Grades Uploaded, and Next Semester
Hi there!
Grades for this class have been uploaded. If you have any inquiries about your grade, please first read this page for more information on the handling of grading disputes before contacting me.
Also, if you’re curious about courses I’ll be teaching next semester (Fall 2008), there’s a list on the front page of this site. Have a look and see if anything appeals to you: there are several courses focused on creative work, as well as a literature course.
Have a good summer!
Final Exam Files
Please download this PDF — it is the self-evaluation form for your final exam — and download the video of your final exam. Po-Ching, since you were nice enough to stand in for a missing student, you’re free to choose whichever exam you think you did better on for the purposes of self-evaluation.
Your files are being stored at MegaUpload. This is a free service, therefore the video will be deleted from the service after one month of not being downloaded. However, you should please only download your own video, as exams are private. When you click the link, a window will load, and you have to wait a few seconds before downloading the file. What can I say? That’s a little inconvenient, but it’s free, and the files are BIG!
Anyway, please remember to submit the self-evaluation form by Wednesday (let’s say, 6pm) to my mailbox at #205 Dasol Gwan, that is, at the English Language & Culture Department Office. The links to your video files are below.
GROUP 1: 9:00am-9:20am:
Yi Yu-Min,- Po Ching & Kyeong Eun,
- Po Ching & Eun Shil
GROUP 2: 9:40am-10:00am:
- Kum Hee Yoon & Hee In Jeon (Part 1, Part 2)
- Min Ji Kim & Yu Na Jeon
GROUP 3: 10:10am-10:40am (yes, this means SIX people, and it means you need to all arrive at 10:10am!)
GROUP 4: 10:40am-11:00am:
GROUP 5: 11:00am-11:20am:
Final Exam!
Hi everyone. Here are some notes on the final exam.
- DO NOT prepare a script. I can tell when you’ve done that, and I’ll just interrupt and change the topic, and it will be much worse for you. The test is of spontaneous speaking ability, listening, and interaction.
- The test will happen at N223, my office, beginning at 9:00am sharp on Monday, June 16th.
- Your whole group must be present before the exam can begin, so make sure to give your group members a wake-up call and arrange to arrive at my office at least five to ten minutes before you are scheduled to begin your exam.
- We will begin the test by randomly assigning partners; two partners will stay and two will leave for eight minutes.
- During the ten-minute exam, you will discuss two things:
- The interviews — any aspect of the interview, from what you learned making it to what you found common between others’ interviews. Make sure you have seen some of your classmates’ interviews so that you have something to say about them.
- What have you learned this semester in our class? If you have a good answer and can explain it, this will be a big help. If you have a poor answer, and cannot explain it well, it will not help your grade. And if you say, “Nothing!” then you will get the kind of grade that a student who has learned nothing deserves!
Here is the schedule for the exams:
GROUP 1: 9:00am-9:20am:
Yi Yu-Min, Park Eun-Shil, Kyeong Eun, Po Ching
GROUP 2: 9:40am-10:00am:
Kum Hee Yoon, Hee In Jeong, Min Ji Kim, Jeon Yu Na
GROUP 3: 10:10am-10:40am (yes, this means SIX people, and it means you need to all arrive at 10:10am!)
Choi Chung, Jin-Ho Joo, Soo Hee Jang, Yi-Jin Park, Hyo-Rin Kim, Su-ji Lee
GROUP 4: 10:40am-11:00am:
Kyung Hee Park, ChaHwan Ryu, Sunyoung Ahn, Akari Mori
GROUP 5: 11:00am-11:20am:
Eunseong Kim, Asami Hiramori, Midan Lee, Chung-Ah Yoo
Announcement for Next Semester
Interested in Writing a Graphic Novel?
In Fall semester 2008, there will be a special course offered under the name Multimedia English Education and taught by Gord Sellar. In fact, this course will consist of planning, outlining, writing, and completely creating a graphic novel – that is, a novel-length and novel-quality “comic book” which will subsequently be published online. (Print publication might be sought, depending on the outcome of the project.)
Students who are interested in a hands-on project in which they can creatively use and develop their English skills are encouraged to consider this course. You needn’t be an “artist,” although talented artists are certainly welcome.
For more information, please contact me.
Revised Schedule For the Next Few Weeks
I’ve made a couple of small changes to the schedule for the next few weeks. Please make sure to come to class on time if you’re leading a discussion, because you won’t get a second chance this late in semester!
Also remember that your Big Project — the video interview — needs to be ready for uploading to Youtube by June 2nd. You will watch the videos that week, and we’ll discuss them in class on June 9th.
Lastly, the poem I asked you to write. I’m going to simply ask you to submit it to me by June 9th. Here is my (rough, with a few mistakes in it) example poem:
If One Day I Woke and You Were All Gone (pdf)
But you don’t have to write like me. Write your own ideas, feelings, and thoughts about what you think you would miss if everyone of the opposite sex disappeared from the world suddenly!
June 2nd: Class Debates, and Discussion of Final Exam
June 4th: Oh Young Gwon, Choong Choi, Chung Ah You
June 9th, 1st Hour: Cha Hwan Ryu, Kyung Hee Park, Eun Jung Park
June 9th, 2nd Hour: Discussion of the Big Project Interviews
June 11th: Hee In Jeong, Jin Ho Jo, Ju Hee Lee
June 16th/18th: Final Exams (TBA)
UPDATE on The Big Assignment
Folks!
Please be careful when you read assignments. I checked what I wrote earlier, and it says that the person you interview must not be a student or teacher at CUK.
I don’t know why someone thought I said the interview must happen on campus. I don’t care where the interview happens, but you cannot interview a teacher or student at CUK.
Please check all the other requirements for this assignment carefully! If you have questions, ask me at our next class!
Debate Moved…
A while ago, I asked you to prepare a debate that we would be performing in class. I said we would perform the debate in class on May 19th, but I actually scheduled discussion leaders for that day. That’s not a problem. I’ll tell you what: we can have the debate on June 2nd instead. Therefore, we’ll save our discussion of your interviews for later on.
So: everyone! Prepare your debates for June 2nd! That gives you an extra couple of weeks to get your arguments and ideas very clear!
(Thanks for pointing out the double-booked schedule, Kyeong Eun!)
Homework Assignment
Hi there,
On May 14th, I mentioned there would be one more big homework assignment in this class. Here’s a description of the assignment. Please read carefully!
Interview Someone From a Different Culture About Cultural Stereotypes
Your assignment is as follows: you and a partner will interview one person each. This means that in total, you will do two interviews, each led by one partner. You will videotape the interview — this is why you have a partner, so one person can work the camera and the other can do the interviewing. It should be good-quality sound, because the interview will be uploaded to Youtube.
Here are the rules about interviewing:
- the interview must be with someone from a different culture from yourself. ie. if your group is made up of a Korean student and a Japanese student, you cannot interview a Korean or a Japanese person — Chinese is okay, Taiwanese is okay, French, Nigerian, British, Nepali, Canadian, Pakistani, Brazilian… but different from you.
- each interview should be a minimum of 5 minutes total; that is, you and your partner are responsible for a total of 10 minutes of footage.
- the interview must touch upon a few racial or cultural stereotypes. One example is, “Canadians are wimpy,” or “Nepali people are poor,” or “Many Japanese people are otaku,” or “Most Americans are racists.” Stereotypes often means negative things, but you should of course be polite and sensitive. Consider the person’s feelings, note that many people believe it even if it is a stereotype, and ask for his or her opinion on the subject.
- the interview should not leave the interviewee feeling angry or insulted. If this seems to be the case, your interview will be considered a failure. If in doubt, interview another person. You are free to interview more than one person if you like, or compile/edit the interviews into a single file where different answers to the same question are put together, but you’re not required to do any fancy editing if you don’t know how or would rather not.
- the interviewee must not be a teacher or student at CUK.
- the interviewee must be informed that the interview will appear on Youtube, and give permission for this.
- you will hand in a CD-ROM containing both interview videos on the morning of June 2nd. (It must be a CD-ROM: not email, not a memory stick — a CD-ROM!) Over the following couple of days, I will then upload them to Youtube and put links on the class website. We will discuss the interviews on June 9th as part of our class exercise.
Advice on Discussing Sensitive Topics:
Discussing stereotypes can be painful. When I hear a negative stereotype about my own culture, I tend to feel angry or hurt; even positive stereotypes like “Canadians like hockey!” or silly ones like “Canadians end sentences by saying ‘eh?’, don’t they?” can be annoying if you hear them too often.
The best way to avoid hurting or angering someone is to be sensitive to their feelings. Here are some tips:
- Ask questions about their opinion on the stereotype. Instead of saying, “Why do Canadians love hockey so much?” — assuming the stereotype is true — ask, “Why do [you think] so many people believe that all Canadians love hockey?” By allowing the person to express his or her feelings, you give the person a chance to respond to the stereotype, and show that you don’t necessarily believe it yourself.
- Qualify statements about stereotypes. Don’t say, “Nepalis are poor.” Say, “Many people in Korea consider Nepal a poor country.” or “People tend to assume that Nepal is mostly poor.” Then follow up with a question about what the interviewee thinks. This helps the interviewee to know you’re not just assuming the stereotype is true, and makes it possible to talk about the ide itself.
- Ask people if they’ve ever encountered this or stereotype before. This gives them a chance to discuss it personally, and express their feelings and opinion in a natural way. For example, “Have you ever encountered any strange stereotypes about your country or culture, in Korea or elsewhere?” or “Have you noticed that many people in Korea think that Frenchmen are womanizers?” By asking this way, you are showing that the person’s experience is valid, valuable, and important, and it makes people feel good to be respected in this way.
- Be sensitive. If the interviewee seems hesitant to speak, it’s okay to encourage him or her, but don’t push the person. People sometimes have very bad experiences with these stereotypes, and it can be difficult for them to discuss. That’s fine. The point of the interview is not to make people relive bad memories.
- Be courageous: it’s very easy to find a Canadian or American hakwon teacher, but the more resourceful the interview, the better your grade will be. Aren’t you curious to talk to someone from Ghana or Turkey? Wouldn’t you like to know how people from Uzbekistan or Brazil think about how they’re considered stereotypically? Be imaginative, and don’t be shy!
- Be careful: whenever discussing sensitive topics, you should be careful not to anger people. But you should also use common sense when searching for people to interview. Bars and pubs are terrible places to interview people — they go there to relax, and many of them spend all day talking to students, so giving an interview is not relaxing! Use your netwoirk by asking people you know, go to busy districts and ask people on the street, look online for people who might be willing to cooperate, or try find an organization (like a Foreign Labourers’ Aid Association, or a foreign students’ society at this or any other university) that could help you to get in touch with people willing to give interviews.
Loanshark Group Evaluations
By the way, if you haven’t submitted a group evaluation for the Loanshark Presentation, please use the normal group evaluation sheet, here.
Discussions Schedule
Sorry this is so late.
Because of all the Mondays off, and the School Festival later this month, we will be very busy with Discussions in class. In fact, we won’t be doing much of anything else until Week 15!
Anyway, here is the schedule:
May 7th: Kyung Eun Kim, Hiramori Asami
May 14th: Yi Jin Park, Po-Ching Chiu, Geum Hee Yoon
May 19th, hour 1: Su Hee Jang, Akari Mori
May 19th, hour 2: Min Ji Kim, Sun Kim, Lee You Min
May 26th, hour 1: Eun Sung Kim, Hyo Rin Kim, Mi Dan Lee, Suji Lee
May 26th, hour 2: Jeon Yu Na, Sun Young Ahn, Eun Shil Park,Min Ji Kim
May 28th: Cha Hwan Ryu, Kyung Hee Park, Eun Jung Park,
June 2nd: No Discussions (Class activity instead)
June 4th: Oh Young Gwon, Choong Choi, Chung Ah You
June 9th: No Discussions (Class activity instead)
June 11th: Hee In Jeong, Jin Ho Jo, Ju Hee Lee
After discussions, some paperwork is necessary, in terms of evaluation:
GROUP MEMBERS: You need this PDF file. Your group will be responsible for assigning each leader a grade using this paper (one segment of the sheet for each group).
It is your group’s responsibility to come up with an evaluation grade. The group will produce two copies of the evaluation, one for the leader and one for my records. Every group member must submit written comments to the leader within a week of the discussion, including positive and negative points regarding the discussion. The evaluation results — which can be arrived at through a group meeting after class, or by collecting individual evaluations by email and averaging out the results, must be submitted to me within a week of the discussion.
DISCUSSION LEADERS: You need this PDF file. You will grade each discussion group using one section of the first page in the PDF — carefully noting the names of the most actively participating students on the back, as well as noting the least active participant in the group, and clearly marking each. (You must select at least one outstandingly active student, and one outstandingly inactive student, for each group.) You will also submit a self-evaluation using the second page in that same PDF file paper.