 15 minute conversation about nothing in particular. Turns out he is 59... these Koreans age unbelieveably well. I thought he was like 40-45! Turns out when he said "45" he meant that he hadn't studied English for 45 years so he had forgotten most of it. I told him if he ever had any questions he could come ask me. He's a very nice man.
The Great Baekje Festival of 2010 is starting in Buyeo. Buyeo is the last capital of the Baekje Dynasty and I guess this festival is held annually, but I'm not actually sure. Either way I'm going to check it out tomorrow with some friends.
I played the number games with the fourth graders today and took a picture of them. I felt a little creepy though. I also got some pictures of my third graders. They were hanging out in my room before 3rd/4th English club started, and they were goofing around with the microphone. My Internet should be hooked up tomorrow, so if so I'll post some pictures!
The 4th graders were about ten minutes late to English club today, and when your class is only 40 minutes 10 minutes is kind of a lot. Seokseong doesn't always run on time, but this was the first time I was kind of frustrated because the 3rd graders were just hanging around for ten minutes... I didn't want to start and have the fourth graders miss anything, but I didn't want the third graders to just mess around either. I ended up waiting for the fourth grade. These third and fourth graders repeat pretty much everything I say, which I actually think is good even if it's not really on purpose. Even random sounds I make, like when I walked out of my shoe and said something like "Ah!" they all repeated "Ah!" When I pass out scissors they repeat when I say, "Here you go, here you are, these are for you, etc." Also when I make clucking, tutting, and shushing noises.
For example:
Me: Okay, listen and repeat.
Class: Okay, listen and repeat.
Me: I have two siblings.
Class: I have two sibling.
Me: No, I have two siblingsssssss.
Class: No, I have two siblingsssssss.
Me: (looking sternly at two whisperers) Uhn uh, sh!
Class: Uhn uh, sh!
Me: (attempting to change the topic) So now..
Class: So now...
The title of this post refers to my first/second grade class. I didn't give anyone below grade 3 an English nickname because I thought it might be too complicated, so I've had to learn all their Korean names, which I've done for the most part. I can't say Daeun for the life of me, and Seongmin and Seungmin aren't the same person. Each week we learn three new letters of the alphabet, and today we did G, H, and I so I thought we could start learning the alphabet song (A-I seemed sufficiently long). The kids actually kind of know the song already, but I want them to relearn it with me to make sure their pronounciation is good. So for like forty minutes this is what we do:
Me (points to A on the screen): What's this?
Class: A!
Me: (points to the word "bat") What's this?
Class: Bat!
Me: (points to G) What's this?
Class: Z!
Me: No, what's this?
Class: (cross between "g,""z," and "ch")
Me: No *shakes head vehemently.* Juh. Juh. *mimes getting punched in the solar plexus* JUH!
Class: Guh! Guh!
Me: JUH!
Class: Juh!
Me: Eeee! Eee! *physically pulls the corners of mouth toward ears, exaggerating the "eee" sound, strains neck tendons*
Class: *makes strange faces* Eeeee! Eeee!
Me: Juh-eee! Juh-EEEE.
Class: Juh-eee! Juh-EEE!
Me: Good! Very good! Jee! Jee!
Class: Zee! Zee!
The deeply ironic part is that when presented with "g," I get a sound kind of like "z," but when presented with "z," the zzzzzz doesn't sound quite like it should.
When they do get it right though, it's absolutely adorable.
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