Korean Job Discussion Forums

[khyber]

Re: incredibly shy students.
I have a B.Ed, but i have to say that this experience has been outside of my sphere of influence; i have a quiet boy in my middle school class.
And when i say quiet, i also mean seemingly stubborn.
I have tried various methods to get him to LIFT up a pencil but things...

well, put it this way, today on my daily lesson timer that i hand to the WJN i wrote "bang my head against brick wall".

KC (the student) and i managed to exchange a few moderate pleasanties at the beginning of class and we talked about the festival tomorrow. I asked him if he was going to dance or sing and he said no. We took out our warmup sheet for the speech context (much later in the year) where we needed to complete 4 questions with 3 sentences each.
I encouraged him for no doubt 20 solid minutes; changing the tone of my voice (firm, kind, encourage, etcc....); changing the distance between him and i (from seated across the desk to opposite sides of the class); various amounts of eye contact and communication in general. The boy said and did nothing (by that i mean he didn't lift up his pen). He would tease me a bit by bringing his hand to hover over it but never managed to grab it.
I waited another 2 or three minutes. Then had to step out for a minutes; rubbed my face and went to the teacher's room to try and get a korean teacher to encourage them.
Now this boy has a bit of a reputation. Anytime someone calls his house, the line becomes silent. Even when our yi sa jang nim called, all old KC did was "....*sigh*...." and that was it. Any korean teachers, no matter how they speak nice, OR yell, not a peep will he issue forth.
Anyways, not surprisingly the korean teacher walked up to the classroom, saw it was KC (by himself, i might add) and said, "Is he behaving?" "Yes but i need help to encourage him" i reply.
"Just .....do...your best ". And she closed the door.
Now while i didn't expect a miracle, i was hoping she would SAY something. But nothing.
Oh well.
And then,....a glimmer of hope. He wrote a sentence. And i said nothing. Though he wrote it incredibly sloppy and i think i may have been overly critical of it (saying "You can read that?" with a hint of surprise).
then back under the shell and that was it.
For 50 minutes, not a thing. Then i thought to lure him into communicating by playing a card game.
So i get the cards and decide to play gin. The boy plays with his cards but doesn't even bother to look at them. Even after i virtually begged him to look at his cards and play.

Usually, there are 3 students in that class, but today two were absent. It's a bit awkward cause the other boy in class is so not keen on working (and doesn't know a thing) that he's decided to clam up as well. The poor girl must feel TOTALLY picked on that i only "end up" talking with her and constantly getting met with a blank stare and a hard wall when i ask the o boys

does ANYONE have ANY tips on what to do. I'll take anything for getting this kid to come out of his shell. I don't care about the other kid; he's pretty much as good as gone. Dude regularly plays 14 hrs of computer games every weekend. I'm surprised his brain has held out that long.
doofus

[joe_doufu]

[Ya-ta Boy]

I have no constructive help to give. I think I would have given up far earlier than you did. Probably take out a book and sit somewhere comfortable and read, keeping an eye on him so he doesn't skip out early. Maybe he'll get bored and try some interaction with you. Maybe not.

[EH]

Ya-ta boy's advice may work. When you run out of other ideas, definitely try that at least once.

You could also try withholding something really desirable from him (pizza, a gaming magazine, hilarious cartoons or pictures, a gameboy or other gadget, etc.) and see if you can get him to react. Or, you could try doing something really annoying to him to see if that causes a reaction (keep it within reason--fingernails on the blackboard, drumming on his desk, snooping in his bookbag, drawing an ugly portrait of him, etc.). The point of these activities would just be to elicit some form of communication from him. Once communication starts, you could try to nonchalantly shape it into more productive forms of interaction.

Good luck. You're really going to need it.
-EH

[SweetBear]

It sounds to me like you are giving him way too much attention. His lack of response is a classic way to assure he gets the attention he desires. A form of passive aggressive behaviour. Two things have worked for me.

A:Ignoring the student in question and giving lots of attention and praise to other students. Let him in on your attention only if he earns it. Making the lesson really fun, something that he would want to be a part of, yet not asking for his input.

B: Really being firm to the point that your voice is raised, you are in his face, you won't take any more bull and the director and his parents are gonna get wind of this right now. (Slapping the hand on the desk.)

I really prefer to use the former, but the latter has worked on more than one occaision.

All that being said, you may be dealing with some serious issues that is not within your power to resolve. Any number of factors could be contributing to this, home/school, etc. if you have an idea that this is the case, you might put your energies elsewhere, as nothing you do will really make an impact I don't think.

Good luck, I've been there...

[funplanet]

I have had a few extremely shy students and I found, in my experience, that talking to them (even if they do not respond), including them in the exercises, etc, a little comedy, a little show of caring, etc works great....
I had one girl who would not even look up (12 years old) and it took 3 months to get her to even speak....now, 8 months later she is one of my favorite students....always eager to participate...

perhaps a little "love" is all they need

[khyber]

i've actually been teaching this little dude on and off for 3 years (from 5th grade to 1st middle school).
He's always been hestitant to talk to me, but, and this is the real kicker, the guy has some of the best listening comprehension i've ever seen. His toeic tests are outrageous in the listening catagory, it has nothing to do with an inability to understand.

thanks for the advice.
"Show and tell" for this kid would be more like "don't bring anything and sit in your desk trying not to look at the teacher"

had it been any other kid, i think it'd work good. And go fish? I played gin with him and tried to get him to say ANYTHING..even count his points. sad stuff.

SB:

[The evil penguin]

Just be satisfied in the knowledge that the world NEEDS taxidrivers and dump truck drivers..... the kid'll become a useful part of society even if his english sucks.....

Teachers and students need to meet each other halfway.... if you are fufilling your half of the job then thats all that matters...