Student essays

Let’s be honest here. My students help me endure the many frustrations of my job. I not only love having the opportunity to teach them what I know, but I also get an opportunity to learn more about them, about who they are as individuals. I assigned the two most advanced classes an essay “What are you passionate about and why,” which I am now grading. I wanted to post some of the essays that have made me laugh and intrigued me. I’ve corrected them on paper, but I’ve left them here in their original form.

Luna:
“ I’m passionate in English. In fact, it’s not all that true. Studying English is not interesting but boring and hard. But I have to be more passionate in studying English for my future. I am not a genius for science, music, sports, art, and ets…. Also, I’m not slim or pretty so I can’t be a actress. The way that only I can choose is studying English.
One of my hopes is traveling the world and communicate with foreigners freely. English is common language for whole world, so I can communicate with foreigners if I study English very hard.
Also English helps me to achieve my future dream translater. I want to notify our language’s charm through translating Korean books to English books. To notify our language’s charm, I have to know many English expressions to translate. Even if I can’t speak English well, I am trying to be passionate in English. And I wish my dreams to be come true as English.”

Joe:
-funny because you have to know that he is a very very tall, very quiet 16-year old who always wears a rolling-stone ring and looks like he should be a bad boy.

“ I’m crazy in rope-jumping. I like it and I’m proud of rope-jumping. I started rope-jumping at 12 years old. I was attached to rope-jumping club. I participated rope-jumping competition, but I wasn’t first place. I have been played rope-jumping. So, I am taller than other many people. Certainly, if you play rope-jumping regularly, you are tall. I play rope-jumping today. Rope-jumping is very very interesting for me. I prepare our school festival. I prepare our school festival. I will go to the stage by rope-jumping.”

Eddie:
-16 year-old boy who wants to study economy at university and who’s been the biggest figure skating fan in korea

“When I was six grade, I was watch Yuna Kim’s 08-09 season’s first competition. She was doing ‘Dance Macabre’ in short and Scheherazade in free skating. First jump is 3-3 combination jump. I was fall in love with figure skating at that time. Figure skating make me crazy. First it has music. Every skater is playing with music. Some of them are playing very intense music and some of them are playing very lyrical music. They must consider about her music. It can make figure fan satisfy. Second, if the competition is finish, many skater doing ice-show. It is different from competition. Many skater are playing each other. It is good for watching. They are playing with music. When I see that, that is very beautiful.”

Chris:
-15-year old girl who never really pays attention in my class because she’s too busy talking all the time…probably telling stories ;)
“I’m passionate about writing and reading books. My dream is to be a global writer. When I was 9, my mother gave me ‘Harry Potter’ books by J. K. Rowling. At first, I don’t want to read those books because those books were very thick and they have very small letters. So I thought it will be very boring and difficult. But after I read them, I became J.K. Rowling’s ardent fan!!! Her imagination was wonderful! Her world of magic was fantastic! And then, I thought ‘writer’ is very interesting job. I wanted to write a very fun and unique story for everyone in all of the world. And I hoped everyone who read my books become to love my books. After that, my dream is to be a global writer like J.K. Rowling and my favorite things are writing and reading fun stories. And because I want to be a global writer, I have to speak and write in English very well. So I really want to study hard. (But it’s too difficult!) That’s why I’m passionate about writing and reading books.