Winter vacation hours

The guy at my neighboring school got this whole week off. My friend in another city is allowed to leave after camp finishes everyday. I'm stuck here watching Youtube vids and driving up my school's heat/electricity bill all day. Is my school unusually strict or did my friends get really lucky and find great schools?

Your friends got lucky.  I, and most ppl I know, stay at school all day (with or without camp).  At least I got heat, unlike some schools.   

It's a roll of the dice. I know a few people in Daegu (NETs and Korean teachers) who can skip out of deskwarming. I'm still here like clockwork, deskwarming except for one week of camp (except it's not being called camp 'cause then they'd have to provide a budget).

And except for the camp business, that's just how it goes. Yeah, I'd rather not come in, but I have to, and that's that.

It's ministry rules that you've gotta deskwarm and the principals that let people go are actually doing them a big favour since they can get in trouble for doing it. Even though I'm just gaming all day as I likely would be with my free time I still resent having to wake up early and come all the way out here to an empty building to do it. Getting paid to play videogames at work is depressingly unsatisfying.

I'm stuck here watching Youtube vids and driving up my school's heat/electricity bill all day.

Hey, lazycat, how about planning future lessons for the students? That is the honest thing to do. You will feel better about yourself if you make the ethical and right choice. You have hundreds of students. How about aiming to impact their life for the better?

Yes, positively impact your students' futures by logging on to Waygook and complaining about what other people do with their time.

I'm stuck here watching Youtube vids and driving up my school's heat/electricity bill all day.

Hey, lazycat, how about planning future lessons for the students? That is the honest thing to do. You will feel better about yourself if you make the ethical and right choice. You have hundreds of students. How about aiming to impact their life for the better?

Get off that high horse bro. 

I start camp next week, and I've been perfecting and finely tuning each PPT and worksheet for the students for the last 3 weeks.  Every detail has been looked at and reviewed by me.  I'm sure other people on this site have planned their camps and/or classes and are ready for it.  They deserve to have some free time to relax and do whatever they want.  Just because we're ready for it, and it doesn't take us as much time as you to prep, it doesn't mean you have the right to criticize others.

But, after reading your username, I think that was more of a trolling post than a serious one.

A lot of NETs are bad at teaching. A lot of NETs think they are better than they really are. A study said the worse the teacher is, the more likely they are to not realize it and assess themself highly. There is always more you could be doing to improve. "My planning and lessons are done and are absolutely perfect and can't be improved upon" is simply not true.

You can improve, plan, and finely tune each lesson plan to an extent.  When trying a new lesson, there's only so much theory and strategy you can think about until you actually execute it.  Once you finally execute it, then you can make some improvements.

I'm not saying my camp is going to be perfect, but after looking at the materials and lesson plan over and over, there's not much I can do right now to improve it.  I don't think worrying and stressing out over all the details instead of relaxing and recharging my battery would be good for me, my performance, and as a result, the students experience of the camp.

Yes, positively impact your students' futures by logging on to Waygook and complaining about what other people do with their time.

With their employer's time you mean? It is stealing. It is theft. Your actions have a negative impact on the lives of hundreds of innocent (pretty much powerless) young lives and you don't care? That's pretty messed up, man. Maybe you don't have a conscience, but others reading this do. (If I take a few seconds to post, maybe I can talk some sense into the several hundred people reading this thread. I hope so anyways. I hope I can change someone's mind. Maybe it will happen. Maybe it won't.)

Yes, positively impact your students' futures by logging on to Waygook and complaining about what other people do with their time.

With their employer's time you mean? It is stealing. It is theft. Your actions have a negative impact on the lives of hundreds of innocent (pretty much powerless) young lives and you don't care? That's pretty messed up, man. Maybe you don't have a conscience, but others reading this do. (If I take a few seconds to post, maybe I can talk some sense into the several hundred people reading this thread. I hope so anyways. I hope I can change someone's mind. Maybe it will happen. Maybe it won't.)

I look forward to reading your detailed curriculum for English education in South Korea.

I'm an amazing teacher that everyone loves. I have thousands of personally-made and perfected lessons at my disposal, I am fluent in Korean, Chinese, Urdu, Russian, Japanese and Greek as well as being in great physical shape. I also have read every book in the world. So I'm in a good place to ignore the troll and answer the OP's question.

My school is a little more lax, but I'm still here until 4:30 most days. I now arrive at 9-9:10, the VP arrives at 9:15. I have a 'conversation class' (1 hour camp with no budget) and spend the rest of the time self-actualising (watching YouTube, wasting electricity, reading sports news, world news, chatting to family etc). I was also allowed to go home at 2pm on Tuesday by the VP. So, your friends are lucky!

Yes, positively impact your students' futures by logging on to Waygook and complaining about what other people do with their time.

With their employer's time you mean? It is stealing. It is theft. Your actions have a negative impact on the lives of hundreds of innocent (pretty much powerless) young lives and you don't care? That's pretty messed up, man. Maybe you don't have a conscience, but others reading this do. (If I take a few seconds to post, maybe I can talk some sense into the several hundred people reading this thread. I hope so anyways. I hope I can change someone's mind. Maybe it will happen. Maybe it won't.)

I thought the "get off your high horse" comment was a little over-aggressive but it's definitely applicable now. You're seriously extrapolating the apocalypse of hundreds of children's futures and a very passive form of larceny from a comment about someone feeling like being mandated to sit at work is a waste of time? You've successfully taken over this topic already so I won't contribute further to it after this post but you need to both relax and not get in people's faces for no reason (or maybe purely to try and grandstand about how incredible your moral fiber is) or you'll go through life with no friends.

Life Improvement's posts in this thread are pretty rich considering he/she decided to go the public school route because they thought "public school would be a cakewalk" 

http://www.waygook.org/index.php/topic,53129.msg344935.html#msg344935

Hahahahaha!  Well, it is desk warming season and we needed someone to stir the pot up a bit and make things interesting.  Thanks for taking one for the team, Life Improvement.  Now we can spew venom and hatred at him/her for the rest of the day.

Life Improvement's posts in this thread are pretty rich considering he/she decided to go the public school route because they thought "public school would be a cakewalk" 

http://www.waygook.org/index.php/topic,53129.msg344935.html#msg344935

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Good catch Johnny!

I for one, like other friends of mine, are leaving their contracts at the end of February and still have to deskwarm for flippin' weeks on end despite all my co-teachers acknowledging that it's a pretty sh*tty deal to have to stay at school while they go home. My CT told me to bring books and watch movies. So that's what I'm doing.

A lot of NETs are bad at teaching. A lot of NETs think they are better than they really are. A study said the worse the teacher is, the more likely they are to not realize it and assess themself highly.

Speak for yourself.

There is always more you could be doing to improve. "My planning and lessons are done and are absolutely perfect and can't be improved upon" is simply not true.

Indeed! So back to work with you again! Think of all the time you're wasting posting on internet forums when you could instead be using this precious time to 'find ways to improve'!

Yes, positively impact your students' futures by logging on to Waygook and complaining about what other people do with their time.

With their employer's time you mean? It is stealing. It is theft. Your actions have a negative impact on the lives of hundreds of innocent (pretty much powerless) young lives and you don't care? That's pretty messed up, man. Maybe you don't have a conscience, but others reading this do. (If I take a few seconds to post, maybe I can talk some sense into the several hundred people reading this thread. I hope so anyways. I hope I can change someone's mind. Maybe it will happen. Maybe it won't.)

If you had a conscience. you wouldn't be wasting time posting on internet forums instead of engaging in actual work! Now, back to work with ya!

As for me, I, of course, don't have a conscience but then again I never put myself up on a pedestal and claimed to be holier than thou!

Life Improvement's posts in this thread are pretty rich considering he/she decided to go the public school route because they thought "public school would be a cakewalk" 

http://www.waygook.org/index.php/topic,53129.msg344935.html#msg344935

Ah. The age old Korean ESL teacher debate. What to do with the endless amount of desk warming time. Personally, I think it comes down to each individual and their situation in their schools. Some people need to utilize this time of the year to sit and plan ahead for the coming semester. Perhaps they teach at different schools with a whole mix grade levels and need to get ahead on the 22 different lessons a week they will be expected to teach. Some people teach at one school with one grade level and see many different classes. It’s not as imperative for them to use this time to “get ahead”. Plus, if your school tells you to watch movies or go home early, can you really fault the individual? It would be like if you worked at a fast food restaurant and saying “Oh so and so over there got sent home by their manager early because it was a slow night. They are terrible employee!” Now maybe they are a terrible employee irrespective of their manager’s decision. I’ve worked fast food – kind of have to growing up right? One of those jobs you can get with no experience. Just sort of walk in and sit down, manager gives you a once over and says “You’re hired!” Not many jobs like that these days. Most of our parents were able to walk into jobs straight out of high school! Could you imagine that? An 18 year old pimply faced ragamuffin strolling into Google and saying “Hey! Make me CEO today!” Sounds eerily similar to the plot of Richie Rich if you ask me. Now that was a turd of a movie. Macaulay Culkin really spiraled into crap fast. But so do most child actors I guess. Such a tough business to be in. The spotlight, the money. Yikes. I had a cousin once that tasted the sweet nectar of show business. He starred in a dog food commercial. He had to eat the same food as the dog because if “it’s good for you, it’s good for your pet”. That was the slogan he had to say after he eat a giant spoonful of the dog food. Problem was it was really watery and tasted horrible. He couldn’t really swallow it and it would dribble out of his mouth and down his face. Anyways, he showed us the blooper reel of his audition and that’s why he’s been known as “Poopy Lips Luke” in our family since Thanksgiving ’04.