Korean Job Discussion Forums

[xCustomx]

I�m working with this completely incompetent co-teacher who has been bugging the hell out of me lately due to her lack of involvement in class. I taught with her last year but she was bearable because I only taught with her three times per week. I�m now teaching with her six times a week and can�t stand to be in the room with her.

Her students don�t respect her and continue to talk, while she just says 자�자�자� (hey, hey, hey). Today I asked her to explain the directions of a game in Korean so we could save time. After explaining everything in Korean and giving the students a few minutes to start, I noticed a lot of them not doing anything. Half of the class said they didn�t understand the directions. I was thinking �WTF? She explained everything in Korean and they still don�t understand?� I put the blame on her, because after I finished going over the directions in English they all understood.

I spoke with her about my concerns last year and again before the start of this school year, but nothing has changed. How do you deal with co-teacher you hate to teach with?

[agoodmouse]

[Countrygirl]

I'm also having a hard time with a co-teacher who can't discipline the students. I only had her for grade 6 last year and she told me that it was the grade 6's that were so bad that all the teachers had given up. I have had 5 other co-teachers in 6 months (everyone has caught the pregnancy bug) and none of the other teachers had problems keeping the students quiet.

By no means have I solved my discipline problems, but what I have done is start the yellow flag/red flag system in class. Since the students are familiar with this system, I don't have to worry about miscommunication. I write yellow flag (twice) and red flag on the board with a circle beside each. When they become too loud I put a yellow magnet in the yellow circle. If they earn 2 yellow flags and 1 red flag with bad behaviour, I told them I will send them back to their classroom. As soon as the students get a yellow flag, she starts to discipline the kids. I feel bad that I have to do this but my beautiful grade 5's from last year are quickly becoming like the grade 6's of last year. I haven't sent a class back to their homeroom yet, but I might have to one day. My classes with her are not as well-behaved as my other classes, but they are not as bad as they were last semester.

My big problem is that she is my handler and she does a good job of taking care of my other issues. My children go to this school and the Principal has treated me well. I plan on staying in Korea for a long time but after 5 classes in a row of kids screaming, punching each other in the family jewels and ripping up paper, I really feel like packing up and moving on. I would also love to hear any more good advice from fellow teachers who have been in this sort of situation.

ps. I first tried positive reinforcement to discipline my classes last year. I started giving stamps for good behaviour with a promise of a prize after so many stamps; but it didn't really make a dent in the overall classroom atmosphere.

[poet13]

She's causing you stress and is not respected by the students. Stop involving her in your class. If she complains, then tactfully explain your issues. Then the next time in the classroom, wait until she has brought the room to order before you speak. If you have to wait for a whole class period, do so. What's she going to do? Complain again?

[mnhnhyouh]

I just teach all of all of my classes.

I do the discipline, it is much easier than the schools I am used to.

I explain everything in simple English, and let those students with better English explain to those who didnt understand. After I introduce the lesson I go around the class checking understanding, and providing further explanation where it is needed.

So far it seems to work well.

There is one teacher who likes to explain it all to them in Korean, and that is fine by me as well. But I will not have another teacher do the discipline. If I do, then I dont get the respect I need to run a classroom properly.

I am currently trying out a number of different methods of controlling large high school classes, looking for one that requires the lfeast fascism on my part and gets the best results.

h

[gangpae]

Nothing.

[poet13]

"But I will not have another teacher do the discipline. If I do, then I dont get the respect I need to run a classroom properly. "

Agreed. Something I have found works well is to make the class captain responsible. For those that take it seriously, and are strong it works well.

We use pushups. More and more teachers at my school are usign pushups rather than the stick. The PE teacher even taught the 1st year students how to do proper pushups.

I have four rules that may never be broken.

No cellphones.

Stay in your chair.

No hitting. Not even fun hitting, because small fun hitting can become big angry punching in the blink of an eye.

Respect. That means when I talk, or students are modelling dialogue, everyone else listens.

Punishment is pushups. For those students who don't really care how many pushups they do, I make all the students around them do pushups. Peer pressure is a powerful tool.

[some waygug-in]

Are you at least "running" the classes?

My co-teachers are OK, and can speak English well enough to teach it, ....
but don't.

Except for one, they conduct the classes all in Korean and made damn sure that I knew that I was just an "assistant". (talking robot)

I asked the grade 6 teacher why she doesn't teach in English and she replied that she was worried that the students would have better English than she......so she just won't teach in English.

I am bored silly and I don't know how much more of this I can stand.

At least last year I got to conduct the grade 3 and 4 classes on my own, this year I'm an English monkey boy for the whole deal.

The one bright spot is that in our new contract (EPIG), we can leave an hour after our last class.

The one co-teacher who does use English, let's me teach small parts of a lesson now and then, but she seems generally shocked that I have any ideas at all. She knows I was here last year too.

I can't get over how dumb they think the kids are. The books are WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY too easy. Most of the kids are bored to tears and I don't blame them. Talk about low expectations.
Why do they think that every little fiddle-fart detail needs to be translated and explained in Korean when I can see that the kids can easily follow what I've just explained?

(rant over)

[mehamrick]

some waygug-in

[xCustomx]

The problem is with her, not the students. I can discipline and run the class just fine, I just get frustrated with her inability to do anything in class other than stand in the back and read a book or paperwork. The other co-teachers I work with are engaging and take part in the lesson, while she has the impression that it's OK to do nothing. There have been times when I've called her name out three or four times because she was tuned out to what was going on in the class. I've already told her earlier this year to please stand in the front with me and to speak up if there are any key points that she feels the students should be aware of.

I conduct about 95% of the class, but it looks like I'll make it 100% when I'm with her

[poet13]

Tell her that you are equals in the classroom, and if she takes a sub-perior position to you, then it looks like she is less than you. Betcha all 240 won in my pocket it works.

[some waygug-in]

[mehamrick]

[Yu_Bum_suk]

If you have a class that is already in the habit of not listening to a co-teacher (the one who yells the most, ironically) it can be a real pain in the ass to have to come along once a week and try to change their attitude, but it's something that needs to be done. I only have one co-teacher who has a lot of problems keeping students' attention and we only co-teach one high school class once a week together. Yesterday in that class three students found themselves sans handphone, comic book, and novel, respectively, and didn't get them back until the end of the day after they had written out a sheet of lines. Not surprisingly, none of them had had me at our combined middle school last year. That class may be one where the students have to learn that I have different standards and while they may be able to ignore Mr JO YONG-EE RA!!! or shut up for three seconds and then start yakking again, they'll only get a few 'shhhh's from me before some unpleasant consequence happens.

Thankfully it's only one and not six.