As time goes by

Progression and regression. I started taking Korean class, and stopped about this time last year. I was going to class at that time, mostly to socialize with other foreigners. Now I'm studying on my own. I'd like to talk to the people I've known for over a year, the people i've never done much more than say hello, thank you, and okay to. It's an uphill battle learning a language. I'm listening to MP3's, reading some Korean survival, and repeating whatever I hear somebody else say.

In my classes, I've begun using a textbook. I have six books for six different classes. Super Kids English, I believe. I found it the right mix of easy to understand pictures, and tightly organized pieces of conversation.

The topics this week for the low level 1-2 class is classroom English. Make a circle, raise your hands, please be quiet, color, make a line, etc. Then the advanced 1-2 class embarks on expressing their feelings; happy, sad, cold, hot, sick, angry, etc. The 3-4 low level class is repeating the days of the week and trying to identify letters, and sounds. The 3-4 advanced class is asking where a class trip is going, and what they will do. The low level 5-6 class is talking about where people are from, and what language do they speak. Advanced 5-6 is asking about what vacation plans, and past vacation experiences.

It's tough keeping it all straight, but it's far easier than creating the topics, target language, and materials myself. Then deciding how to change the material so it's appropriate for each age group, and further changing to match level. The downside is that it's far more linear. This seems to bore the kids. At the least they are learning, or maybe memorizing.

Being the beginning of the Korean school year, former students have come back to visit. This is very pleasing. The middle school students don uniforms (live in these uniforms) and all chopped off their hair (per school rules).

Those who are still my students advanced to the next grade, and this has dramatically changed the chemistry of all our classes. There is an inexplicable excitement about this. The kids grow quickly. The kindergarten students had been some of my favorite. We started teaching them as an experiment. What started very slowly and painfully had become something quite special. Very very very slowly, and very very very painfully. And each day they had class they march in and yell, "HELLO! GOOD MORNING" From there it was chaos with moments, "ah-ha."