Sarah seongsaengnim

That means "Teacher Sarah" in Korean. I learned this during four days of native teacher training I attended this week with about 250 other foreigners who are all here teaching English as a second language. I haven't heard my students call me seongsaengnim (pronounced song-sang-neem) because they call me "teacher" in English. "Teacher" is one English word my students know so they use it a lot, and only a few ever say my name.

The training provided some perspective on teaching here and made me realize I'm not alone! Most of the other teachers are in the same position I am....large classes, seeing the kids only once a week, loud and disruptive, etc. I actually seem to have it pretty good based on some horror stories people told. At least I get along with my co-teachers and my main co-teacher tries to help me as much as she can. It sounded like some people don't have good relationships at all with their co-teachers. The lectures were mostly fun to attend, and I only felt like sleeping through one incredibly dull one. I learned a lot of creative ways to try to get the kids to speak English in class as well as ideas to use for lessons.

The best part was the new and interesting people I met. It never occurred to me that the other native teachers would be from so many different countries. I met Australians, British, Canadians, New Zealanders, and South Africans. We were divided into groups based on the regions where we're teaching, so I met all the people who are in cities/towns near here. We had a fun group made up of one Australian, four South Africans, five recent graduates of the Univ. of WI-Madison (whom I spoke with the least), one New Yorker, and myself. Two of the girls are actually teaching here in Pyeongtaek and the others aren't far away by train, so we've all exchanged information to stay in contact. Yey, I have some new friends in Korea!