Day 398

Tuesday January 19

My blog is getting boring. Its all about the monotony these days.

It was up in the 40's today! I've never been excited about cold weather. I'm just glad its a tad bit warmer!

There was another earthquake...This month there have been earthquakes in Haiti, Argentina, Venezuela, Guatemala and the cayman islands. Thats 5 earthquakes all in a short time. What is going on? Haiti is the only one where people are reporting mass devastation. I haven't even heard anything about damages or deaths from the other 4.

1st class was good. We talked about various issues. The titles of lessons was “can you explain why” and “with whom do you agree”.They did a good job.

2nd class was a struggle as always.We did 2 speaking lessons-birthdays and hospitals.The two chatty boys talked all class long…They are constantly laughing and talking no matter how many times you tell them to be quiet they won’t listen.It’s a joke when you tell them to be quiet..one of them doesn’t bring his book so they share and don’t write answers down-I’m not going to be lenient on them on test day..You don’t pay attention-then I don’t care if you do badly..no hints, no reminders. Its not like the care about their grade anyway. Those 2 boys say they've been studying since they were 5. They are probably 11 or 12 now and their English isn't that great. I'm trying to help them, but there's not much you can do for people who don't want to be helped. The other 3 students were good and participated so I gave them a sticker but not the other 2 boys.One boy talks too loudly and I have to keep telling him to talk quieter…they did good on the lessons….you read a story and answer questions…when I asked what they wanted for birthday they wanted friends.

The 3rd class was our Newspaper class..Our topics were: twins with different birthday,strawberry crab, burj kahlifa in dubai, and foods that are harmful to dogs.The class was decent.One of my mwf students came to class(if he comes to my class on Friday he'll hear the same thing again)…He answered most of the questions…some students wont read or pay attention…The chatty boys continue to talk. I asked one of them to move to another seat, but he wouldn't. Maybe next time I'll just send them out of the room. I don't care where they go, just get out!

My last class was good. We did 2 speaking lessons on pet people and mobile phone etiquette. They did a good job. We finished early and let them play. Boys wrote on board. I played a game with the girl. One of the boys asked me if I spoke Korean. I told him I speak a little. He told me that the chatty boys were saying bad words in Korean. I knew that. He told me to tell them ‘joyonghihae’ which means be quiet in Korean. He was also surprised when I wrote words like etiquette, polite, courteous in Korean. I think its easier to understand if they know the Korean word that goes with it. I find the words on a translator.

Maybe one day I’ll come back, study hard, and become fluent in Korean and I’d be a big help to the students