Korean Job Discussion Forums

[CleverUserName]

Okay, I've been encouraged to use more humor and fun in my elem/middle school classrooms. I have a reasonable grasp at making adults laugh, but kids baffle me.

For example, to illustrate the words 'broken' and 'fixed,' I unscrewed my inkpen and showed them the various parts. They thought this was hilarious.

And there's the classic out of order sentence 'What's drinking Cindy?' illustrated by Godzilla, a girl and a cup.

Aside from that, anyone have anything that's worked nicely, especially for kids with limited English skills?

[John_ESL_White]

Short of putting on a clown costume, acting like an arse, and teaching crappily, I'm not sure what works for all elem/ mid school students.

I've been encouraged to do the same before. I left the place and found one geared more toward teaching rather than edu-taining.

good luck

[cruisemonkey]

I find a sense of humour helps.

P.S. Your ink pen was not broken... it was dismantled.

[Beeyee]

Talk about dong. Works every time.

[cruisemonkey]

[Missihippi]

OP, you don't have to come up with a comedy routine. For the younger grades, just incorporate a song or two per lesson. For the older students, just try to involve some physical humor so the material isn't so boring(i.e. dropping a book several times on purpose, writing things backwards, etc.). My kids seem to get a kick when i throw a random korean word into a lesson (i.e. I am sitting on kimchi, i sat on kimchi, i will sit on kimchi).

[sarbonn]

The kids really like absurd stories that I sometimes integrate. To an adult, it may sound really ridiculous, but I have a group of students that go into hilarious fits whenever I talk about evil squirrels who carry machine guns. And when they first asked me why they carried machine guns, it was to counter the evil teddy bears who use mind control to attack them. Yeah, corny and ridiculous, but it's just one of those things that kids tend to like. Now, the kids constantly bring up squirrels.

We have a book some of the kids are reading that has a cat named Henry in it as a very minor character. I talk about Henry all the time, and now all the kids bring up Henry the cat in almost all conversations and make all sorts of jokes about him.

Part of the trick is not to be the stand up comic the whole time, but to provide them with the material to kind of develop their own routines. As one person said before, you kind of have to have a sense of humor to do it. I approach adults differently and when teaching college classes, I use a completely different style of humor, but you have to be able to be flexible to the group you are addressing.

[tanklor1]

I used to be a boring teacher until I decided to say "truck it". Kids, often times, seem to be the only interesting people in this country. I find adults to be VERY touchy. I normally come up with stuff on the fly. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it depends on the lesson. For example. I had to teach body parts to 6 year olds, I'd draw a person on the board. Two arms,two legs, two eyes etc.. I'd go around the room asking each kid questions like "How many arms does he have?" then I'd erase three-quarters of an arm draw "blood" on the board with a red marker. I continued asking questions; whilst chopping off fingers, eyes what-ever. The kids loved it and were entertained and you bet your a$$ they know their body parts.

[saw6436]

I constantly walk around the room and randomly terrorize a student. Little stuff like flipping their hood over their head, takeing their pencil case, flipping their hood over their head AND tying it tightly closed. Keeps the kids focused on me and what my crazy a** is gonna do next.

When I teach "broke/broken" I take a students pencil. Break it. Then, use my stapler and tape to "fix/repair" it. (Give the kids a new pencil after class). When teaching cooking terms like "Chop, Slice", ... I use my razor knife to demonstrate on a kids eraser. (Have made one girl cry with that one).

I also randomly choose a student (different student each time) and they are designated as my "crash English dummy". That one poor S has to help me with any task necessary to teach the lesson. Role-play demonstratons, vocabulary, whatever. At first they shy away from it but 90% LOVE the attention. Kids scream for the chance to be the CED.

If you use drawings on the board make them insanely crazy. I mostly use cockroachs, dung, monkeys and random students with giant heads. Great fun and the kids pay attention to the front of the class.

Change games a-bit. In my class "Hang-man" has transformed into "Word Shark" and/or "Ossama bin Taliban". Again keeps them interested.

You don't have to be Bozo the Clown but you do gotta keep it spontaneous and fun for the kids. Whatever draws their attention and keeps them interested. (dung, boogers, blood, Godzilla, ....).

[D.D.]

They love everything Korean so try to be funny about Korean stuff.

I remember I had a n American friend who was a comedian in Australia. His first year there nobody laughed at his jokes and I had to explain that they were American jokes. Like he would to do impressions of people on the show Taxi but most Aussies had never watched that show.

So I always do a topic on Korean comedies and they explain who the people are and why it is funny. Gives me a sense of what they find funny.

[Zulethe]

Buy a clown suite. Run around like a monkey. Arm wrestle the kids. Pretend to have a heart attack and or stroke. Use the word pig a lot. They like the word pig

Gain a lot of weight and run around the classroom squealing like a pig.

Do your best impression of every retarded thing you've ever seen. Kinda like this thread?

Bring the principle in and punch stick your finger in his bottom all the while smacking him in his face

You see, creativity can't be learned, it's naturally born. This is why I'm hot

seriously mate...seriously!!

[CleverUserName]

A sense of humor?!?! Brilliant! Why didn't I think of that? <slaps forehead>

Part of my problem is I can understand what is funny for adults (at least adult English speakers), but kids, especially kids from a different culture than mine, that's a whole new ballgame. I haven't been around this many kids since I was a kid. I guess my question is: what makes kids laugh?

Thanks for the positive replies. I've noticed massive exaggeration works pretty well, especially with my stick people on the board, and randomly stealing pencil cases tends to keep the kids at least curious about what I'm up to. The recurring character is a good idea.

I don't think the clown costume is necessary, it's really not that kind of school. I just wanted to make the lessons a bit more interesting for everyone.

P.S. Broken-Dismantled. It's all the same to an 8 year old; the stupid thing just doesn't work.

[CleverUserName]

oops double post

[whatever]

I do not recommend breaking a kid's pencil to make a point. Not that it wouldn't make an English-relative point, but they make take it very personally/complain/cry/throw a fit/hit a classmate/get jeered about it and suffer a self-esteem issue/all of the above.

You will not be forgiven for it by the student, their friends or your CT.

[whatever]

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