Saturday I'll study for real, I think, because I want to have some new things to say to my Vice-Principal. Yesterday, I managed to tell him in a mangled past-progressive sentence, "Lunch time, I was eating." And later in a more correct sentence, "At our school, how many people are there?" He showed me a student population chart on the wall. It was awesome, asking a 2nd-language question and getting useful information back.
I'll be at school soon, and I want to be thinking of myself as a servant. I'm continuing my read-through of James and I just read "Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up." I'm not there to chalk up cool points--I'm there to benefit the kids and teachers, to see needs and meet them, if I can.
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9 AM: I learned how to say "What are you doing right now?" in Korean (Jigeum mwo hago isseoyo?) and I've been trying it out on co-workers. Apparently it carries the connotation of "Are you busy, or can you help me with something?" Because KBR-Teacher was ready to leave her desk to help me until I told her I was just practicing my Korean. That really made her laugh.
My vice-principal played "Just the Way You Are" for me on his phone and said that the song reminds him of me because I make him happy. From all evidence, he's a good man not a predatory one, so I took the compliment in a kind, fatherly spirit. I know that men can change pretty quickly from someone you think you can trust to someone who would harm you, so I'll still keep my guard up, but for now I'm content to view him as a good person and a helpful authority figure.
Met a precious little boy on the way to school--Minki. I've taught him before (he's in one of the 2nd-grade B-class). I recognized his face but didn't catch his name before. He has a few English words and we could have really gotten some good convo going on the way to school if his friend hadn't been distracting him.
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12:45 PM: First period class went fine in that no one was hurt and I connected with about 5 kids individually, and was not fine in that they could barely be bothered to pay attention to anything we were doing.
But 1-3, 1-4 B has Minki in it, the little boy I met on the walk to school! Doll. The other boys were teasing him saying, "Teacher, he gay!" but young as he is (12?), Minki distinctly seems to appreciate the ladies, so I said "Minki is very handsome!" This time, it seemed to give him status instead of causing a fight, like it did when I said it about Deokryeong.
Minki has a round-faced friend named Heesu, and between Minki and Heesu's few words of English and my desperate bundle of Korean nouns and the occasional adjective, we had a fun 2 minutes together. One kid--Dongseok?--acted up so badly, my Co-Teacher made him leave the room and kneel in the hallway. No idea what he did. The kids were mostly dead sleepy in 1-3, 1-4 B, but I gained the friendship of Minki and Heesu.
Next was 2-1, 2-2 B, who I thought I hadn't taught before, but I have. This class has Yoontae in it, the Taylor Swift fan who wrote me a love letter last week. His "Who Is Your Hero?" paper this week was about Taylor Swift. 2-1, 2-2 B has a cutie pie named Sanghyeon whose hero is Bill Gates, and a giant of a boy named Jinseong.
Jinseong has to be 13 or 14, but he looks 17. This boy is gigantic huge-massive. I may be exaggerating, but I think he's twice as wide as I am, and B-Teacher said he saw the boy in the local newspaper for winning a shotputting contest. Jinseong the shotputter--it fits. Jinseong can get "echo down the hallway" loud, and I've heard him cursing a lot in English, so I thought he'd be a good boy to have on my side. I made sure to pull up my chair by him and work with him on his English. He didn't cause problems in class, didn't curse, and I think he and I may get along nicely.
That second class went pretty well. I played them a zillion videos, and if it doesn't properly contribute to their understanding of English, it at least contributes to their understanding that I care about their engagement or at least entertainment. I used the last two videos as a way to keep the room distracted while I worked with the quieter boys on their papers. As a strategy, it was fairly effective.
When class ended, one of the boys walked up and announced that Yoontae the Taylor Swift fan was going to carry my laptop for me. I said he didn't have to, but Yoontae was already scooping up the computer. And the power cord. And my water bottle. AND MY PURSE. My shiny, sparkly 100% girly purse was slung over Yoontae's shoulder like it was no thing and he gestured for me to lead the way downstairs. We talked along the way, but when the other American at school, B-Teacher, saw us in the hallway I was suddenly embarrassed and wanted to explain, "I didn't make this boy carry my stuff! I'm not making the students my personal servants or anything!"
After class, I went to the Special Education room and spent time with O-Teacher's boys with autism. The piano prodigy played "Doe a Deer" from the Sound of Music, and I sang along. O-Teacher has video of it, which I may get to post later. Then piano-player 2 practiced with me for about 10 minutes, working on Heart and Soul. He can reliably play the lower part while I play the high part, so I suggested that we should play it for the school festival in November. He said he'd think about it!
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5 PM Great day! Something amazing happened with Sanghwa, again.
I was wrong.
I was wrong about Sanghwa---his attitude, his motivation, everything. You know why? Because Sanghwa is B-class.
I could have sworn that I taught Sanghwa in a 2nd-grade A-class. Maybe I did; maybe he was transferred downward. But for whatever reason, today I taught 2-3, 2-4 B for the very first time ever because I was scheduled to teach them last Wednesday, but I was out of town. I come into the B-class room ready to meet some brand new faces and I see a boy from afterschool.
What? Why is this child in the lower level? I saw him in A, didn't I? He's in my afterschool--an English conversation class for the brainiacs, right? I asked him, "Sanghwa, aren't you A-ban?" No, he said he wasn't. He didn't just sneak into a random B-class for the fun of it; he is in the room that is appropriate for his tested academic level.
Oh, my boy. A thousand things make sense, now. The way he always looked confused and scrambled--I thought he was messing with me. He did not understand my words. The way he always spoke to me through an interpreting friend and was madly asking, "what, what, what?" every time I addressed him--I thought he was playing some bizarre power game, pretending that I was this foreign creature he couldn't connect with, despite him having excellent English. He wasn't. He isn't. When he didn't raise his head when he was the werewolf in our card game, it was because he did not understand the game rules I had explained.
Today, I started making it up to him. I told him in Korean, where his friends could hear, that he was one of my "best, favorite students". My grammar was awful, but I think he took the meaning of my words. When I came by to help him with his worksheet, Sanghwa read every single word of the questions aloud, as no boy has done, not even the A-class. I recognized the action--pointedly reading out loud--because I do it myself to prove to people I'm not stupid. It's a gesture that says, "I'm not dumb because I can read. See me being aware and capable?" He wanted to let me know that he's still sharp, no matter what class he's in. Yes, you are, Sanghwa. I see that you're smart.
Our class together went well, and then when I was packing up to leave school, I saw a little buzz-cut head and a giant pair of glasses disappear out the front door. Then Sanghwa ran back down the hall, peeked his fuzzy noggin around the corner and waved a cheery "Bye!" to me. It was a devastatingly beautiful moment. I doubt our future will be all smooth sailing, but I know that Sanghwa is my student now, like Taehoon or Byeonghyun or anyone else.
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6 PM: Other bits from the day... Finally gave HH a decent high-five, now that I know he's not just waving.
Little Yunho (pronounced "you know") from 1-9, 1-10 B has decided that we are buddies, so he has stopped quizzing me about his name and started proving that we're close by making obvious gestures of friendship when we pass in the hallway. One time he gave me a very solid high-five (some of the boys think I'm delicate--Yunho decidedly does not), and one time he reached out and touched my hair (which no one has yet done without permission) and announced "cute, cute. Is so cute". Yunho is going to be a governor or something when he grows up, because when he pronounces something to be true, there are no second opinions about said thing. And Yunho saw the English teacher, and behold she was good. End of story.
Pulled Yunho's tiny compatriot Seonghoon-With-Laryngitis off a staircase, warning him to be careful in Korean.
AND today I met several mothers of our students! None of the moms I met had kids in my classes, but it was still great. O-Teacher said that she was going to make Chuseok treats after school in the cafeteria, and she invited me to come because it was a special event for moms and female teachers.
I had the time! The moms were so nice, and one of them had some English, so we had a fun chat. I learned how to make two kinds of traditional Korean flour-based goods. I would say say "baked goods," but I think they are actually boiled. Anyhoo, they tasted delicious and we had some fun fellowship, us ladies all together. Mr. B was the only male teacher to stop by the cafeteria, and he told me that if I make the baked goods well, it means I'll have pretty children. My cookie-things turned out fine, if I do say so myself, so I'm a shoo-in for pretty kids.
You're Welcome, Future Offspring.
---------------------------------------------------9:30 PM Ooh, surprise. The Saturday class I teach once a month is tomorrow! I get roughly 10 boys from our school and 10 girls from the other middle school for 4 hours. Now fortunately, I've met most of these kids and their English is crazy-good, and they are darling individuals.
A friend and I caught a taxi to the HomePlus and I bought a DVD to watch with the students. (The DVDs were not in the electronics section with the DVD players, but rather in the school supplies section, by the notebooks and crayons.) I told my friend that while we had been running into my boys right and left downtown, "we won't see any of them in HomePlus." First face I see when I walk through the HomePlus doors is GrumblyBear-Deokryeong, smiling like crazy and waving hi. I made a big fuss over him and asked if his arm was hurting--sometimes it's in a soft cast and sometimes it's not.
I'm praying tomorrow goes well, for the kids' sake.
