Korean Job Discussion Forums

[PBRstreetgang21]

I am not reffering to studying korean equating to a newfound ability to simply say what an english word means in Korean. What I mean is, if you are studying a language like Korean (since we live here it makes the most sense to learn) does the act of being a student of the language (or any language) impact the way you develop methods to teach English?

Have you ever been teaching a certain and way and changed something you did because you found an easier way that came to you when you where studying Korean yourself?

[Yu_Bum_suk]

Absolutely (even though my study of Korean has been very sporadic and inadequate). When you have a better idea of how Korean works it changes how you present English.

[jindodog]

yeah, especially when you learn things like 'interesting' and 'funny' are the same word in Korean

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[laogaiguk]

Studying any other second language will help you as a language teacher. Studying the language of your students is usually a bit more helpful (though can be a detriment in a few cases)>

[kingplaya4]

I haven't learned anything recently that's helped my teaching, but initially it really helped me. I understood the reason for some of the typical pronunciation problems, the grammer difficulties, and some mistaken word choices that Korean students make.

A few months of casual study would definitely benefits newbies here.

[Scotticus]

Yeah, I'd agree with everyone else here. Even my half-assed studying of Korean has helped me a lot in understanding how/why students here make some of the mistakes they do. In turn, it's allowed me to change the way I present some things and helped me to better be able to address problems when they occur.

[jkelly80]

The words for thick and dark are the same, whatever that indicates.

[just because]

[aka Dave]

If you're teaching composition classes as I am, I think it's absolutely essential to study at least some Korean. The reason is, you need to know why they make the same mistakes over and over, and what kind of mistakes they are prone to make.

I'm talking about subject/agent mistakes. More than half their mistakes in essays are in sentences which lack clear agents. In Korean, *you don't even need to identify the agent of a subject* (at least most of the time as far as I can tell, I'm a beginning Korean student). You simply say, for example, Chay Miss Oh yo. "is interesting".

This problem snowballs in academic essays where students try to to construct complex, multi-clausal sentences where agents and objects simply evaporate.

Verb agreement, singular/plural problems, etc. are all clearer as to why they repeat these mistakes if you study Korean.

[zpeanut]

For sure. Having the experience of learning any second language helps you in teaching. It's about knowing what it's like to be a student in a language class.

Knowing korean would be helpful in beginners classes.

[Eedoryeong]

[Eedoryeong]

[Justin Hale]

Bringing Korean directly into lesson plans and lesson materials is absolutely irresistible if you get to high beginner/low intermediate and above. Sometimes I'd even use my own study materials, which is very lazy, but it works, so who gives a toss??

I went from teaching Koreans and only Koreans for 3 years to teaching totally multinational classes in a summer job I had and you really notice the difference.

[Gwangjuboy]

I was never sure whether my profiency in Korean was a help or a hindrance when teaching English to Koreans. I was convinced that it was for a long time, but it is difficult to maintain that conviction in the face of staunch opposition by Korean teachers and managers.