RANTING/VENTING MEGATHREAD 3.0

Ever tried plickers or a similar form of a "clicker"?  Random name generator or other to take bias out of the selection process?

Unfortunately, having 2000+ students makes keeping track of names a no-go, but I do have a few pretty decent systems of randomized choosing:
For example, I have a stuffy (this month its a pikachu I rescued from a claw-machine contraption) which I toss to some student randomly. Occasionally I then let them toss it to the next student, who will then get to volunteer an answer. It's pretty random, and best of all, it's super fast, fun, and doesn't require any kind of technology.

But I think we're discussing 2 very different things: you're concerned with the randomization of student selection, while I was talking more about getting students to not give me nose bleeds every time I need a question answered.

I agree that there are many great alternatives to "teacher-picking-amongst-raised-hands" to ensure that it's not the constantly the same students who are chosen to participate.

1) The understanding we entered into to share our materials on this website was that they would be freely available to other members.
2) Even right now, the front page proclaims "sign up for a free account to have access to lesson plans" (see attachment).
3) I have posted hundreds of PPTs containing probably thousands of images, many of them copyright of powerful media companies.  When this was a free site, an "educational use" argument is easily made for use of this IP.  Now that it's behind a paywall, not only is Arsalan on the hook, so am I, even though I won't see any money.
4) I don't have any choice but remove materials that I feel may now infringe someone's copyright. I'm going to wait a week or so first, to see if any policy changes are forthcoming.
5) There is also, as anyone able to read for comprehension should understand, a strong objection to the manner in which the paywall was erected.  Any number of ways of raising money could have been implemented, from a donation frame a la wikipedia with a set goal, to a leveled service with limits according to, say, volume of dls--pay a premium for more ppt downloads.

So, over a week has passed and still no word from Aslan and no sign that the pay wall is coming down. How long are you willing to wait Mr. C? I'm wondering if I should make this a priority for myself...

I literally only use Mr C's work and Taramurphys work. I haven't paid yet, but have formulated a plan to get around the "I can't pay" issue I am having, but Tara has already removed her work and if Mr C does the same then I truly couldn't be arsed to even try and make a plan.

I literally only use Mr C's work and Taramurphys work. I haven't paid yet, but have formulated a plan to get around the "I can't pay" issue I am having, but Tara has already removed her work and if Mr C does the same then I truly couldn't be arsed to even try and make a plan.

I hear you.

As I've mentioned before Mr. C is one of the top two contributors with regards to quality of content and meeting the learning objectives.

The publishing company, Chunjae? needs to hire him to create a supplementary resource kit.

Yeah, so I just had a friend message me to say that the following users have removed their content:

Maximmm Mr Tim and Zeegs  * add Schellib39  to the list

Needless to say I won't be paying and he won't be getting another subscription.... 

Also, some things said on a earlier thread (maybe from yesterday) to AlivePoet by the powers that be really rubbed me the wrong way.

BUT don't worry. I will just be here to complain about life and all and sundry.

I literally only use Mr C's work and Taramurphys work. I haven't paid yet, but have formulated a plan to get around the "I can't pay" issue I am having, but Tara has already removed her work and if Mr C does the same then I truly couldn't be arsed to even try and make a plan.

I hear you.

As I've mentioned before Mr. C is one of the top two contributors with regards to quality of content and meeting the learning objectives.

The publishing company, Chunjae? needs to hire him to create a supplementary resource kit.

It's great to be appreciated. 

Right now, I'm working on how to share over at Spam.  By the end of the week I'll have to start sorting through what I can leave up here.  That will still be lot of stuff, but nothing with Mickey Mouse or Mr Bean or Pororo or what-have-you.

Trash printer is insisting that the toner is empty, but they just replaced it a few weeks ago. Instead of wasting money on silly banners and snacks can they please buy us a printer that works?

I asked my CT if the principal is ever involved in disciplining students and she said no, so I asked how can she tell teachers not to do it if she won't even help? It's totally insane, there is no system for discipline here and now our new principal is actively trying to make things worse.

at my school i was explicitly told that the job of the principal and vice-principal is to discipline the teachers, not the students. and that neither of them have anything at all to do with the students, their only job is to manage the teachers.

My travel school is away on a field trip today. The principal of that school told me I could just take the day off, and stay home and relax, because my main school would think I would be there all day.

However, yesterday, 5 minutes before the end of the day, one of the teachers from my travel school drove ALL the way to my main school, to tell my co-teacher there is no school there today, forcing me to have to come and desk warm at my main school. The same teacher, came over to my desk, and helped himself to a huge handful of the snacks I keep at my desk, before leaving. >.<


Also, one of the teachers at my main school, he always dumps food from the cafeteria into my lunchbox. I have lots of food allergies, so I cook lunch the night before and bring it to school. Every day I sit near this teacher, he looks at my lunch and says "You need some of X with your lunch" goes and gets some and dumps it into my lunchbox over everything I have prepared. I have to explain often, not to do that, because if you put food in I'm allergic to, I'm going to have to dump my lunch with the food; and I'm a very picky eater, I also choose to make my lunch so I know I'll enjoy it. The teacher is really nice, but this dumping food onto the food I prepare is really annoying.

My travel school is away on a field trip today. The principal of that school told me I could just take the day off, and stay home and relax, because my main school would think I would be there all day.

However, yesterday, 5 minutes before the end of the day, one of the teachers from my travel school drove ALL the way to my main school, to tell my co-teacher there is no school there today, forcing me to have to come and desk warm at my main school. The same teacher, came over to my desk, and helped himself to a huge handful of the snacks I keep at my desk, before leaving. >.<

Wtf.  This is tremendously spiteful and petty. 

My travel school is away on a field trip today. The principal of that school told me I could just take the day off, and stay home and relax, because my main school would think I would be there all day.

However, yesterday, 5 minutes before the end of the day, one of the teachers from my travel school drove ALL the way to my main school, to tell my co-teacher there is no school there today, forcing me to have to come and desk warm at my main school. The same teacher, came over to my desk, and helped himself to a huge handful of the snacks I keep at my desk, before leaving. >.<

Wtf.  This is tremendously spiteful and petty.

I agree. I haven't even seen that teacher at my travel school either. I think on the day I work there, he is working at a different school. >.<

My travel school is away on a field trip today. The principal of that school told me I could just take the day off, and stay home and relax, because my main school would think I would be there all day.

However, yesterday, 5 minutes before the end of the day, one of the teachers from my travel school drove ALL the way to my main school, to tell my co-teacher there is no school there today, forcing me to have to come and desk warm at my main school. The same teacher, came over to my desk, and helped himself to a huge handful of the snacks I keep at my desk, before leaving. >.<


Also, one of the teachers at my main school, he always dumps food from the cafeteria into my lunchbox. I have lots of food allergies, so I cook lunch the night before and bring it to school. Every day I sit near this teacher, he looks at my lunch and says "You need some of X with your lunch" goes and gets some and dumps it into my lunchbox over everything I have prepared. I have to explain often, not to do that, because if you put food in I'm allergic to, I'm going to have to dump my lunch with the food; and I'm a very picky eater, I also choose to make my lunch so I know I'll enjoy it. The teacher is really nice, but this dumping food onto the food I prepare is really annoying.

Seems like a lot of Korean people don't understand allergies.

My ex was allergic to cucumbers and he said if he ate meals with seniors they would force him to eat the cucumbers anyway and if he refused they accused him of lying. So if there are cucumbers on the plate he had to secretly eat around them or just let them force feed him and deal with the symptoms.

Also, I told my CT about my food allergies and her answer? "Just overcome"...?

I got my ex to make me a little card I keep on me, that says in Korean "I will die if I eat X and X and X etc." (I'm not deathly allergic, I asked her to over exaggerate for effect).
This guy is the only Korean co-worker to force food onto me though. He's really nice other than this lunchtime issue.

It sucks that your ex's seniors would force him to eat food he was allergic too. I think younger Korean people understand allergies better though, so in the future it will probably be a lot better. It still sucks with in the 'now' though.

So a bit sensitive here, and this is NOT an invitation to get into a heated discussion about this topic. I just have to get it off my chest. If I see something like this again I will start speaking with my co-workers about it.

Buckle up. This is a long one.

Now then, I think the two first grade teachers at my school that I just started teaching at this year aren't the nicest women. Far from it. I've literally seen and heard them both hitting and 'roughing up' their students as well as using physical means to intimidate them. I've seen or heard it 4-5 times now in the 3.5 weeks I've been here. My office shares a hallway with the first grade classes. I'm usually alone for the vast majority of the day. Until the after-school teachers arrive in the afternoon.

One teacher is typically much worse than the other(s). I'm not talking the typical flick on the head, pinch on the back of the neck, or tug on the ear. I mean drawing her hand back to her shoulder. The most recent incident was the most disturbing. I was eating lunch with my third and fourth grade co teacher, when I see the first grade teacher, with her back to me, talking to two of her students standing against the glass doors.

I can't tell what the boy is saying, but the teacher first offers a tiny wrist slap to the cheek. He keeps talking and she pulls back to her shoulder and feigns one or two times before finally hitting him on the head twice. Unfortunately I was so fixated on the developing situation that I didn't look around to gauge others' reactions. There were 3 other classes in the lunch room still. Two 6th grade classes and a 5th grade class. I wish I had looked around, because I was curious if people had seen her act this way before.

After a very short while of more talking to the students, two first grade girls walked up behind the glass door where the students currently being disciplined were standing. The doors are the kind with the bottom halves blurred, but I could just see their eyes above the blurred portion. I don't know what they said or did, but the reaction from the teacher caught me off guard.

The area the girls were standing in is like a small foyer before entering the cafeteria. The area has all glass walls from top to bottom except for two walls on either side of the doors. I could not see what happened behind the wall to one of the girls, but have a pretty good idea after a couple of my sixth grade boys passed by during the incident. When they walked by they looked simultaneously very confused and disturbed by what they were seeing. One paused for a moment when walking by and kept changing his glance between me and the situation in front of him like, "You seeing this???" with a really worried expression. They demonstrated on themselves what they saw to their friends, grabbing their shirts by the collar and pulling on it to the point where it could rip.

I could, however, see what happened with the other girl. The teacher grabbed her half by the chin and half by the neck, pulled up a bit, and pushed her into the corner. There the teacher pulled back to her shoulder to feign a couple hits before going in for the real thing a few times.

The whole thing lasted only a few minutes, but it was enough to spoil my day. This happened yesterday, but I was too busy preparing for my next two classes in the afternoon to make a post after lunch.

Keep in mind these are tiny first graders. I've taught at a rough middle school (one of the bottom 3 in that particular city in terms of student behavior) as well as several different elementary schools of varying sizes, and I've never seen physical discipline that serious. And I've seen a LOT of different types of physical discipline, most of which doesn't bother me and some I think are fine. This though.. Kind of got to me.

Again this is not an invitation to discuss the pros and cons etc. of physical discipline and start a heated argument that typically devolves from those types of discussion threads. This was more of a post to, get this, vent and collect my thoughts on it. Also we just had a parents open class day today, which got me thinking.. "Do the kids' parents know about this?"

... Also we just had a parents open class day today, which got me thinking.. "Do the kids' parents know about this?"

That might be a great question to ask your favourite coworker. Or maybe even having a (carefully oblique) discussion about the situation with your students...

    However one feels about corporeal punishment, that seems like above and beyond reasonable. Reminds me of that scandal a year or two back involving a video showing a 4 year old girl getting the crap slapped out of her because she refused to eat her Kimchi...

   The follow up on that incident, by the way was to attend a 120 hour child abuse programme, and 2 years jail time.

However one feels about corporeal punishment, that seems like above and beyond reasonable.

It's that or getting your spirit crushed.

However one feels about corporeal punishment, that seems like above and beyond reasonable.

It's that or getting your spirit crushed.

I was hoping for comments about programmes where one can abuse children for 120 hours, but this will do too, I guess. 

So a bit sensitive here, and this is NOT an invitation to get into a heated discussion about this topic. I just have to get it off my chest. If I see something like this again I will start speaking with my co-workers about it.

Buckle up. This is a long one.

Now then, I think the two first grade teachers at my school that I just started teaching at this year aren't the nicest women. Far from it. I've literally seen and heard them both hitting and 'roughing up' their students as well as using physical means to intimidate them. I've seen or heard it 4-5 times now in the 3.5 weeks I've been here. My office shares a hallway with the first grade classes. I'm usually alone for the vast majority of the day. Until the after-school teachers arrive in the afternoon.

One teacher is typically much worse than the other(s). I'm not talking the typical flick on the head, pinch on the back of the neck, or tug on the ear. I mean drawing her hand back to her shoulder. The most recent incident was the most disturbing. I was eating lunch with my third and fourth grade co teacher, when I see the first grade teacher, with her back to me, talking to two of her students standing against the glass doors.

I can't tell what the boy is saying, but the teacher first offers a tiny wrist slap to the cheek. He keeps talking and she pulls back to her shoulder and feigns one or two times before finally hitting him on the head twice. Unfortunately I was so fixated on the developing situation that I didn't look around to gauge others' reactions. There were 3 other classes in the lunch room still. Two 6th grade classes and a 5th grade class. I wish I had looked around, because I was curious if people had seen her act this way before.

After a very short while of more talking to the students, two first grade girls walked up behind the glass door where the students currently being disciplined were standing. The doors are the kind with the bottom halves blurred, but I could just see their eyes above the blurred portion. I don't know what they said or did, but the reaction from the teacher caught me off guard.

The area the girls were standing in is like a small foyer before entering the cafeteria. The area has all glass walls from top to bottom except for two walls on either side of the doors. I could not see what happened behind the wall to one of the girls, but have a pretty good idea after a couple of my sixth grade boys passed by during the incident. When they walked by they looked simultaneously very confused and disturbed by what they were seeing. One paused for a moment when walking by and kept changing his glance between me and the situation in front of him like, "You seeing this???" with a really worried expression. They demonstrated on themselves what they saw to their friends, grabbing their shirts by the collar and pulling on it to the point where it could rip.

I could, however, see what happened with the other girl. The teacher grabbed her half by the chin and half by the neck, pulled up a bit, and pushed her into the corner. There the teacher pulled back to her shoulder to feign a couple hits before going in for the real thing a few times.

The whole thing lasted only a few minutes, but it was enough to spoil my day. This happened yesterday, but I was too busy preparing for my next two classes in the afternoon to make a post after lunch.

Keep in mind these are tiny first graders. I've taught at a rough middle school (one of the bottom 3 in that particular city in terms of student behavior) as well as several different elementary schools of varying sizes, and I've never seen physical discipline that serious. And I've seen a LOT of different types of physical discipline, most of which doesn't bother me and some I think are fine. This though.. Kind of got to me.

Again this is not an invitation to discuss the pros and cons etc. of physical discipline and start a heated argument that typically devolves from those types of discussion threads. This was more of a post to, get this, vent and collect my thoughts on it. Also we just had a parents open class day today, which got me thinking.. "Do the kids' parents know about this?"

Perhaps grow a pair of balls and talk to your boss about this. Hope that's not breaking the TOS.

However one feels about corporeal punishment, that seems like above and beyond reasonable.

It's that or getting your spirit crushed.

I was hoping for comments about programmes where one can abuse children for 120 hours, but this will do too, I guess. 

How's this for crushing spirits?

Many students are moving to scale down their enthusiasm for English after the government decided to evaluate language proficiency on an absolute scale in the state-administrated college entrance exam.

The move will essentially lead parents to cut their investment in English education for their children.

Education offices seem to be fueling the trend with pros and cons discussions about delisting English from compulsory subjects in primary and secondary schools curriculums.

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/nation/2017/09/181_236742.html

The Elementary and Middle School Education Laws labels English as a compulsory subject, along with Korean, mathematics, general science and physical education.

So what's the fate of English? It hinges on the law.

Woo Dong-gi, superintendent of Daegu Metropolitan Office of Education, is a vocal advocate demanding English be "degraded" into an optional subject.

In a recent interview with The Korea Times, Woo said the English education policy had caused a "great amount of loss."

Donkey?

Well, it sounds like his parents got his name right ;)

I had a conversation with a student who came from Vietnam. This student was born in Korea, but had a Vietnamese mother. I thought that the student would be bilingual. However, the student did not know how to speak Vietnamese at all. I found out that people thought that Vietnamese was useless and that learning Vietnamese would be disruptive while learning English and Korean. The student lost the opportunity to learn Vietnamese due to this mindset. This is a great national loss. [In Daegu, although the number of students is falling, multicultural families grew from 1,423 in 2013 to 3,400 in 2017]

This sounds like a decision made by the parents way before their kid started to learn English. My wife's cousin is married to a Filipina and the language of the house is Korean. I'm pretty sure their kids don't speak English either come to think of it. Not sure why this politician thinks it's a 'great national loss'.

Also making English optional wouldn't necessarily solve the particular issue he mentioned. So the half Vietnamese kid is not made to study English at school, will he be made to study Vietnamese? If not there's no guarantee he'll learn Vietnamese at home. Presumably the father won't speak any. He might end up with only one obscure language and a missed opportunity to learn the international one.