Taejon Christian International School

Today was my first day in Daejon, and I loved every second of today. It was a very busy first day with lots of activities and many new faces! I had quite the trip arriving in Daejon from Seoul after landing at Incheon International Airport. I was to take a bus to Daejon from the airport and got on the wrong bus twice! I almost ended up in Cheonju and some other village in southern Korea!

Waiting in the bus line at the airport

TCIS logo and the doorway to the elementary

I met my class this morning and was welcomed with a giant banner that read, "Welcome Miss Whelchel". The banner was spread across the white board in the classroom and each student had written me a welcome note. My favorite note said, "Do you have blonde hair? Do you have blue eyes? Did you know that life is not fair, so deal with it". That made me chuckle within moments of being in Miss Bechtold's second grade classroom.

In second grade there are 8 students: Arthur (French/Korean), Aylin (Turkish), Yana (Russian/Israeli), Tavin (American), Molly (Australian), Dohgun (Korean), Lily (Korean), and Jiun (Korean/American).
Miss Bechtold has quite an international class represented in second grade! Three off the eight students are limited English proficient language learners. All three have learned English in 1-2 years, Lily is in her 7th month at TCIS learning English!

Today I was able to travel with the students throughout the day to specials, in addition to being in the classroom observing Miss Bechtold. First thing in the morning we had an author/photographer visit. Nic Bishop, the non-fiction children's book photographer gave an hour long presentation about his pictures. He showed various animal pictures and explained how he took them, and how his fascination with animals began. It was a very interesting presentation, the students loved it!

Nic Bishop showing a jumping spider photo

I was able to attend both art class and beginning Korean class with my students. I participated in Korean class and was even assigned homework by Mrs. Hong, the Korean teacher. I learned 8 letters and was able to read words with those eight letters within 2 hours. Korean is a simply scripted language however, semantics and such is a whole other ball game. I don't know a single Korean word besides "hello" and "thank you".

Tavin with his Korean homework

Lily and Tavin with their Korean kites in art

Tavin and Dohgun with their tin foil art project

This week in Miss Bechtold's class we are celebrating Dr. Seuss (in light of his birthday this past weekend). Therefore, this week I will be reading a Dr. Seuss book each day to the students. Today we read "Cat in the Hat" and discussed the message behind the story.

Second grade with their "Cat in the Hat" hats!

After school Miss Bechtold and I went over plans for the unit I am going to be teaching. I will be teaching a unit on oceans for science. I am also covering measurement and fractions in math, along with  reading and Bible. In Bible, the Bible heroes I will cover are Jesus and Jonah. I will also be in charge of organizing the second grade chapel! After schools on Wednesdays and Thursdays,  I am teaching dance class to 10 kindergarten and 1st/2nd grade students! I am super excited about all the things I will get to be apart of while I'm here!