Reasons Why Monday Isn’t Going to be Bad

It's currently Sunday night a bit later than I should be awake given that I need to be up bright and early tomorrow morning. Mondays are not my easiest days. I have two of my most difficult classes on top of the fact that no one wants to do much thinking at all on Monday's,…

Korea Month Two: Spring, Co-Teaching, and a Weekend in Seoul

  April 12th marked two months in Korea for me. Teaching is unpredictable by its very nature and so even after 9 weeks of it, I still don’t feel like I know what to expect from any given day. What I have learned, however, are which classes to be excited about and which classes to…

Things Students Have Said to Me: Part 1

I started collecting the funny little phrases that I've heard thought my first few weeks at school. And while I'm sure there are many more to come, here are just a few things my students have said to me. "Teacher, is that your real face?" "Yes." "Ohhhh natural natural." "Teacher real eyes?" "Teacher first love?"…

Newton’s Third Law of Teaching

  Newton's third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. And it occurred to me tonight, as I sit here at 10:00pm utterly exhausted from a long Monday with an hour or two of lesson planning still ahead of me, that the same principle applies to teaching.…

First Class Without A Korean Co-Teacher

    So the protocol here is that all of the native English teachers have another Korean English teacher from the school in the room when we are doing our lessons. Their degree of involvement from any point after that completely depends on your situation. I feel incredibly lucky to have the co-teachers that I have,…

Work, Culture, and Workplace Culture

  Breaking into a new culture in the workplace is not an easy task. Every job, and office, and company, or any group for that matter always operates under different social expectations even in our home countries. If I started a new teaching job in America it would be much of the same, but easier…

EPIK: Recruiter vs. Applying Directly

For anyone who is considering, or will soon be beginning, the process of applying to EPIK (English Program in Korea) I hope that this can be useful in some way. For everyone else, I'm sorry this is pretty much completely irrelevant. More interesting content to follow as I move out of the country in less…

Beginning of an EPIK Adventure: Moving to Daejeon!

Hello friends and family! I have some exciting news and Korea updates! But for those of you who aren't caught up, or are confused about what I'm doing with my life currently (don't worry most people I know fall into that category), let's begin at the beginning. Rewind to Thanksgiving of last year. That was…