Korean Job Discussion Forums

[alljokingaside]

Hey,

I'm teaching a relatively low level (high for the school) after school convo class [solo]. So far, I've just done listening/Q&A exercises with songs (+lyrics) and Lost (w/ problematic vocab. list). Not sure how much the student are into it; The supposedly medium class size of 15 whittled down to 7 at the start (no shows). The last class I held went down to 4-5
Has anyone had any success with textbooks? If so, which? The only thing I've found so far has been a promising text called Jazz English and a regular fill in the blank, listen to John and Jill talk book (a similar one for a foreign language I took really wasn't any help to me at all)

Kids are high school fresh/soph. age, btw


Thanks!

[Fishead soup]

I've used Lost in the past it's great. Their is also lots of Korean content. Ask one of your higher level students about Jins Korean speaking ability.
He is a Kypo and most Koreans consider his Korean speaking to be really poor. I use Korean pop songs that are subtitled in English 2ne1 is big now.
I also use Andrew Finches" Tell Me More" the handouts are available on the TESL journal under things for teachers. It's mostly survey questions pairwork. Students sit together and ask questions. If a student is distracted or alone I get them to ask me the questions.

[aske]

Why don't you talk to your students?

[ThingsComeAround]

Andrew Finch is good

I use a book (for moms, but it is still good) called Speak Out 잉크리쉬 which isn't all that great for learning English, but it makes for easy topics to talk about with some little translation in Korean for your students.

If you do use that book, keep in mind it wasn't written by a foreigner and some of the text should be changed to make it more "natural". If you read it you'll know what I mean.

[Kaypea]

The good thing about it being 4-5 students now is you can have a more intimate conversation type class

Plan some structured free talk into the class. General interests are stuff like... food, music, clothes... make a list of open questions, provide basic sentence structure for answering questions if you think they need it, and have them ask eachother questions in pairs. Then, as a class.... one kid chooses another to ask, and sit back and hear the communication.

This won't fill the whole class, but it satisfies the "conversation" element of conversatio.

[machoman]

something that i do, that takes up a lot of time and can be potentially fun for your students is to use videos and technology, as in, making your own videos. my afternoon class made a vlog thing where they taught korean lessons to foreigners, taught korean recipes, etc.

this year, i have them dubbing over their textbook videos and it's been hilarious.

i tried asking my students what they want to do, but they always have lame ideas like "watch movies!" or "play games!"

[alljokingaside]

today, i think it's settled at 5 students. woot
so somewhat in reverse order,

the vid. idea seems REALLY cool, but school lacks/prob. won't provide funds. we just got the laptop-tv hookup back up and running after...1/2 yr? for the <3 yr laptop the school provides. i'm still waiting on my Apples and Oranges. maybe if i start whinging a bit more and oscillate my voice in a shrill, yet cute manner...

the best students in that class can understand basic questions (one actually understands at speeds greater than stabbing-my-brain-with-a-q-tip slow) answer in superfragmented ways (eg "is this character's portrayal realistic?" [all defined ON THE BOARD, asked while pointing] ....[silence] "sunho!" "no." "why?" "movie. no." or "no. scissors. hands.")

that's the best kid in class.

i've been thinking more about books, but that's the crap they've already had with their "normal" English class and it still hasn't sunk/been read. oy

like, it seems they want to improve their skills, but generally don't want to put any/minimal work into it. so movies and QnA it is!

[blackjack]

[Kaypea]

[alljokingaside]

[quote="blackjack"]