Korean Job Discussion Forums

trinity24651 · Joined: 05 Nov 2006

Are there a lot of parent-teacher conferences?

ttompatz · Joined: 05 Sep 2005 Location: Kwangju, South Korea

trinity24651 · Joined: 05 Nov 2006

Are there a lot of the "open classes"?

ttompatz · Joined: 05 Sep 2005 Location: Kwangju, South Korea

oneofthesarahs · Joined: 05 Nov 2006 Location: Sacheon City

My hakwon has what I like to call "parent pep rallies." Basically, the parents show up, get fed lots of cookies, schmooze with the teachers and are told how smart their kids are and how much they are learning, and are sent home. None of the native teachers participate. We just eat the leftover cookies afterward. Very Happy

frankly speaking · Joined: 23 Oct 2005

I think that you need to ask the school you are working for. One school that I worked for had one parent teacher conference. I stayed after work 2 hours talking about each student. The parents couldn't really speak English so the director translated. It was the biggest waste of time. I told the director that it was a waste of my time and the parents were not getting anything out of it. He then made me do telephone calls at night. I did that for about 1 month. I said that it was too time consuming and the students weren't getting anything out of it.

The only thing that you will be required to do is evaluations of some sort. Most of the schools that I have worked for have monthly evaluations. I have to write out a brief paragraph for every student indicating what we have learned and how they have progressed. I am told not to say anything to negative but instead to show how they can improve.

trinity24651 · Joined: 05 Nov 2006

Thanks dudes and dudettes!! Never had P/T thing so this will be quite different for me!!

Yu_Bum_suk · Joined: 25 Dec 2004

If you work for a hogwan you'll meet some parents in passing quite often, and be asked to to a few of the 'open classes' mentioned above, but for the most part, communication between FTs and parents is discouraged. They're worried about you saying something like 'Cartman's pronunciation is good but he has to work on his reading' when they've just given mummy a BS report card saying Cartman's reading is very good.

At public school the parents are usually too nervous to talk to the foreigner. I still get to meet some at extra-curricular activities or in their capacities as shopkeepers and they're usually extremely deferential towards me. Some of them I'd really like to have conferences with so I could make reccomendation about how their children could advance in English.