Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Julius]

[jrwhite82]

I don't disagree with anything said in that article. But how many Korean coteachers are both highly proficient and effective at teaching English in English?

If you've ever watched your Korean counterparts teach a lesson it usually winds up 80/20 (K/E). Not using proficiency, not being effective.

[LAtoSeoul]

I disagree. Korean students are saying Korean teachers are better because they can translate for them. Oh it's so easy to listen to English speakers if you have a translator there all the time. Without an NET, the Korean students do not develop an ear for native English speakers.

[tanklor1]

I understand where the kids are coming from. If I were a ninth grade student here I'd rather be taught by someone who is qualified to teach and speaks my native language.

[LURKER]

So is it a good thing for an English teacher to use Korean - or not?

[whiteshoes]

[bbud656]

I had an American teacher and a French co teacher in my high school French class. Because I was at a low level, I probably learned more useful things from my American teacher, but I gained a lot of confidence in my speaking abilities by being able to bounce things off my native French co teacher. Pronunciation and accents are important as well. I haven't met many Koreans who can shake their accent. Also, if Korea wants to work towards this idea of them a global place and bring in foreign investments (which seems to be the case if these international business district areas are any indication) then they are going to have more than book smarts when it comes to English. The kids need a little bit of cultural experience. When they realize their 25 year old American teacher isnt afraid of spicy kimchi, then they might not use it as the opener for their business meeting when they are pseudo grown ups.

[silkhighway]

I think a big thing is in a public school with such large class sizes and infrequent classes, there's no chance to build a relationship with your students, so it's easy for 70percent of students to slide under the radar.

[liveinkorea316]

I agree with the article aswell. For teaching lower level learners it is better to use highly trained Korean teachers. Native speakers are are more effectively used for conversation lessons and for higher level learners.

The reason the students would have said they preferred the Korean teachers was obviously because the Korean teacher used Korean with them which is easier for the student.

[Times30]

English Immersion can produce results, but we should understand WHY students prefer Korean teachers.

1) Comfort zone. Imagine all your life you hear, see, and touch only a single ethnic group. Racist or not, having something different on any facet of life can produce discomfort. This manifests itself into students unable to ask questions, not feeling confident, or even being distracted. WE should ALL have experience with this. The fact of being a foreigner is novelty and that alone can be a tremendous distraction.

2) It doesn't matter how good your draw, signing, and charade abilities are. There are some concepts that cannot be communicated unless you speak the language. Teaching an abstract word such as "abstract"... I don't care how of an amazing artist you are, you cannot draw abstractness on the blackboard. As a foreign teacher you are limited to how you can even communicate to your students.

3) Being a Korean teacher means you've been in the student shoes. Being a native speaker means you didn't learn it the same way as your students. You may only speak one language and have never had an experience of learning another language. Because Korean teachers have been in the students shoes, they know what things can be difficult, and how to solve it. Case and point, have you ever made a worksheet and a co-teacher come over and said "This is too hard for the students."

Immersion is a great ideal and works amazingly but it is very situational. If a misunderstanding occurs, if low empathy is applied, and if the student cannot fathom the language, immersion via a native speaker hurts more than helps. Imagine if our high school languages of Spanish and french were taught in Spanish and french? I probably wouldn't graduated high school.

How can you ask questions and learn if you don't even know how to ask the question? I think it would be foolish to assume that just because we are foreign teachers that our methods and teaching validity is "correct". While my life depends on the Korean education system demanding teachers like us, I'm not going to blind myself to the idea that I'm not perfect or that my teaching methods are the best, or that I'm the bomb and being a native speaker means I have an advantage on all facets of education.

Head out of the sand... Head out of the sand.

[NYC_Gal 2.0]

I don't know about that. My PS kids preferred me. I had a witch of a coteacher, though.

[Unposter]

I teach at a university and I have never taught in a public school so I don't really know what goes on and there is only so much you can get from a short article in a newspaper.

But, this one thing I get from this article: it is dealing with perceptions and feelings and it is not dealing with hard data about the effectiveness of education. Even the native English-speaking "Teaching Assistants" were asked what is their perception of their educational effectiveness.

Until there is any real research on the effectiveness, everything else, is just, well, hot air.

Furthermore, we don't know what is really meant by "prefering" Korean teachers. The question is even, in of itself, "racist." Don't get alarmed let me explain. The question asks which race or nationality of teacher do you prefer when the real meaning of the question is do you prefer a teacher who can translate back and forth from the L1 and L2? Do you prefer a teacher who can teach you what you need to know on the exam? Those whould be examples of non-racist questions. It talks about training native Korean teachers but it does not talk about training native English-speaking teachers.

Anyway, back to the prefering question - where I work - native English speaking Instructors usually receive higher student evaluation scores than Korean Instructors in Liberal Arts classes. The main reason is that the Native English-speaking Instructors are "more interesting." Also, students feel free to express themselves in front of native English-speaking teachers rather than Korean teachers who may be more judgemental, conservative and old fashion.

So, when asked the preference question, if the question was in Korean and they were to assume it was answered for a Korean audience, there may be some pressure to say they prefer a Korean.

In fact, many of the issues brought up in the article such as participation, understanding and teaching for the test should be solved by co-teaching. My outsiders analysis of the "feelings" survey would be that there is a terrible breakdown in proper co-teaching.

And lastly, there is no reason a beginner cannot learn in the language if the textbook is bi-lingual and the teacher is patient. It might be more effective if the class size were smaller and beginning students could get more personal attention. And, if there were proper co-teaching there should not be any issues at all.

But, this article is just another hit piece by the Korea Times to promote its agenda of Koreans who can use English moderately well replacing FTs and should not be consider to be much more than that.

[I-am-me]

Just for that, my kids wont get candy today. Let's see which teacher they like best!

[ThingsComeAround]

Korean students also say they want to use cellphones in class and sleep in school.

[ironclad80]