That morning, I woke up at my apartment in Korea, I picked out the clothes for my first day of work at the school, also known as a hagwon here in Korea, and was patiently waiting when my director, Ashley, came to pick me up. We rode to school and she told me to try to remember the way that we were going because I would have to walk to school starting later in the week. The only problem was that there are so many one way streets by my apartment, that she kept telling me not to remember the way that we were driving, but to remember the way that she was pointing out. Yeah, I know...confusing!!
We got to school and she introduced me to the head teacher, Agnes, which is not her real given name, but her English name for school and teaching purposes. Actually, the only people who do not call her by this name are her family. I thought that was interesting, but sorry, I am rambling. There were 2 other teachers, all of them Korean, Jenny, who generally works with the older kids, and Belle, who doesn't speak English and works with the younger kids after the older kids get to our school. I was given a schedule with the previous teacher's name on it and was told that the printer was broken at the moment, so my name wouldn't be on the schedule until the printer was fixed. I was told that I was to shadow Agnes the first and second day to get the hang of things. In the morning, the schedule goes a little something like this...
M-F, 1st class: grades 1&2 (they are 7-8 years old); 2nd class: kindergarten (5-6 years old)
Then depending on the day, there is P.E., or Chinese, or Math class, or Arts and Crafts after the first two, all with the same kids. There are 12 altogether in the 2 classes. We eat lunch after that and then the bigger kids arrive from their other schools. When the bigger kids get to the school, we have 40 minute classes M, W, F, from 2:30-6:55PM and T, Th, from 2:30-5:30PM.
(FYI)As a little side note, Koreans take education very seriously. They go to school all year round. Sometimes they go from one school in the morning, to another in the afternoon, to a final school at night. Several kids even have school on Saturdays! Parents like to be very involved with their child's education and English is very important because it is a global language of money.
Back to the story...That morning, I followed Agnes around for the 2 classes in the morning with the little ones. We sang songs that she had made dances to go with including, "Under the Sea," from The Little Mermaid. We learned simple words and even started to put them into sentences. I knew that those 2 classes would be difficult because the kids spoke very little English and after shadowing the first couple of days, I would have those 2 classes alone.
We ate a delicious traditional Korean lunch, which I found out was prepared by our very own school chef. After lunch the director came to me and told me that I would be doing the afternoon classes with the big kids all by myself since there was no one else to teach them. I stumbled through the first day of lessons. The kids were very helpful at showing me where we were at in the books. Luckily for me, most classes had a student book and a work book, so I could follow along and throw in a bit of teaching if they didn't understand something. Most of the classes were already in the middle of a unit and didn't require much teaching. Their English was much better than the little ones. Plus, most of the books have Cd's that go with them and all I had to do was just pop it into the player and it would do the rest. I guarantee that the first couple of days were so boring for those poor kids, they had to be, because they were for me!! I felt a little bit useless until I got the hang of things!
That day, Ashley told me that I wouldn't be getting a TV or Internet for another 2 days. She told me that her father, the owner of the school, would take me around the market that is by my house and show me different places that I could shop and/or eat. I thought that I would be able to stop and grab a few things while walking through the market but Hong Kong, Ashley's dad (Hey, I don't know...that is what he told me to call him because his actual name is too complicated for us silly Americans!), was grabbing me by the arm and basically dragging me through the market. (I had fun retelling this story the next day to all of the teachers at school and listening to them make fun of Hong Kong dragging me through the market.)
That night I was absolutely exhausted mentally and physically and still very much jet-lagged!! I fell asleep the moment my head hit the pillow at 9:00PM and woke at 4AM. I was getting a little better about my sleeping transition.
That is all for today! Until next time...
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