There were plenty of others but these are some random ones I
wrote down over the past couple years.
From My Time Teaching Kids:
My directions: Find five new vocabulary words and write a short
definition in English for each.
My students' best answers:
- Son – when a mom and dad lay a boy
- Disabled - can’t do anything
- Problem - the unemployment
- Fur - a dog’s beard
- Witch - bad grandmother
- Mom - the family cook
- Sniff – sniff the goods
- Nagging - mom
Playing a game where one student describes a word to the rest,
who have to guess…
Student 1: "It's brown and it's not a fruit."
Student 2: "Poop!"
<Answer: Wood>
Student 1: "It's a person."
Student 2: "Hitler? Obama?"
<Answer: a doctor>
Pronunciation Mix-Ups:
kitchen
vs. chicken
> (My kids forever said they made dinner in the chicken).
"ET Teacher" instead of "PE teacher"
“I was born on Octopus 8th” instead of “October 8th”
Class Discussions:
Jimmy: What do you think about street vendors?
Kevin: I think they are necessary. No...I think they are dirty.
Shannon: Why?
Kevin: What's a "vendor?"
Other student: Someone who sells things…like fruit and
vegetables.
Kevin: Their fruit & vegetables are dirty.
*Student: I'm hungry very much.
Me: No... I'm very hungry.
Student: Me too.
*Student: Teacher, have you laid a person?
Me: No, I don't have any children.
*10 mins into the class:
Student: "Can we start the class?"
Me: Omg...it already started. It's just that NO ONE IS LISTENING!!!!
*Me: What is sign language?
Student: When people tell you things with their hands
-> James promptly and (I believe) somewhat innocently flips the bird. “Like this?”
Me: Do you know how we celebrate Independence Day in the US?
Patrick: Strange woman and fire! *holds up arms like the statue
of liberty*
(Although I have to say that that’s probably more than the
majority of Americans would know about how Koreans celebrate their Independence
Day.)
This almost seems too ridiculous to have actually happened but
these are true stories.
My good friend, Logan, and I used to hang out between
all our classes (teaching at an English institute for elementary school
students). Once, while I was in his room, we noticed that his kids were about
to mess with his computer (which is no bueno when it’s tiny, reckless little
kids and your own personal computer). Logan started to yell at them and
mid-rant:
Logan: How would you like it if I went through your bag?!?
Student: Threw my bag?
Logan: Yeah!
Student: This bag? *Hesitantly picks up his backpack*
Logan: YEAH!
*Student, with a confused and helpless face, tosses his bag
across the room in order to carry out the punishment he thought Logan was
giving him.
Oh, the looks on both of their faces. Neither one of them
understood the other but I got it all, watching from the sidelines. They were
both pissed and confused the whole time and it was hilarious. I cried laughing
and had to explain it all to my next class because I couldn’t regain composure
to begin teaching again at the beginning of class.
No joke…same kid….the following week:
These kids had a nasty habit of leaning back in their chairs but
they’re uncoordinated little elementary school students so you never know when
one will lose their balance and crash to the floor (and yes, it most definitely
happens).
*Student is leaning back in his chair*
Logan: Seat on the floor!!!
*Student mistakes “seat” for “sit.” Again, confused by his
punishment. The kid never loses eye contact with Logan yet slowly but surely
slides out of his chair and lowers himself to sit on the floor.
Fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. This is comedy that only life
can write.
(Side note: This is a legitimate mistake in Korea. There’s no short
‘i’ sound in Korean so ‘i’ and ‘ee’ sound the same to them at first.)
Adult Students:
I was sitting between two of my students (Jasmine and Rachel) at
dinner. In Korea, you never pour your own drink and you have to hold your glass
with two hands when someone’s pouring yours. Rachel was pouring a glass for
Jasmine but I took the glass to hold it for her so she wouldn’t have to cross
over in front of me. Rachel filled the glass and then with her typical,
genuinely curious face, just wanting to know if she’s using the expression
correctly, she asked me: “So, could I call you her bitch?”
I was in a one-on-one class with my student, Min, and a gnat
kept flying all around him. He swatted it away a few times but the gnat
persisted. It was bothering him enough that I actually stopped talking about
whatever our lesson was and said, “God, that gnat is obsessed with you!” His
response was, “Oh, that’s my Tinkerbelle.” I died laughing (and asked if he’d
just made that up or if it was a Korean expression – but it was all him). Later
in the lesson when the thing finally landed on the desk, I killed it
because…what else would you do with an annoying gnat? I’ll never forget his
hilarious face of shock and disappointment as he whined, “You killed my
Tinkerbelle!!” Sure, he was totally kidding…but this guy’s sense of humor and
deadpan faces make the ridiculous things he says almost believable.
Every day in this particular class I wrote the homework on the
board. One particular Friday when I wasn’t assigning any, I wrote, “Homework:
Drink lots of *soju.” I left the room for a break and when I came back, one of
my students who was excited to have no homework had written something along the
lines of “Shannon is a great teacher. Let’s give her the clap.”
>> He meant to say “a round of applause” and it was really
awkward explaining to them why you can’t talk about “giving someone the clap”.
*Soju = Korean liquor
An enormous company that I sometimes taught for in Korea used
the slogan “Boys be ambitious” for a while. One of my old man students said
those words to me when he gave me a gift and I saw it written on the box. I was
utterly confused. I wanted to fix his English but I wasn’t entirely sure what
he was getting at (plus they were already promoting and selling this particular
product). I asked if he meant “boys are ambitious” but he said no. A couple
weeks later, he showed me that it was a famous quote: “Boys, be ambitious!”
…We then had a discussion on the importance of accurate
punctuation.
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