Korean Job Discussion Forums

[sarahsarah]

Ok, my school's winter camp has been cut from two weeks to one week. However, to make up for the week they cut, they've doubled the hours per day.

My problem ...

I don't know how to fill and 8 hour blocks for 5 consecutive days with English only activities. My high school students have an incredibly low level of English and no motivation to do anything at all. After my summer camp experience, I know I'm walking straight into hell.

I think this is too much for one person to handle, especially since the kids don't speak English, can't understand simple instructions and my co-teacher won't be around to translate. I actually asked my co-teacher if we could hire someone else to help, she looked at me as though I was joking. I told her I was serious and she just said to break it up into activity blocks turned back to her work without further discussion.

I need suggestions on how to fill the time with worthwhile easy to understand activities or does anyone wanna come help me with this thing out of the kindness of your heart??

Also, I plan on showing one movie per day to help fill time. Any suggestions on good movies for the students to watch?

[blunder1983]

I made milkshakes with my classes, went across really well. (that was summer though)

Also did happy families which worked well and took up 2 hours (they stayed after to play). Happy families is a game like go fish only instead of suits you have family members in proffessions, So Mr Bun the Baker, Mrs Bun the Baker's wife, Master Bun the Baker's son and Miss Bun the Baker's daughter.

Spend a good session on them making the cards, first we brainstormed different jobs in Korea and things related to them. We had the Cabbage family of Kimichi makers, the Information family of Librarians.

As for movies, boys or girls? I'd get Love Actually, Bridget Jones and a few cartoon movies for the girls, a few action and horror movies for the boys.

Just do activities which arent really related to English but actually teach them without knowing it. This winter we're doing some science type things, growing a sugar crystal in a glass jar and writing it up in English, making invisible ink and then writing notes to each other in English. Etc. etc.

[some waygug-in]

Yikes!

I'd start with some songs - maybe from a Let's chant - 2 book or something.

origami - get them making something interesting. not paper airplanes.

exercises - get them doing something to burn off all that energy.

movement games - something involving running. ex: have different picture cards placed on alternate sides of the room. When you call out a word...students have to race to touch the right card. First person gets a point for their team.

This isn't much, but I hope it helps.

[peppermint]

If I can manage with elementary school kids, you can manage with high schoolers- at least yours won't try to cut eachother's hair.

8 hours straight of English is rough, but breaking it into blocks will help. Maybe a speech contest of some sort- give them a bunch of scripts and a half hour or so each day to practice, then watch them all on the last day.

Do some listening activities with pop songs, free talking about the movies. ESL games for a bit ( jeopardy is good and will kill some time) maybe a little writing of some sort?

As for movies- school of rock should go over well with either gender, Lord of the Rings is popular, and there's three of them ( and they're LONG!)

[Yu_Bum_suk]

At least you know your winter camp schedule. I still don't know whom I'm teaching or when. At least I'm actually looking forward to teaching my students in smaller, more intensive classes and actually getting to know a few more of them.

[denverdeath]

EIGHT HOURS...YIKES!!! I thought mine being two hours is long enough. Do you know how many students there'll be? I'd say take 'em skating on the last day...good afternoon activity and a good close to the camp...as long as your school allows it. Also, another good field trip might be to take 'em to a movie. Good activity having them organize it...what movie, how to get there, how much it's going to cost, etc...including transit time, that's one afternoon gone. Or, you could always introduce them to the world of Internet piracy in English. Get them to actually get a membership on an English torrent site and have them select the movie they want to watch and have them do all the work in one or two of the hours on day one...on day three, or whenever the download completes, have them scan and unzip it...do everything in English and watch it.

[ajuma]

Maybe have a "theme day" every day. One day "Halloween". Make masks, tell ghost stories (have them write/tell some themselves), trick or treat, bob for apples, make a "haunted house". Show a scary movie.

One day "Christmas"! Have "Secret Santas", make decorations and snowflakes, teach Christmas songs...show a Christmas movie (Rudolph or Frosty).

Others you could use: Valentine's Day, Thanksgiving, Easter, Arbor Day, Election Day (have students run for "office" and give speeches...in English of course!),

[EFLtrainer]

I think your best bet may well be a task-based approach: a student newspaper or magazine, for example. This lends itself really well to division of labor (editors, photographers, writers, layout, etc.) and is a very complex process.

Maybe a debate? Lots of research, but not much talking till the end.

Creative writing compilation? Editing and re-writes take lots of time, but also provide very valuable learning opportunities if handled well.

Skit-A-Day? (Just made this up.) Show a movie, talk about it, do some reading, writing, listening. Write scripts in small groups. Edit, edit, edit. Make cheesy/cheap-o costumes/sets. Practice. Perform.

Family Tree: Self-explanatory?

Cookbook? Gather the info, learn how to go through the motions/do the cooking, then do the cookbook as stated above for newspaper/mag.

In any of these there is ample opportunity for dealing with language on every level: Reading, writing, speaking, listening and grammar. Creativity in the planning stages is key. Also, being prepared to shift gears by the seat of your pants should something not work...

Good luck!!!

[Rteacher]

My lower-level classes last summer really liked "Go Fish" and "Crazy Eights" (by School Zone). My classes only had about 12 students in them, and I bought two packs of each card game. "Go Fish" can also be played with bigger classes by dealing out three-or-four cards to everyone and having them all get up to ask other students ("Do you have S snake?") till they match all their cards.

As far as DVDs, I prefer to show stuff that they are already very familiar with (Like the "Incredibles", some of the earlier "Harry Potter," "Shreck2," "Stuart Little2" ... ) so I can show them with just English subtitles. For newer - or older - stuff they're not very familar with (like the newest "Harry Potter" or the first "Shreck") I let them read Korean subtitles - but it might be a good technique - if it doesn't annoy them too much - to replay selected scenes using first Korean - then English subtitles. Some good seasonal flicks are the "Grinch" movies (both the Jim Carrey and the original Dr. Seusse classic TV version) and "Earnest Saves Christmas" (a couple of Hare Krishna friends of mine - with shaved heads - were paid to be featured extras at the Orlando Airport scenes...) I haven't checked out "Elf" with Will Farrell, but I'm sure it's funny...

[dulouz]

Camps are divided into AM and PM sessions. Mornings get English lessons, afternoons get "activities". You can teach them how to basket weave or tie knots or play music or whatever.

[Fat Sam]

I agree with EFLtrainer that cooking is a great way to pan out a day. I did it this summer and even though I expected at least one kid to cut a finger off or scald themselves with the hot water, it went really well. And I'm teaching elementary.

It all depends on whether or not your school will pay for the ingredients. The science department will have the burners. The way that I did it was to have a dialogue for buying and selling and a list of ingredients that the students had to buy, modelling it on a market (May I help you dialogue). After buying the stuff (print out some fake money) they have a recipe to follow, with you demonstrating.

I honestly didn't think they'd be up to it, but it was probably the most successful thing I've done. We made spaghetti bolognese from scratch and it was most satisfying to see thirty kids silently devouring their endevours after almost three hours. For me, that's an entire day of winter camp taken care of.

For the other days, I'd follow the previous suggestions of a drama/role-play (three minutes max but you might have to provide an outline of the script) which can fill a morning. I also did a science project -making a volcano, with written instructions in English. This winter, I might try the old 'make-a-rocket-out-of-washing-up-liquid-bottles' thing that I remember so fondly from my days as a four-foot sprog. It's a shame that we can't really do anything outdoors, as was possible in the summer.

Take winter camp as an opportunity to do things that you can't do in a single forty minute lesson. If you plan big, you might end up not having as much to do as you think (and yes, I did go to Yongsan and buy a few DVDs to fill out the whole week -Finding Nemo, Madagascar, they already love the Incredibles, Shrek 2 and that Shark movie with Will Smith).

[kathycanuck]

Sounds very difficult! You might want to try "inventions". Divide the kids into groups and have them come up with a new invention. They need to give it a name, describe how it works and draw a picture of it. Then they decide how much they would charge for it, and come up with an ad campaign to sell it to the public. For this phase you can discuss how adveritsers sell their products. Suggest they choose a famous person to endorse the product, and say why they think that person was appropriate.
If you want to extend the exercise, you could have them do a print and a TV campaign. Have each group do a presentation to the class: the group with the largest "sales" wins, and get a small reward (candy maybe). You can also reward other categories if you wish, ie best picture, best TV ad and so on. Hope this helps and good luck!

[GEOM]

[thursdays child]

Tough one! Lot's of hours, low motivation, low level..... Been in the same situation - one thing that worked for me was making the students make 'jumbo' sized board games - they could invent a game or make something like snakes and ladders. Get em' into making them pretty - then play them... lots!