I was back at school for four days this week. I also started my Korean classes. My new Korean name is 이슬비 (Isil-bi). The first couple of weeks we are only learning the Korean Hengal symbols. This is the easy part, because I already taught them to myself. I'm not sure how it's going to go once we start getting heavily into vocabulary I probably only know about 15 words right now, and it has taken me a long time to learn them.
Namsangol Hanok Folk Village 
Last weekend I went to Namsangol Hanok Folk Village. They have many traditional buildings that are fully furnished. The top two pictures are some of the furnishings. Since I went on Chusok, there were a ton of activities going on. All of the little kids were dressed up in their Hambaks. The picture on the left is a girl using a rope swing. The sign below is the History of the rope swing. Basically the rope swing was used by girls because they were not allowed to leave home, but the swing allowed them to see over the walls around their property.
Last weekend I went to Namsangol Hanok Folk Village. They have many traditional buildings that are fully furnished. The top two pictures are some of the furnishings. Since I went on Chusok, there were a ton of activities going on. All of the little kids were dressed up in their Hambaks. The picture on the left is a girl using a rope swing. The sign below is the History of the rope swing. Basically the rope swing was used by girls because they were not allowed to leave home, but the swing allowed them to see over the walls around their property.
These kids are helping to make rice balls. I’m not sure how they get this dough stuff from rice. I think that you cook it once, and then boil it again. It turns into this big ball, and they use these big hammers to pound it out.
North Seoul Tower
While at Hanok Village, I met a teacher from another part of Seoul who was also there by herself. We ended up walking up to North Seoul Tower together. It is on top of a huge hill. You can either walk up a gazillion stairs, take a cable car, or a bus. Of course, I chose the stairs. When you get to the top, there are these “lock trees” that people have left there locks on. There are also locks covering the fences everywhere. There have to be at least a million locks. I had to wait about an hour to go to the top of the tower, but it was definitely worth that and the 7000 won that I paid. All around the tower, the windows show how far away cities in that direction are. The views are absolutely breathtaking. 
This is totally the wrong place to put this, BUT I got this message from my district ELL and I thought you would be interested in the site that we were referred to:
ReplyDeleteTop 12 On-line Sites to Promote English Language Learning
Published: September 23, 2009
Teacher Magazine
ELL 2.0: How to Make the Most of the Web
By Larry Ferlazzo
http://www.teachermagazine.org/tm/articles/2009/09/23/tln_ferlazzo_ell_web.html?r=1111762164
My list includes Web sites that provide activities where ELL students can practice speaking, listening, reading, and writing English. Two of these sites provide students with an opportunity to be creators, rather than just consumers, of online content. Though I’m identifying these resources specifically for English-language learners, certainly several of the student sites can also be useful for native English speakers, as well. For teachers, I’ve recommended several sites that can help improve teaching skills and several others that can relieve you of some of the burden of daily lesson preparation.
http://www.digischool.nl/oefenen/hennyjellema/engels/tpr/voorbladtpr.htm
ReplyDeleteHenny Jellema’s Online TPR Exercises is a site you have to see to believe. I can’t imagine the amount of work that went into creating these exercises, which use the technique of “Total Physical Response”…virtually.
http://www.starfall.com/
Starfall is a well-established primary school site that is without rival when it comes to providing accessible literacy activities for beginning English-language learners. Although it’s maintained by a vendor, there are lots of free tools and activities.
http://www.mingoville.com/en.html
Mingoville is a site from Denmark designed to teach beginning English-language learners. There are many interactive exercises and games. It’s very colorful, and there are both listening and speaking activities, including a voice-recording feature. You can experiment with it as a guest for a few minutes, but then you have to register. It’s completely free; registration takes about 20 seconds.
http://www.gcflearnfree.org/everydaylife/
The Everyday Life Project is sponsored by the Goodwill Community Foundation in North Carolina and has interactive exercises for intermediate and advanced English-language learners. Its activities on food, money, work, shopping, and maps are excellent. Registration is required, but is free and easy.
http://esl-bits.net/main2.htm
BITS Interactive Resources is another good site for intermediate ELLs. It has 19 “sets” of five different and excellent reading activities focusing on “signs, details, matching, gist, and gap.”
http://reading.ecb.org/
Into The Book is an absolutely incredible resource designed to help students learn reading strategies, including visualization, prediction, and summarization. The site has been under construction for several years, but now all of its exercises are fully developed. Users are led through learning each reading strategy with interactive exercises.
http://www.dfilm.com/live/moviemaker.html
Dvolver Moviemaker his a great way for students to easily and quickly make an animated film.
http://voicethread.com/
VoiceThread allows you and your students to upload or grab pictures from the Web, and create an audio narrative to go along with them. In addition, audio comments can be left by visitors--a great way to raise student interest and engagement.
FOR TEACHERS
http://www.englishraven.com/
English Raven, created by teachers, is one of my favorite sites—among many— for great printouts. Not only are the materials particularly engaging but you’ll find excellent ideas about how to use them. I don’t say this too often, but using their site has made me a better teacher. Most of the resources are free, but by making a donation (the amount is self-determined) you can access even more.
http://teachingrecipes.com/
EFL Teaching Recipes is a brand new resource with an extremely accessible design. Teachers can share their lessons, including video and images, and also rate their site favorites. It’s just beginning, and I’m sure it’ll be brimming with ideas quickly. Go over and contribute a recipe of your own and rate what’s already there!
http://eflclassroom.ning.com/
EFL Classroom 2.0 is a social-networking site, using the free NING engine. In keeping with the spirit of its motto—“when one teaches, two learn”—you’ll find teachers posting lots of their resources and encouraging you to do the same. You have to join to access the conversations and content, but registration is free and takes less than a minute.