This Week’s Writing // Nov 1st

Hello! It’s been a while since we’ve been here. We’ve been working on our presentations. The students have been grinding their mental gears extremely hard to create magical peices of writing for you. This is just part one of many presentations that students have prepared.

My Favorite Room at Home, by Alex

Welcome, everyone. My name is Alex I’m here to talk to you today about my favorite room in my home.

I have a room that I love to spend time in, my bedroom.
This is the most exciting room in my house because I can sleep.
I like the bedroom because I can sleep so much.
The bedroom is the best room in my house, and I spend all the time I can there. What do you like to do in your favorite room?

Technology I Would Invent to Change the Future, by Henry Jeong

Hello, I’m Henry and I’d like to talk to you about a technology I think is important ad that we should invent to improve our future. I want to invent a teleport technology like Doctor Strange. I think it’s important because we can move from our home to restaurants or banks quickly. I think teleport technology needs many materials because the technology is not possible yet. We will need to create new technologies in the future to make teleport technologies.

These days, the confirmed covid cases grows because people gather in crowded places. I want to solve this problem because if the Covid-19 confirmed cases continues to rise, then I cannot go outside, I can’t go to my classes, and I won’t be able to go to school. I don’t like to study online until 3:30 in the afternoon.

If I invent the teleport technology, people must still wear their masks when they visit places. If they can think this way, they will not gather with their friends without masks.

I hope that I can invent this technology soon. If you could solve a problem with technology, what would you fix? Thank you for listening today.

Technology in Film, by Jay Cho

Hello, my name is Jay. Today I will introduce what I think is important film technology. There were two changes in history.

The First film ratio was created by Kennedy Dickson. He wanted to use 35mm film, so he decided use 4 films at once and thus created the 4:3 ratio. But the inclusion of sound also changed the movie market. Filmmakers wanted to include record a line next to the film, so the ratio became smaller.

Nowadays filmmakers use regular theatre ratio sizes, but they have special ratios, and in the movie market there are many ratios. I will introduce some of my favourite ratios. 

First is IMAX digital ratio. This ratio has more information than other regular ratios. They make the background feel very wide. This ratio includes Avengers Endgame, Blade runner 2049 and 1917 to name but a few.

Second is Imax laser ratio many Christopher Nolan films use this ratio. The characteristics of this ratio shape is square and to record movies, the makers use films. This ratio feels tall, so the audience feels a whole new experience. This ratio includes Tenet, The Dark Knight, and the upcoming Marvel film The Eternals. If you want to experience in the Korea there is only one theatre with this screen.

So today I have introduced film ratio what I think not only in history but also fun. Thank you for listening.

The Best Day I’ve Ever Had, By David Kim

Welcome, everyone. My name is David. I’m here to talk to you today about the best day I had with my family.

I love to be with my family. Every day is a special day. But there was once a very special day that we had together. This was the time that my family and I went to Taiwan.
This was the most exciting day because we flew to Taiwan by plane, ate meat skewers, and bought souvenirs.

First, we flew to Taiwan by plane. It was fun because flying is really fun. I love flying in planes.

Next, we ate meat skewers. It was fun because the meat skewers were delicious.

Last, we bought souvenirs. It was fun because the souvenirs were so cool. We bought Taiwanese toys.

This was the most exciting day I’ve ever had with my family. What days have you had that were so special?

Korea in 2071, By Jayden Jeon

Hello, my name is Jayden. Today I’ll talk about Korean future technology. In 2071 Korea will have changed and have new technology.

First there will be the fastest Internet in the world in Korea. So, we can use good Internet to watch videos or message something. Or play cool and amazing interactive games with people will around the world.

Second, there will be many robots compared to now. The robots will be smarter than now so they will make our life more comfortable. So, they will clean my room or make some food for me. Then our life will be comfortable.

Last, there will be Hydrogen fuelled cars. It’s because it is good for nature. So, I think many people will use it. It’s because many cars use gas to drive a car. This gas is bad for the environment and also our health. People will want to change. So, I think many people will use it.

I think Korea will be different for these three reasons. What do you think Korea will be like in the future? Do you think there will be many changes? Thank you for listening.

The Most Influential Technology in Human History, By Chloe Kim

Hello, everyone, my name is Chloe and I’m here to talk to you about the most influential technology that has changed humans’ lives.

Technology is a means of processing to be useful in human life by applying the theory of science. So what objects and means help people comfortably live their lives? For example, there are cell phones means of transportation. But I think the technology that helped human life the most is therapeutic technology, because therapeutic technology keeps someone alive.

Therapeutic technology made the Covid-19 vaccine for people. Then people around the world were healthier than before. And the therapeutic technology made the body healthy by finding a cure for those who are struggling with many different diseases such as Polio, Cholera and Smallpox. If there were no treatment technology in human life, human life might not have survived and all would have disappeared.

So treatment technology is the most influential technology in human life because even if there are many diseases, treatment technologies are saving people and many people are living. What do you think has shaped our lives the most? Thank you for listening today.

Show and Tell – My Favorite Insect, By Hyunsang Yun

Hello, my name is Hyunsang. Today, I will show you my favorite insect.  
This is my favorite insect.
My favorite insect is a beetle.
The beetle is brown.
It has a big horn and a small horn.
The beetle eats tree sap.
The beetle lives in the mountains.
I think the beetle is very cute.
The beetle can also fly.
What insect do you like? Thank you for listening. Good bye.

Hallowe’en Memories, By Jamie Lee

Good evening, everyone. My name is Jamie and I have a magical story to tell you. Please sit tight and listen carefully.
            The wind blew. The sun disappeared and the darkness came. It was the 31st of October. It was Hallowe’en. When the sun went down, people lit up the square. All the streets were decorated in orange, black and purple.
            In the purple roofed house, there was a girl named Carmen on the cellphone with her friend Allen.
            “Okay, costume? Of course, witch! Don’t worry. Your face looks like an alien. Sorry. BYE!!!” and Carmen hung up the phone.
Both the friends loved Hallowe’en. They went to a special trick-or-treat party.
The shadows of the houses were low down on the street. Carmen and Allen knocked on the shadow of a house.
            Knock-knock. “Trick-or-treat.” they shouted.
            Then a shadow door open and a woman gave candy. In the candy there was a girl who flew a kite. That’s the woman’s memory.
            The girls went to the next shadow house. Knock-knock. “Trick-or-treat.” they yelled.
            A man gave the children jelly. In the jelly they saw a boy with a bruise. His parents pacified the boy.
            The children knocked on a final door. Knock-knock. “Trick-or-treat.” they shouted.
            An old lady gave a jam cookie. There was a woman and a man who were married.
            Carmen and Allen knocked on all the doors or the shadow houses. They collected all the memories in the treats. The girls melted the treats. Happy, sad, angry, jealous, excited. They made candies with the used memories. If you eat them, you will think of your precious memories.
            Sweet treat, sweet memory. Happy Hallowe’en.
            The end. Thank you for listening to my story.


This is just part one of the writing that the students created. We will upload another batch of presentations later in the month. As you can see the students put in amazing work. Each stage of our curriculum as stated before was divided into differentiated groups for the students, ensuring that they were able to complete the task they were asked to do. We also provided the students with hopefully fun topics so that they would be interested in presenting. If you would like to see what our presentations looked like, you can click here.

Alternatively, if you’d like to see an example of our presentations, check out the embedded video below.

Shooting Star’s English Presentations 2022

We’re Shooting for the Stars

It’s that time of year again where Shooting Star English holds its annual fall presentations. This year we decided to test out our limits, not only the students, but the teacher’s technology skills – we went wild and added a green screen and a mixer. OOOOOH, I hear you say!

Let’s get stuck into the process and let you know how it all went down.

Shooting Star English Presentations

What did the students do?

Shooting Star’s presentation poster for 2022

We felt like the format of last year went well; students choose a topic, brainstorm, edit, review, type – if they can – then practice, practice, practice. This year we focussed on four distinct areas:

  • Foundation: Show and Tell
    Students choose something from home and share with us.
  • Intermediate: Characters
    Students tell us about their favourite characters from stories that they’ve read.
  • Advanced: Demonstration
    Students demonstrate how to do something that they think is important.
  • Beyond: The Past
    Students choose an important topic about the past and bring us up to speed.

What did we do?

Now what did we do differently? This year we integrated different levels of technology into our repertoire. We decided to use a green screen (Chroma Key) which added a massive amount of challenge to our usual set up. From our first inception of presentations at Shooting Star, which included recording students on a cell phone in front of our white board, to now live streaming on green screens, we’re coming on leaps and bounds.

Our new setup

How we started.

The students started off with their concepts. We brainstormed our simple ideas and tried to bring life to them. We thought about expanding the ideas of our favourite characters, for example, and explained specific attributes about them, their personality traits, and whether or not these characters would be the type of person (or animal/insect) that we would be friends with.

Not all students started from the same point, however. We tried our best to give the students all the equal footing possible to help them share their ideas. Aside from the modelled writing, something that we would like the students to create, we differentiated the students’ presentations based upon their abilities, providing support at every step. From guided writing to those who were new to English, to allowing the students to share their ideas independently, without intervention.


Ready, set, practice.

You the reader probably already know that just speaking about either your favourite character or giving us a demonstration is only part of the battle. Being an engaging presenter is extremely important otherwise you will not keep the audience that you’re trying to capture. We took the important steps to provide students with the necessary skills that the likes of prominent presenters would be proud of.


Presentation Day

This year the presentations were held much the same as last year. We streamed on YouTube. Personally, I love to be able to play around with the technology. There was a load of things that I learned along the way that I’ll summarise later. The students were superb. They came with bells on. Their performances were spectacular. I couldn’t believe my eyes and ears. According to their parents, they had been up all weekend rehearsing. It was easy to see. Let’s take a look.

Foundation

This group was asked to think about their most valued possession at home for Show and Tell.

Jennie’s Presentation
Hoyeon’s Presentation

Intermediate

This group’s topic to introduce was their favourite character from a book that they had recently read.

John’s Presentation
Ryan’s Presentation
Yejun’s Presentation
Alex’s Presentation
Sungbin’s Presentation
Soyul’s Presentation
Brian’s Presentation
Siyoon’s Presentation
Hajin’s Presentation
Arha’s Presentation
Seojin’s Presentation

Advanced

Finally, this group of students were asked to demonstrate how to do something they thought was important. Thankfully, some students shared their presentations all the way from the UK.

Suzie’s Presentation
Lucy’s Presentation
Jamie’s Presentation
Ain’s Presentation

Jerry’s Final Thoughts

We watched too much Jerry Springer on Saturday night TV when I was young, can you tell?

    Anyways, back to the point. I had a blast with the presentations, and it looks like the students did, too. The reactions from the parents were all super positive and many of the YouTube streams are getting even more views than they did last year. From what I was told, parents were gathered around their smart TVs to watch the presentations. I’m thrilled to hear that level of enthusiasm, not only for the students, but also for the Shooting Star family.

    My question to myself is, will I do it again this way? Yes, resoundingly. But there were many steps I learned along the way technically, unfortunately many of them last minute. Some of them in the audio and lighting department where I have little to no experience. It was great to give this a try and show what we were capable of. We took all that we learned from last year, making sure we arranged enough time for practice and structure of the presentation practice; then threw more at it this year. I think the results speak for themselves.

    Thank you for reading and I hope to see you all again next year.


    Reading Responses for May

    “The world belongs to those who read.”

    I said we’d be back here next month and here we are. The students have been amazing and have some fantastic work that they’d like to share with you.

    Each week the I choose the student’s work that shows amazing effort or signs of significant progress compared to the previous weeks. I’m thrilled to be able to share the amazing work from all of the different ages and abilities, as well as a huge variety of genres and styles of books. The students just love to read!

    Due to the limitations of the website, and to save your eyes, some of the levels have been clipped. Feel free to tap or click on the image to see the student’s work.

    Foundation


    Intermediate


    Advanced


    See you back here next month for the hard work that the students create. Thanks for checking us out <3

    Book of the Month // June 2022

    “We all can dance when we find music that we love.”

    Giraffes Can’t Dance, Giles Andreae

    Phew, the weather’s starting to get hot, hot, HOT! Before it gets too hot outside I try to get some good habits in and practice some of my exercise routines, how about you?

    Typically, I like to cycle along the Han River with a few friends, or take my two little doggoes on brisk walks early in the morning.

    Bernie and Lucy

    Forming good exercise habits can be good for your body, but did you also know it’s good for your mind? Check out these books and learn about some of the fantastic knowledge that’s out there about the human body.


    Run! Jump! Play!


    By Mary Elizabeth Salzmann

    Forming healthy habits to become a healthy person is so important when you’re young. What healthy active habits do you have that keep you fit and strong?



    Being Fit


    By Valerie Bodden

    This is a great introduction to how exercise can help you stay healthy. What sort of exercise can you do to stay healthy?



    The Science of Super Strength & Super Speed


    By Mary Elizabeth Salzmann

    Hey you. Yep, I’m talking to you. You’re a super hero. There’s a hidden strength inside you that you don’t even know about. Read this book, it’ll help you unlock the hidden powers inside.



    Our Library Updates

    Once every couple of months we like to add more books to our ever expanding collection. We’re fortunate that the students love to borrow books from our library and I try to listen carefully to what they like to read. This month we added some greatly needed books to the library, most importantly, the Pokemon series. I sincerely hope the students enjoy the books.


    Wow! You’ve finished these books already? Well you’ve obviously got good taste. You can find more great books in our library, or at EPIC. Click the blue button below. See you next month.

    Shooting Star // May’s Projects

    You’re off to great places! Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting. So … get on your way!

    Dr. Seuss

    Welcome everyone, this is the first set of projects that the students at Shooting Star have completed since being at the new premises. I’m excited to be able to share the work that they’ve accomplished.

    I believe that projects, over testing, can be a great way to demonstrate more real-world ways of assessing students’ abilities. Tests can only show us so much, and often put undue pressure on students – or the opposite – students can memorise for specifics and not show their flair. Having a project really allows the students to show their unique, individuality, and provides expression. So, without further ado, here’s a tonne of amazing work created by some of the best workforce I’d recommend!!!

    Foundation

    Shapes and colors

    Intermediate

    Appearances

    Advanced

    Self introductions

    Chloe Kim

    Hello everyone.
    My name is “Se Jin Kim” but, my English name is “Chloe”. So, you can call me “Chloe”.
    I was born in 2008 in Korea. Now, I live in Jongro, Korea.
    I’m a student in Changdeok middle school. I study many subjects in school, and my academies. Especially, I’m especially good at math.
    In my free time, I like sleeping, baking, and making something. And, of course, I like to use my smart phone.
    I don’t have a special dream, but I want to make lot of money. And I hope to look smart. Thank you for listening.

    Olivia Byun

    Hello everyone. My name is Olivia. I was born in 2010 in Seoul, Korea.
    I like to study. So, I study hard. I often study math problems because it is difficult.
    In my free time, I enjoy reading Korean books. Reading books is very interesting. Sometimes, I read English books.
    I want to be a teacher. This job seems so nice and good. We can teach students. I want to do that very much.
    Thank you for listening to my speech.

    Henry Jeong

    I was born in 2008, in Seodaemungu, but now I’m living in Mapogu.
    I’m a student of second grade in middle school, I’m leaning Korean, math, English, music, etc. there.
    And I’m a badminton club member at school. The badminton teacher named my team “Han-Bae team”.
    I usually like to solve Ssen math workbook, but I think I prefer to watch Youtube more than that.
    My dream is changing these days, today’s dream to be a teacher. I guess it will change tomorrow, too.
    Thank you for listening to my presentation today.

    Kevin Shim

    Hello everyone! My name is Kevin. I was born in Seoul Jongro-gu on June 17th, 2010.
    My school is Dongrimmoon elementary school. My favorite subject is science. Because I like doing experiments.
    In my free time, I play game League of Legends, and I watch videos. I want to be Youtuber or Pro-gamer because I like make videos and play games.
    Thank you for attention!

    Suzie Park

    Hello! My name is Suzie. But sometimes people call me Suzie Chang!
    I was born in 2010 in Korea. I live in Korea, but when I was 3 to 7 years old, I lived in China.
    I study at Dongnimun elementary school. My favorite subjects are P.E. and art class. My best friends are Olivia and Luna!
    I like to draw and take some pictures. In my free time I draw pictures or do my homework. I like to go somewhere with my friends! And I like to wear some fancy clothes!
    My dream was to be a pianist, but now my dream is to draw some pictures, but not to be an artist. Because, I don’t like to be an artist. I like to draw. I will draw some pictures and take some videos.
    Thank you for listening!!

    Jamie Lee

    I was born on January 8th, 2010 in Seoul, South Korea.
    I’m a Dongnimmun elementary school student. And I’m in the 6th grade. At school, I’m good at art and P.E, but I hate math. Also, I manage the library of our classroom.
    In free time, I enjoy drawing pictures and reading stories. And I like to play some sports, too.
    Imagination is my life pattern. Every night, before I fall asleep, I let my mind wonder. My favorite writer is Roald Dahl. I love the book ‘Matilda’.
    I want to be an artist and a writer who moves people’s hearts.
    Now it’s time for me to finish. Thank you very much for listening, even if you fell asleep when I gave my speech.
    Anyway, thank you everyone!

    Lucy Kim

    My name is Lucy. I was born on June 8th, 2010 in Seoul, South Korea. I still live in Seoul.
    I am a Dongnimun elementary school student. I am in the sixth grade.
    I like and I am good at Korean. But I don`t like math. Math makes me interesting or boring.
    In my free time, I read books and drawing pictures. Also, I love to imagine and think! Think makes me sometimes relax, and happy, but sometimes sad mad. Imagine makes me curious and happy. I like these hobbies because I can feel many feelings. Also, I like to sleep, exercise and do puzzles.
    I want to be a great teacher or the best announcer. Or even, a great teacher. Last, I want to write books. I want to give hopes to children.
    Thank you for listening. I hope you enjoyed it!

    Ryan Kim

    My name is Ryan. I was born in 2010 in Seoul. I live in Gyeonghuigung Xi apartment.
    I live with my dad, my mom, and my sister. I learn in Kyodong elementary school.
    In my school, I’m good at math, but I’m not good at P.E.
    In my free time, I watch YouTube. I usually watch movie reviews. I like Marvel, Ghibli, and Disney movies. I also draw pictures in my free time.
    I don’t have many dreams, but sometimes I want to be a cartoonist or a lawyer.
    Thank for your attention.


    And that’s a wrap for all the projects for now. Come back in a couple of months when we’ve compiled a load more of the students’ work. I hope you have enjoyed what they’ve accomplished.