Here I am tired again from yet another long day at my day job. I had a few private lessons yesterday 2 of them were at YBM and another was at an apartment near the place I work. Both of these were for Adults. I desperately need my time with Adults because being around kids is a passive art PassIVE is far from PassION
in the dictionary and is slowly taking all of my energy and feelings out of the job. I shouldn't have ever signed up to be an educator its just not working.
Here is some new news. I actually taught Passive Tense today. Passive tense was taught by me today in the classroom. I was always taught that this is a wrong way for people to speak. This is just one reason why grammar is over rated in Korea. See-saw-seen doesn't make a person more English savvy.
Yesterday I had a moral dilemma on my hands. I didn't know whether or not to teach the target grammar (passive) or rather try to fix it and just show them how to ask past tense questions. Changing the object to the subject is bad enough but when the sentence doesn't even read well it makes it hard for me to understand how kids truly learn.
I think that the English language is falling on deaf ears actually. Korean teachers with few exceptions think that their methods are correct and therefore they are not able to fully comprehend how to communicate in English and as a result most of them not only are using poor English but hope that miracles will happen and their kids will love English.
Its all about entertaining the kids and not actually about teaching. This is the harsh truth. Number crunching is so critical to Koreans.
This week has been a busy one. I worked at YBM 3 times in the morning (one will also be tomorrow) I did this to cover for a friend of mine and racked up some extra cash in the process. This meant that I had to get up at 450 each morning and finish my last class at YBM around 8:45. This job wasn't stressful even though I functioned on 3 hours of sleep and haad to take a subway for 40 minutes. Why do I enjoy it?
Its fresh air, a chance to think about things, and rest and relax in a good environment at YBM^^
I am so happy to be headed there its the greatest feeling I have when working that is!
Passive voice will no longer be spoken by me-------------how does this shit sound? Should we all walk around like that.
Happy Readings!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Um....what are you referring to here? There is the passive voice (example: the class was taught by Joe) or past tense (joe taught the class) But there is no such thing as a passive tense.
ReplyDeleteYou may have been taught that the passive voice is 'bad,' though that is way too simplistic a way to look at it. In writing, the passive voice tends to produce weak, vague sentences that lack the assertive power of the active voice--when used incorrectly. At times, the subject of a sentence is less important than the action the speaker or writer is trying to convey. In those cases the passive voice may be appropriate. In other cases, the writer may not want to clearly identify originator of an action. Such cases would also merit consideration of using the passive voice.
ReplyDeleteIn spoken colloquial English (probably the most useful to young learners) the passive voice is used very often (I just did it) and is hardly ever harped upon (I did it again!). So, although it should be a goal to use active, strong and assertive language, not everyone does. Language learners, however, cannot pick and choose what they want to understand when listening to a native speaker.
I could get into the CONCEPT of grammar being a construct of the privileged classes developed in the 18th century as a means of identifying proper educational backgrounds of the bourgeoisie and maintaining the stratification of society, but Blogger won't give me the space (google it). Language is a tool of communication; teach it as such.