Korean Job Discussion Forums

Warhammer820 · Joined: 03 Jun 2011 Location: USA

1. When working in a public school, do you get a book to base your lesson plans off of?

2. Is there a video I can watch to see how to teach students who don't already know English? I have taught several times before, but never to students who did not understand me.

ttompatz · Joined: 05 Sep 2005 Location: Kwangju, South Korea

Warhammer820 · Joined: 03 Jun 2011 Location: USA

so for middle school and high school teachers are expected to create their own information.

iggyb · Joined: 29 Oct 2003

At my school, we don't do formal lesson plans. (Elementary)

If you have taught ESL before, you should not have to worry.

If you are teaching in a public school, you don't have to worry about "but never to students who did not understand me". If you worked in the hakwons teaching pre-school and 1st or 2nd grade, you'd have to figure out how to teach true beginning English (survival level), but by 3rd grade in public schools, you will only have a minority of very low beginners (survival level).

If you have never taught ESL before, it will take some getting used to -- figuring out how much X% of the class can understand.

Just spent some time thinking about when you studied a foreign language. How did you do it? Where did you struggle? What could have made the experience easier or more beneficial at the start.

Public school classes are mixed level. Some students won't understand 95% of what you say. But, you will be able to communicate with the class. You will have to simplify, and conversation will be limited, but the bulk of the class will already know enough English for you to work with to build them up.

You also always have the textbook to fallback on.

In elementary school, it is terribly inadequate, because the vast majority of students already know the material, and the book goes at a dead snail's pace, but the material is there for you to use.

Warhammer820 · Joined: 03 Jun 2011 Location: USA

wow thanks everyone for the replies. I do not have any intention on teaching at a hagwon; I will only teach at a public school.

Fishead soup · Joined: 24 Jun 2007 Location: Korea

I strongly suggest you go into finchpark.com. There are lots of video's with the seating plan changed so the staudents are arranged in groups and do lots of surveys using expressions like Have you ever______?
The idea is that you make students do these activities in groups and the teacher is actually a facillitator.

iggyb · Joined: 29 Oct 2003

Group and pair work is stressed in TESOL theory (outside of Korea), but expect it to be a little rough at the start.

Korean students aren't used to it (unless usually the foreign teacher has broken them in with it before).

Also expect it to be loud. That is the hardest part for me. It is hard to easedrop on the group's conversation to see how they are doing and if they are doing the work.

Fishead soup · Joined: 24 Jun 2007 Location: Korea

iggyb · Joined: 29 Oct 2003

Right. They aren't used to it, because the textbooks and teaching practicies they have grown accustomed to don't require them to form their own thoughts and put them into English.

The important thing is - not to give up on group and pair work if it doesn't seem to pay off the first couple of times. The students will adjust to it, but at first, they will drag their feet waiting "to be given the answers" and looking confused.

You have to have some faith in the the process (and research behind it) if you haven't tried it before and the students aren't used to it...