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| Another example of something awesome you can get to eat. I haven't actually tried one. |
I’m getting better at English and worse at Korean
I meant to write I am getting better at Korean and worse at English.
As I went to erase the first part, I had to stop and think which is more true, so I will leave them both.
Teaching English as a second language has some very funny and heartfelt moments. Here are some excerpts of stuff I have collected and checked. I’ll leave the grammar mistakes but fix the spelling and punctuation.
This is from a very smart 1st grader who was the monthly test winner for the first time.
One teacher comes in my class in David Teacher time. The teacher give me the monthly test score card. I and girl friend are winner. I feel tears dropping from my eyes. The taste is sweet because of happy. When I was hurt or very sad, the tear was salty and bitter!~! My first time monthly test winner. It was very proud of me. Then I think will become winner again in December?
I think I am level test winner!
Maybe my favorite
I ‘m afraid of monster because they are scary. They might kill you. Are you afraid of monster or believe in monster? I kind of believe monster at all. I want to see them but it might be scary. If you meet a monster tell police and tell me because I want to see what it look like? So my mom phone number is ###-###-#### Okay? Tell my mom what is look like and she can tell me about the monster. Probably I’m scared at rest room because they might be in they are. They mean is monster.
He actually gave me his mom’s number.
I got this journal from the coolest girl in the world because she would write stuff like this.
I have a friend named Jun woo. I want to marry Jun woo because he is rich. But he is ugly so I hate him a little bit.
Often kids write really sad journals about their scary moms or teachers. Charlie’s are the saddest…
What do you do if you cannot sleep at night?
I will be very scary and go back to living room. My mom say “Go back to your bed room!” Then I will feel lonely and maybe cry. I go to sleep and I will imagine I can count the number of sheep and then I will fall asleep.
He has an even sadder one that I could not find. It was about him working really hard on a picture of a cat or dog or something and showed it to his teacher and the teacher said it was childish! He’s a 1st grader by the way.
There are a lot of chubby kids, I think because they don’t get out and play too much. They turn into beautiful thin adults so it dosen’t matter too much. But the funny stories that the chubby kids write about food are very fun and cute.
If all things changed to the delicious foods. It is very, very good day. APT is made of candy and chocolate and book change to sugar. I think the Nintendo and PSP changing to steak because steak is my best food and Nintendo is my best game. I want the Earth to change to big round jumbo chocolate chip cookie. Then, maybe aliens come to Earth to eat out planets. That is awful! Maybe people’s stomach are bombed! I like eat delicious foods, but I like now time. More than sea water change to coke.
I had a girl give a speech about “If I could be invisible for one day.” She would sneak into her favorite restaurant and eat all her favorite kinds of food. She gave little motions for the different types of food. Like pinchers for crabs, rubbed her little potbelly for sweets ect. But she knows “stealing is bad” (makes X’s with her index fingers as she says it) and will clean up so no one will know she was there.
My very favorite girl right now Michelle, wrote a journal about the book the princess and the pea. After she re-told the story of all the mattresses with the pea underneath she skipped and line and wrote, “I think a pea might be in your bed Mr. SATh.”
We had a talent show this last weekend. It was very fun to watch. Many Koreans classically train their children. Like how many kids at home will do sports, here it is music. So that made for some very good performances on the violin and piano and all that stuff, some very funny dances. Next week we start our new school year. It is weird to have the end of a year party on Friday and go back to school on Monday. We don’t have a extra day off until May. If a national holiday lands on a weekend everyone is S.O.L. instead of making it a three-day weekend. But I won’t complain until they take away my weekends. The U.S. Embassy is open from 8:30-5:00, weekends and Wednesdays off and gets all Korean and American Holidays. What?! I need to find out how to get a job there.
The things I miss the most besides friends and family are…
• Bread, the bread here is no good.
• Sandwich meat. I saw Deli ham at Costco yesterday for 25 dollars
• Sandwiches (notice a trend) I did get cool whip from someone moving yesterday!
• Cheese for under 15 dollars, one thing I do fork out the money for
• Ovens
• Americans walking tend to be more aware of others around them. I can’t even go grocery shopping on the weekends, too frustrating.
• Playing sports and activities. This might be the hardest thing.
• Coaching, actually this is the hardest thing. Track is starting now. I have been following them and they seem to be doing great things and Kara must be doing great with my jumpers, I guess they are hers now. Anyway they look to be having another great year.
• Kraft Mac and Cheese.
• Not being as independent as I want at times.
• Some times I feel like a zoo animal on display
After about 6 months here are some of the thing I know I will already miss besides friends and students of course.
• Food, food, food. At times I am tired of Korean but I really like it.
• All the stylish beautiful people. Everyone is pretty and are primped and ready. It is like a fashion show.
• The walking culture, I walk almost an hour every day to work and stuff. It make for great access to shops and restaurants and anything you need there are stationary shops, pharmacies, tailors, cleaners, fruit stands, and tons of restaurants every where because everyone is always walking. (I’ve lost 15 lbs! I don’t look too skinny though.)
• Public transportation, an hour on a bus for $1.50 is so nice, compared to driving for and hour. Bus trips to the other end of Korea are about 3-4 hours from Seoul and run for about 12 dollars.
• One of the street foods you can get are these deep fried pancakes that are kind of a mix between a cinnamon roll and a sopapilla. Yeah, that’s right.
• Being a zoo animal is not always bad, little kids are hilarious, and some attention makes you feel good.
• Doctors are cheap and easy. If you have a bad cold you can stop in for a visit with out an appointment, get checked on, get a prescription and go to a nearby pharmacy all around 30-40 minutes. Doctor visits usually run about 4 dollars, and drugs around 4 dollars. I went to the dentist and did not need any work done so they did not even charge me. Back home it cost 50 bucks to just make eye contact with a doctor.
Much of the education is private here and kids go to school til just after lunch lots of time and them go to private lessons or schools for the rest of the day. So I work for one of these private schools, and it is ran much like a Korean Corporation. Often I have things thrown on me at the last minute. They have wanted me to write some curriculum for them several times. I always have but on occasion they have giving me little or no notice and wanted a task done by the end the day, meanwhile I am teaching til the end of the day. I do not get paid extra for this. They wanted me to write short stories that they could break down and the kids could practice putting stories in order. When I am annoyed by the lack of organization they get a story like this one. I pray that this makes it into a book somewhere.
One day Seth was walking down the street. He was on his way to practice for his baseball team. He was their best player and their next game was the final game of the World Series. Seth was very excited to play because he loved making his fans happy more than anything, he always putting others before himself. Then he walked past a house on fire. A crowd of people had gathered out front, and there was a big commotion. He heard a women pleading for someone to save her baby. As he got closer he heard her say that the baby was on the second floor. As quick as a wink, Seth ran into the building. His own safety did not even come into mind as was dodging falling debris and leaping over flames. He came upon the baby’s room he saw the baby in its bed crying, the sound was very heartening because that meant the baby was still alive. He grabbed the baby out of the bed and ran for the exit. He was heading down the stairs when they suddenly collapsed on him. His ankle and ribs were broken but he had softened the fall for the baby and it was still crying. He struggled to his feet, and limped out the door. The mother had tears of joy to see her baby safe. Seth left in a hurry and did not want anyone to recognize him because he was a famous baseball player. He went to the game and played without telling anyone what had happened. Knowing he had saved the life of a young child gave him more than enough energy to pitch a perfect game and hit the game winning, walk off home run. As he was rounding the bases he could see blood soaking though his uniform around his broken ankle and ribs. When he finally stepped on home plate he collapsed with exhaustion.
Here are some other examples of stuff I have submitted
It was a cold cloudy day. Seth was stuck inside with nothing to do. He wanted to see his friends but they were too far away to walk in the rain. He was tired of T.V. and was wanting to do something fun. He decided that he was not going to let the rain ruin his day. He grabbed an umbrella and went out side. It was a stormy day. The wind seemed to be blowing harder than Seth could ever remember. Suddenly a big gust of wind caught Seth’s umbrella and lifted him up into the air. He started getting higher and higher. Soon he was flying over trees and building. As he looked around he could see his friends holding umbrellas flying in the sky too.
“Hey,” Seth shouted to one of his friends, “what is happening?”
“I don’t know,” his friend shouted back, “I…
What does his friend shout next?
“I was bored so I grabbed my umbrella, and the wind blew me here.”
“I don’t want to talk to you.”
“Bark, Bark!”
“I’m playing hide and seek, don’t tell where I am.”
If the wind slowed down and Seth and his friends started to land on the ground what would they do?
Get in the car and drive away from the store
Find each other and talk about what happened.
Light the umbrellas on fire for light
Never talk about what happened again
Seth was running for his life. He had spent the last year looking for the famous red elephant. He worked for the museum and they wanted him to try and find it. No one had seen it in over 200 years. Seth followed clues and used an old treasure map to finally find the red elephant. Some people said the red elephant was older than the forest it lived in. When Seth finally saw the red elephant he had followed his map and climbed over a large hill and into an opening in the forest. There it stood, 30 meters tall and the color of a bright red tomato. Seth stood frozen, because of how amazing the elephant was, he could not move. The elephant turned to look at Seth. They stared at each other for what seemed like a lifetime. Seth finally was able to move his feet and took a step backwards. He accidentally stepped on a wild flower. The Elephant let out a loud cry. It was terrible and beautiful at the same time. It sounded like 100 trumpets all together. The Elephant was the protector of the forest and was very mad at Seth for stepping on a flower. Seth started to run just in time. The Elephant chased after Seth. It was getting closer. Seth was running for his life and saw a cliff getting close. At the bottom of the cliff was a large lake.
What will Seth do?
Turn and fight the red elephant
Lay on the ground and pretend he is dead
Jump off the cliff into the lake
Seth and the elephant become friends.
If Seth lands in the lake and lives what will he do next?
He will swim to safety and share what happened.
He will go try and live in the forest
He will go back and show the elephant who is boss
He will go back to work as a policeman
The red elephant was a very lonely creature. He was very big and because of his size he rarely was able to have any friends. Some times funny creatures that could talk would come and look at him. They looked like hairless monkeys. They would stair at him for a long time. Some times he would try and play his song for them. He thought it was a beautiful song, it sounded like 100 trumpets. One time he played a song for one of the hairless monkeys and he ran away. The red elephant thought that he wanted to play tag and chased after the creature. Soon they came to a cliff and the man jumped off into a very shallow lake. The red elephant felt very sorry for the creature because he would surely die because of the fall. This had happened before. He needed to do something to keep this from happening again.
What will the red elephant do?
Stop trying to make friends
Build a fence to keep the creatures from jumping off the cliff
Try and fight for red elephants everywhere
Eat the next hairless monkey he sees
How will a fence help the red elephant?
keep people from jumping off the cliff
Keep the birds in the cage
Keep people close so he can eat them
Stop fighting with the other elephants.
I’ll leave you with a very difficult journal to translate. See if you can figure out what she is saying.
Jazz Jazz Jazz!!!!
Saturday I danced jazz. Mom, dad, big brother, small brother saw my jazz and hitted male. I house I listened CD and danced. I funnied. I like to do some more time. I will do some more time. But just one time do, stiss ticky. So, I didn’t like to do Jazz was many time, to like to do jazz was many time. That time was sing no, I can’t do it… This time I can do.
Finally read this one. Sometimes adults are more immature than children. Are you? I am. Read this and find out, a speech about Christmas.
This is the original pre-corrected version, don’t worry we left the good parts in.
Um…
What sounds? Ding Ding Ding.
The sound come from the window.
I went to there and saw out side.
There is a lot of snow falling down around Santa with red deer, rush to my room.
It’s amazing, What a surprise!!
A door was opened by itself
Santa stands up me and talk to me, “You’re a good girl. Would you mind helping me?! Santa said.
No, not at all, I said.
let’s hit the road.!!
first Santa said “Why don’t we visit Harry Potter’s house? to give gifts for him.
Why not?
I feel myself floating in the air. I can fly… I shouted.
Santa looked at me with smiling.
Harry Potter’s house appears more and more.
We land on his roof and put in his chimney a big gift.
He said Hello. I can’t believe. I met him. He is very nice look and has big bright eyes.
I wanna kiss you and big hug… let me get?
He said, yes defiantly. I got it and felt warm from it.
Time goes by fast, Santa wanted me to go back my room as possible as he can, before comes another day.
“this situation is your gift, you know? Your dream has finally come true.” Santa said.
When I wake up in the early morning there is black circle glasses beside me.
I get a big smile and look at the sky.
The stars still shining.
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