Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Radius]

Anyone here marry a Korean and raise their child here for at least 5 years or so?
I was wondering if your child had a Korean accent when speaking English?
And how did you teach your child English? Was your home a "mostly English" speaking household?

[hondaicivic]

[Swampfox10mm]

[hondaicivic]

[Slowmotion]

[riverboy]

I've had no problem raising my boys 6 and 2 in a billingual home. There are plenty of advantages and liv ing in Korea will certainly give them a head start towards a better education.

I don't really detect an accet with my boys, but to be honest, I don't really know.

The one thing I suggest is that Mommy (if she is Korean) speaks Korean and Daddy, speaks English. That simple.

Now, learning two languages is difficult, so you kid may not develop linguistically as fast as other kids, but interaction with friends, and time itself will work it all out and by the time your kids is three or four, he or she will be doing very well.

Best of luck!

[Landros]

it is not so bad. my son is in grade 6 and daughter in grade 2. they meet lots of foreigners due to my soccer team and other friends but do prefer speaking Korean with each other and their mom. I live in bundang and their school is decent.

[Koreadays]

[Slowmotion]

[big_fella1]

[Unposter]

You are going to hear a lot of different advice. I will tell you about what I have done which I have found very effective but it is a little different than what you might hear here on Dave's.

Actually, I got this idea when I was fortunate to meet the Dean of the Liberal Arts College of the university I did my undergraduate at here in Seoul at an alumni meeting. He was a Professor of English and before he went to graduate school he had done some ESL work in France. While in France, he met his wife and he took her back to the U.S. with them. They then raised two bi-lingual French/English daughters.

This is what they did and it is what I am doing. Their house is a French only speaking zone. Both him and his wife spoke French in the house and as their daughters grew up they encouraged their duaghters to only speak French in the house.

The outside world, being America, was an English only zone. When outside the house, the family only spoke English.

The result was that he, his wife and their two daughters all became bi-lingual in both languages.

For the most part, we do the same thing. We only speak English in the house (my wife is near fluent in English) unless a Korean only speaker is there such as my mother in law. When my kids are outside the house, such as at their nursery school, they only speak Korean unless they are talking to me or my wife.

We do allow then to look at or be read to using Korean language books. We also practice writing both Korean and English in the home, though mostly English as Korean is taught at their school.

The results so far have been fantastic. My kids are almost five years old and they speak both English and Korean well. They can also write the English alphabet and most Korean characters as well.

The key is definitely parental involvement. Especially, you as a native English-speaker have to make a commitment to your child's education. I have met some kids who prefer to speak Korean and IMO it is because they don't spend enough time speaking English in the house, probably because the father is working all the time and they just spend time speaking Korean to their mother. I think this is an important reason why the mother has to speak English to the child as well. This is Korea and exposure to Korean is not a problem but exposure to English is.

You also need to clearly state which is English and which is Korean. If you and the mother start speaking English to the kid, you should not switch. If you are practicing Korean letters or reading a Korean book, they need to know that this is Korean and not English. We have not had any - I mean any - problems with code switching but it is a distinct possibility if you are careless with their exposure.

We also take my kids back home every year for at least a month. We even put them into an American daycare center so they could interact with kids their own age every day in English. After the first time we did this, their English grew dramatically and more equally with their Korean.

As someone else said, raising your children bi-lingually, even bi-nationally has its advantages (and certainly some disadvantages). Focus on the positives with your child and while you can't completely disregard the negatives, you can certainly disvalue them. You'll figure these things out as you are raising your children.

That said we have planned to only let them stay in Korea until they are ready for Middle School. That is when the Korean education system starts moving toward memorization of various facts for the college enterance exam. We also think that they should experience school systems in both countries. At that time, I will take them to the U.S. for middle and high school.

At that point they will be 18 and they can start to make their own decisions. While I hope they attend university in the U.S., it is certainly their own life.

We thought about International schools but the costs were too great for us. If you are really interested in teaching (assuming you are a teacher) at a public school, then getting the experience and certification for international schools is the best way to go. That is not what I do nor what I want to do so we have ruled it out as an option. If you can go the international school route, you may be able to educate your kids totally abroad but from what I have read and seen not all international school are the same and some have much better curriculum and diversity of student body (not all Korean) than others.

Plenty of kids get raised abroad with good results. Some of them even become President of the United States (such as Obama). It can be done but you have to make a commitment to your child's education if you really want it to be a good one. Good Luck!

[nathanrutledge]

Swampfox's/hondacivic's comments got me thinking about a couple of points.

One, for all the bad mouthing about Korean/American schools, remember - if you're married to a Korean, your spouse went to a Korean school. If you're from the US, you went to an American school.

From my experience, my schools growing up were fantastic. If you wanted to learn and do well, you could. If you didn't want to do anything, you didn't have to. BUT, there were specific rules and behavior that was and was not accepted and there was no discussion about it. You fought, you got suspended. You brought a knife, you were expelled. If you broke the law (by bringing a knife) then the police were called. Everyone was treated equally and fairly under the rules.

My experience here, there are no rules. For example, one of my students brought a mamushi (salmosa in korean), a pit viper. He brought a venomous snake to school and it bit another student. They rushed to the hospital and the kid is fine, but the one who brought the snake - no punishment.

The high school I graduated from - I personally know of 3 people in my class that went to Harvard, dozens more that went to other top universities, dozens that went to state university, and hundreds that didn't do anything beyond that except get arrested and go to prison. One of my classmates is serving upwards of 30 years in the Federal system for armed robbery.

The point is, if you are a good parent, you're kid will do well in any system. I think we can all agree that the Korean system puts way too much stress on the kids, and the American system puts too little stress on the kids, but honestly, it wasn't my school that kept me IN school. It was my parents, and my friends, and their parents.

My significant other and I have briefly discussed this issue, and if I were to have kids in Korea, I would not want them in the schools here. I'd have no problem raising a child here (save for the environmental issues), but the lack of critical thinking skills drives me nuts. I'd personally opt for home schooling.

Just my two cents.

[FDNY]

I think western countries, especially the UK, have lost their way morally and ethically. Western countries do not seem to be able to come to terms with the fact that they are no longer the center of culture, learning, industry and finance. However, they seem to think the world still owes them something. Therefore people there do not work hard and think the government should support them at an unsupportable level. The habits of many western people also mirror this decline in importance and shift in power. Drug abuse, generational welfare families, violence, gangs, teenage pregnancy, underage drinking etc., etc. There is no way I am going to let my daughter grow up in such an environment. Korea may have a few problems, but the essentials are still intact.

[Seoulman69]

I think unposter hit a home run with his reply.
Don't worry about your child having a Korean accent when speaking English. Children who start learning a language early usually have native like pronunciation. There are books available that tell you alot about bi and multi-lingualism.
Be prepared for code-switching. This means using Korean and English together. This is a natural thought process.
Encourage the child to speak both languages be having specially designated places where one language is spoken. Unposter's idea of having only English in the house is a good one. Also read to your children in English and teach them English songs. It helps a great deal.

I don't know about the school scenario but if your kid can deal with any bullying that may occur then I wouldn't have any problems with the Korean system. I'd encourage them to go to a university abroad though. And maintain their dual nationality, it brings many benefits later in life.

Good luck.

[hondaicivic]