thirty-six husbands? I don't know about that...

So it took me way less time to prepare for class than I thought it would, and I'm sitting here in the English classroom with an hour before next period, so I decided I'd blog.

I made the mistake of calling my Mom on Saturday morning and telling her all my good stories from last week, so I'm not sure I feel like recounting all of them, although I need to, for my own sake, so I won't forget them. Other than that my conversation with Mom was really nice.

Friday at Donggang was even more amazing that I thought it would. I always assume it will rock, because I love that school and I love my co-teacher and I love the kids. It's the school where I never have to teach from the CD or do repeat-after-me and I have almost complete control over what I teach as well as an adept translator in the classroom with me at all times. Really, what more could one ask for? If I could teach there all week, I would definitely extend, and I might never come home.

So on Friday we had the speaking test/contest. Unlike Mrs. O, who made my life super difficult by not making the speaking test a substantial part of their grade and helping me translate the directions, Su Hyeon basically rocked my life. I was so disappointed after the test at Noan. I mean, I spent a lot of money on prizes, but none of the students really studied. I can't blame them... they didn't know about my cool prizes (because Mrs. O made things difficult) and it wasn't really a big part of their grade, so why should they? But then the morning of the speaking test she came in and was like, "you give grade." And she handed me a paper with the numbers 100-80-60-40 on it. And those were the only grades I was allowed to give. So I don't even know what those numbers mean, or how important the grade was overall, so I don't think I gave below a 60, and I gave a lot of 100s. I mean, don't leave me alone to do this test, tell me the morning of you want me to give grades, and not give me any idea of what it means. She looked at my grade sheet and was like "too muchy." To which I responded: "all students native speaker same same." Sometimes I'm passive-aggressive. It's good that she can't understand.

So anyway, that sucked. At Dongkang I had higher hopes, but my students surpassed them amazingly. Here was the reason I wanted to do the speaking contest in the first place... I hoped that awesome prizes would motivate students who don't usually study or try hard at anything related to English (or sometimes anything at all), to do it. Pronunciation doesn't require a great knowledge of anything else, just a lot of practice. Like, the girl students studied because it was a test and they always study, but most of the boy students won't study very hard for a test just because it's a test. But everytime I messaged two of my laziest boys last week and said "What are you doing?" they responded (in Korean) "poem practice." So I dared to hope they would do well.

The speaking contest itself was just great, because I got to sit down one-on-one for a few minutes with all of the students, which I haven't actually been able to do. And I could tell that they actually studied really hard! (Well, most of them.) [The Youtube video I made of myself reading the poem got 70 hits, if that means anything.) The girls did really well, unsurprisingly, but none of the boys were terrible, and the two top winners were... that's right, my two laziest students ever. Their pronunciation was amazing. My co-teacher almost had a heart attack when I told her. She was like, "wait, I must have misheard you. Who?" Finally, I felt my idea had been validated. Unfortunately, I didn't get to give out the prizes for third grade last week, so the students are waiting with bated breath until next Thursday. My two dark horse winners must have known they did well, or known that they studied really hard, because they've been accosting me since Friday via Instant Messenger to tell them what place they got. I gleaned from one of the interminably long Korean sentences he sent me that they had a bet. Awesome. Whatever it takes. I'm so proud.

The speaking test was doubly cool because while each student was working with me one-on-one, I had the other ones working on a different assignment. I realized that I'd never once seen a single thing my students had written (I take my CONVERSATION class really seriously.) So I created a form letter with blanks in it for the students to fill in. Here's the form letter:

Dear Miss Camp / Briy / Sexy Favorite Teacher / 누나 / 언니 / Future Wife / ________,

Hello! How are you? I am _________ (기분) because __________. Today’s speaking test is _____________ (쉅다/어렵다/재미있다/재미없다/싫다). I (missed / didn’t miss) you yesterday. [보고싶다 / 보고싶지않다]

Now, I will tell you about myself (소개). My name is ______________. I am __________ years old. My birthday is ___________. On my birthday, please give me a present. I want a __________. Thank you! You are so kind.

Now, I want to tell you some secrets! Don’t tell! (말하지마!) I trust you! My best friend is _____________. My favorite person in our class is ______________. I think the cutest boy/girl in our class is _____________. I think the sexiest teacher at our school is _____________. I (have/don’t have) a (boyfriend/girlfriend). I (need/don’t need) a (boyfriend/girlfriend)! My dream date is _______________.

My favorite subject is __________. My favorite color is ________. My favorite book is ____________. My favorite movie is __________.

Miss Camp, I (love / hate / like / don’t like / don’t care about) your English class! It is ____________ (재미있다 / 재미없다 / 지루하다 / 괜찮다). My favorite lesson so far was __________.

Let me tell you about the future (미래). In 15 years, I will be married to __________. My job will be a __________. I will live in __________.

Love always,
_________________

I had a few motivations behind this. I wanted to see how well my kids could spell/write. I wanted to know their birthdays. I wanted to know who they were friends with. I wanted to know what job they wanted in the future. I wanted to know which lesson they had liked best. And I thought I'd probably find out some other random interesting information along the way. Fact.

I'll just share some of my favorite answers with you. #1 favorite answer to "On my birthday please give me a..." was "girlfriend." #2 favorite answer - "wastebasket." Most popular answer "a money." Oh, those zany Korean kids.

I knew I wouldn't get many sincere answers to my secrets questions, but I had to ask out of curiosity. Only two of my adorable kids actually admitted who they thought was cutest, and they were both really shy boys. The number one answer for sexiest teacher at our school was "Miss Camp," unsurprisingly. Perhaps they suspected flattery would get them extra points on their speaking test. Little do they know, I can't be bought. 50% of students also answered that I was their dream date, and one boy went so far as to describe said date: "Miss Camp, soju (alcohol), samgyupsal (expensive meat)."

No less than 40% of students theorize that they will be married to me in 15 years, which seems implausible. The other 60% were a little more cagey. Most of them just wrote "woman," which cracked me up. The boy who described the dream date with me wrote that in 15 years he would be living in "Miss Camp house." Hopefully we graduate to first names by that point.

Other high points, CJ wrote "누나 힘내세요!" on the top of his paper. (It means "Older sister/girlfriend, cheer up!" And SM, who hit me with the basketball and I'm in love with, was super-cute before his speaking test. He's like "Are you okay?" And I said, "Yes, thank you." Then he made the flustered face Korean people always make when they are about to try to speak English and said... "I.... you..." (I'm thinking, this is good.) "... God...." (Wait, what? That wasn't where I was hoping this would go.) Then he got flustered and gave up and started reading the poem. Later I was sitting and chatting with co-teacher, and he came in, so she asked him what he had been getting at. He was trying to let me know that he had prayed for me. Cute.

Uh-oh, class time, more later.