Korean Job Discussion Forums

[ABC KID]

I have done a few English camps in my time and although they have passed smoothly and have even been enjoyable at times, I still feel burdened by them, especially when others have their long holidays. I'm not calling for their abolition but I would sure like to see them made shorter...

Anyway, I'm more interested to know a bit about the history of English camps in Korea...

How long have they been around?

When they started, what was the main reason?
Were they seen as an inspired policy by the government to boost the learning of children's English?
Were they called for by parents, who needed somewhere for their children to go during the vacations, while they worked?
Were they designed to stop foreigners working at other places during vacation time?

Who can share their knowledge of the history and origins of camps?
What are people's thoughts generally about camps?

[sojourner1]

Mine's less than 2 years old and it's operating right now and is the first one I will have done. It will have kids staying in the dormitory from July 29th through August 14th which is where I'll be teaching at during that time. I'll take my vacation in the last 2 weeks of August to anywhere I want to go. There is no reason to complain about working during students vacation when it's not my vacation time, but it's true that many PS teachers get extra bonus time off in the Summer and Winter. I don't know how everything works and plays out as I'm new here and time will only tell what it entails. They're are 2 day programs going on right now at the camp where the students leave at 4 each day, but I'll also be teaching classes at my main elementary school and another school I haven't been to yet. I believe the MOE will continue to pour large sums of money into the English education programs as it sounds like so camps and mock villages will become more and more common in the EPIK PS program. The curriculum and materials are all in place and seem to be fairly decent quality and it's not a real tense stress and high pressure kind of environment as they want the kids to be happy and have a positive experience in learning English as to want to continue to do so.

The camp is like a mock village setting with airport, restaurant, hotel, clinic, department store, and has a video projection board in the main lecture room you can write on. It's a really cool looking little place. Fake money is used to do mock transactions and dialogue training. We will be getting a rewards system (things for sale) soon that allows purchases with the fake money as they also get bonus dollars for good performance on top of the money they start out with. It's not a big place as it's a small, but it's new and fun for the kids and they seem to get a lot of learning out of it. Nothing like a hagwon what so ever.

[ABC KID]

I try to avoid bumping my own threads as a rule but I'm going to make an exception here. I have renamed the thread to give a more accurate indication of the info I'm after...

Can anyone help out?

One more question - How much older are camps than the English Villages? Unless I'm mistaken, I seem to remember the first English Villages starting around 2003/2004...