Caveat: Waar Wacht Je Op?

Last night in my PM1-M cohort CC class (cloze listening of pop songs), I felt like I was living in some kind of Lord of the Flies rendition of hagwon life.

You see, this one boy, Eric, was opening a packet of snack ramen. The kids eat the dried ramen noodles dry, sort like potato chips, with the flavor packets opened and sprinkled over the broken up noodles. What they do is they open the packet enough to get out the flavor packet, which they extract and add into the noodle package. Then they hold the noodle package closed and mash up the noodles inside, so they're all tiny fragments and the flavor granules are distributed. It's like do-it-yourself Doritos, maybe.

So Eric had done this work. And then he tore open his now mashed up and flavored pack of dried noodles eagerly, with a plan to eat his snack. Normally I'm pretty tolerant of kids eating snacks in my class, despite an official rule against it, because I know the whole business of attending night class for elementary age students means sometimes they are hungry and haven't eaten since an after-school snack or something.

The other boys (the cohort is currently all boys, just by luck of the draw) were eyeing his snack jealously and hungrily. Unfortunately, Eric opened his packet too aggressively. The noodle fragments, stained orange by the spicy flavor granules, flew all over the room, landing on desks, chairs, floor, and even in Eric's hair. The boy sat with a stunned and despondant look on his face.

But the worst was when the other boys, seeing their chance, swooped in and began grabbing up all the scattered noodle fragments. They didn't seem to care that the bits were on the floor, chairs and desks. They ate them. In less than a minute, most of the bits were gone. Even the ones in Eric's hair. While Eric still just sat, looking stunned.

I said, "Really? Really? You guys are eating off the floor? It's like a pack of dogs!"

In fact, I wasn't that scandalized – I could barely contain my laughing. But given my in loco parentis role (more loco than parentis, perhaps), I felt obligated to be upset by the performance.

Anyway, we got it cleaned up. It took up about half the class time, though. I guess the boys were not annoyed by this.


Quite unrelatedly, what I'm listening to right now.

Sticks & Big2, "Waar Wacht Je Op?!" Don't ask me why. I just listen to weird things, sometimes. Why not a little bit of Dutch hiphop?

Lyrics.

[Intro: Sticks]
Waar wacht je op?
Waar wacht je op?
Waar wacht je op?
Sticky Steez!

[Intro: Big2]
Hé Sticks, go get 'em!

[Verse 1: Sticks]
Je krijgt deez nuts, Dries van Noten
Breek het open, pistachenoten
Een piece of mind en een piece van mij
Voor de fun en fuck de police d'r bij
Nou als ik niet beweeg, breng ik niets te weeg
En wat zijn mijn woorden waard als ik ze niet meer weeg?
Ik deel mijn lief en leed, en het gaat fucking flex
Maar men ziet liever leed en beef-dvd's
Ik ga next-level, van rap battles naar HMH
Ga aan de kant Jett Rebel en Chef's Special
En Kensington en Go Back To The Zoo
En hoe lauwer de beat, hoe gekker je doet
Ambitie maakt dat ik move met m'n shit
Ambitie maakt dat jij grooved op die shit
'T is hard werken om je vrijheid te behouden
Maar de up-side: het kan allemaal van jou zijn
Nou waar wacht je op?

[Chorus: Sticks & Big2]
Get loose met je poes, als ik dit niet doe zijn we helemaal floes
(Waar wacht je op?)
En iedereen doet mee, met de Sticky Steez en de Biggie 2
(Waar wacht je op?)
Geen plan, gewoon gaan, de leeuw laat je echt niet in zijn hempie staan (Waar wacht je op?)
En de beat goes on (Lachen toch?) En de beat goes, on
(Waar wacht je op?)
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt, het is aan jou…
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt, het is aan jou…
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt

[Verse 2: Sticks]
Nou als het moet, bos ik op bam bam ritmes
Chaka Demus & en de Pliers in een 5-0-1 levi's
Met een witte Air Max, met een pipi' achter mijn oor
Geeft niks, het is the latest greatest
Nadenken is de vijand van vrijheid
Check deze Twan, volgens mij zijn we highlights
Daar moest je bij zijn, anderen willen dat me zijn maar zijn te klein als Royce da 5'9
Voor de clubs ben ik te nuchter, lever de track af, breek de tent af
Zoek rust midden in de drukte
Heel het leven is een trip beter stap je in (Waar wacht je op?)
Record wat, breng het uit de dag erop
Deel de hele taart uit, zet er slagroom op
Er is genoeg voor ieder, er is genoeg voor ieder
Waar wacht je op?

[Chorus: Sticks & Big2]
Get loose met je poes, als ik dit niet doe zijn we helemaal floes
(Waar wacht je op?)
En iedereen doet mee, met de Sticky Steez en de Biggie 2
(Waar wacht je op?)
Geen plan, gewoon gaan, de leeuw laat je echt niet in zijn hempie staan (Waar wacht je op?)
En de beat goes on (Lachen toch?) En de beat goes, on
(Waar wacht je op?)
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt, het is aan jou…
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt
Het maakt niet uit wie wat zegt, het is aan jou…

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Solving Supernatural Problems

As I said I would do a few days ago, here are revisions of my ED1M cohort's Halloween stories. These are entirely the students' writing, but I have made sometimes rather substantial revisions of grammar or vocabulary to make them more "native sounding" – I don't want the students memorizing speeches with bad grammar, as it only serves to reinforce or "fossilize" bad habits. I have not altered the plots as created by the students, although in a few cases I had to fill in some elisions with guesses as to the writer's intent. These plots are mostly quite a bit "darker" than the one I created. This is pretty developmentally appropriate for 4th-5th graders, I think. Death and gore are abstractions, but compelling ones from a story-telling standpoint.

Lucy

One day, there was a lonely ghost, named Nina. The ghost had died with a lot of tension, so Nina wanted to meet other ghost friends and she wanted to try to resolve her depression. Nina was reading a book about a call. Finally a friend called Nina and she was so excited to meet the new friend. This friend's name was Lum. Lum said, "I want to meet you." Nina said, "Sure, let's meet at the playground. Okay?" Lum said, "Okay. Good idea." Nina went to the playground and met Lum. Nina said, "Hello. I'm Nina. Let's be friends!" Lum said, "Good, I want to be your friend too." Then Nina said, "What should we do?" Lum said, "Let's go play with the other living people. It'll be fun to meet living people and they'll be happy to meet us. Let's go down to the ground." Nina said, "Sure, I want to meet these living people too. Let's go!" Nina and Lum floated down to the ground, and went to a school, and saw the students studying. When the bell rang, Nina and Lum met a girl named Sarah. She was very embarrassed to meet a ghost. Sarah could only be friends if she became a ghost. The next day Lum said, "I want to kill Sarah. Will you help me?" "Sure," Nina said. "I want to take Sarah." Thus Nina and Lum killed Sarah with an invisible sword.

Julia

One day, there was a lonely zombie. He wanted some friends, so he went to an amusement park. There were so many people there. He saw he could make many friends. First, he met a doctor, and killed her. She became a zombie. They became friends. The two zombies now wanted many friends. They walked across the street and met many people, all of whom became zombies too. The government gave a public warning: "In the amusement park, there are zombies! Please escape as soon as possible. Hurry!" Then, night fell. The zombies became angry. "Why are there not so many people, now?" The zombies went downtown. There were people shopping. playing, and then screaming. They killed and made friends with so many. The zombies had come quickly, but were dispersed when the government made a vaccine and gave it to people. The vaccine was great, but the zombies didn't want to normal people again. The zombies went to a market. They were hungry and wanted to eat fresh brains. There were many people. "Let's eat and make friends," they said. But one zombie had the vaccine."I can be a good person. I want to take the vaccine." She took the medicine and ran away from the other zombies. She said to the people, "Zombies! Run away!" The zombies were angry. One of the zombies ate her brain and she became a zombie again. She thought, "I don't have to be a good person. Let's find fresh brains." This earth became a zombie world.

Gina

One day, there was a lonely skeleton. This skeleton woke up only on Halloween. The skeleton waits until a child says, "Trick or treat?" Then it grabs the child and eats it. So one day, a child came and said, "Treat or trick?" The skeleton did not hear, because the skeleton could only hear "Trick or treat?" The child had said it backwards. Regrettably, then the child said again, "Trick or Treat?" The skeleton heard that, of course, and chased after him. The boy saw the skeleton and ran. The boy ran to his home and put a human doll in front of the door. The skeleton saw the doll and attacked it and ate it. The next day, the boy saw the skeleton was gone. He was shocked. He went to the hospital. There he dreamed about the skeleton. In the dream, the skeleton came and started eating his head. Then his mom came, and the skeleton hid. After his mom went out, the skeleton started eating his brain. Next the skeleton ate his foot, and his stomach. The boy woke up and was surprised to see he didn't have part of his brain and he didn't have part of his foot or stomach either. For five minutes he did nothing, he was so tired, and he slept again. In a dream, the skeleton returned and at his arm and one of his ears. The boy woke up again, and he was missing an arm and an ear. He looked around and saw the skeleton one more time. The skeleton ate the rest of the boy's body.

Amy

One day, there was a lonely mummy. That night, the mummy wanted to eat some people. Then a woman discovered the mummy, and she was not afraid. The mummy wanted to be friends with her, and she wanted to, too. So she and the mummy became friends. However, she left the mummy finally, because they didn't get along. She hated the mummy. So then the mummy was sad again. She was angry. The mummy started eating people. She ate many people. People tried avoiding the mummies. But the lone mummy got worse. People tried to kill the lone mummy that ate people, but it was not easy. This was because the mummy was eating the police, too. The people still didn't give up. Finally, the police injured the mummy. Unfortunately, because the zombie had been eating them, the police became zombies. Then the police ate people, too. This was terrible. As a result, the village gradually changed into a zombie community. It was a zombie village where only zombies lived. The zombies in the zombie village went to another village, and another. The zombies spread, causing the entire country to be overtaken by the zombie virus. The world was full of zombies, then. After a few more years, it was full of mummies too. In the end, it was full of ghosts. The world has changed strangely.

Luna

One day, there was a lonely devil. The devil liked to play. So the devil would take children's shoes. One day a girl named Elizabeth was crying. She had lost her shoes. That was what the devil had done. All of the kids were crying, and the devil was so happy. The devil also ate people's blood. "Today," Elizabeth said, "I will get my shoes!" That night she didn't sleep. She just hid in the tree. She said, "I'm sleepy, now." She decided nothing would happen, so she went to her room. At that time the devil came to Elizabeth's house. Elizabeth saw the devil, and said, "You are taking my shoes!" The devil was so surprised. The Devil ran away. He said, "I will take children's clothes and things." Elizabeth thought that finally the devil would not take children's shoes. But then one day the kids were crying again. Elizabeth knew this was the devil's work. So she said to all of the kids, "Now let's catch that bad devil." They waited for the devil. At that time, the devil came. Elizabeth said, "One, two, three, catch him!" So they caught the bad devil. The devil said, "What is going on? Hey! Hey! What are you doing to such as fantastic devil as me?" Elizabeth said, "Give us our shoes and clothes!" The devil was so scared, so he said, "Yes! Yes, I will do it." Elizabeth and her friends said, "This devil is so bad. They clapped and said, "Yeah! We caught that devil." Now they were happy.

Sean

One day, there was a lonely werewolf, named WW. WW wanted to eat guts. WW went to the mountains to hunt animals. He ate a lot of animals, but he was still very hungry. The police came and tried to catch WW, so he ran away. Finally WW was caught and put in jail. After 10 years, WW wanted to get revenge. He went to a village and killed all the people and ate their guts. The police came to the village to fight against WW. The fight lasted two years and the police shot many guns. The werewolf was badly hurt but killed all of the police. Finally WW became a kind of werewolf ghost that eats children's guts. The children screamed, "Ahhh!"

A saint came and hit the werewolf ghost, cutting through his body. WW was angry and this, and became a zombie. He was hungry, then, and ate many people's brains. He went to the city and many people became zombies. They ate each other's brains and even ate each other's bodies. Obama saw this problem and sent some soldiers to come and kill the zombies. But the werewolf-ghost-zombie WW couldn't be killed, so Obama himself came and fought WW. It was Obama versus WW. Obama shot the legs on the creature so he couldn't walk. Then Obama sent a missile and destroyed the earth. This solved the problem.

 

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: The Tissue-Paper Mummy Tradition

Every year, Karma English Academy has a Halloween party. The tradition has become that I run an activity room at the party, where visiting cohorts of students compete to make the best tissue paper mummy.

This year, this past Friday, some students in one class insisted that I should be the mummy. I allowed them, and two boys named Alex and Daho mummified me quite well. Daho took a picture of Alex taking a selfie with the mummy-teacher.

picture

Of all the student mummies produced, I believe Lucy was the best, as mummified by her friend Julia and Amy.

picture

Lucy was unusual of the student mummies, in that she didn't complain at all about being mummified. She seemed to enjoy it. She stayed perfectly still. This made her easier to mummify. One has to have a certain tolerance for claustrophobic feelings.

[daily log: walking, 1.5km]

Caveat: New Evidence of Dialectal Divergence in Korean

 

Some linguists have speculated that the divergence of dialects between South Korea and North Korea has become substantial. The vast infusion of foreign vocabulary to the "standard Korean" of the South over the last 7 decades has been largely bypassed by the North. Some South Koreans have told me they have a hard time understanding the snippets of North Korean broadcasts they sometimes see. 

Last night my student James gave me new evidence.

I have a rule in my classes: "only English." I'm a speaking skills teacher, after all. I want them trying to speak English if at all possible. But sometimes, I get in trouble, because I often phrase the rule during enforcement as "no Korean" as opposed to "only English." I've had students either pretend, or, if talented, actually using snippets of Japanese or Chinese they know, for example. 

So I overheard Jae-yeon speaking Korean.

"James. Were you speaking Korean? What about our 'no Korean' rule?"

There was a long pause. "Oh no, teacher. I was speaking North Korean." He grinned at his own cleverness.

"Is that a different language?" I asked, laughing.

"Oh yes. Very different!" He asserted. His friend agreed, nodding vigorously.

In fact, this was so funny, I didn't take away a point as I normally do when I catch kids speaking Korean while that rule is in effect.

For the future, I have to remember to keep the focus on "only English." 

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Karma Guy

picture

My student who goes by Michelle is a pretty talented caricaturist for a 2nd-grader. She drew this picture on the white board and told me it was me. I was impressed. I look like that dad character from the TV animated series "Family Guy."

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Several hilarious student anecdotes eventuated

Yesterday morning, I predicted I would have a hectic week. In fact, yesterday was more than hectic – yesterday was downright insane. My coworker Grace failed to return from her vacation as scheduled (maybe an airplane travel problem? I wasn't clear on the situation). But her substitute teacher was no longer available. We had no teacher for 6 classes, and about 30 minutes to adapt.

So Curt shuffled the schedule, combined some classes, and we made it through. I had a full schedule, needless to say. 8 classes, straight through, no breaks.

For the combined and non-standard classes, mostly I taught non-standard lessons. I'm pretty good at ad-hocing it. So it went OK. I had one combined class with 20 students, though – which is HUGE by hagwon standards. I haven't faced a class that large since I taught at the public school down south in 2011. They were the younger kids. We played bingo. It went smoothly.

Several hilarious student anecdotes eventuated.

I was giving a planned, really hard month-end essay writing test to my ED1 cohort, but being a bit frazzled, I wasn't being very sympathetic or helpful to my poor students.

A boy named Sean, who never pays attention, looked up in the middle of the test, and asked, "What's a film festival?" Perhaps that seems innocent enough – a gap in vocabulary, no more. However, in fact we had been reading, brainstorming, discussing, and trying to write essays about film festivals for the past month. The core of the test, in fact, was to write an essay about an imaginary film festival, for which I gave some made-up details (location, schedule, etc.). So this was a rather glaring gap. Rather than try to help the boy, I just started laughing. I think the students were disturbed by this performance.

I laughed so hard I nearly cried.

Later, in one of Grace's speaking classes, I asked a 6th grade boy named Kai if he was in any clubs. We had been discussing clubs such as a taekwondo club, computer club, chess club, or that kind of thing.

Without missing a beat, he said, "I'm in the night club. Every night." He mimed a disco dance move. Where did that come from? I laughed again. That might seem like a pretty clever pun for a non-native speaker. Actually, it makes a bit of sense. "Club" is a borrowed word from English to Korean (클럽 [keulleop]), but only in the "night club" meaning – thus that's the central meaning for Koreans, rather than what we think of as its main sense, which is just a social organization of some kind.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: on being unscary

I was yelling at my HS1-T cohort the other day, as is so often my wont these days.

It's a very frustrating group of students – a collection of obstreperous, very smart but extremely rebellious 6th and 7th grade girls (yes, all girls – by some grave misfortune).

So I was yelling. The standard stuff: please focus on your work and quit talking about your favorite pop star idols; please speak English during class; please do your homework, next time. 

Maybe the "pleases" were getting thin on the ground. I was pretty annoyed.

One girl (whom I won't name) said, "You know, you're not very good at being scary."

I sat down, deflated.

"I know," I sighed. The girls all had a laugh, and went on their merry way.


What I'm listening to right now.

Communist Daughter, "Soundtrack To The End"

Lyrics.

You put on a pretty face
And we never saved our money
And then we got stuck in place
And I lost my milk and honey

And all the songs were new
And they broke our hearts in two
While we walked away
So I just pushed on through
And I made my muscles move
'Cause I could never say

And all our hearts were breaking
There was music all around
And the walls were always shaking
'Cause our love was the sound
Our love was the sound

We took six of one
And nothing from the dozen
I guess I'll never need another hand to stay awake
Oh, get me right up to the brink
I'll break one way or other

Some of the best of us are already home
Still singing softly through the stereo
Although we tried to make the only amends
Now it's just a soundtrack to the end

And all the songs were new
And they broke our hearts in two
But we still walked away
So I just pushed on through
And I made my muscles move
So I don't have to say
That it's not right to carry on
It might be old but she isn't gone
And you never listened anyway

All our hearts were breaking
There was music all around
And the walls were always shaking
'Cause our love was the sound
Our love was the sound

And all our hearts were breaking
There was music all around
And the walls were always shaking
'Cause our love was the sound

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Thia bag hippe

picture

I was doing a prospective student interview yesterday at work, with a 2nd grade elementary student. My task in these interviews is to try to decide which class to place the student in, based on current level, but where the kids are too young or too low-level to be able to do a typical Korean-style diagnostic test.

I had the student attempt to read from one of our elementary readers, then we tested a few random flashcards from our phonics series. Finally, I tried out our "phonics diagnostic," which is a kind of graded set of sheets where we attempt to gauge how well the students can sound out unfamiliar words.

The boy really wasn't very good at any of this, but he was pretty good at catching my meaning and understanding my directions, in spoken form. We get a lot of students like this, who've attended some kind of pre-literacy "immersion" (in quotes because it's often not very immersive) kindergarten – they have some rudiments of English in spoken form but are very weak on alphabet and reading/writing.

Anyway, I always conclude these interviews with a very short writing test. I have the kids draw a picture of their favorite animal, then have them try to write something about their animal. At his level, I didn't expect much, but in yesterday's case, the result was a bit odd.

The boy drew a picture of a very implausible dog (at right), then smiled and confidently wrote, "Thia bag hippe."

"What's that say?" I asked.

"This dog happy," he said.

Hm: not strong on phonics or sight-words, then, and maybe not even completely clear on the whole alphabet concept, but, for all that, apparently confident.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Call your lawyer

We were doing a speaking book task, where there is a "set up" situation, and students have to then explain what they will say in the given situation.

In this particular set up, it described a situation where the student has borrowed a friend's phone, only to drop it and break the screen accidentally.

So the students had to, presumably, say something to the effect of: "Oh my god, I'm so sorry, I broke your phone. I feel so terrible. I will buy you a new one… "

Anyway, this is actually a really hard task for these students – the book is a bit too hard for their ability level. They just don't have the fluency or active vocabulary to make this happen smoothly. So to make it easier, I spend a good portion of each class describing the situation, acting it out in detail, writing down possible response fragments.

I try to solicit possible words, ideas, and such from the students. One boy, a bit of a contrarian, likes to imagine being a jerk in such situations. So he said, "I feel happy."

I ran with it.

"Right! What if you don't like your friend?" I brainstormed.

"I feel happy. I broke it, so what?" I wrote on the board. The boy scribbled this down diligently. He knew what his speech would look like, now.

I added some more fragments. "It's your phone, deal with it." I spent some time explaining the expression "deal with it."

One girl, normally completely silent, suggested. "I feel joy."

"Joy?" I said, pleased to see her participating. "Not just happy, but joy? You hate your friend?"

She nodded.

"So then what?" I asked. "What if your friend calls a lawyer?"

I spent about 5 minutes explaining what a lawyer was. I explained the concept of "small claims court" – without trying to introduce the vocabulary. The kids were more or less familiar with the idea – there are cheesy courtroom reality shows in Korea, just like in the US.

Without missing a beat, the normally silent girl said, almost inaudibly but clearly, "OK. Call the lawyer with your broken phone."

I was impressed.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: Destiny

Andy is a fifth grader who is in an Honors cohort otherwise made up of sixth graders, because of his high ability. It was a bit problematic placing him there, because he ended up in the same class with his older sister, Julie. I suspect the direct competition isn't helping the younger boy.

Last night, we took a month-end speaking test. Julie scored 99%. Andy, on the other hand, only managed 71%. Their ability levels are similar and normally they score similarly. Andy moaned and made a sad expression. "It is my destiny!" he exclaimed.

"In Karma, it is your destiny," his older sister intoned, with mock seriousness. On the one hand, I think they were imitating the famous Darth Vader line, "It is your destiny." But I realized they both are also probably quite aware that one possible meaning of "Karma" is in fact "destiny" – certainly the fine semantic differences between them is lost, since both words are often translated 운명 [unmyeong] in Korean. I suspect they have a running joke between them. 

[daily log: walking, 7km]

 

Caveat: Swooning

My middle school HS1T cohort happens to be populated by only girls. Sometimes these coincidences arise – there is another middle school cohort, that I don't teach, that is all boys.

Last night they were all giggly and distracted, talking about Idols, I guess – "Idols" means kpop music stars of various types. I got grumpy and serious. I yelled loudly and made them quiet down and we worked very productively and with great focus on some TOEFL-style speaking questions. I was pleased enough that during the last 15 minutes of class, I asked them what they wanted to do. Normally they ask to play a game – card games are currently popular.

This time, however, they wanted to watch music videos. I am somewhat hesitant to turn over control of the internet to my students – it ends up being hard to find anything pedagogically redeeming. So I said if we watched videos they had to be in English. One girl said she knew just the one. I guess there is an "American Idol" style competition show where these boys are competing to become a typical kpop "boy band." They danced and lip-synced to several songs in English.

The girls didn't really listen to the music – I'm not sure they're even interested in the music. They were focused on swooning over their various favorites of the boys in the video, discussing fine points of their appearance and personalities. One girl said about her particular favorite, "I don't actually like him, but he's too handsome."

The boys are just lip-syncing – the show seems to be more a dance and beauty competition than a singing competition. That's in line with what these typical over-produced kpop groups do. They very rarely are involved in making the actual music involved – they're just a performance medium. So in the cases the girls were looking at, these are American pop songs.

In general, "dance covers" are a HUGE thing in Korean youth culture. They're all over the internet, and I have more than once come across kids literally dancing in the halls (both boys and girls), very clearly practicing moves related to one or another of these types of covers.

What I'm listening to right now.

프로듀스 101 시즌2, "Shape Of You." I think this song is originally by Ed Sheehan.

Lyrics (abbreviated as performed on Produce 101).

The club isn't the best place to find a lover
So the bar is where i go
Me and my friends at the table doing shots
Drinking fast and then we talk slow
And you come over and start up a conversation
With Just me and trust me
I'll give it a chance
Now take my hand stop
Put van the man on the jukebox
And then we start to dance
And now I'm singing like
Girl you know I want your love
Your love was handmade for somebody like me
Come on now follow my lead
I may be crazy
Don't mind me
Say boy let's not
talk too much
Grab on my waist and put that body on me
Come on now follow my lead
Come on come on now follow my lead
I'm in love with your body
(Shape of you)
Every day discovering something brand new
I'm in love with the shape of you
(Shape of you)
Every day discovering something brand new
I'm in love with the shape of you
Come on be my baby come on

프로듀스 101 시즌2, "Get Ugly." This song is originally by Jason Derulo

Lyrics (full lyrics, I think they're performing only a part of these on Produce 101)

Girl, ladies, let your hurr down
Let your hurr down
We's about to get down

Oh my, oh my, oh my god
This girl straight and this girl not
Tipsy off that peach Ciroc
Like la la la
Ching-a-lang-lang, ching-a-ling-a-lang-lang
Jeans so tight I could see loose change
Do your thang, thang, girl
Do that thang like la la la

Tell them pretty faced girls tryna grabs each other
And them undercover freaks who ain't nun' but trouble
Baby, I'mma tell you some' only 'cause I love ya
People all around the world sexy motherfuckers

Get ugly
Yeah, get ugly, baby
Get ugly
You're too sexy to me
Sexy to me
You're too sexy to me
Sexy to me
So sexy
Damn, that's ugly

Bruh, I can't, I can't even lie
I'm about to be that guy
Someone else gon' have to try me
La la la
Bang-a-rang-rang, bang-a-ring-a-rang-rang
Bass in the trunk, vibrate that thang
Do your thang, thang, girl
Do that thang like la la la

Tell them pretty faced girls tryna grabs each other
And them undercover freaks who ain't nun' but trouble
Baby, I'mma tell you some' only 'cause I love ya
People all around the world sexy motherfuckers

Get ugly
Get ugly, baby, woo hoo
And everybody say la la la
Get ugly
You're too sexy to me
Sexy to me
You're too sexy to me
Sexy to me
So sexy
Damn, that's ugly

Ay, Ricky
This beat give me that ugly face, man
Everybody lose control
Let's get ugly, dysfunctional
Everybody lose control
Let's get ugly, dysfunctional

Tell them pretty faced girls tryna grabs each other
And them undercover freaks who ain't nun' but trouble
Baby, I'mma tell you some' only 'cause I love ya
People all around the world sexy motherfuckers

Light them up then pass that, pass that
La la la
Everybody lose control
Let's get ugly, dysfunctional
Get ugly
You know what I'm talking about
You're too sexy to me
Sexy to me
You're too sexy to me
Sexy to me
So sexy
Damn, that's ugly

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Hierarchy of Needs

Here is another incident in the seemingly growing category of “7th graders making unnecessary random announcements.”
It was a few days ago.
I think we were talking about parables and allegories. Completely out of the blue, Sally’s hand shot up, and, before I could even acknowledge her desire to speak, she said, “Teacher! I don’t need a boyfriend.”
“Well… good,” I responded, cautiously. Then I asked, “Why are you telling me now?”
If there had been some boy in the class, just then, pestering her in some way, I could almost have seen it as a kind of oblique comment intended to discourage that kind of thing, but in the event, there were only 3 girls in the classroom just then.
Sally shrugged. “It’s important information.”
Another girl, Michelle, nodded knowingly. I suspect this was just the conclusion to some discussion between the two girls that had been proceeding in Korean some time earlier.
In fact, the more I think about it, the more I think that many of these inexplicable “announcements” made by students are most likely much more explicable to their peers, who are in a different, broader social context – the kids have their ongoing, not-during-class interactions, mostly in Korean, with each other. I should feel that it represents a kind of success in language teaching, that they choose to “code switch” into English to express these off-topic thoughts.
Regardless, as the clueless adult in the room, they are often mildly entertaining.
picture[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Unarmed

A few days ago, my oldest surviving Minneapolitan Rainbow Monkey underwent a traumatic experience. Two kids were fighting over the monkey. He fell on the floor. I stepped in (literally), by placing my foot on the monkey, and told them, stop fighting over the monkey. The kids were adamant, however. One boy, Jack, tugged on one of the monkey's arms. I pressed harder with my foot. A diminutive girl named Amy tugged on another of the monkey's arms.

Suddenly, the arm ripped off. She staggered back, and held up the arm, looking stunned. I think she thought I would be angry. I was a bit annoyed, but this seemed like an inevitable consequence the monkey had long managed to avoid through sheer luck.

"Oh my god," I said, in surprise. "My monkey! You broke my monkey."

"I didn't do it," she protested, with a disarming grin.

"You both did it," I asserted. "I helped, too, I guess," I added, stooping to retrieve the remainder of the monkey from under my shoe.

I took the arm, and used an alligator clip (a "binder clip") to attach the arm, ad hoc, to the monkey's shoulder area. I held him up for the class. "Look! Still smiling! What a crazy monkey."

picture

The kids laughed, probably relieved that I wasn't angry.

When I told the teachers in the staff room, later, they were angry. "How can you let kids behave like that?"

"They're just kids," I said. "The monkey seems to be OK."

At right: a picture of my monkey, awaiting surgery (aka needle and thread). He's almost 5 years old – I think he's held up pretty well.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: A Normal Person

Justin, a seventh-grader, made a rather random, unmotivated announcement today in class. He raised his hand.

Justin: I'm a normal person.

Teacher: Really?

Justin: Yes, I am.

Teacher: Why do you say that?

Justin: I have ten fingers, two hands, two feet, one head. 

Teacher: That's good.

Justin just grinned.

Annie, sitting in the front of the class, looked back at Justin, and back at me, and shook her head, rolling her eyes – but she refrained from commenting. I had no idea why he felt the need for this conversation, but you take what you can get, right?

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Quatrains #109-111

(Poem #297 on new numbering scheme)

Three simple songs were sung among
the faces going by.
I knew these songs in passing, then,
though all the years did fly.
A song of patient worrying
came first, a princess true.
The second song had deep kindness,
but understandings, few.
The third song had the boldest heart,
but passions rather wild.
These songs departed. But today,
a song returned... and smiled.

– three quatrains in ballad meter. This poem is not just a hallucination or metaphor, unlike as is the normal case with most of my poetry. Rather, it has a fairly important and specific subtext, which will make the meaning quite clear.

Caveat: 김정은이 중이 때문에 못 처들어오다

I learned this phrase at work yesterday. I guess it’s kind of an aphorism, but it’s a slang-based, very modern one.

김정은이 중이 때문에 못 처들어오다
kim.jeong.eun.i jung.i ttae.mun.e mot cheo.deul.eo.o.da
Kim Jeong-eun-SUBJ 8th-grade because-of cannot invade-come-INF
Because of 8th graders, Kim Jeong-eun cannot invade.

Basically, the idea is that “kids these days” are so narcissistic, disrespectful, etc., that the dictator to the north doesn’t dare invade the South. It’s just not worth the hassle of dealing with the kids. The Korean expression 중이 (8th grade / 8th grader) is a kind of shorthand for referring to the the typical disaffected, disrespectful and self-centered nature of early teens, including the slang 중이병, meaning “8th grader disease,” as a kind of stand-in term for the characteristic mental health issues of puberty and adolescence.
Thus all the international panic about the North’s belligerence is overblown. It just can’t happen, see? We’ve got the kids to protect us.
[daily log: walking, 5km]

Caveat: The cow’s opinion

Scene: My "Davinci1-M" cohort, low-intermediate Elementary English, grades 3-6 mixed. 

Topic: A cartoon picture in our textbook of a farmer milking a cow

Teacher: "What's happening in the picture?"

Katie: "The farmer is making milk."

Teacher: "I don't think the farmer is making milk."

Amy: "The cow is making milk. The farmer is taking milk."

Teacher: "Excellent, Amy. That's very good. I think that's right."

Scott: "I think the cow's feeling is, 'Please don't touch my body!'" 

Point taken, Scott.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: Don’t hope for too much

I have a certain student, whom I've written about many times before. She's been at Karma for a long time – I think at least 3 years now. She goes by Sophia. She is a very voluble girl, and talks with me, in English, almost continuously whenever she's around me. Also, she's the only student I've ever had who ever had any kind of interaction with any members of my family – she bonded to my niece Sarah when my sister Brenda and her kids visited a few years back (I have no idea if that bonding was mutual, but anyway, she still mentions that visit). For these reasons, I've perhaps come to think of her like she was a bit of a surrogate child in a way I don't typically feel for students.

Anyway, I have been feeling singularly depressed about Sophia, lately. She's in the sixth grade, now, and if she's always been a bit emotionally immature and academically unmotivated, recently she's become gloomily but quite declaratively unambitious, too. With alarming regularity, these days, she says things like, "I don't want to learn anything," and "I'm going to get married and only be a mom."

I don't really want to begrudge anyone their passion or heart's desire – and there's a place in the world for "just gettting married and being a mom" – it's not like that isn't a really important role for society.

The problem is that Sophia is possibly one of the smartest students I have ever taught. I would expect that if she took an IQ test, she'd be a genius. At the least, she's without a doubt some kind of savant in the realm of language: without ever having lived or studied abroad, her spoken English is better than most other students'. She's been entirely autodidact in this – she actively resists formal instruction of any kind, and always has. But she soaks up vocabulary and grammar effortlessly. I think she mostly learned English by watching TV shows and movies in English.

She will correctly use a new word that I have used in class in front of her, after hearing it just one time. She has a stunning memory. She can memorize the words (English-Korean translation lists of 20 words) for her in-class vocabulary quizzes in the 3-4 minutes right before the quiz. She can memorize songs in Korean and English flawlessly, and has a huge repertoire of song lyrics floating around her head. She even memorized a fairly passable rendition of a stanza of a song in Spanish, which she sang for me one time simply to impress me. She said she had no idea what it meant – she found it on youtube.

I would be so happy to see her show some intellectual ambition about life. I have tried to encourage various pursuits that match her expressed interests, including suggesting things like acting, linguistics and recently, songwriting or just writing. But my seeing her only 1-2 hours a week really isn't going to give me much influence over the choices she makes.

I suspect these loud declarations of anti-intellectualism are rooted in some kind of rebellion against parental pressure – I sense her mom pushes hard. There's nothing I can do about that. But I feel sad. Hopefully she'll find a different way to rebel against mom that is less self-defeating for the long term.


What I'm listening to right now.

U2, "Numb."

Lyrics.

Don't move
Don't talk out of time
Don't think
Don't worry
Everything's just fine
Just fine

Don't grab
Don't clutch
Don't hope for too much
Don't breathe
Don't achieve
Or grieve without leave

Don't check
Just balance on the fence
Don't answer
Don't ask
Don't try and make sense

Don't whisper
Don't talk
Don't run if you can walk
Don't cheat, compete
Don't miss the one beat

Don't travel by train
Don't eat
Don't spill
Don't piss in the drain
Don't make a will

Don't fill out any forms
Don't compensate
Don't cower
Don't crawl
Don't come around late
Don't hover at the gate

Don't take it on board
Don't fall on your sword
Just play another chord
If you feel you're getting bored

I feel numb
I feel numb
Too much is not enough
I feel numb

Don't change your brand
Don't listen to the band
Don't gape
Don't ape
Don't change your shape
Have another grape

Too much is not enough
I feel numb
I feel numb

Don't plead
Don't bridle
Don't shackle
Don't grind
Don't curve
Don't swerve
Lie, die, serve
Don't theorize, realize, polarize
Chance, dance, dismiss, apologize

Too much is not enough
I feel numb

Don't spy
Don't lie
Don't try
Imply
Detain
Explain
Start again

I feel numb

Don't triumph
Don't coax
Don't cling
Don't hoax
Don't freak
Peak
Don't leak
Don't speak

I feel numb

Don't project
Don't connect
Protect
Don't expect
Suggest
I feel numb
Don't project
Don't connect
Protect
Don't expect
Suggest
I feel numb

Don't struggle
Don't jerk
Don't collar
Don't work
Don't wish
Don't fish
Don't teach
Don't reach

Too much is not enough

Don't borrow
Don't break
Don't fence
Don't steal
Don't pass
Don't press
Don't try
Don't feel

I feel numb

Don't touch
Don't dive
Don't suffer
Don't rhyme
Don't fantasize
Don't rise
Don't lie
Don't project
Don't connect
Protect
Don't expect
Suggest

Don't project
Don't connect
Protect
Don't expect
Suggest

I feel numb

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Wasting time…

Last night in the HS1-T cohort, Dayeon was getting annoyed and jealous because her classmate Hyein was being very diligent and was giving excellent, well-prepared answers.

So I said to Dayeon, "You could be doing the same. Why don't you focus, and do the same?" Dayeon is quite smart, but she lacks the singular focus that Hyein has.

Dayeon surprised me with her very straightforward and self-aware answer to my suggestion.

"I can't," she said. "Because I am a person who likes to waste time."

I was impressed by the precision and correctness of her English, too. And how could I argue with that?

I let her waste some time. At the end of class, Dayeon had homework, but Hyein had none.

Nevertheless, I have sympathy for Dayeon – I too, am a person who likes to waste time.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Unverisimilitudinous

I'm a little bit burned-out feeling, at the moment. So I don't have much to offer.

Meanwhile, here is a rather intriguing if not entirely verisimilitudinous alligator drawn by a student.

picture

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Ugly vs Pretty

I was teaching my beginning phonics class the difference between the words "ugly" and "pretty." I had them draw two columns on a piece of blank paper, and brainstorm their own ugly things and pretty things.

Evan (1st grade) did a nice job, I thought. At least, he channeled my cartoon alligator's spirit well.

picture

[daily log: walking, 1 km]

Caveat: No

I have an elementary 2nd grade student who goes by the English name of Alisha. She is a bit behind her peers in social development, with a lot of pre-elementary age behavior (i.e. “babyish” or young for her age), but she is plenty smart. She doesn’t really know what to make of my “alligator bucks” – the “dollars” I give to students as a kind of reward points system. She destroys them systematically, when she receives them, rather than saving them like other students do. But she derives a great deal of pleasure from destroying them, so perhaps they still serve as a kind of reward.
She has pretty good comprehension of my English output. She’s good at following instructions, and has a recognition vocabulary higher than some of her peers in the same class. On the other hand, she mostly never writes anything using English letters. She “sounds out” the English words she wants to write using the Korean alphabet, hence her name 알리샤 [allisya], or 캣 [kaet = “cat”], etc. And even her hangul is full of misspellings and variants from Korean orthography.  She suffers some substantial dyslexia – she cannot differentiate ‘d’ and ‘b’, and I’ve seen her writing hangul with reversed glyphs, too.
She also is quite defiant, at times. She will refuse to answer questions. But mostly, she simply doesn’t talk at all – in Korean or English. She gestures and has a very expressive face, to compensate.
On Monday, she was more talkative than usual. “No no no no no” she announced, upon entering the classroom. Later, when we were doing flashcards, she described each card as “No.” I appreciated the English, but was a little bit frustrated by the defiance. I turned the card so I could see it – a cat – and said, “That’s not a ‘no’, is it?”
“No,” she agreed.
OK, that was a badly phrased question, wasn’t it?
“What is it?” I tried again. She shook her head, and tried a different type of defiance. She waved her hand, with a kind of stop-motion style, and said, firmly and with excellent intonation, “Bye!”
I moved on to other students, who get impatient when I spend too much time with Alisha. Later, it was back to “No.”
But then, we took our quiz. Often, on quizzes, she leaves her paper blank, or just scribbles on it. Other times, she’ll diligently transcribe all the words in hangul. Without direct supervision and letter-by-letter guidance, she will almost never write a word in English letters.
On Monday, she wrote, using a fat orange marker she’d taken from my basket:

  1. No
  2. No
  3. No

I was impressed. “Wow, you’re writing English! That’s excellent,” I praised. Small steps, right? I gave her an alligator dollar, which she promptly began to gleefully destroy, peeling off the laminated backing.
Then she pointed proudly at the wall. There, in large, orange-colored letters, she’d also written “No.”
“Oh, well… ” I was so torn. On the one hand, I was happy with her finally expressing her sincere feelings in English letters. It was, truly, her first such success. On the other hand, I felt that doing so on the classroom wall was problematic. I ran from the room and fetched a bottle of spray cleaner.
“I am so happy you’re writing English letters. There’s ‘N’, there’s ‘O’… ‘no.’ Great job. But we need to clean that up. No writing on the wall, OK? 그렇게 하지마 [don’t do like that],” I said, gesturing at the wall and shaking my head.
I paused and took a picture, to document the event. I knew this would end up in my blog.
picture
“OK!” she said, grinning.
“Let’s clean that up,” I urged. The other kids were feeling entertained by all this, so I wasn’t too worried about them. I let her wield the spray cleaner bottle against the wall, and we tried to clean up the word. Now there’s a white stain on the wall.
The problem was mostly resolved. Several times more during the class, she sad “No,” but she also said several other words, including “car” and “cat.” And she wrote “alligator” at the bottom of her quiz paper – copying the word from the board, where that particular word is always written, for my lowest-level classes. Given how much I use alligators as a kind of mascot in my classes, kids often feel a need to write this long, difficult word.
On Wednesday (yesterday), Alisha went up to another teacher, Helen, before class started. Apparently, in Korean, she whispered to Helen, emphatically, that she really liked her phonics class with Jared. Helen reported this to me. Helen asked me what I’d done to earn her endorsement. I really have no idea. Perhaps just trying to validate her efforts? Not exploding in anger and violence at her writing on the wall?
[daily log: walking, 7km]
 

Caveat: meery me

This note appeared unsolicited in my basket after my Newton1 cohort class yesterday.

picture

It reads,

     HI! My name is Jared's green white monkey, I think my friend colorful monkey is very pretty. I want meery colorful monkey! Newton-1M June♡

I should note that the Minneapolitan rainbow monkeys were recently supplemented by additional magnetic monkeys, two of which are pale green in color. I think meery here means 'marry.' I have always been quite deliberately ambiguous as to the monkeys' genders, so I found this interesting.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: How do you spell “chicken”?

The scene: my afternoon "phonics" class with 1st and 2nd grade elementary students. This is very beginning English. I've been working on teaching them how to respond to the question, "How do you spell it?" Most of the words are of the "C-A-T" variety. I decided to try a much harder word.

I held up the flashcard showing a chicken to an obstreperous boy who goes by Jake.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Chicken," he said. Koreans know this, because Koreans have adopted the English word "chicken" (치킨), which they use mostly to refer to chicken prepared for eating (cf pork vs pig, in English), but they also know it refers to the animal.

"How do you spell it?" I asked. I expected him to be stumped.

Instead, without pause, Jake spelled, "J-A-R-E-D."

I really wasn't expecting that. I guess at some point, in a previous class, I'd taught them to spell my name (an important thing, maybe, knowing how to write your teacher's name, right?). And he decided rather than admit not knowing how to spell chicken, he'd fall back on something he knew.

It was pretty funny. I think only after he'd said it, did he realize he was equating me to a chicken. I pointed at the flashcard, and at myself: "Same, right?"

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: How did I get here?

"Teacher, can I use my phone now?"

This is normally not encouraged during class. It was 9:30 – halfway through the last hour of class.

"Can't this wait until after class ends?" I asked.

"I need to call my mom," she explained.

"Um… why do you need to call your mom?"

Pause. "I have to tell to get a ride home."

"I see. Well, I guess that's important," I acquiesced.

A moment later, after fishing around her backpack, she said, "I can't find my phone. Can I use my iPad to send a text message?"

I shrugged. "One way, or another. But can you get it done? So we can continue with class?"

She fiddled with her iPad for a moment, then looked up. "Actually, uh… I just remembered, I rode my bike."

"So you don't need to call your mom?"

She nodded. It's worth noting that this girl, finishing up the 7th grade, is the absolute highest-scoring student at Karma, right now. And although she speaks with a noticeable Korean accent, in terms of grammar and vocabulary I'd give her the lead in a comparison with any US teenager. But she's a bit of an airhead.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: Karmacarols

Last Friday, my TQ phonics class merged with Grace's CS "post-phonics" class and had a caroling competition. These are 2nd and 3rd graders. Grace's class have been studying English for two years but the TQ kids (last group singing) have had less than a year of English, just a few hours a week. So I was proud of them.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Yeahhh

The vocabulary list included the word "polite."

I asked my student, "Are you polite?"

He made a mock-aggressive face, looking like a drunk fratboy, and roared, "Yeahhh!"

He has a pretty good sense of humor and irony.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: The Unknowable Girlfriend

Yesterday, in the Newton2 elementary cohort, a boy who goes by Jhonny (the mispelling is deliberate and he's quite adamant about it) announced to the class that he had a girlfriend. He's always a bit of a clown, so this interruption wasn't completely inconceivable.

"That's nice," I said, blandly. "What's her name?"

"I don't know," he said, sheepishly.

"You might want to find out her name," I suggested. "Girls like it when you know their names."

"I can't," he protested.

He's not great with English, and it was clear he wanted to explain more. He explained, in Korean, to the boy, Jerry, next to him, who is better at English.

Jerry said, "A girl gave him a note. Secret note."

"Aha," I said. "That makes sense. So you don't know her name."

Jhonny nodded, vigorously. The girls at the front of the class tittered. "It's so horrible," Jhonny complained, burying his face in his palms dramatically.

"I can see that. Well good luck," I said.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: H┴∀Ǝp

As I’ve written before here, I sometimes use my Tarot cards in my classes, as a kind of cross between communicative listening exercise and entertaining reward. Many (maybe most) of my students are fascinated to have me “read their future” about some question. They ask about their upcoming test scores, their health or the health of family members, about their careers and future prospects for marriage. I keep my readings pretty generic, and of course, like any Tarot reader, I use clues in their questions and things I know about my students to make the answers more interesting and relevant.
Last night, I had a confident fifth-grader, Soyeon, insist that it was her turn to “read” the cards for me, instead. This doesn’t happen often – the kids are intimidated by the 30 pages of printed out “card meanings” that I use with the cards, to lend some legitimacy to my interpretations and to find plausible meanings – I don’t have the 178 possible meanings memorized. Most of the kids understand the principle that an inverted (reversed) card would have an opposite meaning, too, so I can play with that when it happens.
Soyeon was happy to lay down the cards and page through my printout of meanings, however. She told me to ask a question. Keeping to a nice, “safe” topic, I asked about my future health. Most of my students know about my cancer saga – it’s been the background of many a spontaneous classroom discussion. So that gave her something interpret against, too.
She laid down three cards: a past card, present card, and future card. She turned over the past card, and it was “The World.” She looked at the printout, but she didn’t just read it out loud. The printout, to be honest, has a lot of difficult vocabulary. I made it that way on purpose – it gives me a chance to teach something when I read the cards, and it also allows me to “hedge” meanings when I feel like things are too gloomy or creepy or anything else. Soyeon thought about what she read for a moment, and complained she didn’t understand it. I told her to just look at the picture on the card and use the words she did understand to come up with her own idea.
“You traveled everywhere the world. It was good.”
Not bad, right?
RWS_Tarot_13_DeathNext, she turned over the present card. It was the 9 of wands. This was one of those eerie moments when random Tarot hits really close to accuracy. The meaning of this card, as I’d put on my printout, is something like “a warrior has won a battle but now must rest.”
She said something like, “You got sick and it was like a battle. Now you’re tired.”
Then she turned over the final card. It was “Death,” but reversed (upside-down).
She laughed. She only glanced at the printout, before saying, triumphantly, “You should be dead, but you keep refusing.”
That seemed really clever, and exactly the right way to read a card like that.
It was a successful class.
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]
 
 

Caveat: 선생님 잘했죠

20160811_basic-page-009I received some high praise from a first grade elementary student. He wrote, “선생님 잘했죠” [seonsaengnim jalhaetjyo = “teacher did well”]. My heart was warmed.
The note, appearing at the bottom of a quiz paper (at right – you can click to see a larger version of the paper), surprised me – because of his personality, since I have constantly struggled to rein him in even a little bit.
In fact, in terms of behavior, he is a “wild child” – never sitting still, constantly in the faces of other students, always demanding attention. But he’s smart, too, and can sometimes focus really well. I guess he is getting something out of the class, despite appearances.
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

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