Korean Job Discussion Forums

[TECO]

http://berlitz.generalunion.org/news.htm

[Saxiif]

They're so cute when they lie

[panthermodern]

One on One plus one Teaching ...

This could possibly be the most boring form of video yet ...

A new level of bland has been reached ...

[superhal]

actually the berlitz system requires that the teachers do nothing other than manage the tape recorder, so having video cameras to make sure the teachers do not deviate from the plan is pretty normal. the dismal failure of the berlitz system is often attributed to teacher failure, which is why they are so paranoid about what the teachers are doing.

overall though, according to research, the berlitz system cannot and will not and will never ever ever result in fluency.

[Tiberious aka Sparkles]

Playing the devil's advocate for a minute, I think cameras in the classroom are a good idea. 3 years ago I taught part-time at a school that had them, and they made me think again before sitting down and slacking off. I don't consider them an invasion of privacy. A classroom isn't a bedroom or bathroom, after all.

Sparkles*_*

[mindmetoo]

[manlyboy]

I worked in a place with cameras. The management would use them to play mind games with us. At teachers meetings we would get: "Yesterday, the director monitored a class of a certain teacher, and it was sub-standard". Of course, said teachers name would not be mentioned, and we would all be left wondering who, if anyone, was actually being refered to.
Occasional observation I can accept. But someone standing over me every minute of the day? I find that counter-productive. A good lesson should be in a relaxed atmosphere where everyone feels relatively at ease. It's hard to do that when you've got distrustful, critical eyes peering at you.

[Derrek]

I don't care. Put in the cameras.

What do I have to hide?

Nothing.

We had them in a Kindy hagwon I worked at. No one watched them. Resolution on those cameras sucks anyway. Sometimes it's hard to pick out individual faces of students.

When I was a newbee and inexperienced, I was worried a bit about cameras. But now that I have been teaching for 3 years, I could care less. If someone were to spy on my class, they'd see me teaching/helping students/checking their books. Hard to find something wrong with that.

If I worked for a crappy place where teachers were teased by bad students, and the owners didn't back you up on discipline, then I can understand not liking cameras. There are a lot of crappy hagwons out there, and newbee teachers mixed with crappy hagwons = wild classes. I was a newbee once too, and I was such a teacher for much of my first year.

Now, one might argue that the school could use some video-taped situation to fire you, even though the true context of the situation is not understood well on camera.

My position is that if a school is that hard-up to want to fire you, then you don't want to work in that craphole anymore anyway.

[Grotto]

You can also use the cameras to help you out.

I had one student that was a real little ()&*(^@~!!! and after complaining about him for a month and nothing being done I started taping each class he was in. In less than a month I put together a tape that I affectionatly called the best and worst of James.

Once the editing was done I had a 15-20 minute tape showing this little SOB giving me the finger while my back was turned, cheating on tests, being a general little poop disturber etc. I got one of the Korean teachers to call his mother in for a conference and when she showed we three sat down and watched the tape. His mother beat the crap out of the kid(16 years old or thereabout) and I watched it all with a smile on my face. Surprisingly James kept coming and while his English didnt improve any he was much better behaved in class.