It's Time for Me to Be Honest

“Time to be honest." That's the message I wrote to myself after my first week of graduate school. For the past 12 years, as an elementary school teacher who wanted to be a good facilitator, I have been more focused on avoiding my mistakes and weaknesses as much as possible, taking the best advantage of my strengths, and teaching students to make my achievements look beautiful to a certain extent in an expectable range. It played a big part in maintaining confidence as a teacher and in showing my color differentiated me from other teachers. However, this method did not do much to fill my deficiency and to have a dense firmness. So even the moments I want to rationalize as success have probably failed in some ways.

The lesson I learned from reading the forward and the introduction of "A Reflective Practice's Guide to (mis)Adventures in Drama Education or What was I Thinking?” was that the moments I felt were failures in the drama curriculum were not failures, but should be regarded as opportunities to promote greater learning and growth through the process of reflection. Because I was afraid of revealing my failure, I couldn't fill it up from below. It was as weak as a sand castle. Even if I wanted to make bold attempts, I could not help worrying and hesitating. But now, I am ready to confront, dissect and reflect on my classes' bare face.

It’s Time for Me to Be Praised and Confess

I'm embarrassed to say it in person, but I'm a 'loved' teacher to my students. My biggest strength that students talk about is that I respect their ideas and desires because I am a good listener who is always ready to listen. I also want to praise myself for trying to take the time to grasp what students want and use students' needs and desires as the biggest driving force in reaching learning goals. These efforts can be largely divided into three categories.

First, students were able to increase their desire to participate by giving their meaning with the idea that it was a class they created themselves. The most basic way to do this began with sharing experiences. It attracted students' interest. Various stories related to their experiences with learning topics provided them with enough time to bring out and share their experiences. This helped students express their stories bravely without hesitation and motivated them to participate more actively in the process of creating works in cooperation. It also reminded students that drama time is a great communication opportunity to reveal their thoughts, raising their affection for the work they created.

Before the start of the semester, students were offered orientation on the course to share their future visions and plans, while listening fully to their needs and finding a negotiable range so that students would not feel burdened with this class. I understood that the activity could come as a difficulty depending on the student's personality and tendency, and told them that it would be meaningful if they felt that they had grown in any way as the session progressed.

There were more than 30 students in one class and nearly 200 students overall, but I always remember each student’s name and call their name kindly. It was very powerful because it could bring a strong sense of bonding between students and me. I also took notes after grasping the characteristics of student behavior as much as possible, considering the formation of rapport with individual students as a top priority. I also considered the student's mood on the activity day and their relationship with other students important. According to the characteristics of the student, I tried to let the student play any small role in the process, and I supported the creation of an atmosphere where the student could be encouraged and praised for any form of growth. In addition, at the end of each activity session, the feelings, good things, and things you want to fix were shared through discussion and immediately reflected in the next session. In the process of this reflection, students felt that they were respected and seemed to think that they were the classes themselves as active beings who were creating classes, not as passive positions that they just accepted the classes.

Second, appropriate tension was utilized in an acceptable and safe atmosphere. By clearly sharing activities before and after the drama with students, students can know exactly what they need to do at each stage, reducing the burden on learning. Revealing the theme of the work to be created in advance, giving them time to think and share with team friends. It provided an acceptable atmosphere for students to try the content they wanted first and used methods to observe and help them when they had problems.

Other teams' works are kept secret until they are released, which makes students happy to show amazing works they have created, but they also have a chance to see other people's works beyond their imagination and wait for the class excitedly. In the drama utilization class, about 30 students were divided into six teams, and they were randomly organized drawing lots each time. This also provided an opportunity for students to encounter new ideas and become intimate by communicating with people who do not usually communicate well, although the results vary depending on which team they are in.

Third, appropriate mental and physical rewards were given. Since I wanted to teach students that the experience of watching others’ works is as important as the process of creating and presenting their works, I made a checklist to help students see them with a specific perspective during the work and used it to refer to their next work. After the performance, we had time to praise the students' checklist and the teacher's checklist for their success. I thought it was important to talk about good things rather than bad things so I focused on compliments. I was surprised to find insightful answers that even I, a teacher, could not think of, and it was a time of great help to all in the classroom. Through the vote, one best team was selected, and the prize was provided with a chocolate medal. Although it is not a big gift, it gave students the chance to do harder to win the medal as it has a representative image.

However, whenever I was leading the class, I ran into some big problems. The biggest barrier for me was a matter of time and space. Time management always gave me great stress and worries when I was in class. In the preparation process for the drama, I tried to ask open-ended questions to explore and expand the topics and roles set by students, but it was not enough to ask, hear answers, and give feedback to more than 30 students in a short class of 40 minutes.

Also, for the same reason, I could not carefully check the rehearsal process of each team. There also exist large spatial constraints to show the context of the situation well. It seemed unimaginably impossible to install the background or device that students wanted in a small rectangular classroom. So we always had to act ‘Imagine and assume that we were there. In addition, even if the pedagogical skill teacher possessed, it was difficult to find joy and give pleasure in guiding students' acting due to a lack of professional knowledge and insight into the drama and play itself. I asked students questions so that they could think about what kind of device it would be good to have to clarify the message they wanted to convey, but I also had no choice but to give them small tips on how to speak and behave. There were other problems, too.

Since I did not know how to deal with other devices such as backgrounds and props, it was impossible to give professional guides to students. Lack of knowledge of strategy about games or activities that could manage and encourage passive and unmotivated students brought me the feeling of despair, too.

It’s Time for Me to Go Further

Until now, I could express my goal in a sentence called "applying drama and theater education in the school field" because I used it interchangeably without clearly distinguishing between drama and theatre, but now it is impossible. Because I know the difference between these two. Therefore, my goal was also divided into two categories, which may make me look greedy.

First of all, I want to make a class that helps students ease the burden of their minds and reach their learning goals by making more use of drama in school classes themselves. In particular, I intend to use dramas in the learning process so that students who use English as a second language can fully experience the context of the situation and learn English in an environment that guarantees authenticity. My goal is to present various topics, applicable scripts, and activities, focusing on the core achievement criteria required in Korean elementary education for the 3-6th grade; which are in context with 5Cs, but to create a drama guide to develop it creatively by themselves who are participating in the process. Also, I think learning another country's language should involve understanding the culture of that country, so I want to find and think about what kind of devices are available to experience and learn culture naturally in drama classes. Therefore, what I am most curious about is how teachers draw students' attention and how they lead the class in ESL classes, and how they approach other cultures. Second, I want to create a program such as a theater camp that can be used during vacation and practice theater education that anyone can participate in, which is not yet activated in Korea. As a result, I want to contribute to the community I live in and become a starting point for a virtuous cycle in which more children can learn the spirit and lessons of reverse knowledge and give another positive influence on others through the experience of becoming others. To this end, I want to meet, interview and observe people who are providing theater education.

In Korea, I always struggled with time and space constraints, and I couldn't erase the idea that I was always disturbed by this. Therefore, I would like to think about and find out what strategies there are to manage these constraints, how to use them as an alternative, and where to innovate if necessary.

I want to learn the professional and technical knowledge required in dramas and theaters and be at school as an 'expert' rather than an 'amateur' who likes to use dramas and plays, and think about how to observe, learn, and apply them to my country. Furthermore, I want to be reborn as a professional drama and theater education teacher with strategy and humor that works not only in Korea but also in all countries that learn English as a second language, and here in the United States.

-YunJeong Kim
First Year MA