Green Officetel

Working with EPIK, living in Korea. Recipes, application guide, how-tos, teaching ideas.

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A Beginner's Guide To Eating At A Korean Restaurant

Kimchi is just the start.

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Rejected or Ineligible for EPIK?

Rejected or Ineligible for EPIK?

First of all, sorry if you were rejected. There’s a number of reasons for not passing the interview. It’s not always because of something you did or said. Sometimes people with experience and teaching licenses are rejected. Sometimes it seems like the luck of the draw.

Right now, Korea is having a lot of budget problems and a lot of jobs are being cut. It’s almost coming to the point where you…

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Speaking Tests: Questions and How-to

Speaking Tests: Questions and How-to

According to the EPIK Handbook

“From 2011, the Ministry of Education directed all schools to assign at least 30% of GPA to performance tests. Performance Test (sic) is a type of test that requires students to perform a task, rather than simply answering questions. This can be done in various forms such as class participation, a speaking test, project, essay, etc. The purpose of performance test…

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Designing a Summer or Winter Camp

Designing a Summer or Winter Camp

Before you write down any ideas for camp, try to answer the following questions:

 Questions to Ask

Besides the obvious “when is it?”

How many students, what level, what grades?

Who will I be teaching with? (You could be teaching with a handler instead of your regular co-teachers.)

Where will I be teaching?(tour this area if you aren’t familiar with it – what technology will you have access to?…

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What's Going on With EPIK?

What’s Going on With EPIK?

I don’t know much about every province but here is a summary of all the rumors and thoughts on waygooks regarding recent budget cuts.

Quick Background information of EPIK

EPIK more or less started in 1995.

source: Korea Observer

It grew a lot from 2009-2011. The general consensus is that the president at the time poured money, money, and more money into education (and thus English education).…

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Pumpkin Puree in a Rice Cooker

Pumpkin Puree in a Rice Cooker

Lotte Mart had a huge pile of squashes for sale the other day. We picked some greenish one knowing it was as close as we could get to a pumpkin.

Upon further googling we’re pretty sure it is a buttercup squash. Possibly a kabocha. But we think it was a buttercup.

Buttercup squashes are really not that different than pumpkins. The inside is certainly not as slimy. The seeds are about the same size…

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Letters of Recommendation

What?

You have to have two letters of recommendation.

Who?

If you have teaching experience (of one full academic year) one letter has to be from that school

Professors are highly recommended for current students/recent graduates

They cannot be written by a friend, family member or co-worker.

Must be written by “a professional acquaintance” (supervisor, professor, director)

Make a list of 3+…

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I Was Granted an Interview With EPIK, Now What?

I Was Granted an Interview With EPIK, Now What?

Nice! You’re really close but not quite in the clear.

Someone said during our application that “If you were granted an interview it meant your documents were good enough that they would have hired you off the application alone – but they want to double check with an interview.”

Many people aren’t even granted interviews so keep this in mind.

Yes, you can mess it all up, but if you are who you…

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Showing Movies in Class: DVDs, Netflix, and Downloading

Showing Movies in Class: DVDs, Netflix, and Downloading

At some point you’ve decided to show a movie, now you need to figure out how. We could have a big long debate about showing movies in class. Some schools don’t like it. Some people think it’s lazy.

I know when I was studying German, I learned the most after I started watching movies daily. My co-teacher swears by it, saying her English levels dwindle when she doesn’t watch near-daily dramas.

One…

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Time Filler Ideas

I finish early. Constantly. I teach the same lesson- but some classes finish in record time while the other might barely finish.

Then, there are always those random days… a holiday or something leaves you with 3 classes for the whole week. Just three.  And you don’t want to teach just three classes – they’ll be ahead of all your other classes.

Here are some games, movies, and ideas for both these…

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Class Dojo In Korea: Setting it All Up

Class Dojo In Korea: Setting it All Up

I sort of stumbled across Class Dojo online and immediately have been trying to coordinate it. For those who don’t know, ClassDojo is a computer program that tracks students.You can award positive or negative points for good or bad behavior. It seems really simple but it offers “real” consequences and rewards. Students can see a number and can hopefully reflect on how that number came to be. It…

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Using Class Dojo in Korea

Using Class Dojo in Korea

In an effort to keep learning and improving our teaching, we’ve been reading some teaching books. Unfortunately, so many of them are laughable – they have almost no tips for people in our position.

“Always learn students names” – you can use names to make your classroom more personal, this will help with discipline”

Snort. 835 students and I don’t know my Su Mins from by Su Bins. I see them for…

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Watching "Blink" in Class

Watching “Blink” in Class

The Doctor Who episode Blink seems to be a very popular choice with NETs. 

It’s a great episode because it’s not Doctor-centered. You don’t have to explain any back-story “oh, thats the Doctor. He can time travel. That’s the tardis, it’s a time traveling device…” Blink is easy because you can just teach a couple key words like “blink” “statue” “weeping” “time travel” and then get on with it.

Length

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10 Essential Things for Your Desk

10 Essential Things for Your Desk

You’re going to spend some time at your desk. Either desk warming, or during the 20 some-odd hours of planning time you have each week. I repeat: you will spend some time at your desk.

  So here are some things I can’t live without that I think you might find handy, too:

In order of importance:

Toothbrush and Toothpaste

Koreans almost always brush their teeth after lunch. So you’ll need a…

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