My New Kindergarten Class: 6y-1

When I first came to Korea and LCI (my school) I was teaching the 7y-2 class. The kids were seven years old and had been taking English for two years. As I wrote earlier, in February those kids graduated and are now first graders in Korean school. That meant that starting in March I was getting an entirely new class. I now have the 6y-1 class. These kids had never studied English before.

I'll admit that getting settled with them took some time. I had been with my old class for eight months, and we had a rhythm. I was also spoiled because their English was already so good when I came. The first day with my new class we literally stared at each other. I was so nervous, and I'm sure the kids were thinking 'what in the world is this funny looking lady saying?'. They spoke to me almost exclusively in Korean. Whenever they said something to me that sounded like a question I just pointed to the bathroom because I was terrified someone would have an accident because I didn't understand them asking to go. The whole first week was a learning experience. On a positive note though, I do now know how to say 'bathroom', 'pee', and 'teacher help me' in Korean.

The first thing I did was make signs with pictures for the class that said "May I go to the bathroom?" and "May I get a drink of water?". I figured even if they couldn't say it, they could at least point. It's worked very well, and has the added bonus of them not only now knowing how to ask, but doing so in a full sentence. From there we've kept moving forward. Now, three months later, their progress is amazing. It's so exciting and rewarding for me looking back on how we started and how far we've come. They're not reading yet but they are remembering some sight words. Whenever they speak to me they always use English (and a lot of gestures of course). One of our activities in class is poem and I do each poem for two weeks. Many of the kids are now able to memorize the poems! So far two that we've done that were the most popular were Fuzzy Wuzzy and Hickory Dickory Dock.

It took me a little while to get attached to this class. In the beginning I was certain that they couldn't compare to my old class. They've wormed their way into my heart though, and I know I'll be sad to leave them in a little over a month. I can only imagine how they'll be speaking in a year's time. I'll attach some pictures of my class below. We went on a field trip to a zoo and there are some pictures from that too. (As a side note, one of the boys in the pictures left my class, and now I have two new boys not in the pictures that started last week). I have 11 kids in my class now.

Me and the Director's wife

The entire kindergarten program.