Korean Job Discussion Forums

[ohme_ohmy]

So my school recently opened a class for 5th graders and so far we have just 2 boys. I teach them a 40 minute period of United States History (I know, I know...) and it's really dry stuff. We are reading about the regions of the US, the early people and civilizations (native Americans, Mayans, etc.), right now.

Not to mention, the material is not easy. I teach this class at the very end of the day and the boys are desperately trying to stay awake. I know this is part of the hagwon "keep my kid going til he drops" situation, but it is PAINFUL for me as their teacher. I've tried just hanging out and talking to them for a bit, but as soon as we have to do anything from the book, they go into a vegetative state and I feel as though I am talking to myself.

Any advice on how I can make the time worthwhile for them? Sometimes we play hangman or pictionary, but playing the same two games all the time gets old.

Please help! Thanks.

[kimdeal54]

How much material do you have to cover each class? Because it's a hagwon, I'm guessing that you have little flexibility with what you have to teach. I empathise... sometimes the things we have to teach are really dull.

It sounds like you have some time to play around with if you can hang out and play Hangman, so you could take a look online for some pictures that you can print out and use as supplemental material... cartoony-style pictures work well usually, or maps (e.g. a simple map showing the areas in which Native American tribes lived in). That way, you could look at the pictures together, relate them to the text you've covered, and it might break up the lesson a bit.

Students are also impressed by extremes... so you could do a little bit of research, and tell them some interesting facts about the time. I once taught a lesson on Olympic athletes, and the book made it sound incredibly tedious, so I checked the world records for the long jump, high jump, and so on... and then explained the records to the students by using the dimensions of the classroom.

If you have a computer, and projector in your classroom, this is even better... you can find funny video clips, show large images to get them thinking about things, or make short powerpoint presentations (sound effects work great).

If you can find any way to relate the topic you're teaching to their own lives, this might also work. Ask them to imagine what life was like during the time period, and give them examples of stuff they won't have considering (e.g. how the food tasted).

This all means that you'll have to put in more effort during your prep time, but it'll be worth it if you can engage them.

Hopefully, this helps a bit.

[fugitive chicken]

have them do mini art projects on the material? I remember doing that as a kid, and absolutely loved them! Like create a Mayan calendar or maybe make a comic strip for that time period?

Maybe get them more involved and excited about the reading, see who can read the loudest, quietest, oldest, highest, lowest, etc.

Make wordsearches and activity packets for the vocab, www.eslhq.com has a wordsearch maker.

Writing and/or drawing projects as A day in The Life of a Native American. or If I were the First President of the United States....

Making paper bag or sock puppets for people of that time period and creating a puppet show (I've always had success with this one!)

Since they are boys and if they are studying about a war, play a version of battleship or Union vs. Confederates, etc...

These are all projects that help reinforce what they are learning in the book and helps bring history alive...even if it is completely irrelevant to them since they don't live in the States.

THose are all the ideas I have off the top of my head..I hope this helps!

[chrisassd]

Something I love doing and has enlivened some of my most lethargic classes is getting them to place bets on things within the material. It works best with a listening class where there are multiple choice questions where no one knows the answer however I'm sure it can be adapted.

Go through the pages to be covered and make multiple choice questions based on facts and figures, eg; how long ago did X happen? a) 100 years b) 120 years c)150 d) 200 etc. Then get them all to place their bets without having seen the material, write them on the board as a tally chart. I find this makes them eager to find the answers for the sake of competition. As you go through the material the answers will become apparent and a winner will emerge.

I find it works well on its own but introducing small prizes would probably be even more effective.

Good luck.

[SeoulNate]

that is one horrible history book if it is teaching the students that the Mayans lived in the current US. Furthest they made it north is to the middle of mexico.

[ESL Milk "Everyday]

If your entire class is always just you standing there talking and the kids sometimes answering questions, but mostly just feeling lost, it's always going to be boring.

My advice is to give them a project... if you're just beginning, make it a general topic that relates to them personally. A good one would be something like 'what interests you the most about such and such? Why?' and then give them an appropriate word limit. If it's history, something that's always interesting is to give them a scenario, like say 'how would you have handled (this event) or why do you think so and so did this?', and then ask them what they would do. Or maybe you could get them to compare Korean history to American history.

Break it up into several classes where they have to look for vocab first, then take it up, then they have to write.

Honestly, the absolute worst and most backwards way to teach a class is to just stand there and do everything yourself.