::A Geek in Korea::

We’ve been practicing more speeches in classes that need all the help they can get tomorrow. As such, I repositioned my desk to be part of the "audience". That way I can more easily give tips as I watch what the students. I would call students up, then have them pick the next person to read. I was settling into a nice, student run classroom with my green tea and paperwork spread out before me on the desk. I planned to grade the speeches as a way to get more activities written down on my attendance sheets.

As all this was going on, the student sitting beside me was chatting with other students and generally being an unhelpful little ass. He said that he had already memorized his speech, so he didn’t want to listen to anyone else. Since he hadn’t been one of the best students yesterday, I told him to go back and review his material. He hadn’t done his homework today, so even if he had nothing to memorize, he still had something he could have done. Instead, he got out paper and started throwing it at the speakers that were practicing in front of class.

That’s hardly the appropriate behavior I would have someone "too good" to practice do while sitting in my class. I grabbed his "communication notebook" where I record information about him. I wanted to remove one of the rewards I had previously given him. He went to grab for his communication notebook to stop me from punishing him, and it the process bumped my desk, then hit my cup with my hand, spilling my hot tea over everything. The teachers book was ruined, the attendance sheet was soaked, my papers and notes were doused in hot green tea. Everyone in the class took a huge breath in, got wide eyed, and learned back like I was going to toss the student on his head in their direction

In these situations, it’s best for me to not be around the student. I shouted a guttural, "GET OUT," so chilling it actually had the opposite effect. He locked up in sheer terror of what was going to happen to him, so I had to nudge him back in motion. I got him moving again, then pointed to the door and repeated myself, adding, "GET OUT NOW!" He didn’t move. My desk continued to drip hot tea onto everything, so I flipped everything off onto the floor.

At this point I was seeing red. I didn’t throw anything at anyone, or hit anyone, I just pushed the soaking things off my desk. There was a very good chance everything was going to be completely ruined because of what he had done. I just didn’t want any other teacher to have a hard time because this student didn’t do what he should. I picked up the dripping book and held it up for him to see. "See what you did?" Then I took his wet communication note and ripped out half of his "Rewards" section entirely. He didn’t have any rewards left anyway, and this got my point across. In retrospect, this seems a touch too harsh, but hey, I was pissed off.

I got him out of class, then told the desk teachers what had gotten me so angry. Then, I went back into the class with a smile, knowing that I wouldn’t have to deal with him for the rest of the day. The students had already started cleaning up the mess, fearing my wrath. They laughed when I walked back in and let out the breath of air they had been holding for a minute or more. They had already gotten yelled at earlier in the day by a Korean teacher, but I didn’t have anything against the other students. They were doing what they were told when the problem had transpired.

I got my books cleaned up by putting them in front of a heater that was blowing out hot air. Then I went around trying to clean up the mess. The director’s husband came in with a mop and helped clean up the tea on the floor. Then we went back to studying. The boy returned with the director’s husband to apologize to me in front of the entire class. I let him back in. He went back to his desk, put his head down, and cried. I didn’t have time to spend on him any longer. He sobbed for the rest of the class while other students read in the front of class.

Getting distance is an important thing to remember when surrounded by students. I couldn’t have rationally dealt with someone when they had gotten me that angry. I don’t think I did act rationally, but I did try to eliminate the troublemaker from the learning environment and get on with class as quickly as possible. It’s not a one time incident, but a slow build of weeks of "be quiets" and "please do your homework" that got ignored that finally got this student in so much trouble. Had he knocked over the cup in a different circumstance I’d be very willing to forgive him too. I didn’t know, at the time, that the stuff wasn’t all completely ruined. It’s a good thing I don’t drink coffee or something that stains.

My other students in classrooms that share walls with my disciplined class asked me what happened, since the whole class heard me yell at the student. I told them what he had done, and they got the same, "Oh shi-" look on their face. I don’t think they expected the boy to get off as lightly as he did when they heard about what he could have damaged. I’m pretty quick to forget a grudge as long as students don’t trying to keep up any hostility towards me after an incident such as this these days.