Speech Contest

[Unregistered]

I am an English teacher at a Korean school. The children will have speech contests in a weeks time. I only started 2 weeks ago and had the children handed down to me, they already memorized half the speech. Now the children just refuse to memorize the rest of the speech. I give them their homework but they really do not give it their best! I know the contest will be an embarrising moment for the children and me! What can I do to motivate them?

[Unregistered]

I have a brother who taught overseas (I'm from America and so is he) and he said he had extremely frustrating times when the children would not come together and do the appropriate task when asked. He then said that one of the most amazing differences between our culture and theirs is that the students, although they may mess around, really cared about their grades. It holds much more weight it cultures that determine career paths and higher education passed mostly on grades. Thus, when he would become frustrated with inattentiveness or lack of progress..... he would threaten to grade the task at hand and he would regain control.

I don't know if that would help in your current situation, but I thought I should share.