Mothers' Participation Day

Well, in the past week I have survived the intense scrutiny of North Korean soldiers and more than 300 South Korean mothers visiting Jayon Kindergarten for Mothers' Participation Day. I think it's safe to say I can do just about anything.

I'm still working on my post about my trip to the DMZ -- it's been difficult trying to articulate everything I experienced there -- but with Mothers' Participation Day finally over, I'll have much more free time to devote to digesting the experience.

Mothers' Participation Day was actually a two-day extravaganza on Friday and Saturday that we've been preparing for all month. I was only personally responsible for six 30-minute sessions: my three five-year-old classes were split in half based on the mothers' availability. For these sessions, I had to plan a complete English lesson including three songs and at least two activities. When they pitched this to me back in September, I thought: No big deal. I do this every day.

Wrong.

I had to pre-plan every single word I was going to say down to which student I would call on for each turn of every activity. And the activities had to involve the mothers. And each kid had to be called the exact same number of times, because the moms would be counting. Oh, and they better be able to do what I call them up to do, lest the mother be embarrassed in front of the other mothers. And they better not have to wait too long for their turn because the moms would definitely complain about that. The moms would take a survey at the end of the day and also complain if I didn't look professional, if I talked too fast, or if they didn't think their children could understand me. These were the conditions I knew about beforehand.

During the lessons, I found, I would also have to adapt with kids and their mothers who did or didn't show up, unplanned and unannounced. As an extra obstacle, they also threw in a videographer, who had to get certain kids on camera because they ordered a DVD. So if the videographer came into my classroom, I had to scrap the plan and call on the kids with DVD stickers on their shirts, while still keeping in mind that everyone get the same number of turns and in a fair order. It. Was. Stressful.

Also, these were the pressures placed on those of us who had each class for 30 minutes and who received our instructions through a translator. I can't even imagine the pressure put on the poor Korean kindergarten teachers. It was visible on each of their faces up until the Thursday before. I don't know how, but they all managed to cover up their anxieties and put on an Oscar-worthy show for the mothers, even though the day before the VP had been yelling at them about their windows not being clean enough. I really thought one teacher was going to cry at school.

In the end, we all made it out alive -- at least until we hear about the feedback from the mothers tomorrow... I'll let you know how we did! For now, I'm going to chalk it up as a win and get back to my Kindle. Happy three-month anniversary to me!