Korean Job Discussion Forums

[khyber]

To get right to it, I think it may be a good idea to sticky this thread....i think; depends, of course, on whether people use it.
Most folks workin' in a public school will have to deal with at least a few of these kiddies and it would help everyone out if folks knew of a few tips or (even better) a few websites that would help them out.

I'll get started with one of my three kids:
I think that this boy may be Tourrettes. I actually need a bit of help.
I thought he may be ADHD but as it turns out, he is incredibly adept at focusing in on certain things.
Some identifying things:
1) He's quite ticcy, BUT not 100% of the time
2) He has (what could best be described as) a fascination with swear words. Even when he is the littlest bit upset, they REALLY come flying out of him
3) He's quite emotionally fragile and sensitive
4) He has the strangest learning aparatus I've ever seen. The boy will sit and draw scribbles and write curse words in his textbook, quietly muttering all the way, BUT EVERYTIME without fail, if I ask him a question pertinent to what we are studying he almost nails it: 95% style. We had our testing last week and he actually got about 80%.
5) He seems pretty aware of his environment but it doesn't seem to affect him when he's concetrating.

I wasn't even sure if he had any sort of problems until today. Before when he has come to class, he hasn't lasted more than a couple minutes before someone would set him off on cursing and crying. Today, he was quite happy actually...smiling and twitching (well, more like semi-controlled spasms) like CRaZY for a few minutes; then he calmed down.

Good kid and quite bright. As a general state of mind, he seems quite happy; not the general malaise or slight depression of ADHD.

I found this website that seems quite handy for tourettes:

http://www.tourettesyndrome.net/behavior_hone.htm

This is for ADD/ADHD
http://www.addinschool.com/elementary.htm


Hope that this helps someone. And if you have other questions/stories/students you are concered about, let's share here!

[Juregen]

Have you met the parents?

Do they seem overly traditional or more relaxed people. I would first find out what the parents are like, it could be a problem that the parents somehow misunderstand the kid and therefore not capable of resolving the issue.

When there are problems with kids, always try to meet the parents first, their behaviour alone can sometimes explain for a lot of things.

[khyber]

The parents are unavailible to me.
But I think his behaviours are beyond just social misbehaviours (which would certianly be from parents)....this seems neurological.

[Alyallen]

I would have someone talk to the parents on your behalf. Parents here can be very defensive about the possiblity of a disease, disorder or impairment in their child (and before anyone says anything, this isn't limited just to Korean parents). I wouldn't be quick to decide what his problem is. It could be tourette's, it could be another disorder, it could be a social impairment or any combination of things. I would look more towards looking at how to avoid things that set him off. If he writes curse words in his book and scribbles and doesn't disrupt the class, I would let him do it if he is as aware of his surrounding as you claim.

I used to work with Autistic children and adults and from my limited experience some things simply are not what it seems.

Just my 2 cents. In any event, at least you care enough to try to find a solution to his issues.

Good luck!
Alyson

[Hotpants]

I agree that many ESL teachers in Korea must have experience of teaching some kid who has something mentally wrong with them. These kids are placed in regular school classes; there is often no transfer of information about particular kids problems to the ESL teacher; and the kids are expected to learn under the same conditions as the other kids with a teacher who probably has no special needs training.

As you are probably not the homeroom teacher for this particular child, I think all you can do is try to get some communication going between you and the actual homeroom teacher about the behavior of this child and establish ways in which you can both consistently handle the behavior. A child who has some problem processing information around him isn't helped by having different types of disciplining techniques thrust upon him. I don't think as the foreign teacher, that it is suitable for us to approach a child's parents about such a problem. It's often too sensitive an issue with many parents often being in denial in the first place that something is wrong.

It's really challenging to teach a special needs student, especially when you have to manage up to 30 other unruly kids at the same time. One teacher gave me advice about trying to sit a problem student who was very disruptive next to the teacher's desk and giving them supplementary tasks such as coloring worksheets to occupy them when other assignments were finished. It did alleviate the disruption the kid had on other students, but it still wasn't a perfect solution.