Who, What, When, Where, Why, How

Today has been a long day. I started with a class at 9:10 and I stayed busy for the most part from then until 8:30pm. I got home around 8:45. Because of the holidays and campus events, I had to make up one class tonight (a Friday) and I have to make up more classes next week. I will be glad when this semester is over.

Sometimes I am glad to be doing what I am doing and sometimes I am not. I’m motivated to stay here because of the financial package and the interesting conversations I have with students. But sometimes, many times, I wonder if I should stay here. Even though the financial side is beneficial, I don’t see a lot of fruit coming from what I am doing. The students this semester have been very difficult to work with. I think this is a combination of poor teaching methods, language and cultural barriers and a lack of motivation on the students‘ part. It makes me wonder whether I am making much of a difference.

The difficult thing about teaching is that there is no litmus test for the progress that students could make. I think that students are better at listening and perhaps speaking, too, but that doesn’t mean that they can have a conversation in English very easily. I learned tonight that one student doesn’t know the English equivalent to the Korean words for who, what, when, where, why and how. He knew a few of them but not too many. I shocked me to realize I didn’t know this even though the semester is almost over. When he took the oral mid-term test, he seemed to do okay at speaking in English but when it comes to a regular conversation, he can’t seem to manage that. I’m inclined to give an oral exam where all students can do is study the subject but they don’t know exactly what kind of conversation will take place.