Korean Job Discussion Forums

[fromtheuk]

My numerous posts about co-teachers has led me to conclude the following. I also think this advice may be beneficial for public school employees who want to work less hard than they currently do.

I personally feel from experience the more you offer to help, the more Koreans ask of you.

I didn't plan the current poor working relationship but here's some advice.

If you really cannot be bothered to kiss up to your co-teacher, because they are objectionable and also because you realize they have no real power over your job, only the Principal does....try this.

Don't say anything to your co-teacher unless it's necessary. Don't even greet them in the morning, otherwise they'll think you like them and will therefore ask more of you.

When it comes to lesson plans, do what is required, but don't volunteer anything extra, because this will increase their expectation of what they want you to produce for lesson plans.

It's not easy but don't look or feel guilty when your co-teacher gives you that awful fake look as if to say 'is that all you've done?'

I know even when I put in a lot of effort it is never appreciated anyway.

In short, be as cold as possible with your co-teacher, produce the bare mimimum when they ask you to do things, eventually you'll see them ask less of you and they'll want to avoid you because there is absolutely no way they can control you.

But always be civil. I haven't done it yet, but I am thinking about putting on a fake smile in future and saying 'thank you' in a really false way to my co-teacher. I suppose the co-teacher will feel like they are looking in the mirror!

[R. S. Refugee]

All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten
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All I Really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten is a book of short essays by Robert Fulghum, first published in 1986.

The title of the book is taken from the first essay in the volume, in which Fulghum lists lessons normally learned in American kindergarten classrooms and explains how the world would be improved if adults adhered to the same basic rules as children, i.e. sharing, being kind to one another, cleaning up after themselves, and living "a balanced life" of work, play, and learning.

The book contains fifty short essays, ranging in length from approximately 200 to approximately 1,000 words, which are ruminations on topics ranging from surprises, holidays, childhood, death, and the lives of interesting people including Mother Teresa. In his introduction, Fulghum describes these as having been "written over many years and addressed to friends, family, a religious community, and myself, with no thought of publication in book form."

Although amazingly popular, some critics found Fulghum's essays (especially the title piece) to be trite and saccharine. Fulghum addresses this in an essay in his subsequent book, It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It wherein he mentions "grown-up" subjects such as sexuality.

Fulghum worked with Ernie Zulia (Director) and David Caldwell (composer and music director) to create a musical based on Kindergarten (Mill Mountain Theatre, Roanoke VA, June, 1992) of the same name, and an extension of the third book in his trilogy, Uh Oh, called "Uh Oh, Here Comes Christmas." (Mill Mountain Theater, Roanoke VA, December 1998)

Over nearly two decades, the title essay, "All I Really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten," has spawned countless parodies involving television shows, movies, books, and other phenomena. The standard format mirrors Fulghum's own work, starting with "All I Really Need To Know I Learned From [name]," followed by a list of quotes and/or in-jokes from the subject being parodied.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_I_Really_Need_to_Know_I_Learned_in_Kindergarten"

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NO WAIT. All I really need to know about being a teacher, I've learned from studying the pearls of wisdom provided for free to us on this forum by fromtheuk. Thank you, oh great teaching guru.

I'm thinking of writing a book for English teachers in Korea called, All I Really Need to Know About Teaching I Learned from fromtheuk.

This could be a collaborative effort if any of you other acolytes would like to contribute.

[Scouse Mouse]

There is some truth in what you say. In the first half of my first year, I was pretty useless and I was left to do as little as possible. I was told to teach from the textbook and that is exactly what I did. Lesson planning was skimming the 2 pages I would cover before hand, and my lessons involved reading from the book and expanding on it where I see fit. Life was easy!

As I learned more about teaching methodology, my classes became much more involved. I taught myself how to use ppt in the classroom and I worked hard to make the lessons more involved. After I did that, the co-teachers started offering advice and gave me extra tips, which I took on board and used them in future classes. I worked harder, but the end result was that I was more effective in the classroom. They gave me tips on methodology textbooks to read, and I purchased them and worked through them.

Nowadays, the co-teachers make insane demands. They expect me to teach extra classes for free, they want me to make a school website in English, and they want me to submit fully scripted lesson plans for every class (including past classes). Following their format, each plan is 4+ pages of text. Apparently, this is no problem as I have Saturday and Sunday with no classes, so I can do it all on those days. Best of all: after 3 months of me telling them to suck my nuts is as polite a manner as possible, they had the audacity to be shocked at my "unexpected resignation after a few misunderstandings".

I can't help but think that my life would have been much easier if I was still stood at the front of the classroom reading from a textbook.

[fromtheuk]

Thank you everybody. It's pathetic when the co-teacher makes basic errors in English, fairly regularly.

What's worse is when they bad mouthe you with a smile on their face, even with the students sometimes.

My co knows I have sussed her out and I've made her look as stupid as she is.

So, I am happy with my approach now.

I have no respect for her and it's clear she has no respect for me. She is arrogant, ignorant and tries to hide it, despite her extreme mood changes.

[it's full of stars]

No matter how much I disagree with you in other posts (amongst other things), this is the one subject I agree with.

The more you give the more they (she) want(s), until it becomes unreasonable, without offering the tools necessary to do the job. Snide comments about me not working on Sat, no budget for materials, extra classes slipped in whenever possible, no English language software on the PC, undermining my authority in the classroom by "pardoning" rude behaviour, "misunderstandings", lies, falseness, control freakery & constant tightening of the screws, expecting you to behave like a tape recorder, dismissive behaviour and attitudes.

But I found that saying no, even resorting to raised voices in the office when money was being stolen, not caring what people might think of me, having a few people you can talk to on the staff, and doing your job well, especially in front of the superintendent (superintendant?), realising that it is only one person because my vice and principal don't make me sit at the desk over holidays, makes life a bit easier. Stand up for yourself, do your job and don't take any cultural misunderstandings bullhockey, unless it really is one.

[wayfarer]

I'm not motivated to make my classes fantastically useful or creative, because I've seen firsthand how the Korean teachers at my school teach by themselves: completely one-dimensional, straight from the textbook, the class time fleshed out with copious chatter in Korean and some feeble worksheet exercises downloaded from the textbook's website, or pointless memorization of some artificial dialogue. Compared to what they do, my stuff is brilliant...

If they wanted a serious, credentialed and certified career teacher, they should have hired one.

[esglumac]

Yeah, what is the deal with control freakary here???It comes out in so many undertones...and It's annoying as hell and I think it's even worse if your a foreign woman with older male supervisior..
Every-time some little problem happens that I can handle on my own ( like going to the embessey and replacing my passport afer it was lost), my supervisior says "Why didn't you tell me???
A Korean friend once told me that "In Korean, if you do not tell the older adult the problem, they get really pissed off"
I have to agree though with It's full of stars, that you have to be confident and not care what people think of you here. They ( espcailly Korean males) really hate a confident woman.

[reimund]

As a gyopo, I can understand the frustration and sentiment regarding Koreans' control freakish behavior. I think thousands of years invasions from other Asian countries, the most recent from Japan, combined with relatively fast economic growth, perpetuated by rabid consumerism, has something to do with it. You mix self-victimization, along with incredibly selfish and materialistic attitudes of doing business, and that's you get: people who want their cake, and eat it, too.

[crusher_of_heads]