Korean Job Discussion Forums

[jajdude]

I've got a good few classes these days where the material is simply too hard for the students. I've got kids who need to learn phonics trying to read at a grade 2-3 (American) level. They cannot read half the words, don't know the meaning, and just want to half-ass their way through it, which I do not blame them for. I blame the school for not knowing how weak these kids are at English. I'm thinking of getting other material to use, but photocopies do not jive with kids. Seems we are all pretending this has something to do with learning English. I use puzzles and games to ease the pain.

I've also got a couple of middle/high school student classes doing the ibT Toefl preparation books. They don't have the skills either, except for 2 or 3 students out of 10. One girl just joined the "intermediate writing" ibT class. I asked her, "What grade are you in?" Not a clue. She told me her school name in Korean. Of course the director says try to get them speaking! It's futile when the material I'm teaching is about writing paragraphs, or considering the pros and cons of somethings, and students can barely understand or speak two words. Well, maybe they understand more than that, especially when I write on the board. Speaking and listening skills are very low for most, however. Strangely some can write not so badly but are either unable or too timid to speak. I think reading is the easiest area of a foreign language, not sure about the others: they are all hard I think.

[oneofthesarahs]

Does your school ever do classroom rearranges based on skill level? Once a year, my school re-sorts the kids based on their in-class test scores. The resorting just happened this month, and several of my classes have already become easier to teach, because the classes who were doing well on the tests are doing the same material, or harder material while the the kids with poor scores are often re-doing old material.

My only complaint with this system is that it only applies to the younger classes. Once the kids hit a certain age, it seems like they are suddenly in TOEIC/Toefl overload. Some can handle it, some can't.

We also have a couple of "advanced" classes who have an additional special class with only the native speakers three times a week. But "advanced" basically translates to "parents willing to shell out the money," so the ability of the students is all over the map, and a lot of the course work is too hard for them.

[Darkness]

Skill level of my kids doesnt matter, they are sorted by age.

It's re-f'n-diculous....