Korean Job Discussion Forums

[rapier]

I have fought solidly with my unruly middle schoolers for 6 months solid. this being a zero discipline hagwon, they know they rule, as their parents are well paying cusomers.
At one point I remember shouting full bell into their ears at point blank range to make them open their books. Never mind all the other "moments"- which usually bore no fruit...
Today I decided to forget about forcing them to read the usual passages in their staccato mumbling way.
Instead I just started taking the **** out of Korea. Suddenly they sat up and listened. I was onto a good thing. "Korea is a useless country..it ranks about 25th in importance in the world..as for the olympics..winning at table tennis is pathetic, its not even a real sport..blah blah" I went on, tearing to shreds every Korean nationalist point of pride possible, ending by accusing them of stinking of Gimchi.
A miracle occurred- suddenly they were actually reaching for words to express themselves in English, tripping over themselves to make correct and complete sentences...
I'm not even going to take the worst girls threats to get her dad to hit me and deport me out of Korea..I could see she'd enjoyed a lesson for the first time.

[jajdude]

Good one rapier.

Anything of interest works.

[cacheSurfer]

thats one of the best ideas i've heard in a long time.
next monday...when those kids piss me off i'll finally know how to respond.

-CS.

[Alias]

The only problem with that might be that the parents will complain to your boss.

[cacheSurfer]

[mog]

Just say you're preparing them for the onslaught of ignorant people who will say bad things about Korea in English. You are teaching them to defend themselves.

[yoda]

It doesn't sound like a good long term strategy though.

[U.S.A.]

Did you preface your comments with something along the lines that your words were indicitave of some non-Koreans? Or were your lines based on personal feelings? Getting students riled in order to get them to talk can be useful but must be done carefully.

If this was just a way of venting, it shows poor lack of judgement and extreme immaturity.

I currently teach at a middle school in America (worked in a middle school in Korea also), and too many teachers actually lower themselves to the mental levels of many middle schoolers.

As I recall my mentality at that time, I often said things just to get a rise out of my teachers, and when they bit, I fired off more idiotic comments.

[Walter Mitty]

I did something similar when one student brought up the "5,000 years of history" bit this week.

I asked him what Korea had accomplished as a nation (or people) or what they had contributed to the world in those 5,000 years.

Nobody in the class could come up with a single thing.

[Saxiif]

[mithridates]

I think this is a good strategy if you could find a way to explain to the parents that you are teaching them how to debate. If your school has really good resources you could probably tape a clip of Hard Talk from BBC to show them what you're talking about. Mention that he always takes the opposite view of the guest regardless of his personal opinion on the matter.
I bet your attendance goes up as well.

[crazylemongirl]

I would use this one carefully. I use a lot of humor in my classes. For instance my 2nd graders were studying pets this week so I went looking for interesting pics to show my students. This:



was a big hit. Especially when I leave it for last and tell them that this five class. They all you noooooooooo.

That said my 3rd years are a surly and grumpy most days and teaching them is like pulling teeth. But even they have their moments

[Dalton]

That's funny Rapier. A lot of us can add concept that to our bag of tricks. Comment on their hair, clothes, favorite singer or some other relevant cultural icon for that age group. Figuring out what they like talking about is a challenge. It sure isn't using tenses or personal pronouns correctly.

[captain kirk]

Haha, rapier. Today, in a class of seven 13 year old girls an article was about George Bush. I knew it would be a laugh. It was from a really good textbook but which has some pages going on about American politics and history as if Korea gives a damn, particularly a one page biography about Bush (it's material for grade fours in America passed on into an esl book, good book, called ESL Reading Cards. They aren't really 'cards', one page then the next questions for discussion. It fits 30 minutes neatly). Well, of course, they all hate Bush-ee. I don't give a damn so that didn't get my goat. One girl immediately poked out the picture of his face with her pencil with a multitude of stabs, as if she was doing embroidery. The article mentioned the Vietnam War and I asked, 'did you know that the U.S. gave Korea lots of money in return for Korea's participation?'. They looked pouty and said that Korea gives more money to the U.S. They meant buying weapons systems, which Korea doesn't need, can make itself. Instead of being coerced into buying American. I said that back at the time of Vietnam Korea couldn't make planes and tanks and so on very well, but now they can. You're right, rapier, they sure do talk but it's a swill of brainwash that gives me a serious headache , the room starts getting too small, spinning around until they MAKE me belive and I'm like, 'it's true, your right, so right!'. Then we can talk about pop songs, little dogs, and joke around again.

[nasigoreng]

The older elemen. girls are crazy for

Dong Ban Shin Gay (korean boy band)

You can get them to talk about anything if you relate it to that boyband.

Also Harry Potter and Spiderman for the boys.