I taught I taught!

Following our Thursday mountain triumph Ben and I had our first full on day of teaching. Fridays are long days, which means the school day goes from 2:50pm to 10:00pm. Unfortunately we have to come in at noon for our first month, so its a reeeeally long day for us. I was pretty nervous, but it went well for the most part. The class times change from 50 minutes, to 45 minutes, to 40 minutes, which completely flustered me. Each class also has different material so I am currently living in perpetual fear that I will completely fail to give one class the correct test or book or something. (I am told this goes away after the first month).

As with any teaching/child related experience, it really all depends on the specific class. I had some that were a lot better then others. My favorite class was with only three kids. They are fairly advanced but also really eager. Because Korean kids work SO HARD it is common for the older kids to check out and become less interested the longer they have been at ECC, so it was nice to be with students who stayed on topic and got through the material. The hardest class I had was actually around the same age group and level as the three kids, but there were like 10 of them. I had to get through about 9 pages of the book with them and Amanda warned me that they are just a rude bunch. They spoke Korean to each other through the whole class (this is forbidden since its English language learning) and I felt crappy about it because having to power through material on my first day with them left no time for anything fun, and did not make for a good first impression. BUT! There is plenty of time and I am hoping to have good times with all of my classes. Today will be my second full day of teaching. We will see how that goes.