Two blogs in one day? Unheard of!

I love my students.  Some days more than others.  I always feel slightly envious of my friends who get to work with the older students, however, as I remember fondly upon my time working with middle school students in the States.  In fact, my "least favorite" classes are the ones with the youngest kids--partly because they don't know any English at all, and partly because I feel at a loss as to what to do with them.  

Today I was teaching a first grade class.  The students know random words in English (like hamster and guitar) but in no way can they understand a sentence.  This makes communicating very interesting, and they often just talk away at me in Korean, asking many questions.  Of course I can't answer a single one.  

There is a particular student in there, a girl, who has been very shy.  When I first started teaching, she wouldn't talk to me.  Eventually, she discovered that I would play "rock scissors paper" with her (a Korean favorite--they do this with everything) and would run up to me in the hall to play.  Then, today, when I came in she ran up to me, wrapped her arms around my leg, gave me a big hug, and then followed me around for most of the class clinging to my skirt, smiling up at me.  

My heart melted into a pile of mush.  

I suppose there are some upsides to teaching little kids, after all.