Korean Job Discussion Forums

[panthermodern]

A Rant:

I teach "adult professionals", and to note, I will not do so for much longer.

Today/Yesterday (April 6, 2004) I taught 10, one on one adult classes, and said to each and everyone of them ...

"Wow! It is May already, ... time really flies, does it not?"

and I did not even get a blink from them.

(it's April)

I even wrote it down ...

Nobody said anything ... smile and nod .. smile and nod ...

Smile and Nod ...

These ... people ... have been complaining (perviously) that I am boring and do not challenge them and "make them speak English enough" ...

That's another story ...

BUT 100% of my students when provided with an obviously false statement failed to make any mention that I was wrong ...

or any sattement at all ...

Yea, these guys will debate grammar till the cows come home: "Teacher can I say this ..."


NO!

Sure they are all great guns think up new crazy way to say something simple but when they are hit them with a bald faced lie ...

SURE ACCEPTANCE!

They will bitch to the management ... sure ... tell them it is May in April ...

NOTHING!

BTW: This was during the "warmup" free talking part of the class where I am instructed by the S.L.P. of the institute to make small and help build student confidence ... and listening skills ...

I really, honest to God I thought it would have gone this way:

PM: Wow, it is May already, time flies ...

S: It is April and not May ...

PM: You are right, it is April!

Having a holiday on a Monday has really messed me up ...

I have a hard time remembering it is Tuesday and not Monday so I slipped on the month ...

Do you "feel" like today is Monday rather than Tuesday ...

S: Yes, it feels like Monday ...

But, NO ... nothing ...

I even made it a question: So they HAD to answer ... they all (100%) agreed and said:

Yes, it does ...

(Time flies rather it is not May .. or is it ...)

My conclusion Korean students of English only what to say crazy things and when confronted by the insane: they are content.

[buddy bradley]

[shawner88]

Adults are really stressful. You have to actually teach but yet it seems they don't really want to learn. Just talk. I would trade my adult class for a couple more elementary any time.

[tsgarp]

[kangnamdragon]

maybe they did not want to embarrass you

[buddy bradley]

[kangnamdragon]

You were actually serious about Koreans not being people?

[Harpeau]

Maybe part of Confuscianism is the teacher is always right. No?

[The Lemon]

[panthermodern]

RANT PART II:

If the teacher were always right they (the students) would not run off to the managers to complain that I "do not let" or "do not make" them speak English. Why would they complain if I were "right".

BTW: As soon as my student enter the classroom I duct tape their mouth closed or shush them evertime they try to speak English ...

I only allow then to speak Korean ... No English!

English is too much work ...

The point is that they are B.S. little whinners who do not pay attention and put no effort into trying to express themselves but are more then willing to complain and whine ... They really don't want to practice, I swear they come to complain.

As I stated: this was an experiement to test to see if they would respond to an obviously incorrect statement phrased as part of a question, to see if the student would not answer the question at hand and question the question, a skill which I feel is important and a necessity to speak English fluently.

How many times has a Korean asked you a question (in English) and you ask them a question rather then answering the question directly? What is the result?

Usually stunned silence.

This is typical Western "language behaviour" and thus students should be a ware of and understand that this does indeed happen. Teaching a language is more then teaching grammar and vocabulary, it is also teaching the realities of the "language culture".

[The Lemon]

So teach them THAT.

Tape record that first part of your class where you make the obviously false statement, and then when they react as you observed, make them listen to it back and ask them why they answered as they did. Also tell them what you just said about language patterns and culture, if you think they need to be made aware of it. Sounds like you just identified a good objective to work on with your students.

[panthermodern]

Ahhh Lemon the problem is I am so hemmed in by the SLP (Standardized Learning Procedure) that I cannot be so creative.

I am thankfully getting out of this situation but my hands are totally tied.
I cannot do anymore then I am ...

I would LOVE to teach them "critical thinking" and other such topics but alas that is just not part of the tooling of this langauge factory.

[The Lemon]

There are probably those who would argue that digressions into critical thinking and conversational cultural differences are beyond the scope of our mandates as teachers. I disagree.

However, it'd be a tricky thing to do without sounding like you're preaching, or indicating that their way of doing things is somehow faulty (which, if we're honest, many of us believe it is... thus, we're "ethnocentric", blah blah..) Students are hypersensitive of teachers who are critical of the Korean way, even if we're just explaining the differences between Korean and Western practices as neutrally as we can.

I solved the problem for myself by requesting no high level adult classes this semester. Lower level? Fine, a pleasure. But higher level ones are by far the hardest classes we've got here, for cultural/political reasons.

[panthermodern]

I agree, Lemon ... I am giving up teaching adults all together and going back to kids.

(mark your calendars kids cause this don't happen often)

How a language is used is far more practical, in my opinion, then how it works.


RANT III: "Test Taking English"

Like other B.S. English programs like Business English but a little more honest.

The cultural aspects of language are far more important and are absolutly critical for "real" communications then most people are willing to admit or able to understand, especially Korean students and instructors.

Memorization of grammar, vocabular and whatever else you want to bore yourself with by memorizing it is dandy BUT is not the point of studying a lanaguage: COM-FREAKING-MUNICATION!

WRONGO!

Koreans Study english to take tests and never actually intend to use this skill in any practical way.

Much like the way they look at Accounting, Law and Structural Enginnering.

They study these subjects to take the exams but never actually use them in "real life".

My guess is after passing any sort of exam, Korean students bludegeon themselves with hammers (or soju) so that the offending knowledge is no longer haunting their decission making process in the future.

I swear that I can no longer handle the "Test Taking English" mentality of any of my students ...

I want to go back to Go Go, he undersands ...

Oh Min Ho! ... You have failed and have to study Go Go 3 again!

[kiwiboy_nz_99]