Future Life Is Exceedingly Complex

Here are some entries from a student's journal last month. Angela's in the 5th or 6th grade and is really quiet in class. She's in the Impact Intro book and obviously uses the dictionary! This is after I made some minor corrections.

4/12
Today I drew a science conjecture picture. I drew a robot and conjecture world. It is a picture of future life. Future life is living in comfort. I'm so cool. In future life someday we will feel inconvenience. Life will become complex and exceedingly complex. The time will come when we will repent it. We will want to return to the present time life.
4/13
Today I'm writing about future life. I am busy with my writing. I'm lost in thought. I cannot get it off my mind. But the more I think about it the more confused I get. To my thinking future life is exceedingly complex. A good idea occurred to me. It's a 'future life is exceedingly complex' subject writing. Things go according to one's expectations. The results turn out just as one expects. I'm happy.

Upon reading it again, I don't know if she means 'the future' as in many years from now, or 'the future' as in when she gets older. Because as we get older, life sure does become exceedingly complex. In the past I've wondered if she's copying from a book, but now I just think that she's a particularly thoughtful girl and she makes an effort to translate her thoughts into her English journal. She uses a dictionary to find the words that she doesn't know (thus the strange wording for an elementary school student!).

The more I learn, the more I'm awed by how complex the world is. The physical world, sure, but the sociology of how people interact, the psychology of how our own brains work, how people adapt to other cultures, how the West is influencing the rest of the world, the globalization of the world. Even how various cultures have developed over many centuries in different ways yet mostly with the same core values, despite being isolated from each other, is amazing.

Recently it seems I see such good and such bad things, and wonder how they can exist in the same world. The innocence of the children and their simple trust in the adults around them contrast so sharply with the evil things going on in the Middle East with the prisoner abuse and the beheaded man.

Morals continue to fall, with the latest the homosexual marriage. The USA has been leading up to this for years as homosexuality became more accepted little by little. As Dr. Dobson pointed out in his newsletter, what comes next? Group marriage? Marriage between an adult and child?

That's enough thinking for now. I didn't do much today. Class, KFC late lunch, haircut, Wal-mart (where I ran into a couple of people from church), home. I completely forgot to call Annie until it was late. Oh well, tomorrow.

Pliers

I apparently have a new across-the-way neighbor (the one whose veranda I can see from my window). Before there were girl clothes drying, but now there are big jeans and army uniforms. I'll have to be more careful about when the windows are open.

The day was slightly annoying. The first thing is we'll have a foreigners' teachers' meeting next Tuesday at 10:30 AM. All the schools that will be part of this new franchise are sending their teachers. Have I mentioned that? As of sometime next month (I think) our name will change from Oh Sung Sik English Academy (or OSS for short, named after a famous Korean educator) to Much Better Than English Academy (MBT sounds OK, but WHAT is 'much better than English?'). I can imagine some of the brighter students joking, "Korean is much better than English." So anyway, I usually teach the adults 11-11:50 on Tuesday mornings, so I have to call Annie and have her teach Tuesday for me and I'll teach Friday for her. That means I'll have 4 early/long days next week (and one holiday day).

Joelle videotaped a couple of Sandra's classes today, since Sandra is the best teacher on the face of the earth. It sounds like we might be watching part of it in the meeting, and/or new teachers will have to watch the video to learn how to teach. HELLO--there are different teaching styles that work depending on the class and the teacher's personality. What will they all do with Sandra gone for FOUR MONTHS?!

The kids were tired of working, but there was no time for play since tests are coming up. At 2 they weren't concentrating on reading so I had them write the dialogue instead. I actually had to put Tim outside of class to write since he was so distracted. The other Tim came to class in tears and wouldn't say what was wrong. I only made him do some of the writing since he's still having some problem with his arm (after breaking it severely several months ago). Instead I had him read it all to me, one-on-one. The next class was OK, then at 4 I corrected journals and got in a few minutes on the computer.

At 5 PM they remembered to remind me to practice for the speaking test. Thanks, kids! But first we did a couple of pages from the book. The topic was generation gap and the dialogue was about things that kids and parents might argue about. Edward always has to be different, though! He and what's-his-name worked together.

It should have been something along the lines of the following:

A: What's wrong?
B: My parents and I had an argument.
A: Yeah? What about?
B: About my hair.
A: Why? Don't they like it?
B: They think it's too long. (a boy speaking)

Instead, Edward took the easy route and only changed a couple of words:

A: What's wrong?
B: My parents and I had an argument.
A: Yeah? What about?
B: About my face. (Class erupts into giggles and takes a minute to quiet down.)
A: Why? Don't they like it?
B: They think it's too short. (More giggles as what's-his-name corrects Edward, "No, it's too ugly." It was all taken in good humor.)

At 6 PM (the same book) we also practiced a tiny bit for the speaking test, as well as some of the book. Harry was funny. The girls were a little talkative, so he very politely said, "Be quiet please. I want to study." Yeah, right! I'm so sure! We got onto the subject of my Korean ability, and I explained that I know a lot of words but that it's difficult to make sentences. Harry said, "For us, too." They have been studying a lot longer than I have, but I live surrounded by the language. Part of me felt like I shouldn't push them so hard, but the other part said that it's my JOB to be hard on them.

The next class was BAD BAD BAD. At the end I kept them all after to write, "This is a classroom. This is not a zoo, or a circus, or a playground. I must listen carefully and speak English." Especially with the older boys (6th grade), they know better. I wanted to strangle most of them!!

After dinner I got back on the computer, where Dave had sent me the outline for Sunday's sermon. In less than 5 minutes I had it up on the website. I remembered how to do everything perfectly! Last night I updated the movies (with a little help from the Ulsan Web, which has the HTML to make the scrolling work).

At 8:30 I again had to use pliers to painstakingly pull words from their mouths. Two of them didn't have books. Usually I'll make copies for them, but they were both late, so I gave them my book and told them to go make copies themselves. They've got to start being responsible! How hard is it to remember your book, especially at 7th-8th grade?!

Anyway, the weekend is here. I don't particularly want to go to Korean class tomorrow, but it's the last class of the session. I need to decide if I want to register for next session. Between the church retreat and the orphanage I'll only be able to go twice in June, then miss at least once a month the next two months. It takes up practically the whole day, and I'm not learning all that much. At this point, I'm learning more from just listening to my students.

Crazy Eyes

Will Grace ever speak English properly?? No, probably not. Oh well. At least I'm more bold now about correcting her pronunciation. She needs to listen more carefully, though! When she's not pronouncing a word correctly she asks me to slow down. I do, but if I slow down too much the word doesn't sound natural.

After I finished with the adults I took my books, papers, and two combo CD/tape players into the video room to tape the listening tests. It took about 45 minutes, and when I came out Mr. Kim looked at me strangely. Sure my arms are full of stuff; I've been busy working! After lunch I went into the computer room to surf the net. As the kids entered the academy they greeted me. Many also came into the computer room to ask me what I was doing and look at the ENGLISH writing. "Oh wow, teacher! Good job! Good English!" Well I should hope so, it's my native language!! Mark came in a second time about 20-30 minutes after the first time (the 2 PM students often come at 1 PM and hang around school). He told me that if I looked at the computer for too long my eyes would go crazy. He meant blind, because he then closed his eyes, held out his arms in front of him, and stumbled about.

The first class did a lot better job about staying seated this class. They continue to volunteer enthusiastically to read, answer questions, or anything else. They have such good attitudes! If only I could replicate that and inject the middle school students with it. In the next class Lisa was passing out snacks again, which I made them wait to eat. (I think someone has too much spending money.) She was careful to make sure everyone got equal amounts, even if she didn't like the person very much. The 4 PM class was good once I got them settled down.

At 5 they are oh so very DENSE. Will someone put me out of my misery?! They weren't talking AT ALL. HELLO!!! Stacy's attitude is HORRIBLE. Because they were such lumps on logs I wrote the answers on the board so that all they had to do was copy them into their books. Stacy didn't even bother doing that. She just laid her head down on the desk. WAKE UP!

After that horrible class my slight headache had gotten much, much worse. I took some drugs then walked into the 6 PM class to find them all walking around and shouting. It was complete chaos. It took a couple of minutes to get them all seated and quiet. As I was greeting them Joseph started talking to his neighbor quite loudly, so I kicked him out of class for about 20 minutes. After that the rest of the class participated pretty well. I'm really trying to get them to speak all English, especially as they'll probably be moving into the Impact Intro book next month. Toward the end of class I caught Andy doing his math homework. I took his book away from him and made him stay after class. He had to catch the school bus home so I gave him extra homework to do, due tomorrow.

At 7 they were slightly better than usual. Brandon even asked his classmates some questions in English! I decided not to go to the restaurant tonight because my headache persists. Instead some quiet time at home (and more drugs and caffeine) will hopefully make it go away.

Geometry in Elementary School??

It was quite a busy morning. Well, maybe "busy" isn't the right word. More like "productive." I worked with Blogger for awhile this morning, and finally figured out how to not only make links appear in the sidebar, but also add stats tracking. Laundry, sheets, then french toast for brunch.

At work Kelt (3rd or 4th grade) started out the fairly interesting day by showing me what looked like a geometry problem that his dad had showed him. I was never very good at geometry, so gave up quickly and let him show me the answer. Later they started asking me all kinds of questions about my favorite things. Tomas asked me who my favorite boyfriend was, and I couldn't resist saying, "Chris!" (the boy sitting next to me) as I kissed my finger and then tried to put my finger on his cheek. They all cried out in disgust and Chris (2nd grade, I think) practically dove under the table. It was cute, but took some effort to get them calmed down again. The 4 PM class is SO MUCH BETTER with Kevin gone! They're still a handful, but manageable.

At 5 PM there were only 4 kids because of the middle school boys camp. Laura bought ice cream for everyone so we spent the first 20 minutes or so talking, then they studied pretty well (although Laura and Sally acted really sleepy towards the end of class). While Laura and Luby (yes, that's her name) were gone getting the ice cream Sally told me about her test results. English was her best subject, but overall she was 9th in her grade (of something like 440 students!). Wow! Way to go Sally! But then she said that it's a secret, because the other two girls hadn't done as well.

At 6 John had trouble pronouncing "psychology" (pronouncing the "p" and then what should have been a "k" sound he pronounced as the "ch" sound) and when I corrected him he said, "One more time, teacher!" and began the paragraph from the beginning to get it perfect. At 7 they were entirely too loud, but not too bad once I moved Jason's desk to beside me. Then for the last class of the day (8:30-9:20) Sylvia was back and they did well at talking. When they were reading a dialogue, I admonished Tom about talking before Lucy had finished. I told him that he was being really rude.

When I got home I did some more housework--sweeping, taking out the recyclables, emptying the trash, washing more clothes. Kendall called to tell me that instead of Bible study tomorrow night they're going out to a restaurant to say goodbye to Jeremy and Amanda. So it's a matter of finding out which bus goes to Gongeotap Rotary from school, then finding the restaurant itself!

Good morning!

I ran into Kara and Stephanie on the way to the bus THIS morning. They, also, seemed surprised to see me, and asked me where I was going. I replied, "to work." At this they were VERY surprised, so I had to jog their memories that I teach the adult class. I think most of the teachers forget that I'm there earlier than them most days. As I was leaving last night Mona said, "I envy you. You get to go home." Well, I also get to work early!

Then this morning Mona was already there doing some computer work when I arrived. I'm thinking this is just temporary until after next week's tests. After I got my stuff ready for class I went into the kids' computer room to surf. Grace started to pass by, then stopped to say "Good morning!" in a voice WAY too cheery for just after I'd woken up. The time between adult class and afternoon classes I got a lot done. I also used the 3-4 PM break to finish the two listening tests and finished the writing test. All that's left is the speaking test and recording the listening tests onto tapes.

Classes were fine. At 6 PM Sidney didn't appreciate Helen telling me what a dirty room Sidney has! (It tied in with the lesson somehow, I can't recall how.) Otherwise nothing too notable about the day.

"A" vs. "The"

I passed Holly and Shelly on the way to the bus stop. They seemed surprised to see me. Holly keeps forgetting that I live in a new apartment this year.

Adult class was actually OK today. On the days that all my classes are either really good or really bad I'm trying to look at my attitude to determine if my attitude influenced the kids' behavior or if my attitude only influenced my thinking.

In the first class they continue to impress me with their brilliance!! Only second grade but I can understand a lot of what they say (OK, we use some gestures and body language, too). In the 6 PM class we did the last dialogue in the book (the Tom Sawyer story). They really enjoy playing the different characters, changing their voices, adding gestures as they read, etc. We spent nearly the whole class on just two pages. The characters were Tom, Huck, Becky, Aunt Polly, a man, and a woman. As it was time to choose new people to read, Billy called out, "I'm a woman! I'm a woman!" I made a big deal of it, asking him if he was Harry-Sue (a famous Korean trans-sexual that all the kids know about) but I still don't know if he realizes the difference between saying "I'm A woman" and "I'm THE woman."

Speed-reading

There was absolutely nothing on TV last night, so I continued reading the book that I started in the coffee shop and read on the subway and bus ride back. I read for about 6 hours going to bed only when my head started aching and I knew that if I didn't go to sleep I'd feel bad the rest of the day. Yet I didn't want to stop reading, being anxious to see what happened next in the fascinating mystery. This morning I got up and finished it before church. More than 500 pages finished in less than 24 hours. A very exciting book, though.

After church John was there to take me to Shinbok. Only 3 kids today. The middle school boy is really good, while the elementary school boy is OK. The middle school girl is SO ANNOYING—constantly whining and not wanting to say anything. Why does she come?? After the study we talked for another 15 minutes or more about the president, sexual harassment in Korea, a comparison of the school systems in Korea and the USA, and other random topics. It's nice to be able to discuss adult topics every once in a while. Octavia and John both speak English quite well. Most of the foreigners I know here aren't really into current events.

When I got home I spent a couple of hours trying to make my computer be able to type Korean. I half-way succeeded. It will type in Korean, BUT the online dictionary doesn't recognize the font so I can't look up any words in it. (Exasperated sigh)