Do you need to know the language of the country you're moving to? (Trave...

Do you need to know the language of the country you're moving to? by Christine Kaaloa

Sometimes I find myself making more excuses not to do something, than to do it. It's all unconscious, of course... a combination of worry, self-doubt, fear and/or anxiety. I usually start with "WHAT IF" and end with either, "...I'm not enough" or "...I can't."

Just Show Me Pictures: An Expat's Frustrations in Learning a New Language & Culture

So when I first arrived in Korea, I started an expat series on my GRRRLTRAVELER blogsite called, Just Show Me Pictures, dealing with the frustrations a newly arrived expat has with learning a new language in a foreign culture.

I actually derived the series from this ppt presentation I did for my Teacher & Adult English classes. There's no sound-- it's really a powerpoint presentation which I walk through and
elaborate on with personal stories, such as the fact I washed my hair with Korean conditioner for 2 weeks thinking it was shampoo!~ This is a very short presentation but it's definitely one of my favorites.

Here's a pdf version download (roughly 40MB) of my ppt  in the case anyone wants to use it.

Teaching English to Teachers (Lesson Plan: Teaching Classroom English)...sorta

A video sample of my Powerpoint presentation (I did this a while back)

I love learning languages and nothing is more painful to me than watching a language teacher, who has no facial expression, speaks with flat delivery and no vocal intonation. Painful.

 Learning a language is learning about cultural expressions, intonation, vocal pitch, gestures, facial

Ice Breaker Games for Adult Introductions (and my first Adult English class!)

First day of my Parent's English class. I was nervous and upset--

a. My co-teacher had given me the class textbook (I ordered) that very morning, which meant...

b. I only had a small window of time after lunch to prepare a 1st Day of Class lesson plan for a 100 minute class! Yup. Unfortunately, my recycled About Me Introduction ppt presentation was not going to take a full 100 minutes.

c. I discovered during lunch that the textbooks hadn't arrived and that the parents would be without them, so...

d. I had to make handout copies of the pages I would teach and ...

c. It was at 2PM when I came to that realization (that, not having textbooks stuff) after it

My first class teaching Teaching Teacher's English ( Introductions, Gossip & Glamour)

Name - ___________________________

Level - Beginner / Intermediate

Topics for Learning English:

1.      Holidays

2.      Classroom English Terms and Phrases

3.      Birthdays

4.      Celebrities  

5.      Tipping

6.      Children and Family  

7.      Dating  

8.      Telling Time

9.      Days of the week

10.  Months in a year

11.  Western Slang

12.  Free time and Hobbies   

13.  Gender Roles

14.  Travel

15.  Music

16.  The Weather

17.  Movies

18.  Transportation

19.  Restaurants and Eating Out

20.  Money and Shopping

21.  Giving / Asking - Directions in English

22.  Introducing yourself

ANY OTHER SUGGESTIONS?

 The above checklist worksheet is something I passed out to my teachers at the beginning of class. It's a list of subjects they might want to learn and I have my teachers mark or rate what their preference for topics.

First Class teaching Teacher's English

I really didn't know what to prepare or what to expect.

I spoke to other EPIKers as to how they were handling their Teaching Teacher's English class. EPIKer Anika had some great tips as she was excited about teaching her teachers and
had several lessons worked out. Her checklist above is what I thought was brilliant.

Extracting answers from my Koreans teachers

A class needs a curriculum for structure and when you can't teach from a textbook, this can be hard--

I will be the one creating the textbook, the Powerpoint presentations and possibly worksheets. Getting teachers' interest is a way to form a curriculum.

But if you ask adults for their ideas or interests, it's like asking to be frustrated by the response of silence. Getting my teachers to speak about their personal goals or expectations for the class wasn't easy. Many of them were either, too shy to express what they want; and  some, I suspect didn't quite know what they wanted out of the class either.

Asking for ideas from your students? No.

Bad idea.

It was a god-send that I printed out the above questionnaire in advance as a safety solution. I had the students fill them out in class and voila! I have a direction to shape my class curriculum.

Class #1: Activity :  Give students an article and generate a  class discussion from it

Didn't quite have faith in this activity but it was recommended by another EPIKER. I hear some EPIKers will pass out articles for students to read and generate class discussions from. I find this a bit droll but it was my first class and I didn't have a safe springboard.

I passed out an article from BreakingNewsEnglish.com about Carla Bruni and Nicolas Sarkozy (my document) rumors & did a discussion about gossip and rumors.What they thought of gossip & who they would want to hear gossip about , etc...

I didn't get to do my ppt Intro, so...

Class 2: Introductions

The Non-traditional approach to Introductions:

Introduce yourself via Cosmo Questionnaires

In the U.S. many of us women have at least done one in our lifetime. This is a more extended answer of a questionnaire (no spicy content or choices to choose from. I have students choose from the list of questions to Ask/Answer  Are you a Cosmo Girl/Guy?  to other students when they do this. They do it for 3 minutes and rotate partners. 

- I got this from some teacher's idea site (I wish I could remember so that I could give them credit; I think he was an EPIKer). The questionnaire was named something else, but seeing as I was starting my class on the subject of Gossip & Glamour, this was a nice continuation.

Finally, time for my introduction

My extended version of my Powerpoint Introduction to the Teachers, spoke a bit about my challenges in learning the Korean language.

My PPT Introduction of my stats, my former job, my birthdate year + the following inserts which I made:

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Teaching English to Koreans if you don't know Korean? Psst- there's a formula!

How are you going to teach English to Koreans if you don't know the language?
This was the question I got from many friends and family just before leaving for Korea.

"I dunno?" was my answer.

Somehow, I had faith there'd be something in the EPIK process, allowing me to teach English in a way my Korean students to understand. New to teaching and teaching abroad in a country where I didn't know the language, the obvious question to ask is-- how you will communicate with your Korean students? It's not terribly difficult. The good news: 

There's a Formula to Teaching in a Korean public school:



1) There's a national curriculum and many (but not all) public schools teach from the same or similar textbook.

The video below is from a Listen and Repeat section for Grade 3: Lesson: Happy Birthday.  It's not the same "actors" as in my school's textbook but its the same lesson, character names and dialogue.

2) Every school seemingly teaches the same lesson at the same pace.
  Most of Korea is now probably on a Lesson 12 in their textbooks, for 3rd grade, 4th, 5th & 6th as I type.


3) Textbook Format: There are 4 sections to one lesson.
As a general guideline, this is the structure I've broken down so you can easily follow:

Section a) Introduction NEW VOCABULARY & EXPRESSIONS of the lesson.

Section b) PRACTICE & LISTEN

Section c) Learn to READ & WRITE the words and expressions

Section d) Review

(a- Look & Listen, Listen & Repeat, b- Chant/Song,  c-Read & Write/Roleplay,  d-Review)

Resources for Lesson Plans:

• Korean-school.blogspot.com is a great site that has the textbook flashcard (covering lessons #1-8 for grades 3rd-6th.

• Waygook.org is my most favorite site for lesson plans and ideas for many grade levels. It usually also has a rolling list of lessons as they come out in the classroom, as every school teaches the same lesson at the same pace.

11 Tips to Speed Learn a Language

Trying to learn a new language or in a rush to learn the language of the country you’ll be moving to? Here are some tips to help you with your memory technique, as well as ideas to help you optimize your speed learning process.
5 TIPS TO IMPROVE YOUR MEMORY TECHNIQUE:


1- Practice first thing in the morning.
Did you know that the morning is the best time for learning and memorization? Your mind is fresh, alert (after you’ve had your coffee…), retentive and most permeable to suggestion.

2- Create your own immersive environment.
Dress up in your sari or beret and bombard yourself with the language in various forms- watch films, listen to radio news and music, listen to language tapes, join language groups. The more you surround