::A Geek in Korea::

All of my students successfully completed their first unit test of our new book after a month of study. The test I gave them this week was identical to the test they took to get into their current level. We used the first unit as a placement test to see what classes the students would be suitable for in our school. Since this was the second time they had seen this test, I expected marginally better scores from all of my students.

One of my new students scored a 3 out of 53 questions. This is only because he was able to guess correctly on some true and false questions where he had better odds to come up with a correct answer. Anything he wrote himself was entirely wrong. Not "Oh, close but not good enough for partial credit" wrong, but "What the hell is this?" sort of wrong. He didn’t know how to use the past tense, or the idea of "the past tense" as a concept. He didn’t know how to correctly use the "Be" verb, which I’ve taught to kindergarten students with enough time. Simple stuff that he had to have learned in multiple levels multiple times hasn’t sunk in. The fact that he couldn’t write simple sentences should have been a clue he wasn’t ready for a class that has "weekly journal writing" as a requirement.

He’s not a rotten kid, he just doesn’t know any English. He’s got a good sense of humor about his complete cluelessness. I’ve seen students act much more poorly than he has when confronted with a test where they didn’t know a single thing.

The boy has been studying at the school for several months. I know who the previous teacher was, but I don’t know what kind of score he got on his placement test. I also don’t know what that other teacher spent his class time doing. Nothing "stuck". Whatever his score was the last time he took this test, there was NO way he was prepared to be in this class. He’s never completed an assignment, done his homework, or been able to answer a simple question on his own. I spent class time I could have better used helping teach other students so that I could catch this student up on his work. Whatever he got on his placement test ultimately didn’t affect where he ended up in our school. The whole placement test schtick we got from the manager was complete crap.

I actually called out my manager on this, and he acted surprised to hear the student had done so poorly. He’s gotten to be know as a very poor liar around the school, so I held up the test as evidence. He seemed to get the point, what with all the red marker on the page. There is now evidence that he isn’t in the right level other than his total lack of effort.

The student doesn’t have a clue what is going on, so moving him down a level or two would probably be best. The age problem will probably be the biggest stopping problem, as he’s already too old to go down any farther than he is, and to get him on the right level would mean he was learning with students three to four years younger. This is a huge no-no in Korean culture, and I can just imagine what it would do for class dynamics. This is less than ideal for anyone.

The only other options are for him to either stick in the class for the six months he was promised, failing every test, wasting my time, only to be told to repeat the material again, or quit the school. I’m not rooting for him to quit, because every student helps pad the bottom line, but I sure as hell don’t want him in my class with his current classmates who are really good. He’s like an iron anchor bringing down the whole class.