I'm supposed to be at school at 8:00AM each day, but I don't actually start teaching until 8:30. Unless it's Wednesday, which means we have a staff meeting at 7:45 & its usually 45 mins of me sitting at my desk & not understanding what's going on, but being unable to work on my own things since I should be paying attention & focused on the meeting like all the rest of the teachers.Anyway, on most mornings I have roughly 30 mins to get myself ready for the 4-5 classes I'll teach that day. It's nice to ease into things in the morning & gather my thoughts for the day ahead.
Also, at 4:10PM each day is designated as homeroom teacher time, I guess as a sort of planning period, but since I'm not a homeroom teacher, I just sit at my desk and try to lesson plan. This period, however, is also the cleaning period for the students, so everyday I have some high schools sweep and mop around my desk, clean it off if I need it, or throw out my trash if I had some. Child labor at it's finest. I'm kidding of course.
This time is also sort of fun for me because it's when I get a few students who come up to my desk and just want to talk to me. Even if they don't have anything in particular they want to say to me, they just look so EAGER that I stop whatever it is that I'm doing just to shoot the breeze with them for awhile.
With this many classes, and me seeing them so often each week, I'm responsible for roughly 7 lesson plans per week. When I went through training, EPIK estimated that I would be lesson planning for about 2-3 classes/week. Right. But on top of all that, everyday during student's lunch, the english classroom is open for conversation and activities. Activities that I have to plan. Everyday. It's exhausting trying to figure out so many activities for one week. And it's only the second week!
But once 4:40 hits, I'm out the door. I sort of feel bad because the rest of the teachers, that is, the ones who are full time teachers, have to stay a bit longer. My desk is in the main teacher's room, which is essentially a big room with like cubicles in it. All the rest of us bounce and it's a bit awkward because everyone can see you leaving. And sometimes these same teachers that I goodbye to first, are at school the next day BEFORE me.
I also never know what language I should speak with the other teachers. With the students for sure I only speak english with them, since I am their english teacher. But with the other teachers I never know if I should speak english or korean. I try to bow to everyone I know, and say hello to them when I see them, but it's a bit funny because they'll try to speak to me in English and I'll try to speak to them in Korean. Broken English meets Broken Korean. ^^
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