TGIF

It's Friday! Congratulations, everyone, you've made it through another week! As I look back, I consider it a satisfying week. Today I issued a test in one of my kinder classes, and everyone got at least an 80%. All of my students are still alive, and I really enjoyed my afternoon classes.

For those curious, here's how my days go. Monday through Friday, from 10-11:30 I teach 2 kindergarten classes (Koala and Swan). Sometimes I do lunch duty from 11:30 to 12 (supposed to be unless someone [David] doesn't eat his rice), then break until 12:30. At that time I teach the same 2 classes again until 2, usually switching out the subject, i.e. studying a story book (what idiot made "Growing Vegetable Soup?" no one likes reading it, and it doesn't even have a song, and who even likes vegetables? What 5-year-old, anyway?) or phonics (snooze).

At 2 o'clock, all the teachers convene to spend 1 hour preparing for afternoon classes, which commence at exactly 3:05 (????). Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I teach older kids (11-13) from 3 to 6, and Tuesday and Thursday I have afternoon kindergarten classes. These kids go to Korean kinder and have English supplementary classes in the afternoon; I absolutely love these kids. They are adorable in every way, and I only have to see them twice a week. :)

Several times this week, girl students have proclaimed, "I love you, Kate Teacher! You are so beautiful!" And each class period, Lena (one of the older girls) thanks me for teaching. I don't know how that couldn't be heart-warming.

For those accent enthusiasts that I know (Hi, Dad!) let me illustrate what I nail my kids for constantly. The "f" sound is foreign here; coffee becomes cop-ee, for instance. There is a commercial I see far too often that repeats over and over "Iced cop-ee, iced cop-ee" and I sigh. Yesterday I spent 10 minutes showing a class how to make the "f" sound, and I am pleased to report that it worked!

After replacing "f" with "p," it is time to move on to replacing the soft "i" sound. Igloo = eegloo. Feesh. Eecky. Eet. Ees. Good! Now add a vowel sound at the end of every word. "Feesh-ee." "Engleesh-ee." There you go! You are now speaking Konglish.

Now that I'm a legal alien, I get internet in 2 hours. My next post, hopefully, will be from the comfort of my apartment. Hooray!