Back at School

It’s been a wonderful and successful first few weeks back at school for the 2012 school year. Lots of the kids grew, and some of them seem a bit more mature. It’s exciting to see how they change. The kids are more comfortable with me and have repeatedly used the extent of their vocabulary and gestures to communicate the important things they think about.

I was most proud and happy when one of my students who was challenging at the beginning uttered the phrase, “Teacher! Help me!” Hahaha. It’s the first full English sentence ever spoke to me without being coached. Another teacher was dragging him off for something he didn’t want to do. This kid is alienated by school. He has learning difficulties and is behind in all subjects. He did his utmost to derail the class for the first month. It took a lot of strategizing to build a positive relationship with him, so it was really satisfying to hear him communicating with me.

The first few chapters for every grade varied in difficulty for the same theme of names, introductions, and greetings. In several of the classes I used hand shaking in the activities as a way to share US culture. Bowing is the traditional Korean greeting. Hand shaking is new and occurs most often amongst men. If hand shaking does occur, then the person in the higher station (principal, elder, mayor, etc) offers their hand first. The kids were squirmy and giggly at shaking my hand. The kids who were very polite were so uncomfortable with hand shaking that they would bow and touch their left hand to their right wrist as they shook hands.

In Korea it is polite to touch your left hand to your right wrist when, shaking, exchanging items or making a purchase. This custom stems from holding back the long sleeves on traditional clothing to prevent spills etc.