Dear friends,
One of the requests by the Bureau of Education in Kaohsiung is that each school that has an English Village must create a video introducing their English Village. Since their specifications and requirements for the video were very vague, my co-teacher, Ashley, and I exercised our liberty to create a funny video that could be used to teach our students what to bring and what not to bring to an airport. A professional film crew came to film us last Friday and we all put on makeup and costumes for the video. Below is a picture of some of the students that were in the film. In the center is my principal, Mr. Liu.

Here is a picture of the professional film crew filming my principal saying a little bit about our English Village.

The film crew will give us a copy of the video/DVD later in the semester. At the time they filmed us, they had already filmed nineteen schools with English Villages. The Kaohsiung Bureau of Education has really put a lot of money into building these English Villages.

Dear friends,
My school, Hua Shan Elementary School, recently went to English Village at a nearby elementary school. In the above picture, I am acting as the waitress and teaching my students how to order food in English. Normally, there is a foreign teacher who works at the English Village. It was not supposed to be my turn that day to work at English Village, but my friend had an emergency so I had to cover for her. My students were pleasantly surprised when they saw that I was the foreign teacher working at English Village that day. Although I thought they would be disappointed that they didn't get to meet another foreigner, my students were actually excited!

At Tai-Ping Elementary School's English Village, my students went to 8 stations, 4 in the restaurant/hotel and 4 in the supermarket. At one of the restaurant/hotel stations, my students had to put together a puzzle that me and my fellow Fulbrighters made (see above picture). At another station, the students had to unscramble some words (see picture to left) and at yet another station, they had to make a paper airplane (because the simulated environment was an airport). I previously spoke about English Village in these blog posts. To understand more about English Village, click here.

My students with their homeroom teacher (above) at the airport simulated environment. All in all, I'm really glad my students had a good time at English Village.

Dear friends,
Flat Stanley Pictures are in from New York City. Be sure to check it out at the Flat Stanley Page!

Dear friends,
As you may have noticed, I've made lots of friends in Taiwan. From little children to grandparents of co-workers, I have a mixed age range of friends. My Chinese professor (I'm taking Intermediate Chinese classes here in Taiwan) recently introduced us to some of his other foreign students.

Some of my new friends that I frequently hang out with, pictured from left: Andres (German), Finja (Taiwanese), Kevin (Taiwanese), Olivia (Taiwanese), Alex (German), & the other three Fulbrighters you already know (Gered, Rebekah, and Dan).

Dear friends,
Of the many restaurants I've been to in Kaohsiung, I've really enjoyed Korean barbecue style restaurants and a restaurant called "Sweet Dynasty." I went with my host family to the Korean barbecue restaurant a few weekends ago and I recently went to Sweet Dynasty with my co-worker, Joyce from Ling Zhou, and her family. Sweet Dynasty is a Cantonese style restaurant so they had what I really missed, dim sum! Be sure to check out my food album, as I update frequently.

Dear friends,
Some students at the school I teach at recently made a video of what they do during break time. This video was submitted to a national film festival and is now on the web. Please see link below to vote for the video
Hua Shan Elementary School:
http://www1.businessweekly.com.tw/event/2009/school/film/detail.php?id=17

Dear friends,
This past weekend, I went to see a movie with some friends. We saw Ip Man, a Cantonese Kung Fu movie about the first martial arts master to teach the Wing Chun fight style. Ip Man (pronounced "Yeep Men" in Cantonese) taught the famed Bruce Lee. I hear they're coming out with an Ip Man 2. For those interested, I've posted a link to the Ip Man movie trailer below.

I've been watching a lot of Taiwanese/Chinese films lately in order to understand the Chinese culture more and to improve my Mandarin. Some of the movies have been rather disappointing, but I do like Ip Man.

Ip Man (葉問)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=959h-GXfeNc

Additionally, one of my relatives suggested I watch this documentary:

Up the Yangtze
http://www3.nfb.ca/webextension/up-the-yangtze/

Up the Yangtze is a documentary on how the building of the Three Gorges Dam in China is affecting the lives of millions of people and their culture. I hope to watch it when I go back to the States.

Dear friends,
Yi-ling (Janice), my new co-teacher, taught some of our fourth graders how to sing the "Hello, Goodbye" song by the Beatles. If you're inclined to learn the lyrics and sing-along with our fourth graders, scroll down. Enjoy!

Some of the lyrics:
You say yes, I say no
You say stop and I say go, go, go
Oh, no
You say goodbye and I say hello
Hello, Hello
I don't know why you say goodbye
I say hello
Hello, Hello
I don't know why you say goodbye
I say hello

I say high, you say low,
You say why, and I say I don't know
Oh, no
You say goodbye and I say hello
Hello, hello
I don't know why you say goodbye
I say hello
Hello, hello
I don't know why you say goodbye
I say hello

You can also find a link to this video here.

Dear friends,
Since school started again, I have not updated as frequently as I did last semester. Don't worry, though, as soon as everything gets rolling again, you will see weekly posts. I'm adjusting back to school life and I've been very busy these past few weeks.

Chia-Ling, my old co-teacher, has received a position at Keelung University (North of Taipei) to teach Curriculum and Instruction in the Education department. Congratulations, Chia-Ling! I am now teaching with a new co-teacher, Yi-Ling (or Janice). Yi-Ling has previously taught English at cram school (buxiban), or schools that teach a subject intensively for two hours or more in the evening after regular day school. So, she is pretty experienced in teaching English. She is very nice and I look forward to spending more time getting to know her.

Here is a picture of Yi-Ling (Janice) and me:

And here is  a picture of me with all my co-teachers, past and present, at Hua Shan Elementary School's English Village classroom:

Pictured above (from left): Me, Ashley, Chia-Ling, and Yi-Ling.

I co-teach with Ashley all the 5th graders at Hua Shan Elementary School. Yi-Ling (Janice) has taken over all of Chia-Ling's old classes so I still co-teach the 4th graders, the 6th graders, and the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd graders. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd graders have their own special English time for half an hour each week. The 4th, 5th, and 6th graders have two periods of Enlish a week.

I look forward to a great semester with my fabulous co-teachers.

Dear friends,
I'm back from my trip to mainland China and Hong Kong. School started last Wednesday, February 11, but I had to go in one day earlier because I had teacher meetings.

Before I left for China, I was given very special gifts from the Counseling Director of Hua Shan Elementary School. Her two daughters, Lily (whose previous name was "Toyota") and Mazda, bought me a special gift from Penghu, an island off of Taiwan that is known for their beautiful minerals and rocks. They gave me a seashell wind charm, which is just gorgeous (See picture to the left). I'm not too sure how I'm going to get it back to the United States, but I'm sure I'll figure something out. The entire wind charm is made of special seashells found in that area of Penghu.

The Counseling Director's family also gave me my own stamp made out of the special rocks in Penghu. The rock has my name engraved on the bottom and it's fairly big (See picture below).

My students love receiving stamps in class and now they can receive one with their teacher's name on it! Although the stamp is a bit huge, I think the students will like it.

Here is what the inside of the lid says:

I'd like to say "Thank you" to Lily, Mazda, my Counseling Director, and her family! What beautiful and memorable gifts! Thank you so much =D