My first week as a teacher

Well, I made it through my first week of school. I really like my students and I enjoy teaching. I do have a lot of classes, 23 a week each with about 35 to 37 students. I've been very strict with all of my classes, but they still seem to really like me.

In all of my classes this week, I spent the majority of the lesson telling them who I was and where I was from. I also told them a few things I really liked and a few things I didn't like. I then gave them paper and colored pencils and had them all write about four things they liked and why and four things they didn't like and why. I think the lesson went pretty well, but my younger students (7th graders) seemed to enjoy it the most.

This coming week I'm going to start the actual teaching. I'm required to teach out of the text book, which will be a little difficult because the text book is very dry and not written that well. I do have some good ideas for a few games, so I'm going to try them and see how they work.

I'm also supposed to go on a three-day long field trip next week. I'm really not clear on where we are going or what we are doing or even what my duties will be, since I don't speak Korean. I just know I will be riding on a big bus and I think there is a mountain involved.

The past few days I've been fighting a pretty bad cold. I think I went through the worst of it last night, so hopefully I'm slowly getting better. The teachers in my school were nice enough to get me some medicine, so I've been taking it as they prescribed. Again, like everything in Korea, I can't read the bottles, so I have know idea what the medicine is for, so I just have to trust the people that gave it to me.

Anyway, I am filling slightly better. I was supposed to go out this evening to downtown Incheon. There is a reunion of sorts with the other foreign teachers that came last week along with a bunch of teachers that are already here. I think its pretty important to try and meet these people, so even though I'm still a little suck, I'm toying with the idea of still going.

JW