On the blackboard in the staffroom, these last few days, was the following reminder from the boss.
I felt particularly proud of the fact that I didn’t really need a translation. I didn’t understand every word, but I got the gist of it easily enough – partly it’s driven by being familiar with the context. A transcription of the boss’s challenging handwriting:
학생정신교육강조
1. 수업시간에 나가지 않기
2. 교실에 쓰레기 처리
3. 핸드폰 전자기기 전원오프
4. 쉬는시간 준수
Using the googletranslate, with some tweaks, we get:
Emphasize the moral education students
1. Do not let [students] out during class time
2. Pick up trash in the classroom
3. Mobile phones and electronic devices powered off
4. Comply with the break schedule
I find it interesting that a bunch of low-key rules are referred to as “moral education” – but that’s how Koreans conceptualize these things – I don’t think it’s an inaccurate translation.
Karma Academy goes through these cycles, about 2 months in length. We crack down on rules, then they gradually relax, and then finally we crack down again. Partly, during the test-prep time, which started just now for the middle-schoolers, Curt tries to run a more “serious” environment, whereas he lets things relax and be more fun during the other parts of the academic schedule. I have no problem with these rules, for the most part, except that I’m actually pretty comfortable with my students having their cellphones in class. All but a few of them, even of the elementary age students, are quite adept, now, at using them appropriately, in my experience, and my feeling is that they’re so ubiquitous that removing them is like asking students to give up book bags or something. Plus, because that’s where the dictionaries live, and I’m not an opponent of dictionary use, I allow them for that reason, too. Some of my younger students do seem to have nasty trash-leaving habits, but this is nearly universal with children, and is best dealt with by nagging.
