The quote above was said by my friend Meredith a couple Friday nights ago while we were chatting about our winter camp experiences. I couldn't agree more.
What have I been doing the month of January? Babysitting... I mean.... I have been solo teaching at a free winter camp at my elementary school. I knew it would be a lot of work but I don't think I expected it to be as much work as it turned out to be. As I had said before I spent the majority of December preparing materials for camp but as my days slowly went by I realized I didn't have nearly enough materials to make it through fifteen days of teaching hour long lessons.
I taught four classes a day. Two in the morning and two after lunch. Both sessions were split by the kids level of English. One group spent an hour with me and then switched for an hour with the Korean teacher. My classes varied in size from 7 to 15 students. Some of the higher level kids really got into my Harry Potter theme but sadly some of my younger kids couldn't sit still long enough to have an enjoyable class. An hour is far to long to sit and listen to someone talk in a foreign language, especially when you are in 2nd and 3rd grade.
One of the hardest parts of camp was remaining flexible. Before camp I was asked to write lesson plans and give them a schedule for the whole camp. No problem. Then on the first day of camp I was told that the materials wouldn't be ordered until midway through the camp. And then a few group days were moved around which meant I had to move my schedule around again. In the end I think I moved my lessons around four times. At first that frustrated me but as camp progressed I decided to throw my hands in the air and accept that whatever happens happens from day to day.
At the end of each day I had to start preparing for the next day of lessons by making powerpoints or games. I even spent a frustrating night trying to figure out how to make an origami dragon. In the end I'd say it was a success. I think I tricked the kids into using English in a fun way, which was my goal. The best part for me was getting to know the students names finally and also getting to know them better.
Me on the first day of camp wearing my Harry Potter themed clothes.
The students made their own magical animal. This is one of my favorites because of it's creative name.
One of my favorite lessons was "potions" because the kids got to experiment mixing different substances (like pink vitamin water and baking soda).
We made soap as a group one day.
Some other things we did was to practice the future tense through making "predictions". The kids really got excited when they got to predict who would win in an arm wrestle contest, me or a student. Oddly enough some of the young boys beat me while the next day I was able to beat the 5th and 6th grade boys. On the last day of camp the older kids got to write their own story. Most of them ended in death but at least they were creative in English.
I've been enjoying a few restful days off before the last three weeks of the semester begins in February.
Bless friends.
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