There are countless daily rewards of being a teacher. Today I got one I was able to take home with me.

Anyone who teaches English in Korea knows the kids have attention spans of spastic monkeys. They won’t sit still for much. Your best bet is probably a funny or interesting video. Some call it edu-tainment, some call it bribery, either way it works.

With that in mind, here is a fantastic website with lots of worksheets based on movies and TV shows. You can probably find the relevant clips on Youtube, and then you can use the video to teach vocabulary. I had a great deal of success with this Mr. Bean worksheet.

Below are the clips I showed. I usually don’t like to show a video this long, but this is the last week of classes and I wanted to give the kids a break. I didn’t show the third part of the episode because of nakedness.

The kids went nuts for it. Mr. Bean is one of those cultural universals that crosses all boundaries.

Here’s an interesting teaching tip I found:

Take a candle into the classroom for ‘R’ and ‘L’ pronunciation practice, after the manner of Professor Henry Higgins in ‘My Fair Lady‘ (although he used it for ‘H’ practice). The candle will flutter or go out when an ‘R’ is pronounced correctly, but will remain unmoved (or should) when an ‘L’ is pronounced.

Now where can I buy some candles? (And when will the school give me some spending money? Not that candles are expensive, but don’t teachers generally get a bit of money for supplies?)

Right now I’m working on the lesson plan for Summer Camp classes. It’s two weeks of classes, two hours with advanced students and two hours with lower level students. My lessons consist of Youtube videos, Powerpoint slides, and photocopied/dowloaded worksheets. Also flashcards, which the kids strangely seem to love.

My Powerpoint slides aren’t anything particularly fancy. Mostly just a difficult word with a picture next to it so students can figure out what the word means. I’m not entirely sure that more complex Powerpoint presentations add anything to the experience, except maybe entertainment value.

keeping it simple

One thing that’s really difficult is finding content that’s both entertaining and educational. Considering we use Youtube videos as a staple of our lessons, it can be almost impossible. Youtube is anything but a hub of learning and horizon-expansion For my own part, I use videos primarily as entertainment. If I can catch the kids’ attention for a few minutes, they’ll be more receptive for the rest of the class. Once I’ve grabbed their attention, I can attempt to teach them something useful.

Here’s a video that got a particularly positive response, especially the bloody parts: The Ghastly Truth About Life in the Middle Ages.