Today is the Thursday of my second week teaching at Taepyeong Middle School. Time flies here. The classes are only 45 minutes long, lunch is an hour...and although I am at school from 8:10-5:00pm, it seems like the days go by very quickly. This week I have been giving so many lessons. Like I mentioned before, the school schedule here changes frequently...sometimes at the last minute. Today for example, my co-teacher informed me that all of my afternoon classes have been cancelled. Therefore, now seemed like a good time to reflect upon my experience here in Korea.
I have gotten into the swing of things here at school and have improved my discipline techniques for quieting down the class. I have a clapping routine that usually works. I also realized that the best way to get shy Korean kids talking, is to give them a competition. These kids are secretly extremely competitive. Give them a game and watch them all start speaking and getting involved. Since my main goal here is to improve students' speaking abilities, I think I will try and include some sort of speaking game or warm-up activity in every class.
Kids are sometimes so shy in the classroom, but once they are let loose in the hallways they become so daring and bold. They run and up and say "HELLO TEACHER! I love you! You are so beautiful! AYYYYYYY!" and then scurry off giggling. Hahaha, cracks me up. I am so used to getting stared at every day and receiving declarations of love and compliments. I think when I go back to America I am going to feel like no one notices me.
This week I had 2 more professor dinners. Usually, the head teachers make reservations at a restaurant and we all go out to eat right after school is done...around 5:00pm. The dinners are generally delicious meals served at long tables where we all take our shoes off and sit on the heated wooden floor. I feel so uncoordinated when I try and sit cross-legged at these dinners. Fortunately, my flexibility has been improving over time. At almost all the meals I get a comment about how good I am at using chopsticks...and I also get asked if I need a fork. I always say, "No, no, I'm used to using chopsticks." I usually do fine with the chopsticks until they all start watching me eat...and then I drop the food in my lap... Typical bad luck haha!
On Tuesdays and Thursdays after school I lead an English Club for my fellow teachers that are interested in learning English. I like teaching adults. Most of them are interested in English conversation classes, writing, and vocabulary for traveling. It is a piece of cake compared to teaching distracted middle schoolers.
I really enjoy living in my apartment. It is nice to have my own space. I am glad that I brought my ukulele though...otherwise I'd be afraid that I'd get bored or lonely.
Life here, all in all, is very easy to get used to. If you have an open mind and a positive attitude, you can learn to adapt to almost anything. Although, I thought I should record some of the things that surprised me about Korea when I first arrived, before I forget.
Koreans will often start sprinting down the street---this means that are trying to either a) cross the street before the light turns red, b) catch the subway before it leaves, or c) catch the bus. At first I thought this was very funny to see all these people sprinting down the sidewalks, but now I understand! If you miss the crosswalk green light, you have to wait almost 10 minutes until it turns green again. Traffic here is bad! So, now I run too!
Secondly, Koreans have such cute, adorable shoes. Many of the women strut around all day wearing super high heels. Despite Korea's shoe fetish, Koreans always take their shoes off at the door. At restaurants you take your shoes off, at home you take your shoes off, EVEN AT SCHOOL you take your shoes off! So you know what that means---at school we wear slippers or plastic sandals. In the hallways, instead of having coat racks, we have shoe racks. All the kids leave there shoes in the hallway outside their homeroom classes. I should really take a picture of this. It was so strange at first, but I'll admit, it is so much more comfortable to wear my slippers all day than to wear dress shoes!
Thirdly, when you walk down the sidewalk, it seems like Koreans can't pick a side. I am used to staying on the right side. But in Korea, everyone walks wherever they want. I feel like I am going to walk into people because they don't walk in straight lines. Lots of people bump each other...and here if you bump into people, you don't say "sorry" or "excuse me"...you just don't say anything. That caught me off guard the first time, but now I am used to it.
Fourthly, it is extremely rude to blow your nose in Korea. People would prefer sniffling all day to blowing their noses in public. I think they would go nuts if they saw people in America blowing their noses and making trumpet sounds. Also, one kid sneezed during one of my lessons, and I instinctively stopped what I was saying and said, "Bless you." Then I thought about it, and realized that in Korea, people don't say anything when they sneeze. Whoops!
Fifthly, a lot of hand gestures in Korea are different than in America. The A-Okay symbol means money. Also, when people gesture for you to "come here", it kind of looks like they are shooing you away because they put their hand palm-side down and move their fingers back and forth. To me, it looks like they are saying, "Shoo fly, don't bother me." But then the look on their face is like, "hey, get over here!" It always catches me off guard.
Sixthly, Koreans are so clever! They all bring their toothbrushes to school so that they can brush their teeth after lunch. Literally every professor grabs their toothbrush as soon as they get back from the cafeteria. I know only a few people in America that do this. Here it is common practice. I felt so nasty being the only one that didn't brush my teeth during the first week of school. I guess I am just used to having a dirty mouth and bison breath. But now I realize that there is a simple solution to my problem! Thank you Korea, for improving my dental hygiene! :)
Well that is all for now! I am going to get some things prepared for my English Conversation Club after school! Peace!
The key to eating at a restaurant is to stretch your legs out under the table once in awhile. Usually I only do this around family so it might be rude with your head teacher there haha.
ReplyDeleteAlso, people brush their teeth after lunch because Korean food has a lot of chili pepper (and gets stuck in your teeth). You don't want that happening in class!