Students and Scenery

We've had unseasonably heavy rains,  resulting in verdantly dense foliage and lush flowers (as you saw in earlier blogs), which out did themselves!  Perhaps they impacted this young artist.

In a recent lesson, we talked about the planet and they colored in this sketch at the end.  I invited the students to color it however they wished--create their own planet's colors and such, in keeping with the lesson's suggested activity.  This is one of my favorites. Notice Elin's recurring rainbow theme, including the one coming out of the mountain?  One of my boys, however, the quiet, soft-spoken type, created this:

Same assignment, but Evan created a world where a "devil hand" reaches out of a "black hole" in the sky; "Halloween monster trees" grow, and life forms include a "red killer whale" and a "death worm."  BUT, there's also a "watermelon tree" to sweeten the planet a bit.  Having grown up with 7 brothers, this world doesn't surprise me a bit!

Someone asked me a simple question regarding what I'll miss when I leave Korea.  I've been reflecting on that.  First and foremost, I'll miss so many of my students.  I try not to think about that too much, reminding myself that interesting, funny, and profound personalities are global, not area specific.  Duncan and Ron, here, have just made bracelets out of Bbeong tuigi (fun snack idea that occurred to me because this kind has holes in the middle).  Duncan, dude on your left, says in his English diary (edited a bit for legibility), "If I were President, I'd remove the academy (schools like mine) and tests [from students' lives].  I'd reduce taxes, but tighten laws on murder and abuse.  I will be a president loved by many people."  Ron, right next to him, enjoys coming to our school and his mom just bought all of the teachers at our academy pizza!  Sarah writes, "I like you so much, Joanna teacher, because you are kind and play games!!  I like Tuesday, because I study with you.  Thank you, Joanna!!"  Stuff like that...I live for and I'll miss.  There are students who absolutely melt my heart, including Duncan, who says he'd shut down the school if he could!

Lynn, who I've included in this blog before, writes, "My favorite subjects are Korean, English, history and social studies.  Korean is very easy, I think.  I understand it.  I can learn it very easily.  I like to study language. It's very fun and I use it.  So, I like English, too.  I like social studies.  It's interesting, but Korea's history is very poor, I think.  I feel really angry, sad, and depressed [about it].  I think Korean history would be longer if war had not happened.  I hope so.  In fact, I like all subjects.  It was hard to choose."  Oh, Lynn--I love this girl!  In my comment section, I simply encouraged her to use that brain of hers to build a bright future for Korea!

There are students like Mary, who are happy pretty much ALL THE TIME!  She comes in early, hands out everyone's name tags and is enthusiastically engaged and engaging--not unlike a Golden Retriever.  She bounces in and stays up beat all through class, then bounces out with a promise to "see [me] next week!"  Donna is a quieter, but equally optimistic, source of happiness everytime she's in my class; and her inner peace manifests in her English diary.  "I like spring best," she writes.  "Spring is warm and flowers blossom.  I like flowers.  I like cherry [blossom] flowers best.  I like spring because spring is not so hot or too cold, but it's warm.  So, I like Spring.  PS: Do you like spring, teacher Joanna?"  Yes, I wrote, I do!  I also love summer!  I took this photo last week, looking back from a morning walk up a favorite mountain with Sherry Anderson.  Wish EVERYONE could see spring and summer here!

Christina, from Olivia teacher's class did a fun diary on being an "Invisible Human," with comments about eating all the ice cream she wants and finished by creating this fantastic cartoon to illustrate her point.  See the light pencil sketch?  It would be liberating to be invisible once in awhile!  Again, I encourage the students who like to draw to use that medium in their diaries and fill in the ideas they don't know how to express yet in English, rather than just dismiss the thoughts entirely!

There are longer diary entries that my students make, which I frequently photocopy.  Who knows why, but when they say particularly amusing or insightful things, I want to remember them.  Sophie went on a rant about the problems of the increasing popularity of fast food consumption and its link to health problems, especially childhood obesity.  She doesn't unilaterally condemn fast food, however, which I respect. "The problem is," she writes, "people eat fast food too much.  Especially when children eat fast food too much, they're in more danger than adults.  They're still young, but they can get adult diseases.  Children's corpulence prevention (her choice of words, btw) is a hot topic on the news...From now on, people should only eat a suitable amount of fast food."
Ok, it's getting late.  Took a nice long bike ride with a Korean friend after church today, and I need to get ready for Monday.  But, first, last and always, the kids I work with and the scenery which surrounds me, these are the things I love most and will miss when I leave.  Took this last photo on Saturday, at the top of a mountain trail I've wanted to figure out since I got here and finally found!  But, I don't intend on not coming back.  Nope.  I'll be back to walk these paths, when I come back to promote my children's books and music.  Sacheon will always be Korea for me.