First Day Teaching of Fall Semester

Today (Tuesday) I began teaching 6th graders. 5 classes then 1 class of 4th Grade. It was good to see the students but I still feel like I can't quite fully improve everyone's level of English with close to 30 students per class. True that 25 of the students did really well writing down past tense verbs of ones in present tense. But those 5. Man, I just want to get them caught up. Even still, my co-teacher mentioned that while those in the "top" 25 can recite the past tense on a list they manage to not comprehend their speech and use present tense in conversation that requires past tense. So many things to think about while teaching. It's not so logical and linear. Sigh...

But my co-teacher, Jisoo, finally finished her Masters thesis early summer and graduated this past Friday. So she celebrated with offering our office some fruit and cookies. Korean custom flips things around and have the one celebrating give gifts instead of others give gifts. Like you buy your close friends dinner on your birthday as another example. And you give traditional rice cake (ddeok, less like the light airy fluffly snacks but more like thick dumpling in dessert form) to neighbors when you move into a new place.

So here are a couple pics of Jisoo's celebration table.

Jisoo's not pictured but some of the other office ladies are cutting apples and peaches. All the fruit was delicious. It's so hard for me to hold back and let others have a chance to eat...but I was good today. :D