I've talked some about what I'm doing here, but not a lot about the actual work I'm doing. I work in a Hagwon, which is a private college. There are many different Hagwon's in Korea, and there are a lot of public schools, and whichever ones you go to are different. I think my contract says I'm not supposed to talk too much about where I work, so I'll leave that out.
Levels I teach.
I teach ESL Kindergarden 6 years old Korean, 4 years old International age. I teach E1's that are 8 years old Korean, which is 6 years old International, and E2's which are 11 and 12 years old Korean, which is about 9 or 10 International.
I'm required to be to work by 9:40 in the morning, and classes for Kindergarden start at 10am. I teach math, colors, shapes, bodyparts, about plants, crafts... basically, its a true kindergarden. I even have gym class, which I hate more as a teacher than I did as a student. There are 5 periods in a day of classes, and 1 period of lunch. Lunch is about 50 min long. There is a 10 min break between the first 4 periods, and a 5 min break in the last 2 periods. That break isn't a full break for me because I have to take the kids to the bathroom and back to class, so its really about a 5 min break, but hey, every 40 min I get a 5 min break, not bad. Except the last break, which doesn't always exist cause its only 5 min long in the first place. Kindergarden ends at 2:20, and we get the kids dressed, and off to their busses. Its really busy, and I'm learning new ways of teaching as much as the kids are learning new things.
After Kindergarden I get a 20 min break before E1 starts at 2:40. I normally use this to setup the classroom and revue my notes and materials for the upcoming classes, because the next breaks are not very long. E1 as 2 periods with a 10 min break in between and ends at 4pm. I start the class by checking homework, then going over the date, and the weather, and asking how the kids are. This is more bookwork than Kindergarden is, however they are still young and beginners so we do a lot of active things as well. Last period we were reading a story about riding on different things like bikes, and spaceships, and scooters. So we had chair races acting out riding on this different objects, and the kids had a blast, and they all learned their words. My E1's are my favorite class because they like to participate a lot, and I can really see them learning the new words, and they don't scream like Kindy does.
Next is E2. Oh my E2's... They do not like to work. They have LOTS of bookwork that needs to be done, reading, and writing, and speeches, and it's a lot harder to make these fun because they have to be done. I'm having trouble thinking of games for them as well, however my other teachers have been helping me. E2 is only MWF and it ends at 5:30
so thats not bad right? doesn't seem like a long time to be at work at all. However, that doesn't take in preparation time. I try to get my lesson plans done during my breaks and lunch time, however I also have to write the schedule for my classes the next month. Also, I have to prepare speech topics, and make telephone relays, and prep materials and tests. There is grading the tests and homework assignments, speeches to correct, and diaries to check and score. Then we have progress reports as well, and those take longer to do. Thankfully those are only every 2 months, not monthly. There can also be parent teacher conferences to fit in, and other meetings, and extra training.
Thankfully, I'm becoming a lot faster at completing my work since I first started. My first couple weeks I was doing about 50 hours of work with teaching and preparation and learning. Now I'm putting in about 40 hours of work, and sometimes I'm doing a little less. I also have the least amount of classes of the teachers at my school, everyone else has at least one more class, or and E3 class were they stay until 7:00. Of course they are paid more than me, and they didn't give me more classes because I am a new teacher. However, I'm thankful for that because I'm not sure I could handle that extra class!
Some of my favorite things about the teaching has been teaching holidays, and going on Field Trips. It really allows you to explore and teach without having to stick to a book, and come up with fun activities for the kids.
Now, every teacher I've talked with has said this is way more work than any Epik/Gepik teacher will have to do, and more than a lot of Hagwons, but they have also said that sometimes schools can treat them badly. At my school the staff is very supportive, and everything is handled well. People are friendly, and the students are good. Not great, they are still kids and I'll probably never think a mass of them are great, but there isn't any who need to be thrown out of a window.
Well, thats a bit about the job I'm doing now, so you know what its like here. I've only been here for a couple months now, I hear I have even more work to look forward to as Open house approaches, and Quiz Contest, Speech Contest, and when we start putting on plays... I think there is Children's Festival next month in Gym we have been training the kids so they know how to play the games. Which means I've been being pulled aside to learn how to play them! I've also learned like 40 different songs, and made up some of my own, for the kids.
Ok, this is all I'm writing about this for now. We shall see if I need to add more in the future. I'm not spellchecking or grammar checking, I'm just posting it from typing it, so don't bother to say anything about how I'm supposed to be teaching English. I make sure my assignments are correct before I teach them.
Levels I teach.
I teach ESL Kindergarden 6 years old Korean, 4 years old International age. I teach E1's that are 8 years old Korean, which is 6 years old International, and E2's which are 11 and 12 years old Korean, which is about 9 or 10 International.
I'm required to be to work by 9:40 in the morning, and classes for Kindergarden start at 10am. I teach math, colors, shapes, bodyparts, about plants, crafts... basically, its a true kindergarden. I even have gym class, which I hate more as a teacher than I did as a student. There are 5 periods in a day of classes, and 1 period of lunch. Lunch is about 50 min long. There is a 10 min break between the first 4 periods, and a 5 min break in the last 2 periods. That break isn't a full break for me because I have to take the kids to the bathroom and back to class, so its really about a 5 min break, but hey, every 40 min I get a 5 min break, not bad. Except the last break, which doesn't always exist cause its only 5 min long in the first place. Kindergarden ends at 2:20, and we get the kids dressed, and off to their busses. Its really busy, and I'm learning new ways of teaching as much as the kids are learning new things.
After Kindergarden I get a 20 min break before E1 starts at 2:40. I normally use this to setup the classroom and revue my notes and materials for the upcoming classes, because the next breaks are not very long. E1 as 2 periods with a 10 min break in between and ends at 4pm. I start the class by checking homework, then going over the date, and the weather, and asking how the kids are. This is more bookwork than Kindergarden is, however they are still young and beginners so we do a lot of active things as well. Last period we were reading a story about riding on different things like bikes, and spaceships, and scooters. So we had chair races acting out riding on this different objects, and the kids had a blast, and they all learned their words. My E1's are my favorite class because they like to participate a lot, and I can really see them learning the new words, and they don't scream like Kindy does.
Next is E2. Oh my E2's... They do not like to work. They have LOTS of bookwork that needs to be done, reading, and writing, and speeches, and it's a lot harder to make these fun because they have to be done. I'm having trouble thinking of games for them as well, however my other teachers have been helping me. E2 is only MWF and it ends at 5:30
so thats not bad right? doesn't seem like a long time to be at work at all. However, that doesn't take in preparation time. I try to get my lesson plans done during my breaks and lunch time, however I also have to write the schedule for my classes the next month. Also, I have to prepare speech topics, and make telephone relays, and prep materials and tests. There is grading the tests and homework assignments, speeches to correct, and diaries to check and score. Then we have progress reports as well, and those take longer to do. Thankfully those are only every 2 months, not monthly. There can also be parent teacher conferences to fit in, and other meetings, and extra training.
Thankfully, I'm becoming a lot faster at completing my work since I first started. My first couple weeks I was doing about 50 hours of work with teaching and preparation and learning. Now I'm putting in about 40 hours of work, and sometimes I'm doing a little less. I also have the least amount of classes of the teachers at my school, everyone else has at least one more class, or and E3 class were they stay until 7:00. Of course they are paid more than me, and they didn't give me more classes because I am a new teacher. However, I'm thankful for that because I'm not sure I could handle that extra class!
Some of my favorite things about the teaching has been teaching holidays, and going on Field Trips. It really allows you to explore and teach without having to stick to a book, and come up with fun activities for the kids.
Now, every teacher I've talked with has said this is way more work than any Epik/Gepik teacher will have to do, and more than a lot of Hagwons, but they have also said that sometimes schools can treat them badly. At my school the staff is very supportive, and everything is handled well. People are friendly, and the students are good. Not great, they are still kids and I'll probably never think a mass of them are great, but there isn't any who need to be thrown out of a window.
Well, thats a bit about the job I'm doing now, so you know what its like here. I've only been here for a couple months now, I hear I have even more work to look forward to as Open house approaches, and Quiz Contest, Speech Contest, and when we start putting on plays... I think there is Children's Festival next month in Gym we have been training the kids so they know how to play the games. Which means I've been being pulled aside to learn how to play them! I've also learned like 40 different songs, and made up some of my own, for the kids.
Ok, this is all I'm writing about this for now. We shall see if I need to add more in the future. I'm not spellchecking or grammar checking, I'm just posting it from typing it, so don't bother to say anything about how I'm supposed to be teaching English. I make sure my assignments are correct before I teach them.
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