My battles with the Thermostat.

So. Up until today I had been looking at my Korean Thermostat with cautious curiosity. I googled, I researched, and all my efforts left me just as clueless as before. While it was plain to see that I had no clue how to heat my apartment (even having been here for 5 months already), I neglected to take the appropriate –and obvious- actions and request the assistance of my Korean coworkers (hindsight is 20-20 folks).

So, here, in all its glory, is my decoded, Korean Thermostat / Temperature gauge. This could also be entitled “How to work my Korean heating system”.

I’m now going to proceed to label this post in a billion ways in hopes that some other poor foreigner in Korea will be able to get their heating situation worked out for the winter. Merry Christmas!

(Sidenote: Heat still takes a long time to kick in over here. I’m now going to fearlessly experiment with my settings and see if I can get more heat to rise out of the ground by lowering my water temperature?)

“As Kids See it” – the non-readers digest version.

Here we go. I usually wait to write a blog after a good week of teaching… but lately the little munchkins have been acting more like rascals and I haven’t felt inclined to share any of their latest antics… BUT. The redeemed themselves yesterday. Well, Anthony’s kids were cute enough to re-melt my heart and give me happiness at the end of a long week (thank you support class!).

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My support class is lovely. Here, we find six beautiful children. Five girls and a boy. The boy is hilarious. Chubby little cheeks, big puppy eyes… and he loves all things princess. Princess pencil cases, pencils, crayons… anything pink really. So funny. His name is Peter. He never ceases to surprise me with the funny things he does.

Peter is always the first one to get ‘out’ while playing musical chairs. It isn’t that he’s not coordinated, or unable to understand the game… its that he has other things on his mind. Sitting next to me, he holds up his hands, makes a square with his fingers and proceeds to ‘take pictures’ of the girls as they are circling the chairs.

Me: “Peter, what are you doing?”
"Peter: “I fashion photographer.”
Me: :)

Later that day, while grading homework, I hear:
Peter: “TEACHER! ME DRESS!”
(I look up to find he has constructed a strapless dress out of our plastic connector toys and is modeling it for me.)
Peter: **Swishes the skirt and giggles**.

Later that week:
Peter is drawing a picture of a mermaid. Complete with seashell top. He beams at his picture.
Me: “Wow, Peter! Who is this?”
Peter: “She Cinderella. She beautiful!”
(Peter picks up the picture, kisses it, hugs it, closes his eyes and smiles).
Me: “Is she your friend?”
Peter: (nods) “She my girlfriend.”

Later that month:
Peter gets up abruptly from his chair, walks over behind Amy, and proceeds to start finger combing her hair.

Me: “Peter, what are you doing?”
Peter: “Hair is (makes messy hair with his hands). Me make pretty.”
Me: “Oh, are you a hair dresser?”
Peter: nods.
(By the end of the class he has helped two other girls with their hair issues.)

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My older kids have their funny moments as well. This is from my class of nine-year-olds:

Question: What is your favourite food?
Their sincere responses are as follows:
Se-min: “Cookies.”
Sally: “Eating.”
Jack: “Teacher.”

At least Se-min understood the question :).
**
I’m also convinced that some of these kids are brilliant and genius-like in the way they process information.

Me: “Se-min, what does “the rest” mean?”
(Se-min looks at me, grabs a pencil and starts writing. Upon looking at her paper, I see that she’s drawn out a complicated math problem, and is in the process of solving it. Confused, I wait to see what  happens.)
Se-min: (Turns her paper around. The math problem has been solved, and Se-min points to her conclusion “1 remains”) “There, Teacher, 1 is the rest.”

Genius I say.
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Recently I noticed that my eleven-year-olds were continually asking me about a teacher named Justin. He was apparently very mean and  they strongly disliked him. I was very puzzled by their inquiries because there is no Justin working at the school. Then, it hit me.

After the bell rings, I always rush to erase the board just in case a teacher wants to use it after me.

This is what the girls were constantly hearing me say:
"OK Girls! We need to erase the board. Justin Case Teacher is coming and wants to use the board.”

For the past while, they have been bitter against the fictional ‘Justin Case’ for his lack of respect and for being the reason their precious drawings were being erased at the end of each class.

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Here are the latest occurrences in my core classroom:
As a bit of background info, my six-year-old kids, being ever so creative, have decided to adopt a class pet. Thankfully, it is an inanimate dinosaur they’ve fondly nick-named “GABOO”. This is pronounced “Gab-boo”. Emphasis on the ‘Gab’. They have also developed a cheer for it (“GABOO! GABOO! GABOO!…” *little fists are pumping in the air*) which they will chant at any opportunity. Literally. 8 little pairs of lungs and vocal cords exerting great energy into the GABOO chant. Yeah. Lucky teacher.

Also, the kids are obsessed with being each others ‘pets’. Apparently this means that they are the animal of the ‘owner’ for that entire day.

Typical morning with my kids:
Me: Ok guys, lets get out our Reading Street books!!!
Will: I get GABOO at lunch.
Rachel: No! Me GABOO!
Kelly: No, you GABOO yesterday!

Me: Come on guys, please get out your books!
Harry P: I want GABOO!
Harry L: No, GABOO is Rachel’s (gazes lovingly at Rachel).
Michelle: GABOO is Will’s. Will, can I be your pet?
Will: Rachel is my pet.
Rachel: And you Gaboo?
Will: Yes, me Gaboo.

Me: GUYS! Please get your books out!
Sue: Nooooooo, Teacher say we share Gaboo.
Me: We will talk about Gaboo at lunch time. Go get your books.

(General shuffling towards bookshelf)

Harry L: Rachel, I’m your pet?
Rachel: OK.
Alan: TEACHER. I WANT GABOO.

The whole class: “GABOO! GABOO! GABOO!”
(*sigh*)

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Another couple of stories of romance and rejection:
My classroom is a mini soap opera. Here is the complicated love line/triangle/square:

Kelly, Sue, and Michelle all like Will. Will likes Rachel, but will play off the attention of the other girls to get her attention. In return, Rachel will torment poor little Harry L., because she too likes Will, but knows SHE will get Will’s attention if she gives Harry L. attention. Poor little Harry L. is head over heels for Rachel.

An example of a typical Harry L. crush moment:
Harry L.: (whispers shyly) “Teacher, can you put me on Rachel’s team?”
Me: “We’ll see what happens.”

(Later while drawing names out of a hat, Harry L. gets his wish)

Me: “Harry L., you’re with Rachel!”
Harry L: (Beams. Then, after thinking about it for a second, looks panicked and runs to me) “TEACHER! I CAN’T DO IT!!!! PLEASE! I NEED ANOTHER TEAM!!!!”

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Likewise, there has been a declaration of love by Harry P. for Michelle. She flat out rejects him each time. The more recent overheard conversation between the two of them is a classic tale of boy likes girl, girl breaks boy’s heart. Keep in mind, these are six year olds:

Harry P: “Michelle, I your team?”
Michelle: “No.”
Harry P: “I’m your pet?”
Michelle: “No.”
Harry P: “I your team then?”
Michelle: “HARRY P. YOU ARE NOTHING TO ME, OK!?”

(ouch).
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It’s also amusing to see these romances play out in the kids’ writings. Whether intentionally funny or having created double meaning phrases by accident, homework marking has never been more entertaining:

* In Will’s writing journal: “I have too much game.”
* In Michelle’s writing journal: “My friends are all simple.”

Sue’s journal was also humerous. Somehow, in a single sentence, she managed to declare the following.

* In Sue’s journal: “Everyone likes Katie teacher. Except men the.”

That got a nice appreciative laugh :) These kids are so perceptive ;)

Sidenote:
From Alan’s journal: “Grapes become win.” haha. My kids like wine.

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There was also a moment the other day where I felt like I had been teleported to the Twilight Zone. My class had turned into a gangster film or something.

While cleaning up after snack time:
Rachel: “Teacher, mommy said I could bring a gun for show and tell.”
Me: “… what kind of gun?”
Rachel: “Daddy’s gun.”
Me: “… a real gun?”
Rachel: “Yes. but no POW POWs” (makes gesture).
Me: “… a real gun..?!”
Alan: “POW POW!” (makes gesture).
Rachel: “Yes, but no shoot.”
Me: “No, I don’t think it would be a good idea to bring a gun to school.”
Harry L: (great excitement) “TEACHER!”
(I look over. Harry L is sitting on his chair with a fan of 1000 won bills. He is fanning himself with the money and squinting at me.)

:D Seriously?!?!?! :D

Then, already confused by this convo, from the other side of the class, I hear this conversation:
Michelle: “Yes, Will, you can be my mermaid.”

Gracious. What response is there but to laugh?

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Gotta love life as an English teacher :)

Recent Observations :)

Hello! This isn’t going to contain a great deal of cleverness or anything as exciting as the sort. Instead, it will simply contain my observations as of late.

1. While the majority of students and their parents are panicked about the Swine Flu thing (it’s hit our school a few times now and a bunch of the elementary schools in the area are closed), my students seem to be troopers. That’s right. Not one of them has abandoned me at this time. We remain now, and probably forever more (until March), a family. All nine of us. Me and the eight children. I can officially say that I could not survive single-parenthood of octuplets. It just would not work. Period.

2. English is a hard language to learn. I know this because I’m now trying to learn it. I have no idea why adding ‘s’ to the end of a noun makes it plural while adding ‘s’ to the end of a verb makes it present-tense-singular. Why? Why did English people decide that was a smart thing to do? Furthermore, I’ve never given any former thought to things such as ‘inflectional endings’. What is that you might ask? My response… well. I have no clue. Ask me at the end of November when I stand up in front of my class and present my research.

3. My students understand their Reading Street stories, scoring nearly perfect on the reading comprehension portions of exams. Unfortunately, they don’t understand the words and fail the vocabulary portions. I’m not really not sure how that works…

• Example:
  (Question) “What was Mama’s favourite birthday present?”
  (Response of student) - “Mama enjoyed it when Francisco gave her a surprise party for her birthday! It was her favourite present!”
  
  Later:
  (Question) Fill in the blanks with a word from the word box.
  1. On my birthday my Mom gives me a ____edge____ to open. 2. Once, my friends had a _____draw_____ party for me!

4. Kids here are very open about their past traumas. For example, while waiting for the bell to ring, a few teachers and our students were waiting in the stairwell. This is the conversation that followed:

Boy to teachers: (Gesturing to girl in another class) In grade two she always hit me.

Girl to boy: You hit me too!

Boy to girl: You read my diary!

Girl to teachers: See!? What kind of boy is that?! (looks appalled).

5. My kids thought I lived at GDA. Specifically, they thought that I lived in my classroom. It’s named Montreal Class. They had a giant discussion about it with me. I slept under the table and ate in the closet. For some reason, my partner-teacher, Anthony, lived in the staffroom (as opposed to his classroom). He ate in the kitchen (seems unfair!). The awesome thing was that they were 100% serious. They were shocked when I explained I lived in an apartment.

6. In all the 22 Remembrance Days I’ve lived through, I remained completely ignorant to the fact that half-way across the world people were buying bulk orders of chocolate-covered-cookie-sticks and spending the day passing them out to… well. everyone. That’s right. On November 11th, Korea celebrates PEPERO day. Pepero is a fancy name for a chocolate-covered-cookie-stick. I’ve seen them reach a length of over 1.5 feet. That’s one big chocolate-covered-cookie-stick. Anyway, on this date, everyone seems to bestow chocolate-covered-cookie-sticks to everyone else in celebration of the fact that November 11th’s date looks like four giant Peperos when its written like this: 1111. I’m not really sure why this is so exciting… but man, the Pepero makers sure struck it rich off that observation. Remembrance Day was celebrated in style this year. I was probably given over 50 sticks. I can’t eat them due to the gluten-thing :)Peperos anyone?

7. Teaching children how to express their emotions in a foreign language can be quite interesting. First, they think you’re happy. Then really happy. After cycling through ‘surprised’, ‘angry’, ‘sad’, ‘scared’, and make it back to ‘very happy’ they think that you’re suffering from a massive crisis and are developing severe mood swings. The reactions of children to such lessons vary.

          

Wouldn’t you be confused?

8. Even if they don’t know the words, Korean children will sing with great gusto. GREAT gusto. “THERE WAS A MMMAMMMRRRRR WHO HAD AFFOOG AND IINGO WAS HISSSSAAMMMMMOOOO”. Practically angelic.

 

9. My neighbours (who don’t speak any English) love to give things to me. They are very sweet people, and have been very generous! In addition to their lovely smiles, there is one lady who gives me a full carton of milk every time she sees me, a couple guys at the grocery store next-door who will run over to me and give me fruit (plums and tangerines!), and today my next-door neighbour (whom I just met today) proceeded to run into her apartment and come back with four plump tomatoes for me :) What lovely people they have over here! If they could read English, I would write them happy thank-you notes :) Since they can’t, I’m settling for big smiles and thank-you’s. I’m going to repay them somehow though… They’ve made my day on numerous occasions. Such things are very rare in Canada.

Remind me to make brownies or something for my neighbours when I return to Canada.

10. My afternoon kindergarteners are really funny. Unintentionally so. For example:

Me to Wina: “You are from Korea, and you live in Bundang.”
Wina: “I live in Bundang!”
Me: “Ok, try to answer my question: Where do you live?”
Wina: “I live in a cave.”

I never found out where that answer came from.

11. With the proper pre-Korea planning, all Canadians can enjoy delightful meals of POUTINE while in Korea. Just bring along gravy mix, spices and buy some mozza-cheese from COSTCO once you’ve arrived and you’re all set. Mmmmmm Canadian food tastes so good. This is actual photo proof of such culinary achievement in Korea.

12. I have amazing friends and family :) Thank-you to all the people who have sent me letters/cards :) I absolutely love reading them! I have you on a list and I’ll be sending you Christmas cards in the near future :)

Even if you haven’t sent cards/letters, I probably still think you’re awesome ;) Have a lovely day/night everyone!

That’s about it for now! I hope you’re all doing well :)
~Katie

The awesome life of an ESL teacher:

The life of an ESL teacher at GDA Junior, Bundang, brings with it much excitement; but along side the hard times are the wonderful moments where you could just about melt over the sweetness of some kids, or perhaps grin in deep amusement at the blunt, honest ways in which kids approach each other, or laugh aloud at the hilariousness that can happen when meanings get lost in translation.

 

Here are some of my favourite memories as of late:

• (While with my 9 year olds):
  Me: “Ok guys, who knows what the word ‘wonder’ means?
  
  Jack: Teacher, it’s like this… (stops and pretends to think… then gets an insanely happy look on his face) “There teacher! I wonder about a gorgeous girl!”
  
  
• (After a particularly long day with my six-year-olds, while reviewing vocabulary words"):
  Me: “Who can give me a sentence with the word ‘beautiful’ in it?”
  
  Harry L: “OH! OH! TEACHER! I KNOW!”
  
  Me: “Ok Harry L.! Raise your hand!”
  
  (Enthusiastic waving of hand) Harry L. Blurts out “Teacher! You’re beautiful!” (Harry L. beams)
  

• (While correcting nine-year-old Belle’s homework – writing vocabulary words in a sentence):
  
  “Shining: Katie teacher is shining.”
  
  
  
• (Alan got glasses one day and some of the kids were making fun of him):
  
  Rachel to Alan: “You’ve got glass eyes!”
  
  Kelly to Rachel: “Rachel, you have glass eyes too!”
  
  Rachel to Kelly: “noooo! Mommy said that’s ok!”
  
  Sue to Alan: “Alan, I think that’s ok because your glass eyes make you look really cute (beams at him)”
  
  Alan: (*giggle*)
  
  Me to Alan: “Hear that Alan! Sue thinks you’re handsome with your new glasses! And, she’s right – you are looking very handsome this morning :)”
  
  Alan to me: “Teacher, handsome is what?”
  
  Me to Alan: “Um, handsome is like… man-beautiful!?”
  
  Harry L.: “Teacher, am I man-beautiful too?”
  
  Will: “Me too?”
  
  Harry P: “Me too?”
  
  Me to boys (with big grin): “Yes boys, you are all man-beautiful.”

• (While walking down the hall to get the snacks, I encountered a small boy from Jen’s class – about 5 years old. Walking in earnest beside me, he looks up and…):
  
  boy to me: “Hello, I’m Justin. What’s your name?!”
  
  Me to Justin: “My name is Katie teacher! Are you in Jen teacher’s class?”
  
  Justin to me: “Yes. Nice to meet you! How are you today?”
  
  Me to Justin: “I’m doing pretty well! How are you?”
  
  Justin to me: “I am very HAPPY!” (he then runs away laughing).
  
  
  
• There was the time where the kids were having a massive conversation about a special sheet of paper. I still don’t know what made the sheet so special, or why they were talking about it… The problem was that they couldn’t properly pronounce ‘sheet’. I spent a good 5 minutes getting them to pronounce the ‘eeeeeeeeee’ sound instead of the [it] sound. Those poor kids. I hope they figure it out eventually.
  
  
  
• (While in class, during lunchtime):
  Rachel to me: “Teacher, I want to change my name.”
  
  Me to Rachel: “What do you want to change your name to?”
  
  Rachel to me: “Teacher, I want to change my name to… (she pauses for a second to build suspense, then, in a moment of complete drama, she flings her head around to cause a giant hair swoosh, gives me a dramatic, intense look, and proclaims…) RACHE.”

 

• (Seconds after Rachel changes her name):
  Will to me: “Teacher, I want to change my name too!”
  
  Me to Will: “To what Will?”
  
  Will to me: “WILLIAM”
  
  Me to Will: “Why William and not Will?”
  
  Will: “Because, everybody go WIIIIIIIIIILLLLLLLLLL when they mad at me and now they can’t go. Now, they have to just go WILLIAM. And that is all.”
  
  (Will crosses out the name “Will” on a nearby worksheet and in rebellion writes WILLEAM”
  
  
  
• While completing an exercise in their “Exploring Writing” texts, my students came across the following details and instructions:
  
  Firefighters put out fires, rescue people and help people who can’t get to a doctor. Answer the following questions:
  1. What do firefighters do? __________________________________________.
  
  Students to me: Teacher! We don’t know!
  
  Me: “Ok guys, lets read the top part again”
  (They read it out loud)
  
  Students: “Teeaacchhhheeerrrrrrr. UGH!”
  
  Me: “Come on guys! We finish this and its playtime! Think really hard. What do firefighters do?”
  
  Class: “They put out fires.”
  
  Me: “Ok, that’s one thing that they do, what else?”
  
  Class: “Teacher, how do you spell ‘put’?”
  
  Me: “Its written right here” (I point at their books)
  
  Class: “Teacher, how do you spell ‘fire’?”
  
  Me: “It’s written right here guys! Make sure you look at the text!”
  
  Class: “Teeeaaachhhheerrr. UGH!”
  
  Me: “Ok, firefighters put out fires. They p-u-t… o-u-t… f-i-r-e-s.”
  
  (Actual responses discovered while marking their work):
  “Firefighters are people.”
  “Fire.”
  “I don’t know teacher.”

• (During the next activity, the assignment was “Write a thank-you note to your local firefighters”)
  
  Class: “Teeeaacchhheeeerrrr, how do you spell firefighters?”
  
  Me: “Guys, I want you to look in the book.”
  
  Class: “Teacher, how do you spell thank-you?”
  
  Me: “Try to look in the book.”
  
  Harry L.: “Teacher, how do you spell handsome?”
  
  Me: “Huh?”
  
  Harry L.: “Teacher, how do you spell handsome?”
  (I love his randomness :)
  
   
• (While the rest of the kids simply wrote “Thank-you firefighters, Harry L. wrote a masterpiece of child-creativity):

"Thank-you. You save my baby. Dear firefighter thank you.
here is a meat. Thank-you it is very dilishas.
Thank-you it is very beautiful.
thank-you it is willy willy nice.
Thank-you it is very very beautiful and whondlful.
Thank-you it is very handsome.”




• (Earlier in his writings, it was asked what he wanted to be and why. He replied that he wanted to be a firefighter or a doctor, because…):

"I help a people.
I rescue a people.
I save a people."

Sounds like a new firefighter/doctor’s motto to me :)

• (Background info: Harry P. loves attention. He craves attention. He will do ANYTHING for attention. He is also very pushy when he doesn’t get attention. At this point, I was very tired with him, and was willing him to stop poking, yelling and pulling at my arm/sleeve/pen/pencil/etc. My attempts at having him sit down and quietly complete his work were proving futile)
  
  (Michelle, in her innocent,blunt, ‘precisely what I was thinking’ sort of way stepped up in the battle to bring Harry P. back down to normal behaviour):
  
  Harry P.: EVERYBODY! EVERYBODY! LOOK AT ME! (he is currently holding paper over the garbage can and has a pair of scissors posed in a threatening way).
  
  Harry P.: EVERYBODY! EVERYBODY! I AM GOING TO CUT THE PAPER! (waits for people to look. no one does).
  
  Harry P.: MICHELLE! MICHELLE! (pokes Michelle repeatedly and waits for her to watch) MICHELLE! I AM GOING TO CUT SOME PAPER!
  
  Michelle (without looking up): “Harry P. You speak a lot of words but say nothing. Stop talking please.”
  
  Harry P.: (looks baffled, cuts the paper, and then goes and sits down at the table – note: he was not overly hurt by this, mainly just confused.)

 

• (While “A Whole New World” is playing in the classroom during Arts and Crafts"):
  
  Rachel to class: “OH! OH! I KNOW THIS SONG!”
  
  Kelly: “You know words?”
  
  Rachel: “Yes. Words I know.”
  
  Harry L.: “What the words?”
  
  Rachel: “I know words” (starts humming)
  
  Harry L.: “Noooo, you just make noise! No words!”
  
  Rachel (with sincerity): “I know them. Um,,, ‘A WOOO WOOO OOOORD. A WAA WOOO BA BEE DEE BE BOOOO. LAA LAA KA MAAA LAA LOOO… um…”
  
  Kelly: “You no know words.”
  
  Rachel: “I know music.”

 

And, then of course there are the massive hugs and the “KAATTIIIIEEE TEEEEAAAACCCHHHHHEEEEEER – YAAAYYYYY!” Moments that just make this whole tough-job-on-the-other-side-of-the-world seem pretty crazy good.

What a bunch of nuts :) The kiddies sure have their cute moments. In fact, I’m glad I finally sat down and wrote up this blog – it’s almost made me forget my super crazy day :) I really do love these kids, and as much as they drive me insane sometimes, I don’t think I would give a single one of them up to a different teacher if I could :) All it takes to completely change a hard day around is a good laugh with my 6-year-olds, a dance party with my 5-year-old princesses (complete with spins, leaps, twirls, ‘walking on teacher’s feet’ and ‘pick-em-up and slow dance’ moves), a hardcore game of ‘make the shape’ with my afternoon kindergarteners or ‘act out the vocabulary words’ with my older kids and all is well :)

 
It is now time for me to buckle down and do my lesson plans for November (due tomorrow). It should be fun! I hope you’re all doing well back in Canada and that today is beautiful for you :)

And I’m back! Chuseok holiday - part 1 :)

Back and blogging that is. Gracious, it’s been awhile! Now that I’ve tackled a cold and a [almost] conquered a determined flu bug, here’s some awesome new stuff from Korea :) OH! And Jacob (Jen’s boyfriend) has also arrived since the last post :) Welcome to Korea my friend!Ok. Here in Korea they celebrate a holiday known as ‘Chuseok’. I’ve been told that it’s kinda like Korean Thanksgiving… Being that we’re in Asia though, it’s actually nothing like either Canadian nor American Thanksgiving in terms of appareance. It’s something entirely new and special. The above picture features about half of the GDA morning kindergarten kids wearing their special outfits – Hanboks.

Let us zoom in on my children for a second… Please note that not a single one of them is looking to their left, where the camera was, and where they were directed to look. It was a long day. I had no voice at all, and watching over the eight kids in a public park was quite a task :) They are cute though eh?

The school celebrated the holiday with great passion, renting Hanboks for even us foreigners. Huge in dimension, the dress poofed enough to make any prom dress blush and allowed me a bit of insight into what prom may have been like… For all the guys out there wondering “but what would I get to wear at Chuseok?” – don’t worry! Here is a photo featuring Jacob, who in combination with Jen got to sport the lovely ‘couple's Hanboks’.

The kids all brought their own outfits :) Here are my lovely ladies!

Here are the handsome gentlemen. I’m not sure how Harry P and Alan managed to make themselves looked conjoined, but Will and Harry L look as sweet as they normally do :)

And just because I love my kids and think they looked so beautiful/handsome in their outfits, here are some more pictures from their proud teacher :)

Michelle and Sue :)  Kelly, Will, Harry L, and Miss Rachel :)

Harry L, Rachel (the heartbreaker ;), and Will (the ladies man) :)

Traditional Korean dancing? :) Cooking up traditional Korean Chuseok treats (rice and sugar balls…)My beautiful Michelle with one of the Korean teachers :) I love her smile :)

Rachel preparing to throw her ‘spear’ in a traditional Korean game :)

And finally, since my old core and support classes have been combined, I now have a new support class featuring these lovely young (5 year old) ladies:

Jessica the little cutie. She speaks almost no English and only knows how to say “Hi, my name is Jeshhica” and then she’ll beam at you :)

 

Sarah the little punk :) But a cute punk. She’s the “no!” kid. You know the type. The one who has learned the word and is determined to use it anytime she wants ;) But, she likes to dance. So we just dance and she will eventually start listening!

Rachel (background) – the super sweet perfect student with the crazy mother, and Kate (foreground) the attention-loving, attitude giving princess with a charming little smile :)

and finally, my little ray of sunshine:

This is Miss Amy. I love this kid so much. She just beams with happiness, listens perfectly, and has a nice mother. She’s the kid that runs to give you a hug when you’re a bit grumpy on a Monday morning, or who smiles and says “teacher, Octopus dance?” when we’re trying to learn the Letter “O”. Indeed, the Octopus dance was a smash hit and teacher and students left the class mutually happy that day. What a beautiful child. I’m sure from now on the name Amy will bring happy memories of this kid into my heart.

Now that I’ve gushed about Amy for a bit, I also feel inclined to point out Harry L in this picture. Bahahaa. What a kid.

Ok. That’s about it for now. This is part 1 of probably about 4 blog entries that I will be posting in the next few days :) Check back later to read more about my lovely vacation featuring the purchase of two essential kitchen items (oh the suspense!), and the second trip to the Aquarium (sans enfants). :) Woooooo!

Here’s wishing you all a HAPPY CHUSEOK!
~Katie