My schedule

In my haste to tell you all about my life. I forgot to tell you about my schedule in Avalon and what I actually do! All this time I mention my students to you, yet I have neglected to actually tell you anything of substance about my job and what my daily routine actually is. To remedy that brief oversight, I am going to break down the Avalon system as I understand it and give you all my schedule. This is partly because I’d like you to know what I am actually talking about and partly because I am proud of my ability to color coordinate my life on a sheet of paper. I’ll start with the basics and work my way up from there.

Where I work in Cheongju can be conceptualized as a franchise. They have headquarters in Seoul and have obligations and dues towards the Avalon/LangCon company. Right there, I come to a second point: Avalon and LangCon are separate organizations, but act in concert. LangCon is a private enrichment school for lower-elementary children while Avalon is a private enrichment school for upper-elementary and middle school students. I know even less about LangCon than I do about Avalon, so I won’t make stuff up for you (refreshing that I choose not to for once, hm?). Up in Avalon we have different programs for each of the age groups. For the upper elementary-aged kids we have the Champ program and for the middle school students we have the Ivy program. Within each of the Champ programs there are three main divisions and there are three classifications within each division. The divisions for Champ are, in ascending order, Dash, Jump, and Glide (D, J, and G respectively), and they are subdivided into Base, Intermediate, and Advanced (B, I, and A respectively). So, a Dash Advanced is abbreviated as DA, a Glide Basic is GB, and so forth. The Ivy program has four different divisions: Horizon, Mountain, E is… something, and T is for… T? Sure. Horizon and Mountain are subdivided on the same B/I/A scale, but E and T are subdivided based on 1, 2, and 3. So, Horizon Intermediate is HI, Mountain Advanced is MA, and E2 is E2. Hm, anticlimactic. The kids graduate from one to another through some method that I don’t know anything about, but I imagine it has to do with performance and intelligence.

Each level has its own quirks, pace, and areas of focus. For example, while the E level is doing mock TOEFL preparation, the Horizon kids are working out of a book with lessons such as “The Making of a Sand painting” and “What is ecotourism?” It sounds really impressive, and it is when you realize these 13 year olds can do four or five pages of all English text, listen to a teacher who only know English, and think through it all in English. Makes me feel lame!

Congratulations, you now know the levels. But it isn’t like I just walk into school and each class has one book that we work through each day. The school is divided into a 3-day group that comes Monday, Wednesday, & Friday, and a 2-day group that comes on Tuesday and Thursday. Each group will come in for a three-hour period, during which that class will have 3 1-hour lessons. One or two will be taught by a foreigner and the others will be taught by a Korean. The students have classes in Reading (RC), Grammar, Speaking (SP), Writing (WR), and Listening. I don’t know the abbreviations for the others cuz I don’t teach them. Sorry. Each subject has its own book, which means each kid brings 3 books to school every day. We foreigners only teach Writing, Speaking, and Reading. So they will have each class once a week, except that there are two reading classes a week – one taught by a foreign teacher, one taught by a Korean. The only difference between the three- and two-day classes is that Wednesday is a “Wacky Wednesday” of secondary programming. We teach out of special Wednesday-only book and alternate between two schedules every week.

I think I have explained the system and schedule well enough to introduce my week without too much confusion:

Oh the life…

Color coordination across similar divisions and yet enough variance to determine the different day? Yeah. It’s kinda like that.

The format for each of those cells is as follows: level, room, class type. So GB 4AUD WR means Glide Basic, room 4 Auditorium, Writing class. The two parts that you may have questions on are the split box on Wednesday and the IEWC on Thursday after my E2. The split box is because on Even Wednesdays I teach my JB403 class again and on Odd Wednesdays I teach GB210 instead. The IEWC class is a new addition starting on the 18th for the International English Writing Competition where I will help students write essays. As you can see, I mostly deal with the younger kids: JB and GB. That is kind of difficult in terms of behavior (them being mentally older than me) and communication. However it is also nice because I have half the planning then if I had more dispersion across the divisions and classifications.

So most days my classes start at 3:50 and I don’t stop until all 6 classes are done. That means I better have all my materials prepped and printed before I start my day. And I better not get hungry. Prep is heaviest on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday because that is the first time I teach the classes I have two of (GB210SP on Monday = GB403SP on Tuesday, etc.). Thursdays used to be the best day because I had so many breaks and I ended on the E2 class, which is not overly taxing and the closest I can come to talking to the kids on an equal level. With the addition of the IEWC, we shall see what happens, though, and I look forward to it.

“Such a schedule!” you gush approvingly. “How organized!” others of you cheer. Then somebody, I think it is O’Hagan, says “You deserve a promotion!” Now usually I don’t agree with my friends, but you are right. Thank you. With this organization at my disposal, I am free to use my time more effectively to prep for my classes. A very efficient machine of creativity and productivity, I am. From the moment I enter the building anywhere from 1:30-2:15 PM until classes start at 3:50, I am furiously thinking, reviewing, editing, creating worksheets, and mentally getting myself presentable to teach the hell out of English to these kids. Then I teach, take an hour at some point to cram food into my stomach, and am forced to leave at 11:05 PM. I try to use the last few free minutes of each day to prep for the next day, but on Fridays and such it is actually difficult to focus so I decide to not hamper my future efforts.

Woof. I think that was a little too much information for you wasn’t it? Well you asked… Let me know if there was anything I left out and I’ll try to add it in the comments.