I'm a Seoul (Wo)Man!: A Goodbye to the "Nuts"

Hello All!
Since I am behind in blogging about my life, this post is sort of what we call old news. The end of February marked the end the school year here in Korea. It was time for the little kindergarteners I had been teaching since July to graduate. My homeroom class was called the Chestnuts and my afternoon kindergarten was called the Pistachios. So it truly is a goodbye to the "Nuts." It is weird having them graduate. We were in such a routine with each other because I had been with them since my very first day in Korea. It was sad to say goodbye, I guess it's probably the closest thing I felt to having my OWN kids, as weird or creepy as that sounds. It was just another example of how life is continually moving and changing no matter how much you don't want it to. They were wonderful kids to have for my first teaching experience and I wouldn't change it for the world. For kindergarten graduation, we had a ceremony at a location away from our school. It was an auditorium with a stage for the kids to walk around and receive their graduation certificates. Of course, all the parents came, cameras in hand. I gave a quick little speech about my class (we graduated over 100 students!) and the kids got their "diplomas", snapped some pictures (forgot to mention - they were wearing caps and gowns!), and then the kids had practiced a song to sing. We had 9 kindergarten classes, 3 classes sang a different song together. My class sang, "First Grade, First Grade" sung to the tune of "New York, New York" - You know, "We want to be a part of it, first grade, first grade" The Chestnuts truly are wonderful singers, as they showed me throughout this year at such event like the Christmas concert, or daily in the classroom.
I will miss those kids, though I am pretty lucky. I get to see most of them EVERYDAY still because they are now in 1st grade. Some went to a different POLY school, one that you had to test high to get into, but out of my 24 kids, about 14 still go to my school. They are great - They are the first class to come after our hour prep time and many of them come early. When I am prepping for the afternoon classes, I will go to make copies at the copy machine and it is almost impossible to do so without running into one of my old students wanting to say hi. I love it. I teach a first grade class (not their level though) and my Chestnuts and Pistachios wait for me outside my classroom door just to say a quick hello and give me a hug. So, I guess it's like they never left? :-) Though, they look older, crazy how that happens. (I sound like a mom when I say that). Along with my kinders graduating, I got all new classes and the other grades moved up. I will talk about my new students and classes in my next post.
Here are some pictures from graduation!