Korean Job Discussion Forums

PatrickSiheung · Joined: 21 May 2003

I'd like to know how many of you waste hours and hours every month filling out reports and writing teachers comments about each student. I wouldn't mind it so much if we didn't have to stay at school to do them.

Anyone else going through this hell??

Dalton · Joined: 26 Mar 2003

I only had to do that at one school- every 6 weeks. About 100 students. They let me devise my own report card. I had standard comments that I used so I didn't mind it. I had a week to do them which always covered a weekend. It took me a couple mornings to complete them. I didn't have to do them at school.

I also kept a running record of how I'd grade the students and comments. It was great for class discipline, shortening the time to write reports and teaching the students effectively. I had a chart with all the students in each class and the appropriate headings.

Compared to schools I've worked without reports I'd say that reports from teachers have the potential to help maintain class discipline. It helped me in may ways. Sometimes I'd just pull out my clipboard and say evaluation and they'd all snap to. But they never really knew for sure when I was evaluating them. I didn't really care for formal testing evaluations. Kids respond differently to that pressure.

I had a kid crying all day last week because she did poorly on a written test given by the KT. But she is one of the top students at my school in pronunciation and simply speaking English to me. It's a shame that fact will never be recorded and reported to her parents.

Corporal · Joined: 25 Jan 2003

I don't have to do report cards.

sistersarah · Joined: 03 Jan 2004 Location: hiding out

yes, over 200 friggin report cards a month.....i've decided to "forget" about august though, since i've been teaching extra classes.....oops!

hojucandy · Joined: 03 Feb 2003 Location: In a better place

NEVER!!!!

PatrickSiheung · Joined: 21 May 2003

For those of you that do write report cards... are you stuck doing them by hand? Or are you able to type them up?

ajuma · Joined: 18 Feb 2003 Location: Anywere but Seoul!!

Believe it or not, I actually LIKED writing report cards when I worked in a hagwan! I made me really think about each kid and whether or not they had improved. I could do them at home, so it was no problem. I DID get a little tired of writing "Your child needs to study for his/her spelling test EVERY WEEK!!!!"

Demophobe · Joined: 17 May 2004

Dalton · Joined: 26 Mar 2003

lookingtoteach · Joined: 18 Feb 2003

THe first time I did report cards it was after I'd been there only five days and the director got pissed off that I didn't put anything more than "Jason is doing well in this class. Keep up the good work" even though I had no idea who Jason was from a hole in the wall. After that we did them every month for elementary/middle school and every two months for the kindys. It was just checking off poor/fair/good/very good/excellent (we weren't allowed to use poor or fair unless given permission by the director) and writing a four line comment, but we had over 80 month each to do.

wylde · Joined: 14 Apr 2003

i use to do 170 a month.. really pissed me off cuz 80% of the parents couldn't understand english anyways.

Dalton · Joined: 26 Mar 2003

Wylde- you're funny, your avatars funny and I'll bet your post hits the mark for teachers doing report cards right now. Nicely done.

ajuma · Joined: 18 Feb 2003 Location: Anywere but Seoul!!

I guess Wylde and I are going to butt heads again! I think that most of the parents DO understand a fair amount of English. They may be shy about showing it, but a lot of them DO understand and actually WANT their kids to learn something! I WILL grant that there are a fair number that use hagwons as babysitters, but that doesn't mean that they don't understand English.

animalbirdfish · Joined: 04 Feb 2004

ThePoet · Posted: Wed Aug 25, 2004 5:10 pm Post subject:

When I first came to my school, I didn't even hear about a report card until 3 months later. I was told at the time we did them every three months. I never minded, because that was fairly standard back in Canada too.

Now we do them once a month -- but they are combined with their attendance sheet. We mark their attendance, we mark the dates we give them homework, we mark their test scores on the dates we give them tests, and we provide running commentary about attitude, behavior, and ability. We started this new system two months ago, and maybe its just my imagination, but I am really noticing an improvement in classroom management, work ethic, and even some improvements in language ability.

I first was really against the once a month reporting -- but now I am really happy with it.