Korean Job Discussion Forums

[uuini]

I am planning on going to Korea to teach sometime in the future and there's also the possibility of other teaching-oriented jobs in my future (community education/environmental stewardship). I don't think I need to invest in a TESL or CELTA/Trinity type certificate, but I would like to be know what I'm doing (I've taught for 4 months in Korea previously and had no clue what I was doing at first!). Could someone recommend books, videos, short/cheap courses that would help me get a good idea of how to plan lessons, conduct a class, etc.? Would taking a class or two at the local college's education department help?

[mnhnhyouh]

For first time teachers some of the most difficult things are :

1) Classroom management (behaviour management really)
2) Standing up in front of a class with a large number of eyes looking at you.
3) Lesson timing - how much will you get through.
4) Having enough "extras" to do when your lesson plan is finished and the bell has not gone
5) Knowing when to be taken off you lesson plan by circumstance, and when to stick with it.

The importance of the first varies greatly, if they are perfect students motivated to learn it is easy, if they hate school and dont respect your or any authority it can be a nightmare. Generally walking into the room appearing full of confidence will go a long way. It is your classroom, they are your students, and you decide what happens and when it happens. If you dont have the confidence, faking it can be a good idea, if you can carry it off.

Taking a few classes will go a long way to helping with number two, if it is a problem for you.

Taking lessons will also help you with number three, but the lessons learnt will have to be modified for the age group, of course.

What useful things to do for filling in time depends on who the students are, so taking a few classes may or may not help.

Taking a few classes will also give you a bit of a feel for the last as well.

h

[Woland]

I would add to mnhnhyouh's list the ability to plan lessons that build on one another and are learning centered, not merely entertaining or active. Though merely entertaining or active will get you by with crowds of students who don't care about learning.

Any training is better than no training. What instruction does, whether for language learning or language teaching, is provide the learners with shortcuts to knowledge that would long and painful to get through experience alone, if one got it at all.

Whenever people ask on this board about the value of getting training as a teacher before coming to Korea, I say the same thing:

Your job will occupy approximately one-third of your time here. How do you want that time to be? The more training you get, the more likely it is to be a manageable and pleasant time. And enjoying your job will spill over into the rest of life, letting you enjoy it, too. It is often the people without training that you here complaining here about their jobs, and my sense is that the lack of fun they have at work makes the rest of their lives here not so much fun either.

The choice is yours.

[lover.asian]

I suggest you start by buying the following books:

"How to Teach English" (Jeremy Harmer, Longman)

"Inside Teaching" (Tim Bowen, Jonathan Marks, Heinemann)


Read both cover to cover (several times).

Both are well sourced, so buy more books and keep learning. ESL teaching is a profession, not just something you do to live overseas. Your students deserve a professional teacher.

Another piece of advice I can give is to always focus first on what your students are learning in the classroom, not on what you are teaching. You'll understand what I mean as you gain more experience.

Good Luck.

[passport220]

[ddeubel]

[mnhnhyouh]

Worth a bit of a look at this as well, I think....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_%28learning_theory%29

h

[uuini]

Thanks for all the replies! And the suggestions and book & web recommendations. I've read the Longman How To Teach English book, and a few others. I am interested in teaching as a profession, and I do care that my students would learn - I don't want to just entertain, or just make enough money so I can live overseas. The reason I don't think I should invest in a CELTA or similar certificate is that I don't think I will be teaching English specifically in the future. I'm going for conservation biology and would like to teach community environmental stewardship.

So I'd like to ask, on top of all these great hints, are there any specific aspects of teaching (classroom management, or lesson planning/lesson continuity) that I really need a specific college course or book to learn? I've been reading some "how to teach" books and wondering if I'm getting a thorough foundation.

[Ya-ta Boy]

[Woland]

Many of the things you would learn in a short training course directed at TESOL would be transferable to teaching other subjects later. I think in particular about syllabus and lesson planning -- setting long term and short term goals, constructing individual tasks and cycles of tasks that would lead students to meeting those goals, and knowing how to assess task and task cycle outcomes.

You can read many books about this, but the advantage of studying it in a course is that you will be forced to actually make lesson plans, and more valuably, get feedback on them. It's from that interaction with someone more expert as you work on a task that you really learn how to do it. You can't get that out of a book alone.

There are a lot of short courses available that can give you some grounding in this, as well as other aspects of teaching. And if you really are interested in teaching as a profession, you'll be able to find ways to make knowledge relevant later.

ddeubel, I agree with you that good lessons can both learning centered and enjoyable. In fact, I think purposeful, enjoyable lessons are the most effective. And I'm an admirer of what you've done in this regard. My objection was to being an entertainer for its own sake.

lover.asian's point about attending to what students are learning is fundamental. That's why you need the training I suggest above, along with developing the ability to sense in class whether goals are being met and some resources for making changes when you have to. Again, this will come easier with help from other, more expert people.

[tzechuk]

Just some advanced advertising for KOTESOL for those of you who are interested..

I believe that Jeremy Harmer is coming in October as one of our invited speakers... if you are interested, keep your ears and eyes out. I will keep you updated!

[lover.asian]

[lover.asian]