Month: January 2017

I was explaining the term "speed demon" to some students this morning. I drew a pink "speed demon" on the whiteboard." Later, a student amended the drawing, adding glasses and the name "Teacher" to the speed demon, and adding "scared" to the student.

I asked if the teacher was me. She said no, it was just an average teacher.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

I had an unexpected experience on Monday, the first work day of the new year, and first official day of the Korean school year's long winter "vacation" – meaning no public school, but hagwon still run full-tilt. 

I was looking for a certain fellow teacher, for what was, at that moment, an urgent matter – I needed to know something about a student. I didn't know where that teacher was, so I was popping my head into various classrooms. I popped my head into the large "Seminar Room" (really not a seminar room, just our largest classroom, generally used by the high school section). This wasn't a likely spot to find a middle-school teacher, but I was just covering all the possibilities. 

When I looked into the classroom, a girl named Yeonju, who had been my student some years ago in middle school, stood up from where she sat at the front. It's not unusual in the high school section to see a student sitting in the front of the class, in a "teacher" position – I assume this has something to do with the pedagogical style of Pete (the chief high school teacher). I hadn't seen Yeonju in quite a while, and she stood and approached me, saying hello. I asked if she'd seen the teacher I was looking for, which she hadn't.

Her English has always been quite good – she was a star student in middle school, and part of one of my best-loved cohorts of students – that cohort is the only one that sent me get-well cards when I had my cancer surgery.

Since there was no teacher present, I jokingly asked, "are you in charge of this class?" 

Quite unexpectedly, she answered, simply, "Yes." She grinned mischievously, and I realized she was serious.

It turns out that Yeonju has been hired for the period of the winter vacation to be a part-time teacher's helper at Karma. Later, she was getting trained on the mysteries of the printer/copy machine, and was tasked with stapling some handouts, sitting next to me at the empty desk in the teachers' room.

This is the first case of a student becoming a colleague, in my teaching experience. I feel a strange pride and gratification. She is in her last vacation prior to starting university, and in my limited observation, many students get some kind of low-level part-time job for that vacation period, since it is, in fact, the one time in a Korean student's career when there is no upcoming exam hanging over them (they're accepted to university, but haven't started yet). It tends to be a university-bound Korean student's first job, ever – unlike American high school students, Korean students almost never get jobs if they are university-bound – studying is  deemed too important, and they do it year-round. I also learned, later, that Yeonju has been accepted at the prestigious Korea University. That's pretty major, in Korea – kind of like "Ivy League" – what they call "SKY." It also happens to be my boss and friend Curt's alma mater.

I feel kind of old, having a former student whom I remember as a 7th grader, working here. I guess I am. At the least, with respect to Karma and the fairly tightly-knit Hugok neighborhood English hagwon universe, I am an old-timer.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]