TESOL Program Graduation

Now that I am finished with my mountains of grading and am officially on Winter Break, I have a little time to do some blogging from the past month or so.  

Here are a few pictures from the Fall 2008 Sungkyunkwan-Georgetown TESOL Program graduation ceremony, December 18th.

My colleague Erik Lundell (right) gave a touching speech on behalf of the faculty.  It was something of a tear-jerker for most of us in the audience, and Erik himself had trouble getting through the whole thing. 

After the ceremony, all of the faculty lined up for photographs with each of the classes.

The day before graduation, the last 'official' day of classes, was put aside for reflecting on the semester, writing thank-yous to classmates, and taking pictures.

Then, each of the classes got together for its own end-of-sememster party which professors were invited to attend.  

Clearly, there is little taboo in Korea regarding partying with one's professor.  A good time was had by all, though things got a little sillier for some than others!

This is why I haven't posted in a while...

This was my stack of grading for the weekend:  45 professional portfolios, 45 collections of journal entries, and two letters of recommendation.    

At one point, I stacked it all up and measured it -- 1.23 meters of grading!  (I'd have taken a picture, but it wouldn't stand upright on it's own.)

Anyway...  Whew!  Thank god, that's done!

Three more days of classes, graduation, and then SIX weeks of vacation -- Whoo-hoo!

Children + Welding

This photo is not my own. I found it after googling "Unsafe Welding."

I stole it so I could give you, dear readers, an image of what was going on in my classroom yesterday.

During my first lesson, dude pops in with his bag of tools and begins to set up shop. Dude interrupts me mid-song (bringing song to a screeching halt). Dude grabs a desk, pulls it to the front of the room, stands up on it, and starts ripping out ceiling tiles to install a new overhead-projector screen.

The overhead-projector screen is located, of course, in the front of the room directly in front of the board that I use for my lessons. I had planned a game for my students that required the board, but it became immediately clear that I would not have any access to the board that day.

Silly me -- here I was, thinking that education is more important than equipment for education.

After several hours of banging and drilling, dude actually starts WELDING. In the classroom. During class. Metal sparks fly out over my desk. Some land on papers on my desk and cause some smoldering. Several students scream, which is, I feel, a highly appropriate response that I do not discourage.

Can you imagine it? There he is, standing on a wobbly desk in the front of my classroom with metal sparks flying all around him, wearing no protective clothing and no protective eye goggles. Me, trying to teach over it because I don't want my students to feel like they're that unimportant.

Snowy Seoul

Winter has hit in full force! Yesterday night was bitterly cold and today the snow fell. We were excited about it, though, as you can see from the photo.

Christmas shopping in Insadong

I braved the frosty weather this afternoon and spent several hours out Christmas shopping in the artsy Insadong neighborhood. It was a gorgeous, clear day.

This plaza is full of local artists' work (and full of shoppers):
These two photos are from art in the stairwell of the plaza: