Korean Job Discussion Forums

[MarionG]

Does your hogwon or public school permit the students to be hit?

[rockstarsmooth]

my public high school most definitely does. i'm the only teacher who doesn't carry a stick. i have been offered one, a very nice slim one made of bamboo, but i couldn't hit a student.

not that i wouldn't mind one for personal use...

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right now i'm listening to: king khan and the shrines - fear and love

[mindmetoo]

[garykasparov]

[waynehead]

Yes, definitely yes. I see students get beaten everyday, on their back or butt. I work at a boys' public middle school.

[CentralCali]

[garykasparov]

I said "hitting" was against the law not "corporal punishment." I've seen my employer hit students on their heads his knuckle before. Other teachers have hit the students over the head with sticks and pinched them under the eyes. They started to cry. I'm positive there are no provisions in the Korean penal code that give a teacher room or discretion to hit students (such as hit them in the head with knuckles, hit them over the head with sticks, and pinch them under the eyes).

[CentralCali]

This article reports that corporal punishment must be meted with a stick, not a fist. It also states that the punishment may not be meted out in the presence of other students. The other articles linked there are worth a read, too.

[yingwenlaoshi]

[CentralCali]

[Jizzo T. Clown]

[oldfatfarang]

Children are beaten on a regular basis in my middle school. Thankfully (after my expressing my extreme repulsion of this), children are not being beaten outside my class, anymore. I simply would not stand for any Korean teacher to beat a child in my classroom.

There is a very fine line between corporal punishment - and beating and torture. Korean cultural norms don't differientiate between these - but western cultural norms do.

I believe that helping children to use English doesn't require beating or torturing them. Korean teachers do not believe this as they are also socialising these children to take their place in an outdated, rigidly hierarchical Confucian society. Hence the 'beating the tall nail down' behavior.

Whether we like it or not - Korea is not a modern country. It's society is based on cultural norms that were prescribed 2,300 years ago. Children will be beaten here by their parents and teachers (and elders) whether we agree with this or not. Our problem here, as teachers, is that both Korean children and adults are socialised into respecting violence (especially from elders or superiors).

However, I believe that all western teachers should express their extreme revulsion of treating children this way to their Korean counterparts. My experience is that Koreans are very embarrassed when this topic is brought up (face saving). Nothing changes if nothing is said.

[crusher_of_heads]

[xCustomx]

Yesterday, one student got punched a few times on the side of his head, bi*ch slapped across the face and shoved really hard by the pe teacher....just a normal day for me in the office

[Boodleheimer]

my school uses voo-doo dolls, actually.