The Special Class
By JL Copeland
Alright? Ready for the special class?
Music for this post? Well, I did try to cast a spell over the special class, but I think it was myself who was turned into a newt. Here’s Thee Milkshakes:
My wife’s cousin runs a study room. This is a small, one-classroom English-teaching business, max ten students at a time. At Chinese New Year, she asked me to teach a one-off special class for her.
I tried to refuse, but I really suck at saying ‘no.’ If someone approached me in the street and asked if I’d like them to remove my face with a cheese knife, dip it in tabasco sauce, and reattach it with a staple gun, I’d probably respond
“Is it for free?”
I rarely take on extra work. I don’t have time; incoherent/incontinent blogposts don’t write themselves, my friends. But I like her cousin, and so to help her out, I agreed (she also offered me a generous fee to sweeten the deal).
The main reason I was reluctant to take it was that her cousin teaches 7 to 12-year-olds. I’m —somehow— a professor at a university. Not a great fit for such a class. I also hadn’t taught kids for seventeen years.
What is the typical teaching style in Korea?
Mostly knowledge transmission i.e. the teacher talks and the students listen. This is especially true in middle school and high school, where the pressure is intense, the curriculum is difficult and wrist-slittingly dull.
What is the #1 cause of death in Korea?
For young people?
Suicide. You can probably guess why.
It’s a little better in elementary school, but pair and group work (my teaching style) in English is usually still pretty alien to the little ones, so I know I’m going to struggle.
As I’m a planner/worrier, I fretted about it for weeks, losing sleep.
The night before the class, I had a dream about it.
Yes, in the dream, I was late.
No, thankfully, I was wearing underpants.
Yes, the guy from my favourite writing podcast was observing the class. In his eyes burned the question: Why the hell are doing THIS when you could be writing?
My wife (she’s Korean) couldn’t understand my concern. From her perspective, anyone with a hand can wipe their ass, and anyone who’s fluent in English can teach it. All I can say to that is thank Christ for bidets.
The cousin sends the details of the class. There’s going to be two 3rd graders, three 5th graders, and two middle-school students.
Great, three different age groups. Oh, she adds, and their levels are all different. Planning for the special class is going to be fun.
If there wasn’t enough pressure, the day before the class, I’m told that one of the student’s mothers is going to come and watch fifteen minutes of the class.
This is to check I don’t simply put on a Mr Bean video for the hour and sit at the back, smoking a spliff (pretty much the typical impression many Koreans have of foreign English teachers in Korea).
The mum wanting to observe doesn’t surprise me. There’s a term in Korean: cheema balam. The direct translation of this is ‘windy skirt.’
No, this isn’t used for a lady who’s had a bad batch of kimchi dumplings; think of it more as ‘hurricane mum.’ One who sweeps into their child’s educational facility and causes devastation wherever she makes landfall.
Yeah, I know, why ‘skirt?’ Don’t get me started on the rampant sexism in Korea; we’ll be here all century.
Which country has the most strict parents?
Korea must be up there. There are lots of cheema balams in Korea. Most Korean parents take ‘helicopter parenting’ to the next level.
Think of them like one of those funny baseball caps with a propeller in the top, but the parent is the propeller and they stay fixed in place while they spin the kid until they’re sick (or jump off a building).
I digress.
On the day of the class, my mate Chris is visiting. My wife is at tango so he offers to take The Girl and The Boy to a nearby cafe and teach them card games while they wait for me. As if I’m not already on edge, as I walk to class, I have a premonition. The Boy, in the backroom of a Vegas casino, hand being smashed by a wise-guy’s lump hammer. A Ray Liotta voiceover oils along:
My relationship with cards started with a father’s friend in a coffee shop in Korea and ended with a loan-shark and a shallow grave in the Nevada sand.
I’m digressing again, aren’t I?
The first activity of the special class falls a bit flat on the sea of little blank faces. Their wide eyes and pained expressions tell me they really, really want to understand me, they really do, but I’ve completely misjudged their levels as well as my ability to grade my language and to deliver clear, comprehensible instructions.
Also, the smallest kid (one of the 3rd graders) is one of those ‘Why the hell am I being forced to learn this gobbledegook?’ kind of kids. Oceans of sighing, four score and ten eye rolls, and a general ‘Why does this always happen to me?’ vibe.
In one activity, I’ve given them five different sentences chopped up into individual words (difficulty adjusted for each age group). In pairs, they have to rearrange the sentences (one at a time) in the correct order.
The middle school students have misunderstood and mixed up all five sentences together. Good luck with that one, guys. I pretend they are invisible for the rest of the activity.
Surprisingly, the fifth graders get it, no probs.
But the third graders are struggling. I try to help, but that small kid is really screwing up his sentences—literally. He’s balling the words and flicking them around the desk. At one point, I think I see him put one in his mouth.
We move on swiftly.
Next, scattergories. I have a list of ten categories. I will give them a letter of the alphabet, then each team have to come up with one answer beginning with that letter per category to win a point. E.g. if the letter is ‘b’ and the category is fruit, an acceptable answer is banana.
Easy, right?
Wrong.
Despite having spent an inordinate amount of time carefully selecting a letter and then the corresponding categories that even the lowest level should be able to write an answer for, feeling fruity, I chuck my planning for the special class out the window and let a student choose the letter.
Turns out there aren’t many colours, weather, or days of the week beginning with ‘k.’
For the last activity, running dictation, I’ve even written a story.
Running dictation is one of my favourite activities. It practices all four skills (reading, writing, speaking, listening). In short, you pin a piece of text far away at one end of the classroom, then one person from each team has to run to the paper, memorise as much as they can, then run back to their team and whisper it to them. Their team write it down. Every few minutes, you change the runner. First team to make a perfect copy wins.
Simple, right?
Wrong.
They misunderstand my garbled instructions and think they’re playing by themselves. Eventually, I redirect them into teams, and we get some semblance of ordered competition going (although not much running but lots of foot-dragging by that small guy).
This was the story, by the way:
The Trip to the Zoo
James and Kate are in a car at the zoo.
They are discussing whether to get a dog or a cat.
They drive their car into the safari park.
James sees an antelope.
Kate sees a lion.
The lion’s eyes glow like the inside of a volcano.
James is very scared, but he keeps driving.
The lion appears to be hunting them.
Kate and James’ car is very old, and the engine suddenly stops.
The Lion chews off one of the side mirrors.
Kate frowns at James.
James starts the car again and drives quickly away.
But the lion jumps on top of the car!
James hits the brakes, and the lion flies off the roof of the car.
He then reverses for a long time until the engine squeals like a baby elephant.
Kate says that next time they will go to the cinema instead.
Also, they will get a dog.
I was quite chuffed with this literary masterpiece and hoped it might raise a smile from the little cherubs.
Then I hear one of the students ask my wife’s cousin (in Korean),
선생님, 문장을 순서대로 써야하나요?
‘Teacher, do we have to write the sentences in order?’
And she replies (also in Korean),
아니, 마음대로 해
‘No, just write any words you like.’
For Christ’s sake.
So, they proceed to butcher my pristine prose into a list of randomly ordered words and nonsensical sentences.
And, of course, that student’s mum has snuck into the class right before this activity to observe this chaotic shitshow.
I sign off with a round of Pictionary (draw a picture, guess the thing).
Competition time!
See if you can guess which recent award-winning animated movie my incredible effort below depicts.
Have a guess in the comments. The first one to guess the ‘golden’ answer wins an incredible prize: I will draw a similar incredible work of art depicting a movie you love (as long as it’s familiar) and include it at the bottom of this post.
What more could you wish for?
Here’s the pic:
The class finally ends, and I smile goodbye …and breathe.
It turns out my wife’s cousin thinks I did an outstanding job and wants me to teach there on a regular basis. I manage to back away from her, mumbling ‘well, er, you see…’ until I’m safely around a corner. Then I run.
The lesson learned from the pedagogical pandemonium of the special class?
Sometimes, you have to ignore the ” fail to prepare, prepare to fail “ cliché. Sometimes, there are things you just can’t plan for. Sometimes, all you can do is rock up with a sincere intention to do your best and to roll with the flying kicks to the head in good humour. You’ll be surprised how many people appreciate it.
And so long as no one has choked to death on a grammar exercise by the final curtain, take that as a win.
Speak soon.
JL
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