Day 6 - A week in Korea has just about come and gone but it honestly feels like I've lived a lifetime. They've had us so busy with Korean, cultural workshops, and teaching discussion groups that it's hard to find time to breath. Even tomorrow (Saturday) is a full schedule. Various speakers (including the executive director of everything having to do with Fulbright Korea) have mentioned that the teaching assistantship here is highly regarded throughout the world of international fellowships and it's becoming apparent through our orientation. This is intense job training and our orientation coordinators take it really seriously. It's definitely helpful and we're learning a lot; I can't imagine how unprepared I would have felt if I'd been thrown into my homestay right away.
Our Korean language instructors have stepped it up a notch too. My first quiz is Monday and I'm beyond unprepared. We got our first vocab sheet on Thursday so now I actually have to start learning what words mean! Why couldn't we just stick to perfecting the alphabet?!
On Sunday it sounds like we're getting a chance to explore outside little Goesan. It's not official yet since they have limited space on the bus from Jungwon and they still have to draw numbers for the lottery but about half of us are going to get the chance to go to Cheongju. Our orientation coordinators are leading excursions throughout the city and it's a great chance to explore more of Korea. More to come on that next week.
Other than that there's not a lot more to report. We've had a couple of really informative teaching workshops that have helped me reflect on my teaching methods and philosophy but a lot of it is stuff I already know from this past year and my teaching experiences. We got "Fulbright's Official South Korea Teaching Manual" with tons of tried and tested lessons which will definitely come in handy during emergencies. Korean scheduling in schools is apparently very unpredictable. I've heard stories of past ETAs having classes sprung on them at the last minute because it's been their co-teachers birthday or something like that. I'll have to work on always being on my toes.
That's all for now. Happy Friday back in America.
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