ok, so made it thru my first week of teaching relatively easy. this week was easy as they left it up to me to come up with a lesson plan so i did my own intro lesson. i setup each table with a canadian flag, toronto tourist map, and one item each of some tourist stuff i brought like a baseball bat, hockey puck, frisbie, so each table had something different. wasnt nervous at all and very comfortable talking to the kids who responded well and enthusiastically. now i am the celebrity, they are yelling my name ash-ip, and boys yell i love you, and high five me!

on my first day i gave a box of ice wine chocolates in the staffroom and made a speech that this is a tradition when you are a guest and you stay with someone to bring them gifts. after, when i had the meeting with the principal and vice principal i gave them each a box of maple syrup chocolates shaped like maple leaf and a toronto calender. my co-teacher also got a box. she said she was surprised to hear about this tradition as they never got gifts before? i also made the effort that the secretary that helped bring my luggage get the first one before they all finish in the staffroom.

my intro lesson is my name, i am from canada, find canada on a map, name of cities, which city am i from. when i show them a picture of toronto they all think its the namsung tower or the samsung tower. then they try toronto tower or canada tower before i tell them the name cn tower.
then i ask them to describe snow before i show them a picture of toronto with snow. they are surprised by the amount as i think they only get 1-2cm here. i tell them the kids have the shovel the snow after school!

then i start to talk about my family and they get confused when i talk about my nephew so i have to explain what nephew and niece is. i ask them about hobbies and they all say i like to play computer! i tell them my hobby is biking and ask them what that is. they wave their arms from left to right or up and down like a roller coaster?? so when i show them my bike they all giggle when i show them their hand gestures back to them.

then i show them some travel pics. my china pic by the great wall they all know. my venice pic they think is hong kong, singapore, macau, china, even get daegu for some reason?? one advanced class even said it was a fake that i made on photoshop! :) the final pic of picadillly circus they think is tokyo or seoul as they all see the samsung sign in the background. they seem to know manchester and birmingham instead of london i think because of football teams.

buckingham palace is the most hilarious. when i ask them what it is they cycle thru the names high school, middle school, university, museum. when i tell them house they are shocked. some think its my house. then they think its obama house. one kid even yelled anjelina jolie!!

now we play a game where each table has to guess the name of the item on their table, baseball bat and ball are easy. they hockey puck they think is hand cream, eraser, soap, or hockey ball. they try to smell it. frisbie they also think is flying disc. i had a stuffed football but they started to pull the stuffing out after a few classes. also, my toronto maps started to shred again after a while so i stopped giving them out.

finally, we use the toronto tourist map and they have to find koreatown while i play the song funkytown. then i show them a slide show of pics i took in koreatown by yonge/steeles. then we do Q&A but they all ask how old are you so i stopped letting them ask that so they learn something more.

i'm teaching middle school which has three grades so i think grade 7,8,9. within this they are grouped by level (advanced, intermediate, beginner). also some of their pronounciation is wrong, you throw the ball and you catch-ee... you read a book-aa.. so i have to work on fixing this.

i have 21 classes in the week and i'm supposed to have 22. so they will do an after school class where i have to teach the teachers which i'm excited about as i wanted to teach adults as well. a lot of the teachers want to talk to me but dont know how. first they giggle like schoolgirls, then one will try to say a few words and go back and tell their friend. then the other teacher will try.

i started eating lunch in the cafeteria which is a good chance to spend time with them. you get rice and one salad everyday but the other items will change. so i told them to teach me one word each day. first i learnt hue-je cho-se-yo which is please pass the tissue. then i learnt bap which is rice. so the dish bibimbap makes sense now which is mixed rice so i learnt two words. then i learnt ma-shi-so-yo which means delicious. if you raise your tone you are asking the question, or flat tone is replying.

i also have a box of maple fudge which i will maybe use in my adult class. i have a bunch of pins and stickers/tatoos for the kids as well as maple leaf cookies, but its nowhere enough for 700 kids so i will have to ration. my lower level kids are all on thursday/friday so i have to change those classes a bit. i have some special needs kids which nobody really told me about so i have to try to make them feel comfortable. the lower level classes have 15 students, whereas all the others have 30-35 so easier to share gifts in the smaller classes to start off with.

we also had dinner for the english teachers in a japanese style restaurant where you sit on the floor so my leg went to sleep as i couldnt stretch them. first we had a wet sticky rice. then another rice dish came which you scrape out and put in a bowl. to eat you dip in another sauce. the leftover rice in the pot you pour hot water and place a lid to let it steam. then you spoon out the water and drink it. korean food is nice when u put it in front of me but i still have to work on names and learning to order it myself.

also some of the kids are figuring out where i live. its strange, now they are bowing to me when i walk in the neighhbourhood. there are even kids that do that to me in homeplus now. even on the bus from downtown just now two girls tapped my shoulder and said they were from my school! i'm stealing free internet from my neighbour when he has his router switched. i cant get internet or cable tv until i get my alien registration card in 10 days. most of the apartment problems have been fixed by the landlord, and took some elbow grease from me to clean up and arrange the rest, as well as creative decorating and buying accessories to make the place feel like home.

a/c works most of the time now, only problem is odour when i switch it off and go out so i might just buy one of those 10 inch fans and leave it running permenantly to vent the laundry/bathroom area. next year i wont take a ground floor apartment and i suggested i help choose the apartment for my replacement.

i had to disable comments on my blog because some veteran local teachers got hold of it and started posting dumb comments as they got worse apartments then me. if they know the other new teachers have worse apartments they should be trying to help those people instead of commenting on what i bought at homeplus or had for dinner?? Also, I use my real name, facepic, name of school and don’t hide behind a fake alias which is more than can be said for them.

anyway, i'm going to wonder the town centre again and take some more pics of cultural sites. i'm arranging some weekend trips for the others to see the mountain temples and bhudda statues just outside town. the week after next is the school field trip for 3 days so i havent got a clear answer if i am to go or stay and do classes. the following week we get 4 days off for chuseuk which is korean thanksgiving when i plan to goto seoul.