Korean Job Discussion Forums

[BS.Dos.]

So I'm finding my feet and slowly slipping into the groove that is being a FT in Korea.

What I'm finding strange is that given the amount of resources currently being thrown into the PS system over here into English Language acquisition, is why this investment appears to yield such poor results.

My HS has about 190 students, all boys. I teach around 13-hours per week, lessons which suppliment the 4 FT Korean English teachers grammar and listening classes. My point is that when you consider the investment made by the Korean government to recruit, house and pay us, plus, factor in the wages for the Korean English teachers, not of course forgetting all the resources used (books, paper etc) one would hope, nay expect, Korea to have some of the finest English speakers in the world. Alas and unfortunately, this is evidently not the case.

My impressions of the system so far, and I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge is limited, is that our Korean English co-teachers can be likened to that of teachers of architecture, inasmuch that the time that they spend with the students is purely to teach them about the nuts and bolts or, mechanics if you like, of the English language, which, IMO, is fine.

However, the problems arise once they leave the language 'architecture' classes and then step out onto the language 'building' site classes (i.e. our classes) to learn and apply what they've learnt. One would assume that they would have a grasp of what bricks are i.e. words and that they would know about how these bricks (words) are held together with cement (sentences). In addition to laying these proverbial bricks and constructing them into long lines (walls) using sentences, many haven't the faintest idea what the windows, doors and roof are for. It's almost as if they've studied the intricacies of architecture but have never touched and held the bricks or so much as mixed the cement, let alone picked up as shovel. I would have at least expected them to have messed around with a wheelbarrow, maybe even have knocked up a few dodgy BBQ's, but their overall ability has left me seriously befuddled.

In offering a solution, I would say that the Korean government should invest some cash on recruiting some senior ranking German education workers. Anyone who's ever been to Germany will know that the typical German has an excellent command of the English language, which is taught as comprehensively in Germany as it appears to be in Korea and yet with significanlty higher results.

While I can see that Germans learning English is obviously easier for them than Koreans learning English, I just think that this current approach is both expensive and ineffective and that simply throwing big pots at cash at the problem is never going to work. Sound investment with a major re-organisation of existing Korean teaching approaches and practices is what's needed if the next generation of young Koreans are going to master a second language more successfully than their predecessors.

If they don't and things remain as they are, then I fear that one day, we'll all be awoken by an almighty crash as all those crooked and wobbley houses come crashing down.

Ahh, what do we care.

Have a good holiday and make sure that you pump some of that blood money back into the local economy.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

15-20 November, 2012, is when the house will come crashing down, I believe. The 2012 Korean SAT (수능) will be the first to employ a communicative test for its English component. There are going to be a lot of Korean English teachers who will want to crawl into a hole and disappear around this time, I predict / fear / secretly hope.

[Privateer]

Judging by the number of pathetically poor student exercises I've seen marked 'correct' by Korean teachers, I tend to agree with the OP that teachers tend not to know basic English construction techniques.

Where's the evidence for their high-falutin' architect skills though? They know the difference between a subordinate clause and a complementizer, is that it? Do tell.

[ddeubel]

You are failing to see two things / problems with the "German" example.

First and foremost, English language acquisition on a societal level is very closely correlated not with the amount of time alloted in the public school system nor the efficacy of that teaching. What is most important is how that teaching is reinforced by the penetration of the English language in the culture as a whole, "in situ". Meaning, the media, the institutions(corporate/political/social) and commerce. Germans like most N. Europeans had easy access to and reinforcement of the English language. Simply, Koreans don't get enough backdoor contact, incidental contact with the English language. The govt needs to alter the landscape through expenditures in key areas to change this.

Further, there is the obvious. I am German and know well the similarities between German / Dutch and the English language.

Please don't think I don't see that teaching on a micro level makes a difference. It does. But for society, it is not enough unless the above occurs.

DD

[Woden]

Not only is the desired level of English ability in Korea not achievable, it isn't even necessarily desirable.

English has been constructed as an elixir of development, which having been obtained will lead to an vast increase in the human capital of the nation...what this ignores is the fact that most workers will never have to use English in their day-to-day lives. It is a vast waste of resources and just illustrates how far the discourse of western economic development has restricted nations defining their own course of development.

Unfortunately, the only people who will have the ability to achieve a level of English fluency will be those with enough money to study at Hagwons and study abroad. Isn't this a reason to extend English into the public schools, much as it currently is? No, because there aren't the resources or skilled teachers available to make it a success and the money it would take to implement would be far better spent in other areas of social development...

...having said that, while I am here I will try as hard as I can to be the best teacher I can, but I also know it is the education structure that will fail the students, irrespective of what I do in the classroom.

Rant over.

[BS.Dos.]

But you acknowledge the current system could be improved upon considerably.

Having only just got here I'm just surprised at the inadequacies in the existing system. Seems to me that all that money could used more effectively, but I'm hearing you on the broader European cultural point. That's something which can't easily be imported overnight.

[Woden]

[BS.Dos.]

[Woden]

[MarionG]

It would help if 1) some of the Korean English teachers spoke English and 2) if they taught some of their classes in English.

It takes 10 minutes to explain what an adverb is to an advanced English class...they know what it is, and usually use them correctly, but they've never heard the word "adverb." So when they confuse and adverb and adjective, and you say, you need to use an adjective (or adverb) because you're modifying a noun (verb) it's the gigantic blank look. And f0orget about something complex like "present participle!"

Someone else taught my 2nd grade phonics classes one day, and they translated all the words into Korean (train, brain, drain, chain etc) They simply did not understand the point of the lesson.

[jlb]

I hear rumors from my public school friends of: them only seeing each class for like an hour every week or every other week. How is this effective, I'm not so sure?

I also see plenty of Korean English teachers who can barely hold a conversation/understand what I say to them even when I speak very slowly and clearly. If you haven't mastered your subject, how can you teach it well? Obviously you wouldn't want a fat, out of shape person teaching you how to lift weights. Or someone who has just graduated from high school teaching you high school math.

More native speakers, better Korean English teachers would probably be helpful. As for how to achieve the latter, I'm not so sure what the best method would be. It seems to be a systemic thing that needs to change.

[trubadour]

OP - I appreciate you taking the opportunity to share your observations. Others here too, thanks.

Judging from what I've seen since I've been in public schools, pretty much the whole thing is a waste of resources. When they are being taught stuff, it's basically 'shut up and listen' time, when they aren't being taught (i.e. when there are no teachers present - a lot of their time) the kids maraud around like they are animals captive in a zoo..

But who cares about the poor and weak? - as long as enough jump through the exam hoops, everyone can sit back and mathematically verify they are somehow not fundamentally failing generation after generation of young people.

Exams, and the teaching students endure, happens because it is conceived and is carried out as a kind of ticking the box procedure, by people who desire proof of a certain outcome. English = success. Therefore: give them English words [check] tell them how to use them [check] train them to pass an exam [check] = job done!

The whole system is conceived of and executed in this way. The whole system is a sham. We merely flesh out the lies...

However, just because we are a part of it is not to say we don't do some good. Through actually trying to get the students to participate and not just sleep through class like they are allowed to sleep through life, we introduce them to some thing a bit different.

Sometimes I think students like us, not only because we are unusual or they get to be a bit rude to us without us noticing, but because we actually try to teach them. And we keep on trying.

Or was I dreaming?

[trubadour]

Actually, I was a bit off topic there.

Basically we are totally underused. Take you as an example. You teach 14 hours, yet have to sit there for 8 a day, while the KT 'teaches' 40 kids in a class.

It doesn't take a math genius to sense a solution to that one.

[ddeubel]

[Fresh Prince]

I ran into the same problem, studying Asian languages back home. There is no opportunity to use them outside of traveling to Asia, which is prohibitively expensive for a lot of Asian-language students back home. Most people that I know from university, lost their second language abilities after two or three years due to lack of use.