What's goin on?!

Yet again, I have failed this blog. I'm in the process of putting a 'Day in the Life' style blog together, but it won't be finished for July.

Best I can do now is an update. Lots of things happening here.

1. Summer Camp.   My school teams up with the four other elementary schools in my neighborhood and pools our resources (namely, Native English Teachers like me). The 5 of us travel between the schools, two days at each, teaching the same lessons. It's great system in that we can meet lots of different students, get to see the differences between our schools, and get to know each other better. It's a terrible system in that it gets boring. Fast. The same 2 lessons, 25 times each? 5 of lesson A one day, 5 of lesson B the next, then lesson A again at the next school, and so on. I'm smack in the middle of it right now, so I'm leaning towards irritated rather than interested.

2. Certification Class.   As I've mentioned before, I'm currently taking an online course for my teaching certification. While I'm excited that I'll have certification in hand when I finish teaching in Korea, I want to rip my hair out more often than not. Some assignments are worthwhile, and teach resources that I'm sure I'll use in my own classroom, but those are few and far between. It seems like the great majority are busy work intended to fulfill some kind of activity quota. The most frustrating thing is that the instructors are knowledgeable and very well-intentioned. It's a topic of discussion among my group members, and I'm certainly not the only one with the opinion. However, the ends justify the means in this scenario, and I'll continue to pump out the same repetitive information on the assignments that call for it. If anyone is interested, I've created a separate blog where a few assignments are required to be posted.

3. Teaching Exams.    In addition to completing the course, I must pass the required Praxis exams to get my teaching certification. Because I'm going for Secondary English Education, that means 3 exams: the Praxis I (general knowledge, like the SAT), a Praxis II exam about theory/method (for me, grades 7-12), and a content-specific Praxis II (English). Because there's only one test center in South Korea and tests can only be taken during the week, I have to be very careful about when to take these exams. During the school year would mean taking a day off of school, which the administration would seriously frown on, so that means using vacation days. Luckily, teaching summer camp on Saturdays gives me extra vacation days, so I've decided to take two of the exams just before vacation. The Praxis I will be easy. Acing the practice test before cracking open a study guide certainly helps that confidence! The other one I'm taking now is the theory exam, all about classroom techniques, laws, and who contributed what theories to the development of  formal education. Things that all seemed common sense when I registered for the test. Decidedly less so when I bombed the practice before studying. Unfortunately, the motivation to study is fleeting. So monotonous and boring! But I've gotta do it, and I'm slowly making my way through my study guide.

4. Vacation.   I'm going to Malaysia, Singapore, and Bali in less than 3 weeks. I got shit to do!

Let's just say I sleep really well at night. Most of this will calm down in a month, after the new semester starts. Heck, it'll calm down when I'm on my flight to Kuala Lumpur!

I should learn Malay...

안녕!