School Daze (June 1)

• Happy June! 
• I had a GOOD day at school! 
• First, some background info: In my classroom, I don't use desks. Winter and I quickly realized that the lightweight desks provided in my classroom were going to be both a distraction (kids could - and did - move them all over, rocked them back and forth, etc.) and a danger (especially when they decided to stand on them when we were practicing understanding "Stand up"). So we shoved them to the back of the room and started taping the students' nametags on the floor for each class. 2 weeks ago, we finally decided that we no longer wanted to deal with taping the nametags down every class (it took about 10-15 minutes on days that we were both working on it and we used about a roll of tape each week) or with the students pulling them up (and us then having to retape them). Because of THAT habit they’d gotten into, we made a rule that pulling up your nametag was an automatic X for you team. (Early in the semester, we divided the students into teams. Misbehavior gets their team an X. If the team has no Xs at the end of class, each student gets 2 stickers. 1 X and each student gets 1 sticker. 2 Xs and no one gets stickers. 3 Xs and they have to go down to their homeroom teacher for punishment (which we haven’t done yet).) Anyways, we changed from nametags to electrical-taped name-squares and they are working very well.
• Back to today. Ji Won (this is the student with whom I had a standoff a couple weeks ago and who ran away from our classroom in March) ripped off part of the tape of his name-square when he didn't win Simon says (a regular reaction of his). So, as per my system, his team got an X for that. He shut down after that (unfortunately, also normal) and tried to get attention by not participating and banging a marble against a desk. I ignored him and about 5 minutes later, I saw him trying to unroll the ball of tape he'd made out of his name-square tape...he was trying to fix it! So I brought him a roll of new tape and scissors instead and showed him what to do. He cut the pieces himself and, even though it’s not a perfect square anymore, I'm going to leave it - hopefully it will remind him to keep his temper or at least make him not want to mess up his own work. I was so proud of him that he did that though! I gave him a sticker and took away his X (which I don't ever do). 
• In general, the kids were just better behaved today. Still loud but no one came in running or kicking or punching. Hyeok Jin was almost on time (he usually either comes in late or skips altogether). Se Hyeong (he skips more often that Hyeok Jin and is just a jerk when he does come) was 25 minutes late but came in without much fuss and stayed relatively quiet. They all participated in dancing and got really excited when I wrote "+1" on the board, meaning they all got an extra sticker for good dancing. (The place where I write it on the board is right under the chart where I record Xs, so when I go over there they get really quiet because they think someone is getting an X. Today they were so cute and cheered very loudly when I told them everyone got 1 extra sticker.) They were excited to sing the Days of the Week song (Addams family version) that I taught them this week, and even asked to do it again. And when I waited for them to get quiet to get their stickers they ALL shushed each other, sat up straight, and sat crossed-legged with their hands on their knees. For at least a month (though probably more like 2), we've been trying to get them to wait while each team comes up to get their stickers at the end of class. I now say "Okay, which team is ready for stickers?", pretend like I'm thinking really hard and they quiet down pretty fast. BUT they've never been this quiet though so it was really cute. 
• Then, third graders were cute too! They came in and Chae Yeong asked for a cup for water and offered to get me some. While she was gone, In Ho and Dong Yun got Uno ready. When she came back with my water, Chae Yeong and I both drank some and were like, “ahhhh” – and In Ho and Dong Yun were both like, “One shot! One shot!” It was really funny but I was thinking, “WHERE did you learn that???” We played a few games of Uno because they were working really hard to speak English during the game (a rule I try to enforce when we aren’t really doing English activities...). Then it was time for Simon Says – and they were enjoying it so much and I wasn’t feeling well, so they just played it on their own for the last 25 minutes of class! It was so cute and they loved it. 
• After that, Chan Gi came in – he’s in 4th grade and supposed to have class with the 3rd graders. Oy. But we went over days of the week, which he did well with, and then played several games of Uno. He practiced his English and we kept score, which was good number/math practice. Then Su Hyeon, Da Bin and Woo Seok joined us. We taught Woo Seok how to play and they were so excited-loud about it and it was really cute. They even stayed late to play again. They weren't speaking as much English as I would have liked, but they were being so funny and having so much fun, that I just let it go. Su Hyeon and Woo Seok even granted us a "tango" dancing performance at the end of class...
• Plus, the vice principal said (in English) that I looked gorgeous (I wore a new dress today) and Hye Sun, Office Guy and I had a good conversation at lunch, even without Winter or Mi Hye translating. And we had my favorite yummy anchovy thing (called멸치볶음) for lunch. Mmmm. 
• (I also arrived in Andong tonight, to visit Shelby’s – and, though I was glad to finally get there, that was more stressful than anything else, so I’m not going to include details.)