Saying Goodbye To Some Really Cute Kids

Last Friday was my last day for some of my classes. There wasn't anything too special about it, and I still made them work, but I took the camera along with me to capture a few sweet pics and some video to remember them by.

It's always frustrating for teachers here to get kids and even adult students to stop speaking Konglish. I think Aaron has mentioned what Konglish is, but I'll give you an example. It's where they use a an English word, but they koreanize it so that it's easier to say. Like the word "orange" is used for things like orange juice, and orange flavored things, but not for the color orange. It is spelled in Hangul to sound like orange. In the Korean language, a consonant is always followed by a vowel sound, so when they say "orange" it comes out "orangie". Or, "bus-uh" for "bus". I gave up on poor little Chris, but I'm glad that at least he knows that the color is orange. :)


I can no longer hide the fact that Chris is my favorite one of all. There's something about his little scratchy voice paired with his little movements, and as bad as this sounds, his laziness when it comes to even coloring, that is just so adorable. He's never a distraction so I never have need to get angry, but I have to coach him almost the whole time. Here he is reciting what he knows about monkeys.
Listen for when he says "monkey monkey".



Here are a few pics of my eleven-year-olds. These guys kept me laughing!
Steven, Michael, and David. Kevin used to be in this class too, but he disappeared during the month of October. They would sometimes like to play jokes on me like leaving little plastic bugs in my pencil bag, and running and hiding when I would run to the bathroom. They were so much fun.




Steven needed a haircut back in July, but his mom recently had a baby, so he's been just a little neglected. He's really sweet, and reminds me of our friend Henry. He even gave me some chocolate on my last day.


This is Steven's little brother. He doesn't have an English name yet, and I don't remember his Korean name, but he is one of the sweetest, most mild mannered babies I've ever been around. He's only five months, but already he has a ton of hair!! He always smiled huge at me when I would come close to his face. His mom said she thinks he loves me. I know I love him!


This is Michael. His English is really good, and he doesn't attend any sort of English academy. He likes Michael Jackson and some Korean group named Big Bang. I taught his sister, Crystal, in the class before his.


And, here's David posing with his Harry Potter book. His glasses are relatively new. I remember him squinting at a picture in a book only about 2 feet in front of him, and the next time I saw him he had glasses.

I'm going to miss some of them a lot! My dear friend Nancy has decided to take over teaching them starting this week, so I'm sure I'll be able to get updates from her on a regular basis. :)