New school, new students, new start! Korea Part 2!

아녕!

 Well, since my last blog was an absymal failure *sigh!*, I decided to start a-fresh!
Heres goes...
The hightlights of my first year in Korea!

A summer's night at Gwangalli Beach, Busan.

Amazing view of the city, near Namsan Tower, Seoul.

Smiling through the filth! Boryeong Mudfest.

Admiring the ice scultures at the Ice Fishing Festival. Hwacheon.

Making Christmas Cookies with my students. Beyond English Academy, Cheongju.

A few things have changed since my last blog.

Firstly, I've moved schools and am now working at two public schools in Gyeong-gi-do. So far I'm loving the public school experience. I feel so much more supported than I did at my hagwon, and all my coteachers are lovely and so helpful. Plus, 2 months (give or take) holiday every year is a big improvement on the pitifil 10 days I got in my previous job. Can't wait to start planning where I'm gunna go :D

My school name tag. It reads:
 'Native Teacher/ Laura Brown/ Namyangju Deokseong Elementary school.

Secondly, I've moved house (again)! I now live in a brand new area called

Byeollae (별내), nearest city, Guri (구리). Pros: everything is brand spanking new, subway around the corner and I just have to roll out of bed to get to school. Cons: No other foreigners live nearby.... in fact, pretty much nobody lives nearby. Just me and a few grumpy looking construction workers, who do not respond whether you greet them in English or 한국말. Believe me, I've tried!

Thirdly, I now teach grades 1-6 elementary, in contrast to my old job where I taught grades 4-6 elementary and middleschool. Which means the level of english is a lot lower than I'm used to, so I'm kind of missing being able to chat away to my kids at random. Especially my 'handsome boys' chats with my middleschool girls :'(

But on the upside, it also means that my new students are at the age where their not too cool to dance around, and do animal impressions and play games, so their much more responsive when I'm bouncing around at the front of the classroom, making myself look like an arse, than my older students were. I'm

 pretty sure they have no idea what I'm saying most of the time, but they play along so it's fine.

Well I think that's pretty much everything up to date but I'll be off to the Lotus Lantern Festival   (http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/SI/SI_EN_3_2_1.jsp?cid=972387 ) in Seoul, this Saturday so there should be a new update very soon!

Goodbye for now :)