The last few days (from around the end of last week) have been ceaselessly amusing. In my Media English class, we’re looking at Superman in some of his different incarnations, which means I have to do a Powerpoint up for next week, when I’ll do a talk on the stuff students aren’t likely to have been exposed to. We’ve been watching the pilot episode of the series Smallville and it’s been interesting, but their background seems limited. In my lecture, I’m going to broach the subject of “alternate history”, of adaptations, of continuity, and of course some of the basic …
Category: teaching in Korea
Small Indeed, This World
I ‘Heart’ You, originally uploaded by studentoftheology. I got a funny surprise when, checking out Jodi’s blog, I saw this picture in a post of hers. Who knows what strange set of connections brought Jodi to this photo, but this was a student of mine, not long ago. (She took a public speaking class with me, and I still see her around the University sometimes.) I shall have to remember to call her by her English-teaching name, “Shine”. UPDATE: I’m told by the teacher who posted this picture that I am indeed correct. Well how about that?
“Crystal Methuselah” redraft requesting runway clearance
Today I’ve divided my time between working on an almost-total rewrite of my long-ago (July 2006) flash piece “The Crystal Methuselah”, and writing comments onto the last remaining Form Mastery Projects I never got around to in January so that I can mail the whole blasted lot of these things out either Friday or Monday. As for the Form Project stuff, all I can say is that someone is busily, merrily, having students read and study Edward Said’s Orientalism and then letting them loose on Asian film… and some of my more politically-inclined students are missing the point that (a) …
John, Beer Pen, Pool, Expatriat(ism)e, Sleep, Shinchon Pianos, White Cranberry Chocolate, and Back Pain
Couldn’t think of a good title, so it’s kind of a summary of the post. Yesterday I met with my friend John, whom some might know as Ritu‘s husband. I’d just finished my course of antibiotics and was eager to test whether or not my prostate is back to normal, which was a good thing, as we went out for a few beers and caught up. For having a pint of Guinness on draft, I was rewarded with a Guinness pen! Hmm. It writes okay, too. It’s too bad I have no depth perception, or I’d have volunteered to have …
Starting to Understand Form Letter Responses
I’m ripping my way through a pile of somewhat-unimportant assignments, and the killer is, I’m not sure which students expect feedback and which don’t… but I am pretty sure that not all of them do, and I’m also pretty sure that some of them very much do want some. However, the feedback and the grading process are not the same thing. Havng discovered that the wait for a tourist visa to China is no less than 2 days (or, at a cheaper rate, 4 days minimum), I will have a little time next week to add comments to some of …
Inter-Hakwon Warfare
The Hankyoreh has a story about accused teaching method-piracy: An English teacher at a language institute in Seoul has been indicted on allegations that lectures she delivered to her students were stolen from a neighboring institute. I think I have a defense. Look for the original text which the original institute’s examples were stolen from. Teachers are unrepentant thieves. They also are often happy to share, since they stole themselves. I am somewhat doubtful that the teaching material was wholly original in this case. If it was, they should have published a textbook, in order to further learning. If that …
Oooof.
Well, I finished grading my remaining 15 essays today, with the exception of one essay that was missing page two. Actually, page 2 from a different writing project was there in place of page two of the essay. I’ve emailed the student to please email me the missing page so I can grade the essay. If she doesn’t by Friday, her grade’s going to suffer some. Anyway, I am now working on grading “form projects”. It’s actually relatively easier, in that grades are assigned mostly not on quality but on whether an attempt was made. Students who actually tried hard …
Just as Confusing In-Context
From an essay by a female student, on (I’m pretty sure she’s discussing) eating disorders: “In fact, the women are the ones only making the causing emotional problems.” And no, the context doesn’t really help much.
Taking a Break From These Essays…
It never ceases to amaze me how many students outright ignore the comments I make on their essays, and fail to ask me about the comments during one-on-one meetings with me, or even just after class, even though I tell them they should do this. Anyway, I marked seven essays this evening, several of which were absolutely oustanding–including a highly impassioned plea for social justice and legal reform in the handling of trasngendered people in Korea (which got an A++ because, really, it’s almost pro-magazine quality in my opinion)–but the last few, they were almost demoralizing. I mean, no, not …
Night Class Essays Down
One of the wonderful things about marking essays that I’m required NOT to return to students is that I don’t need to make extensive notes. I do tend to make a list of notes at the end — in almost unreadable hand, except that I can read it — about what’s good and bad in the essay, but I don’t have to be highly consistent in marking errors of those types throughout the essay. Mark a few, and then just note them. The class is on a ranked grading curve anyway, and participation in a writing class is mostly hard …