Day 310 - More Teaching Woes and a Cute Student Encounter

Despite drastically dumbing down my lesson (the 2-3 kids in my class who have any kind of English skill to speak of complained that it was elementary level) the majority of the students still said it was too hard. Since I'm drawing dialogue, grammar, and vocabulary directly from the book at this point, I don't know how much simpler I can make things. The co-teachers are starting to get pissed at me; I get frustrated that the students can't handle even the most basic English, and maybe the co-teachers think that I blame *them* for the students' amazingly terrible English skill. Which I don't at all -- I know how impossible it is to teach them, so I can totally empathize with their situation!


Anyway, yesterday I was clearly upset after struggling through one of my worst classes. A little, mousy girl -- always quiet in class, but clearly tries her best and hangs on every word I say even though she doesn't understand 80% of them -- lingered in the classroom. I went about cleaning up after the students, collecting papers and erasing the white boards. She came up to me, unable to make eye contact, and softly stumbled through an attempt at an apology in English.

I was really touched that this girl -- a girl who never misbehaves in my class and always tries her hardest -- took it upon herself to apologize for her classmates' terrible disrespect. She was clearly at a loss with her English, so she switched to Korean, apologizing that they were loud and bad. I hugged her back and told her she shouldn't worry, that she's a kind student, that she should keep studying hard. Tearing up, she reached into her pocket and handed me the cookies she had probably brought to school as an afternoon snack, told me she loved me, and rushed out of the room.


For all the rotten, frustrating students there are, every class as at least one of her. Maybe they won't grow up to be international CEOs or translators or whatever, but I like to tell myself that I'm significant in their lives for *some* reason, even if it's not English.