Korean Job Discussion Forums

[captain kirk]

Well, you know, things are going all right at the haggie. But there's a certain pizzazz missing which I hope you can plug something in to zap things up a bit.

As long as it isn't a pizza/ramyon/snack part because teacher isn't a waiter and class isn't a stinking restaurant.

This class is 40 minutes a day four days a week. It's sweet. 10/11 year olds. The age I love to teach. They get right into it and no holds barred. They treat it like a participation sport. Mistakes! We don't need no stinking mistakes! NO SUCH THING!

I set it up as usual. Two teams. Always racking up points for responses. At the last five minutes of class there's a target game for five minutes. Pitching at a point target on the whiteboard. Ask a question and best response gets a shot. Then extra candy for the winning team. Everybody gets a candy.

The book is ok, just ok. I ask questions about the book/pictures. Give them new vocab they write in the margins. Ask them to make a sentence using a word. 20 minutes on this book.

Then, since they review it to death and it's pretty simple, some supplementary stuff. Handouts made from the book English Time (first book, book 1). Just those big pictures. I ask them about, and give vocabulary about, the big pictures. For five minutes just before the last five minutes which is the TARGET GAME (which winds things up actively and they're crazy about).

Can anyone inject some new method/activity into this?

I've thought about something, but it takes work, energy, and time. Free time, unpaid. It's a big pocket hanger. Basically a kind of tic tac toe using the pockets of which there are 12. In the pockets are cards with vocab. Make a sentence with the card. 2 teams going at this (I always have class halved into two teams).

Too much work, that. Long term project but once it's done it's done.

Another thing I've heard of is using a ball. A foam ball tested so that no matter how hard it's thrown to the side of someone's head it doesn't hurt.

Volley this to a person who asks a question then pitches the ball to the answerer and so on. Anyone doing this?

I think the ball thing is good for a short time and a way to shift gears a little into a little fun. But I've never steadily used it in class because it would probably be construed as a game by parents and get the boot as a class activity by command of the wonjonim via the mothers.

There's also the rowdy kid who really beans it into some shy girls head and she cries, which is messy.



This kind of thing. A five minute activity to incorporate regularly into the class time which works the materials in a fun way.

The other thing/possibility to and/or do would be 'testing'. Every class. Give them a paper and ask them to write down a sentence. Anyone doing this? I know it's conversation class but a little writing down to enforce the grammar structure/get it down of a sentence would be a wake-up. Especially to those kids who don't speak up much. The ones who speak up get the 'make a sentence' thing and do a good job. Those who don't speak, because they don't invest by trying, end up with one word responses. They haven't 'been there', in the sentence thing. Have been on the sidelines daydreaming, not committed.

Thanks, doctors and nurses.