Techings Kids Style

Over the course of the week at the kids camp at my uni, I've had a chance to observe all the Korean TA's and a number of the other foreign teachers and their style of teaching/leading. And I've noticed one major thing that sets a few people apart from me, and that is how much feedback they give the kids. I'm not talking about feedback directly related to activities in class and their English and spelling of words and stuff. Of course, I am pretty active in that regard. But it's all the other stuff I'm talking about.

For example, my TA keeps telling the kids to be quiet and to not talk, when they're waiting in line and stuff. But, in my eyes they are waiting very quietly and in an orderly fashion, so I don't really care that they're chatting a little bit with their neighbor. What difference does it make...and I wonder if he even has any clue how much negative feedback he is giving them and that that has a way of making kids not like you. Shouldn't camp be fun?

And some of the other people are yellers. Even yelling (as opposed to talking at a normal level) at other teachers without even really realizing it because they're so hyped up from yelling at the kids the whole day I guess. Yelling chants while walking down to lunch. Yelling at kids in the cafeteria to put down their umbrella and about where to sit. I will never yell. Never. Instead, I use the stare until quiet ensues. It will almost never take more than 20 seconds or so. Or I just use a gentle touch on the arm to get their attention and give them some directions. Walking down to lunch, I just don't care that they want to talk to their friend in Korean. They need a break from me and English. If they want to have a little conversation, in English with me, I'm happy to do it (and most of them do). In the caf, I just don't care if they bring their umbrella into line with them or where they sit. Basically, I see no need to yell or give directions to kids for things that just don't matter, or can be done at a much quieter level.

Now, I'm not a kid superstar, I fully admit this. These are just some thoughts. What do you experts out there think?

A Fun Camp Game

I'm working at a summer camp at my school and we played a pretty fun camp last night, that the kids seemed to enjoy for the most part. It was called Mission Impossible and they had to go in their classes around to 10 different stations, seeing if they could complete various challenges in 5 minutes.

Some of the stations:

1. Trying to make one of the teachers laugh.
2. Having to guess 10 words in 5 minutes, based on the teacher explaining them. Example. Teacher: "It's an animal that eats bananas" Student: Monkey!
3. Making shapes as a class. Square, diamond, etc. They did 2 in 5 minutes.
4. Listening to a song and writing down words they hear. If they get a certain number, as a class they get their challenge completed token.

It's Camp Time!

I'm teaching at a kid's camp at my university for essentially 8 days and we have our homeroom class (mine is grade 4/5 elementary school) for 4.5 hours/day. That is fine, but the kind of annoying thing is that we have been given literally no material to teach them. Nothing. So we've had to be on our toes, coming up with 36 hours of stuff out of thin air, on short notice. We were all kind of under the impression that there would be books or something. Anyway, after much frantic internet scouring and such, I've come up with the following plan. Maybe it can help you if you're stuck in a similar situation.

Period 1. Make your own country. Each day will be a different theme. Example, day 1: make/draw a map of your country, with animals and kinds of plants. Day 2: education system and rules/punishments. Day 3. Type of housing/draw a picture of that. Etc, etc.

Period 2. Reading, I've picked out a book and will make copies of it for the students. I'll play various little activities and games to go along with it.

Period 3. Vocab and games relating to that. Day 1: days of the week/months. Day 2: people descriptions. Day 3: Numbers up to 100. Day 4. Review game for the first 3 days.

Period 4. Something active. Tag. Duck, duck, goose. Scavenger Hunt. What time is it Mr. Wolf? Leapfrog relay. Etc.

What are your best camp ideas?

How to maximize savings in Korea

I save a lot of money. As in my entire base pay, that I earn for teaching 7.5 regular classes of freshman English for 2 semesters of 17 weeks in a year. Do I not spend any money? That really is not the case at all....I just do a lot of overtime. During the semester, it seems to work out to 12 or more hours/week. And in the breaks, I do a camp and various other little things to essentially pay for all my traveling.

So, when you're looking for a uni job, the key is not really how much your base pay is. 2.0 or 2.5, it's not that big of a difference. The hours worked for that base pay and overtime opportunities are what really matter. If you make a base pay of 3.0 but have to work 25 hours a week to do it, you won't have that much time for overtime opportunities. Ditto if your accommodation is far from where you live. And if there is more overtime than you can handle, such as at my uni, that's how you can really make a lot of money here in Korea. Of course, you can do private teaching but there's the whole stress of getting busted and kicked out of the country, so I just avoid that whole scene in order to have a happy life in Korea.

When you're checking out uni jobs in Korea with an eye to make the big $$$, remember the 2 things that really matter.

1. Hours worked for base pay.

2. Overtime opportunities (ask the other foreigners working there for the 411).

(3). ....and, if camps during breaks are mandatory (which is okay in my eyes), are you paid extra for it?

The Memory Circle

This is a game that I often use with smaller (less than 10 students) and younger students (middle/elementary school) but I've also used it with uni students with good results.

You can make a rule as to what kind of words the students can pick. If we're studying food and drinks, I'll say that the students can only use those. New vocab from a vocab book, only those words. Past tense verbs, then only sentences from the past.

Everyone will stand up, in a circle, and I will start the game off. "I ate pizza last night." The next student says, "She ate pizza last night, and I studied yesterday." The next student, "She ate pizza last night, he studied yesterday and I watched TV." And so on it goes, around the circle. If someone misses and gets it incorrect, they have to sit down and the game is over. I usually let it go until there are 2 or 3 of the geniuses left and then I give them a prize of some sort and start over with the same rules, or a new set of criteria.

Lesson Planning

...for my students is perhaps less than ideal.

But perhaps, they are less than ideal students. Very low motivation, with the exception of a few in each class, a very low level when they start with some literally not being able to say their name and major, they straight-up refuse to do homework in most cases, they will skip the most classes they possibly can without getting an "F" and attempt to cheat their way through tests. And at the end of the semester, they expect to get an A+. It's almost laughable.

Anyway, that's life at a second/third tier uni in Korea so it goes with the territory. I'm not exactly dealing with the best and the brightest with the exception of a few majors here: robotics, nursing, animation, fashion, which for some reason attract much better students. And what electrical engineering student who just wants to stay and work in Korea really cares about English? I can understand and don't really blame them for their lack of motivation.

But, how does that affect my lesson planning? In a lot of ways. I know that I can't lecture because there simply isn't the attention span to make that possible. The minute I start is the minute that the students little heads start nodding and eyes start closing. So I make it interactive. Like they actually have to stand up and walk around talking to people. Or do a little presentation thing in front of the class, where if they don't at least try, they will look like a dumb-ass. Or I play a game where if they don't participate their group as a whole will suffer the consequences. It seems to keep the class moving along at a pace that's not tedious, clock-watching drudgery for me or them.

I try not to put people on the spot. I'm almost never pick someone out of the audience to answer a question, unless they've first had the opportunity to practice it with a partner. Then, if I do pick them and they have no answer, it's their own fault for being embarrassed for not being able to answer, not mine. They're low-level, so I always take this into account. I realize that big group discussions, or even discussions with 3 or 4 of their classmates just aren't possible for most classes so I don't try.

I will always do an example for each conversation question or game that I do. ALWAYS. They can not be trusted to understand and carry out my instructions, no matter how simply I explain something. The class turns to chaos without an example, and it's totally my fault, so I allow time in the lesson plan for this.

I have many more ideas. Perhaps this will be finished in a part two.

Book or No Book?

There is a lot of debate in the ESL/EFL world about this. I've done both and can see quite a few disadvantages and advantages for either side.

Using a textbook in class:

-obviously, it's easier for the teacher in most cases, unless you are one of those organized people who has a whole file folder system with lessons and things. I'm not one of those people.

-the students can get a more systematic overview of a certain topic, because a well-thought out book will cover the basics.

-it can be motivating for students to finish a book.

Using no textbook in class:

-the lessons can be tailored to the student's needs.

-it can be more interesting because even the best books get old after a while.

Overall thoughts:

I almost always prefer a textbook, because I am perhaps a little bit lazy. Not lazy in the sense that I don't prep, I ALWAYS prepare thoroughly for every class that I teach. But I mean that if I have a book, and I've taught it before or am familiar with the system, I can plan for an hour long class in 10-15 minutes. If I have no book and I'm doing my own thing, it will generally take over 30 minutes to prepare since I'm searching around on the internet and through my old handouts and stuff. This adds up when I usually teach over 20 and perhaps closer to 25 hours each semester.

I also prefer a textbook because I think it's much more systematic. Now, I think that I have a fairly good idea of what I'm doing in terms of teaching ESL, but I certainly don't have the desire to reinvent the wheel. If someone has spent months/years putting a well-thought out textbook together, why would I not take advantage of someone else's labor? Of course, I can mix my own ideas in as well and then the students get the best of both worlds. And this keeps it interesting as well and prevents the boredom of doing the same book, all the time.

What do you think?

"Education Fever" by Michael J. Seth

I recently ran across this book about Korea's obsession with education. You can read the first 30 pages for free on Google Books.

Smart Choice Reviews: The Author's Response

So, as I suspected might happen, Ken Wilson, the author of "Smart Choice 1" did find his way over to my blog and my reviews of his books. Here are his comments (in blue) and my own thoughts (in black).

Re the dialogues - the formula for that page was kind of foisted on me by the editor, but got major good reviews in piloting classes, so I didn't object to it. The songs have caused a major split - about 60-40 against them, so they will probably be pushed onto the website in the second edition, which I will start writing in the fall.

I'm still not so into the dialogues and will continue to not use them in my classes, unless there are additional activities or something to go along with them. Or they are easier for the students to insert their own ideas in a way that encourages normal speaking instead of just weird conversations.

Moving the songs onto the website is definitely a good move I think.

The comic strip is a huge success just about everywhere, but of course particularly in Japan, where the manga style originates. They will stay in the second edition, but there will be extra activities to go with them.

If there are additional activities to go along with them, I'd definitely be willing to give it another go. And perhaps even have another try at them, as is. I think I just had a couple dud classes with them and wrote it off entirely as a dismal failure. Perhaps it was just the class that was bad, not the page in the book. 

 

Giving clear directions

I think it's extremely important to be very, very clear when giving directions for activities and things but especially so for things that involve grades such as homework and testing. To ensure this, I try to give them in many forms.

1. I will tell the students about tests at least 2 weeks before the test, giving them a reminder every class for the students who were absent.

2. I give them a little handout with the basic points.

3. I write the basic info on the board and give them a little spiel in class.

4. I make them tell me the info before they leave for the day. For example, "When is your test?" "What % is it?" "Where is it? Here or my office?"

I think you can never be too clear when giving directions to people who might not necessarily understand you :)