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JacktheCat
Joined: 08 May 2004
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Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 5:03 pm Post subject: Raging Hormones in the Classroom |
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I've come to discover that teaching mainly upper middle-schoolers and high schoolers has one big drawback. Raging hormones.
Ah, summer is here. The weather is warm and a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love.
Just why does it have to be in my classroom.
Lately I been having problems with my students being more interested in romantic entanglements than learning English. They are not being disruptive or insolent, just "preoccupied."
Wondering how others have delt with this problem. What did you do and how did it work? |
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Clutch Cargo
Joined: 28 Feb 2003 Location: Sim City 2005
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Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 5:15 pm Post subject: |
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Teach them how to chat up the opposite sex in English.
Do dating role plays eg. eating out, buying movie tickets, getting a room...
Ask their date questions about themselves and family etc in English.
Could be a lot of fun if handled with tact and common sense. |
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kangnamdragon
Joined: 17 Jan 2003 Location: Kangnam, Seoul, Korea
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Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 5:41 pm Post subject: |
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Clutch Cargo wrote: |
Teach them how to chat up the opposite sex in English.
Do dating role plays eg. eating out, buying movie tickets, getting a room...
Ask their date questions about themselves and family etc in English.
Could be a lot of fun if handled with tact and common sense. |
maybe not getting a room for middle and high school students.... |
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katydid
Joined: 02 Feb 2003 Location: Here kitty kitty kitty...
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Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2004 6:57 pm Post subject: |
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A mixed high school? Fun!
I'd suggest maybe trying to find a way to work the gossip into the lesson. If you're doing superlatives or comparatives, ask about the boys and girls from the neighboring schools. If you are studying adjectives, ask your students what their ideal partner would be like. For hypothetical situations and giving advice, make up an advice to the lovelorn column. See what they have to say if they are in love with their brother or sister's best friend, their best friend's boyfriend or girlfriend, or they feel extremely lonely and want to date.
Any time I mention the word boyfriend, my girls' ears perk up*. It's hilarious. I now use it to get their attention. I guess you have to play into what they are interested in....
*Of course, with some classes, the word "Choco-Pie" works just as well, if not better.
Last edited by katydid on Fri Jun 11, 2004 4:20 am; edited 1 time in total |
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posco's trumpet
Joined: 20 Apr 2003 Location: Beneath the Underdog
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 3:53 am Post subject: |
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Make them do readings from 'agony auntie' letters in womens' magazines Then have them role-play/act out the letters.
Works great, and with college students, you can use Penthouse letters. |
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crazylemongirl
Joined: 23 Mar 2003 Location: almost there...
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 5:12 am Post subject: |
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my boys stink and alternate between tired and surly. We've been doing a lot of listening to music in class. One kid was doing his hogwon homework in my after school class today. I took it away and packed a sad and feel asleep. After unsucessfully trying to wake him up. I wrote 'please don't sleep in english class' on his cheek. His friends thought it rather amusing. |
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PEIGUY
Joined: 28 Mar 2004 Location: Omokgyo
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 6:43 am Post subject: |
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crazylemongirl wrote: |
After unsucessfully trying to wake him up. I wrote 'please don't sleep in english class' on his cheek. His friends thought it rather amusing. |
Remind me to never fall asleep in one of your classes! , why didn't you use the old ruler trick or yard stick whatever youw ant to call them just whack it hard on the desk if that doesn't make him jump than i would write on his cheek but whatever works! |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 7:42 am Post subject: |
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I've noticed the middle school boys have very bad strategies for winning the hearts and minds of the girls they're interested in. I think this is probably a function of the fact most of the kids go to all boys and all girls schools. Hagwon is the only time they associate with members of the opposite sex. They seem to pursue this "well she can't say she hasn't noticed me" strategy.
Like there's this one girl named Amy. Every time I call her name, this boy who likes her shouts out "HER NAME ISN'T AMY IT'S CRYING FACE!"
In another class when I call out this girl named Irene's name, this other boy shouts out "HER NAME ISN'T IRENE, IT'S CHICKEN HEAD!"
Boys boys. Calling the girls you like Crying face and Chicken Head gets you noticed, but it's not the right kind of notice.
Last edited by mindmetoo on Fri Jun 11, 2004 2:58 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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coolsage
Joined: 28 Jan 2003 Location: The overcast afternoon of the soul
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 7:53 am Post subject: |
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Good luck with that. I find that uni freshmen, having been gender-segregated since elementary school, have the approximate social skills of gerbils. Instead of the wooing and cooing one notices on a North American campus, there is punching and hair-pulling more characteristic of twelve-year-olds. Sad and pathetic. They never grow up; they just grow old. |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 2:57 pm Post subject: |
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coolsage wrote: |
Good luck with that. I find that uni freshmen, having been gender-segregated since elementary school, have the approximate social skills of gerbils. Instead of the wooing and cooing one notices on a North American campus, there is punching and hair-pulling more characteristic of twelve-year-olds. Sad and pathetic. They never grow up; they just grow old. |
lol it heartens me to know they don't grow out of it by university I was talking with a woman a couple months back who teaches at Korea U. She noted much what you said. These young men and women, ostensibly some of the best Korea turns out, have the socialization level of Grade 10s. |
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crazylemongirl
Joined: 23 Mar 2003 Location: almost there...
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Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2004 5:12 pm Post subject: |
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PEIGUY wrote: |
Remind me to never fall asleep in one of your classes! , why didn't you use the old ruler trick or yard stick whatever youw ant to call them just whack it hard on the desk if that doesn't make him jump than i would write on his cheek but whatever works! |
Acutally I had bashed on his desk a couple of times... hence the writing. This time it was only a ball pen. next time I will use a marker and my digicam is coming out. |
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