The first week back from vacation usually sucks…

…and for the most part, this week was no exception. The fact it has gone from summer to winter this week probably has something to do with it though in all fairness. The end of last week was sunny and warm with clear skies (rare in Korea). I have to admit as much as Arizona has going against it, the one thing it will always have on damn near every place is the amazing weather. Anyway, because of the nice weather I had a chance to place 10 geocaches in Uijeongbu. Hopefully it gets the Koreans and the Military guys who geocache to place some for me to find. I am nearing in to 30
finds in Korea and 150 finds over all. Then this week I found a Korean's blog who wrote about finding my caches. I think this is pretty cool. Then Anyways as I was saying before my ADHD attack, last Sunday was beautiful and warm and this week has been cold and on occasion, wet. I admit my grumpy meter has been quite high. Maybe I am just being grumpy, maybe I am home sick or maybe it is something else but I really hated life on Wednesday and Thursday. On Wednesday I had to deal with my 6-2 class which shall now be known as the terror class because their former home room teacher is in the hospital from having a nervous breakdown from dealing with them. Anyways, they can't seem to get the easy rules into their head so the week before Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) I told them that they had to write each of the sentences 20 times. I really was not expecting much from them as they usually disappoint but they really stepped up and did it. Well every one but one student – he is not writing each one 40 times as make up work. Anyways I really though that they had learned their lesson but I was wrong and my co-teacher was so angry they had to write each rule 100 times. Wow. Anyways dealing with that and personal stuff was not easy and I was feeling down the rest of Wednesday and Thursday. Then my beautiful wife to be came over and we figured out a lot of issues. I really like when we talk and this leads me to believe that life will only be easier once we live together. Friday, is usually one of my least favorite days of the week because I don't really like some of the classes I have – but today they were not bad. I had the terror class today again. They came in and were bouncing off the walls so I taught them the Macarena (which they enjoyed) and promised them a "Halloween, Dress up, Trick-or-Treat, Candy, Movie party" if the entire class can follow the rules for the whole month. I really hope they get it because I want it too. Then my special class (which is usually crappy) I taught the Kids "let it be" which they picked up on quite fast. Love it. Next week we are doing "Hey Jude".

Till next time, bye.

Oh if you want to check out the Korean's blog post about my caches
look here ----> http://fbshare.me/AUBJy

Woah! Did I just get medieval ?

My 6-2 class they are so bad. They made a female teacher leave the
school because she had a nervous break down. Luckily I am male so I
don't have it as bad but It still sucks to teach that class. Any way
Korean education is lecture, lecture and lecture some more and the
students just sit their – something I am trying to get away from. To
stop any bad behavior in this environment, which I know would be
unfamiliar to them I set up some very specific and easy to follow
rules:

Rule #1: Speak English Only. Pretty easy to understand why this one is
needed. If they speak Korean then they will never learn English.
Rule #2: Full sentences. In 5th and 6th grade they should know how to
do this by now. You can't go around for the rest of your life and only
saying one word answers. Also I know if I can teach them how to say,
for example: "I like apples" then they pretty much can say they like
what ever vocabulary they know.
Rule #3: Raise your hand. You have no idea how much this one was
needed. This rule is self-explanatory.
Rule #4: Don't talk when teacher is talking. Also pretty self-explanatory.
Rule #5: If you need help, ask. I want the kids to know it is OK if
they don't know and they can always ask for help. Aww I have a warm
cuddly feeling.

On Wednesday, my 6-2 class was being their horrible selves and I told
them to behave several times. All requests were ignored. I told them
they obviously did not know the rules so they were to write each rule
20 times and hand it in today (the day before Korean Thanksgiving
vacation). The ENTIRE class blew off the request.

They were quite upset when I told them that now they need to write
each rule 40 times and hand it in the day we come back from Korean
Thanksgiving. "But teacher, it is vacation", "Give us a break
teacher", "Can you minus the number" were just a few of the protests I
heard. I told them there weren't going to be negotiations. They have had,
many, many. Many chances in the past and their bad behavior has
finally caught up to them. "But teacher !!!" they cried. "Hey" I said
loudly "you had a chance to only write 20 and everyone failed at that,
so now every one has to write 40" also, I continued "I am grading this
assignment as a class, you are all a team and if part of the team
fails, you all fail." They looked a bit confused so I explained that
everyone in the class has to do the assignment or they will be forced
to write the rules 60 times, them 80 times and so on and so forth
until every one hands in the correct number. I did this because it is
obvious to me that the teachers can't control them so maybe their
peers can. We will see how it goes. Woah! Did I just kick some ass, I
think I did.