Update: English Camp (week 2 & 3)

I'm in my 3rd week of winter camp. Not much has changed, except that I have fewer students, some of which are just way too hyper! My 5th grade class has only 4 boys and they're all boys. I was teaching them parts of the body - simple things: leg, hand, fingers, arm, neck etc...

I guess boys will be boys regardless of where they're from or their age. They had to label each other with Post It's and for some reason they thought it hilarious to place these labels on their crotch. Sigh...

So I tried another activity with them. I taught them how to speak of ailments when they go to the doctor, like how to say "My arm is sore" or "I have a headache"

I had them do role plays - one was a doctor, while the other was a patient. And I gave them toilet paper to use as 'bandages'.

And then there are students who are just exceptional...like these:

These are my all time favourite 6th grade students. ...love them to bits!

Update: English Camp (week 1)

My first week of English camp is over, and I have to do some damage control.

EFL teachers will agree that lesson plans don't always work out as well as they seem on paper. Many times, I had to think on my feet and alter the lesson plans to suit the class. Also, children vary - I had a mixture of classes...either very lethargic or way too energetic.

Some activities that worked are the ones below. I had various body parts written on Post It's and had the children label a "model". They had fun with this one, although I had trouble trying to keep the 'model' still!


Korean kids love the cartoon character, Spongebob Squarepants so when I taught shapes, I had them draw Spongebob! (That's my drawing on the board...not too bad, eh ^^)


For my 6th graders, I was teaching them adjectives, so in pairs, I had them create their very own cartoon character with 'special powers' and they had to present their new superhero to the class - saying why he/she was so special...


This was by far the most popular. When I taught prepositions to the classes (all grades), I had candy all over the classroom - under the chairs & tables, behind pot plants, on the window, on the mirror, next to the computer etc... The kids had to search for the candy, and come and tell me where they found it. Eg, "The candy was behind the computer"

Salaam-E-Ishq

from google images

I've been out of the Bollywood scene for a few months, so I'm well aware that Salaam-E-Ishq is "old", but I recently watched it on DVD and now I'm so regretting it.

Films that can boast a star-studded cast tend to do well (example: Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna). Salaam-E-Ishq stars Anil Kapoor, Juhi Chawla, Salman Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Akshaye Khanna, Ayesha Takia, John Abraham, Vidya Balan, Sohail Khan, Isha Koppikar, Govinda and Shannon Esra (who, by the way is a South African actress!)

The film is poor - mainly because there are just too many plots happening at the same time.

I fast-forwarded through almost the entire film...the only story I could bare to watch was the John-Vidya story. They're married and in love when Vidya loses her memory in an accident.

The Anil-Juhi-Anjana story had potential, but it clearly wasn't carried through. It spoke of a real subject... a middle aged man who nearly succumbs to the temptations by a younger girl.

The story between Sohail-Isha are a waste of time, as are Salman-Priyanka's. Even the Govinda-Shanon story was lame... she travels from Canada to India to stop her Indian boyfriend from getting married... and in the interim, falls in love with her cab driver.

Some of the dialogues are just way over the top and cheesy. The only thing that was worth seeing was the song/dance items.

Anyways, that's just my 2cents :)

Fun with froth

Teddy bear face that my friend, Sun Young made from the froth in a Starbucks Green Tea Latte

Mind your language, kids!!!

One of my 4th grade students pointed this to me today.
"Not me," he said. I realized it must have been from the previous class that I had.
"What is it in English?" I asked.
He look at his friend and just said, "Bad word."

So I took a pic of it & asked my Korean friend what it meant.
"Son of a b*tch"

...written by a 3rd grader!
*sigh*

Fun in the snow!!!

This is what I saw when I stepped out my apartment building this morning @ 8am:

The walk to school:

My 4th grade class was so good this week, so we had half of the lesson outside - competition to build snowmen. To make it more English-orientated, they had to tell me parts of the body they were building (in English) like body, head, eyes etc...

Girls in my class

This boy is so cute - always keeping the rest of the class quiet for me!

This boy was crazy not to be wearing gloves!!!

This boy was charging for me with this snowball!!!

K-Pop: Big Bang & Wonder Girls

K-Pop (Korean Pop) is HUGE! What's the most interesting thing is that the chart-topping artists are sometimes under 21 years old!

Two specific songs have played endlessly in Korea since I arrived. The first one is by a group called Big Bang - a boy band. I'm actually crazy about this song...not quite sure when it'll grow stale with me.



This song's chorus is "Tell Me" - my students go nuts over this song and is sung by a group called Wonder Girls (a group of really young girls)