School Day #4

4:30- School was good. I finally have a school computer, though it's not hooked up to a printer yet. I have been preparing for days, but I still have so much lesson-planning to do. I've been in about 10 of B-Teacher's classes, observing what he does and trying to memorize some kids' faces. When I watched K-dramas with school scenes in them, the students always had nametags on. But when I arrived at my school, all the uniforms were blank. So I will be teaching about 500 of the boys during the course of a week, and I'll be tryying to learn who they are without nametags. You lied to me, K-dramas.

I only know a couple of names right now, and so far my favortite students' names start with "Byung". Byunghyun wrote me an encouraging letter yesterday, and today I met Byungyoon, who lived in California for a year and has a bit of a Cali accent. When I said hi to him in the hallway yesterday, he answered with something really natural like, "Hi, how's it goin?" I thought I was hearing things! So it may be a challenge to keep him from being bored in English class, since he's basically like any of my highschoolers back home.

I wrote Byunghyun a return letter today and delivered it to him when I sat in on B-Teacher's class. I think writing back was a good decision, because it's English practice for Byunghyun and the whole class thought it was hilarious. His best friends were chanting, "love letter, love letter!" and it was super cute.

One smart 2nd-grader also heard me laugh at a non-English joke and asked me if I understood Korean. I tried to evade the question, but different kids are figuring out that I know some of what they're saying. I was hoping to keep it hidden for a while longer, just so they try to communicate more in English instead of using Korean and hoping I understand.

I spoke Korean to one of the kids for the first time today. On the walk home from school, I saw a 1st-grader wipe out on his bike. It looked so painful, and he was a tiny child, too. He had to be 12, but he looked more like 9, and I helped him get his bike up. I asked if he was okay in English, then Korean, and he said he was, so I let him go on. The motherly instincts kick in pretty strong when someone young is hurt.

Vice Principal let me go home early again. He's really a lovely person.

Stopped by the church I want to go to on the way home. Sure enough, it looks like an English-free zone, so Sunday service should be completely over my head.

Tonight, I'm going to prepare, prepare, prepare my lesson plans, then tomorrow I'll walk to school to get in some Saturday practice, setting up my PowerPoint stuff. Monday, I teach one 1st-grade, two 2nd-grade, & one 3rd-grade class, plus two hours of the fun afterschool stuff. It's not a lot to do, hours-wise, but it represents a monumental amount of prep work. Off I go!

10 PM: Got dinner with two friends--our first Korean restaurant meal ordered all on our own. We ate at a samgyeopsal restaurant, and the waitress handed me the tongs, so I was in charge of grilling our food.