downtime at last!

It's no secret that Korean kids (probably Asia in general) study way too much. I mean they spend A LOT of time in their books - and when you hear about it, it sounds uncanny. Having seen it myself, I can tell you it's not an exaggeration. My very own students are here from 8:20am with the 1st class at 8:50 only to finish the last class at 16:05. For majority of them it doesn't end there. After school they are subjected to basically another day of school, attending hagwon (academy) where they work probably even harder. At hagwon, they brush up on subjects of great importance such as Korean, English, Maths and Science - oh yes and which Asian kid doesn't play an instrument - got to squeeze in that violin lesson too.  These extra lessons can last right through to10pm and for high school scholars preparing for their final exam, midnight is a reasonable hour to still be in school uniform.  It's no wonder our students are always tired and stressed out - they work harder at the age of 14 than I did at university!

You can imagine, then, how awesome it is, even for us teachers, when the students have a bit of down time. They are so happy and you finally get to see them as they truly are - and that is, they are just children. At our school festival last week - the kids really brought their game faces. It was pure bliss. Dancing and singing competitions, game stations, movie screenings, market and sports day all rolled into one (well 2 days). It was magical. I was having so much fun I am surprised I managed to take so many snaps...

Awesome Taekwondo demonstration

settling disputes the old fashion way - rock, paper, scissors

sweet victory

super teacher + super student

Yep - my school had a legit stage set up and the girls danced their hearts out

Final thoughts
I so wish there were more of these days. Maybe not to this magnitude, but just generally more time for the kids to let their hair down. It was really awesome to see them so happy.  The only challenge now: trying to teach them after all these festivities - "Teacher, movie today please?"