Fall in Korea

Well, it is officially fall in Korea!  The leaves are changing and the weather is getting cooler.  Bring out the winter gear, which by the way I never really need in Texas.  I bought my first wool coat from a girl who had to move back home unexpectedly.  I will also be purchasing my very first pair of winter boots here shortly.  Is it sad that I'm kind of looking forward to the cold weather?  Well...then again, I'm also a little terrified of the cold weather.  It gets to negative 5 degrees.  I've never experienced weather that cold before.  Bring. It. On.

Last week, we had a Harvest Event at school.  The students harvested rice, and then used the rice to make rice cakes and popped rice.  They had a lot of fun.  Here are a couple of pictures:

With the fall weather, it's time for Halloween!  I am completely trying something new in my classroom.  I have been doing mostly ABC activities and early phonics, but it's been difficult.  My students are visually impaired, so I can't do some of the regular fun phonics activities that I have found on Pinterest.  I found one where they put phonics words around the room, and the students try to be the first student to find it.  I think that sounds really fun, but my students can't see that well.  I have tried doing something like with my small groups, but they just don't participate sometimes.

So...I decided to completely revamp things.  My co-teacher wants me to do phonics, so I will spend the first 15 minutes doing phonics and then the next 30 minutes doing thematic unit activities.  Each week will be a new thematic unit.  Some classes I see once a week, and some classes I see 2-3 times a week, so some classes will get more activities than others.

So far, the list of ideas I have are:

• Halloween
• Thanksgiving
• Christmas
• New Years
• Olympics
• Musical instruments
• Baseball
• Basketball
• Soccer
• Football
• Butterflies
• Oceans
• Rainforests
• Winter
• Spring
• Summer
• Fall
• Solar system
• The sun
• Earth
• Bones
• Going to the doctor
• Going to the dentist
• Senses
• Washing hands
• Homes
• Transportation

My plan is to show a quick video on the topic, do a couple worksheets with new vocabulary, and do an activity where we act out gestures or sing a song.  I am starting to find some great videos on YouTube and have started playlists on each topic.  If you have any ideas, I would LOVE to hear them!

I have found some great Halloween videos that I wanted to share.  Maybe you can use some of these in your classroom.  I am always on the lookout for fun, catchy videos...especially if there is a fun song.

I have found some great visual ABC cards with actual photographs.  I don't have access to a color printer here in Korea, but I do really like the cards.  You can find them HERE.

This is a sample of the D flashcards.  Aren't they great?