Korean Job Discussion Forums

[noguri]

Thank you, PRagic, own king and super hero for your suggestions that things are done differently when teaching in Korea. I don't want to screw up my first semester and any hints about how things are done here can help me a great deal.

Here's another question, though. In the U.S., while I didn't have much power to eject students from the classroom, I did have the power to fail any student who...uh, flunked exams or didn't do homework, that sort of thing. And if I chose to assign five books, then so be it; the students had to read those five books, or else fail the exams.

However, now that I'm going to teach at a university in Korea, I've been told that I shouldn't make classes "too difficult" by assigning many essays to write or materials to read. It was suggested to me that I make classes fun and interesting. I am in favor of interesting classes, but it sounds like I don't have much power to make students do work outside of the classroom.

Is this the case? How many assignments can I give before I am asking the impossible of the students?

[SuperHero]

[denverdeath]

[noguri]

Thanks, Super Hero! Yes, that helps. In addition to homework I was thinking I would have in-class assignments, that the students work on in groups or else individually. These will be graded and added separately to the final grade.

Thanks also, Denver Death for your reply. I am not certain how many students I will have. I will be teaching a conversation class, a writing class, and two content classes for English majors. Those content classes are the ones in which I plan to assign some outside readings and I was warned not to assign too many...but how much "content" can I teach without some assigned readings?

Really, you say that Korean students aren't even taught to write in the Korean language in high school? Sounds stark.

I thought by assigning essays I was helping the students. When I taught in the U.S., students scored higher on my essay exams than they did on my multiple guess/fill-in-the-blanks. Why? Because I read an essay, and I think, "hmm, I sort of almost see what you were trying to say. Okay, not bad." But when I grade a multiple choice exam, each answer is either right or wrong, and there's no way of cutting slack.

Maybe it is just the case that Korean students feel more comfortable with multiple choice and fill-in-the-blanks. A cultural thing.

[denverdeath]

[Keepongoing]

i did a test for this class and talked to each student individually and they were all smiles and polite and yet I knew that one really hates me and 4 dislike me as a teacher and yet couldnot detect any animosity in any of them .How can they mask it so well?

I happenned to upset another one in class because I wrote the question:" Who is more Korean? Those living in the country or those in the city?' I explained that I meant traditional Korean. It was a discussion on City vs the Countryside. Anyway, this girl got very angry and defensive; stating that her family was just as traditonal as those in the country and she told me it was a strange question.

I don't think things are improving in this class. Oh, one girl stated that she believed people in that countryside were more traditional. Anyway, I did say that I did not know the answer. that I was just asking them.

Two weeks left, perhaps it is a lost cause already.

[fiveeagles]

[Gwangjuboy]

I find it really annoying that university students yield so much power over their foreign teachers but at the same time have no power over their Korean teachers. Something is definitely wrong there.

[rothkowitz]

Korean students have ZERO qualms about complaining.

It could be anything.You might have spoken a little too quickly,they totally misunderstood some thing or they have a funny outlook on what they suppose their relationship with the teacher ought to be.

I've had adult students revolt on for these above reasons.I said a couple of sentences too quickly which put them in a spin,students thought I was here just to travel around a bit...well,duh!Whats wrong with that??!!and lastly because I didn't want to hang out with them at the weekend"Our last teacher did........."

I think perhaps signing up a kind of contract with them could make life a little simpler.

Certainly,student training ought to be an issue you could look at addressing.

BTW,Your question to the class about who might be considered more traditional....well,it is a slightly funny question I guess.But,one never knows how defensive Korean students are going to get.

[TheUrbanMyth]

[Real Reality]

[Keepongoing]

Wow, I just received my end of semester evaluation. It was 95

The class that evaluated me before went up by 10 points

Oral Communications 100
Oral Communications 84.3
Public Speaking 98.6
Reading and Writing 97.1

I changed my approach and it worked. Thank you