Called to the Principal's Office

Yesterday's time table:

7:15-8:50: I wake up, shower, shave, eat and head off to school where I read all the blogs I check out regularly. Outlook: Normal day where other people's lives are just as boring as mine.

8:50-9:10: Teach my favorite class from a book where kids just repeat dialogues. Outlook: The kids are just as bored as the last time until we apply the dialogues to a game to practice using it.

9:10-9:55: Watch an episode of Politics and read various news sites. Outlook: Americans aren't dumb after all.

9:55-10:00: Next class comes and talk to me all in Korean and want to play around. Outlook: The kids have energy so the class should go well.

10:01-10:14: We then play a review game but the kids are having a hard time keeping from talking over one another and following rules. Outlook: I'm starting to get annoyed this has been happening a lot lately and not just from this class.

10:15-10:17: I stop the game to try and teach that day's lesson but the kids revolt. They want the review game to carry on. They start foolishly telling me what to do. I snap. Outlook: I hate this class.

10:18-10:20: I tell the class to put their heads down and to keep quiet. One kids pipes up that they want the old teacher back who confessed to me he used to let the kids run wild and usually just played games. In the private academies where I used to work, these teachers get fired. Outlook: I'm wasting my time here. I quit.

10:21: I print off my resignation letter I had written a couple of weeks earlier when I began to realise this teaching job wasn't teaching and I was only staying here because of the vacations. Some of these kids are the rudest I have come across in Korea regardless of their English levels. Outlook: I've been thinking about quiting for weeks, here is the perfect excuse.

10:22-10:45: I hand in my resignation letter and tell my supervisor everything that's been troubling me. She tries to come up with ideas on how we can make this work but the best is that I should just not care about the bad kids. Outlook: Good decision.

10:46-12:50: Teach the good class again. Read about The Flames. Have fish for lunch. Outlook: Some classes are good but The Flames and fish suck.

12:50-1:10: The teacher whose class was so bad sincerely apologises for her kids and many of the wilder girls come up crying and say they are sorry. I then meet again with my supervisor and she tells me it's the area we are in (rural Korea) that make the kids so bad (isn't it supposed to be the other way around?) I've been teaching in some of the richest areas of Seoul where kids come from good families but here they are much poorer and family life for some isn't ideal. Outlook: I like rich areas and won't be swayed this is still not a teaching job.

2:55: I'm told to go to the principals office for a meeting at 3:30. Outlook: I haven't been to the Principal's office since grade 9 when I was suspended from the bus for a week. Oh-oh.

3:29: The Vice-principal comes to get me and struggles to find these words, "I'm sorry for students...bad...etiquette." Outlook: I hate confrontations.

3:30-4:00: Confrontations. All the school's teachers are sitting in a circle in the Principal's office smiling. We then listen to the principal tell everyone what has happened and why I don't enjoy school life. I make out about 1/3 of what's said. When the other foreign teacher was here the teachers had to be in the class the whole time to help him control the kids. Once I arrived the teachers saw that they didn't have to be here. They saw that I was teaching and the kids continued to have fun and learn. (I have never been called a boring teacher.) He then went on to talk about schools in America and how kids can be kicked out of schools. The teachers said they will try to make things better in class and we can decide in a couple of weeks if things are better. The principal then ends the meeting telling me I will stay for 2 more years. Outlook: What just happened?