10 AM: Second day of short vacation, and it's lovely.
Spent almost all of yesterday studying Korean, which was such a relief. I was looking back over my notes from Tutor, and there were concepts she was trying to teach me which I couldn't understand in April, but in June I can grasp them easily.
Then I planned for my Hunger Games afterschool. I'm actually designing an "Arena" for them, a game where there are 10 locations and they have to try to avoid each other and gain "health points" by remembering vocabulary and answering questions. If two teams end up in the same location, they have to arm wrestle for the right to stay.
It's going to be beautiful, I think. My afterschool is a fun mix of kids. I've only seen them four times, but I'm already feeling the pulse of the class a bit, getting used to them.
Last semester, I had 22 kids, of which only 2 were B-level and the rest were A-level, making it easy to communicate with them. Now I have 15 kids, of which half are A-level, meaning I have to use a lot more Korean to connect with them. But hey, it's great for my language practice and it's good for winning the hearts of the class, which is what I have to do first, before anything else.
Interestingly, I have a few of the same boys from the first afterschool. I have Minsang (model student, quiet, calls or texts me every day), Jinhyuk (one of my "trouble boys"--smart but unmotivated, sensitive heart, I feel like his mother), Wonhye (I used to think he was a monster, but now I understand his bold personality better and he's my boy), and William-Jiyoon.
In the new class, everyone behaves better because I've gotten better at class management and I know what to expect of them. For my March-May afterschool, I was just thrilled that I could keep them all from using their phones because that was the thing that killed my Fall afterschool. No phones--it was magical.
But now I know I can expect even from them, and I mostly know how to get it. I don't expect perfection by a long stretch, but I know that I can expect them to stay in their seats and not chat while I'm talking. I know that if one of them is too chatty, I can move him to another chair.
Sadly, the first two classes, I had to move my Sensitive-Jinhyuk away from his friends. Because bless his heart, he just could not stop talking and I knew he would obey me, while his best buddy was new to me, a kid whose heart I don't have yet.
Background on Jinhyuk, taken from my own blog post on March 27th:
---------------------
And I made a difference by going to sit with my troublemakers. I was sitting on a desk behind Leader-Jaehoon and CoolGuy Hyunseo and the other good boys who I already like. The song "Let It Go" came on and the boys asked me to sing with it--to really sing it, loudly. I did so, and I noticed one of my troublemakers on the other side of the room, staring at me.
I looked back later and he was still turned sideways in his chair, watching me sing and not even hiding the fact that he was doing so. Then it hit me--this kid who has only annoyed me before wants to be a favorite. I'm sitting across the room with kids I care about, while he is left out because I didn't click with him right away.
Well, I'd had enough of watching a student stare hopelessly, so I relocated to Troublemaker Central to help them with their worksheets. Staring boy is Jinhyuk.
-------------------------------
So that's Jinhuuk in a nutshell. A bit of trouble, but with a good heart, and terribly receptive to love or the lack of love. If he's not getting lots of touch and time and attention, either from his best friends or from me, he positively wilts. When I had to lecture him in his Friday class, I made sure to hold his arm later, to let him know we were okay and that he was still loved. When I had to separate him from his afterschool buddies, I went to sit by him and play word games, because sometimes Jinhyuk needs one-on-one recognition that he's special.
Minsang doesn't need much extra attention, because he has my phone number and therefore has access to me whenever. I never catch Minsang acting up in class. He is the Good Son.
Wonhye is the bomb diggity. He still won't do jack about his assignments, but now he and I are closer. I can make fun of his crayon-squiggles that he did instead of making a district logo, and we both know that I'm being funny. He now writes his name as the number 1 and the hand-drawn symbol for sunshine, because sunshine in Korean is 해 (hey). Therefore "1-hey" sounds like "Won-hye". Isn't that clever? My little sunshine.
I actually started singing "You Are My Sunshine" to him in class, which made him die of embarrassment. Then 3 of the other boys joined in, somehow perfectly knowing the lyrics.
Jiyoon, as always, is one of a kind. He's been behaving right well, though. He missed the first two afterschools because of swim meets, but since he's been back, he's been quite good. He even warned the other gabby kids to calm down because I mean business.
Because I have a new little firecracker in class, named Dohyun. Firecracker-Dohyun is pint-sized tiny, and he's B-level, and has enough personality for 4 kids. He likes me, but he also likes to mimic my voice and parrot what I say. I don't mind that much, but sometimes it crosses the line from Cute-Sass to Too-Much-Sass.
On Tuesday, it crossed the line and and said his name very firmly and fixed him with a "no, darling, that is quite enough" look. Dohyun shrugged it off as me not being serious until Jiyoon took him aside and explained something in a very sober, intense whisper.
I asked Jiyoon if he was explaining our incident together in April, and he nodded an affirmative. Dohyun looked at me with new eyes, full of amazement as he said, "Wow. Scary," in Korean. It seems that I'm somehow more worthy of respect and appreciation in Dohyun's eyes because I dragged Jiyoon to the big office, made him cry, and asked for and received a public apology for his bad behavior.
Dude. I never want to react to a student in anger again, like I did with Jiyoon, but I'm shocked that that event bore any positive fruit whatsoever. Jiyoon doesn't seem bothered in the slightest about the past and he's actively helping me keep the crazier kids in line, with stories about his battle scars from altercations with me.
After class, Jiyoon came up to me and asked sweetly for extra Pringles and I gave him and Wonhye theirs before the new kids got their portions, because sometimes you've got to let a kid know that you respect the history between you. Nobody's going to go without, but my first boys are entitled to just that extra measure of recognition.
When I assigned the boys to different Districts, it went better than I could have thought. They are all either in District 1, 3, 4, or 12, and I made them sit at tables with their team members. Then I told them to pick Tim-jjangs (team leaders), not knowing how it would go.
Well, there were two very clear team leaders right off. Smart-Jinwoo was the evident leader of District 4. He's smarter than most kids, has better English, and is just generally quick-witted and fast on the uptake.
Over in District 1, Jinhyuk's friend Changhee announced he was the leader and there was nobody willing challenge him. Changhee's one of those man-sized 1st-graders who is taller than me, so if anybody was inclined to knock him out of his jjang status, they'd have to pack a lunch an bring along two friends to accomplish the job.
But also, Changhee's a natural leader. He designed a killer logo, motivated his teammates to work, and asked me to look up the Louis Vuitton logo to give him inspiration. This kid is on top of his game, and if he hadn't become a team leader, I wouldn't have know it because he tried to sleep through the last afterschool.
District 12 was going to be trickier. They didn't immediately yell out that they had a jjang, so I went over to pick a leader. As I was debating which of the two big personalities to give it to (Jiyoon or Dohyun), they both suggested Sunshine-Jonghan. Jonghan is my baby. He's B-level, so I never teach him, but I know him from walking home together. He's not tiny in size, but he has the softest, highest baby voice imaginable, touched with just a hint of a headcold, to make it impossibly cuter.
Imagine a snuggly golden duckling, preening its fluffy-feathered self in a sunlit meadow of dandelions. Now give the snuggly duckling a voice. The voice you imagine is Jonghan's.
Jonghan looked agreeable, regarding the idea of being team leader, and I knew him to be a good-hearted perfectionist, so all worked out well. He's going to enjoy the extra responsibility and I'm going to enjoy watching him be thoughtful and cuuuuuute.
District 3 was hardest. You've got Joohyun (quiet, B-level), Jaehyung (quiet, B-level, loves me from the bottom of his soul), Junho (A-level, sharp but quiet and very moody), and Sensitive-Jinhyuk. Not a natural leader among the bunch. I didn't even know who to offer it to. Junho openly suggested Jinhyuk, so at that point I no longer had a choice
Because even though my boy Jinhyuk had his head down on the desk, and has never once completed an assignment for me without me holding his hand (sometimes literally), I had to make him team leader. Because even if he does a horrible job leading his team, it's better than me showing a lack of confidence in him. If I said, "No, I think Junho should be team leader," it would have shredded Jinhyuk's self-esteem. Not that he cares about leading, but he does care about being believed-in. And that's what class is ultimately about, isn't it?
Anyhoodle, I love my afterschool. We're going to have a rollicking good time next week.
----------------------------------------
