After about a week of "special classes," which provide a kind of transition for middle-schoolers between the 내신 (exam prep time) and the post-exam regular schedule, I had my first full-schedule of regular classes today. I don't really like doing the special classes – mostly because the middle schoolers are all so depressed-seeming and desultory in the immediate aftermath of their exams, but also because the odd schedules mean that I get mixed bunches of motivated and unmotivated students who don't know each other well because they're not in their regular cohorts. It's often challenging to put together a successful one-up lesson plan.
Anyway, today I got my regular middle-school classes. So that was good, I guess. But very tiring. I always feel compelled to be a little bit "scary / hard" with returnees, so they don't start off on the wrong the footing.
Meanwhile, though, with my elementary honors class we had fun. We were getting ready to do a debate, and the kids said they wanted to be different "characters." Once, when I was doing one of my schticks where I have the whole debate myself (meaning I argue back and forth with myself, taking both sides), I made it more interesting by giving each person in the debate I was playing different personalities or "characters": so there was a lazy debater, crazy debater, stupid debater, annoying debater, etc. They wanted to play characters. I let them. I'm not sure it was a very good debate, but they sure had fun. I like seeing the kids being creative that way. Sally did an excellent job being shy, Fay was so good a being a confused debater that I thought she was really confused and wanted to correct her – I said, "you're arguing the wrong side," she said, "I know. I'm confused," and gave her winning grin, shrugging. It was a good class.
[daily log: walking, 5.5 km]