I have been teaching for a few days now! I guess my experience is a little different from most of my fellow Fulbright ETAs. Most of them are gloating in the celebrity status that they get at school. Why do they get this immediate rock-star status.. you ask? Well, blonde hair, blue eyes or even a white face will do the trick. You see, S. Korea is a very beauty-obsessed culture and there are very specific things that make you beautiful. There was this Korean girl at Orientation that I thought was gorgeous, but according to Korean standards, her face was not white or small enough. This explains why a majority of Koreans get plastic surgery to get “better” eye-lids or nose. Anywho, it is interesting to be Indian-American in S.Korea to say the least. Instead of getting that burst of excitement upon seeing me, it is more of a VERY CONFUSED look when I am introduced as being from America. In that sense, it is somewhat exhausting being “ON” all the time because 1) I am so conscious of how I am being judged on my appearance and 2) I have to work harder to prove myself to them because I do not get that American-card unless that is brought up in conversation but even after.. not really.
But, maybe this is the reason I have a “diplomatic visa” or it is my duty as a “cultural ambassador.” In a sense, I am a walking example of how diverse America is and every confused look I get is another chance I have to break the stereotype that Americans are all white. Just hopefully after a while, it won’t be so exhausting …
Even showing my students pictures of my friends BLEW THEIR MIND – they did couldn’t grasp at first that the person that looked African,, Filipino, Irish, Mexican and me were all, in fact, “American.” In one class, I had to go back and forth with this one students who just would not believe that my friend who was black was American. She pointed to the picture and said “African!” and I said “No, American!” She looked puzzled and pointed again, African!” It became screaming-fest back and forth of “African!” and “No, American!”
I guess another upside is that the compliments I do get are very thoughtful ones. There are less students petting me or wanting to touch my hair and more of the “You are a very diligent and hard working teacher,” “Can I be your friend, teacher?” or “All the teachers think you have the sweetest heart.”
As for my students, they are very cute girls. I was told before that students on the Island are much more naïve and sweet. Why that is... I am haven’t fully figured out but when I do.. I will surely write about it.
I spent an hour at the moon-bang-gu trying to figure out how to decorate my classroom and came to the conclusion that the classroom isn’t really for me… it is for the students. And so, I decided to do a “Cube Activity” for my first lesson. There is a cube cut out and they have to answer 6 BASIC questions about themselves. I thought this would be a good lesson for a couple of reasons: 1) I can learn about the students 2) obviously, use it as decorate the classroom .. hang it off the ceiling and staple it to the bulletin board 3) I can also gauge how much English they know
I am glad I did this activity first because I was SO SURPRISED the fact that in ALL my classes there would be one girl who knew EVERYTHING and could write multiple sentences.. and she was sitting next to a girl who looked at me as if they had never heard English before. Its not that I had too high hopes for my students.. I will surely teach and love them at their level, but how do you “teach to the middle” when half the class has a great grasp of English and the other cannot even spell the world nurse or know how to answer “What is your name?” Yesterday was a tough day.. I taught five classes, almost back-to-back with just one break. And after a whole day of seeing this extreme range in abilities all day, I was just quite discouraged. The pouring rainstorm didn’t help either. I am thinking of dividing the class half and half based on abilities. Sure, I’d have to spend that much time more creating different lesson plans but it would be worth it.. I think. The only thing I’d feel guilty about is having my co-teacher be responsible for the other half of the class. Sure I would give her instructions of what I want to be done with those students, but I am worried I would be asking her too much. gah, okay time for hopkido with the host sisters.. i'll finish my thoughts later and put up pictures too :)
