Korean Job Discussion Forums

[plasticmustache]

Hello everyone,

If you are someone who has worked in Seoul before or are currently working, would you please answer the following? Thank you so much!


1) What's the average student size per class in a Seoul Public School?

2) How big are the schools? Do they sometimes have at leat two native speaking teachers?

3) Most importantly, how are the students? Are they polite or rude? In Seoul, do the students tend to be more polite or more rude(i teach in small town)?

4) Lastly, any thoughts on the adjustment from a small town public school here in Korea to a bigger one in a major metropolitan city?


Jeez, lots of questions. Thanks so much. This info would help greatly!

Have a good day too!

[oldfatfarang]

My public middle school classes have 37 students. They are the most friendly bunch of kids I've ever met. I'm always treated with respect and I just get tired of having to say "hi" a couple hundred times a day - they are that nice. I'm lucky, I've got 4 very good K co-teachers. I don't have any class management probs - that's the KT's responsibility.

Most schools would only have 1 FT - that's why you are the SUPERSTAR.

Go for it. I came from a very small rural school and now I teach 1,000 kids a week. Best move I ever made. And all those non-teaching days are just bliss. Shame about the summer and winter babysitting residential camps, though. That's what really hurts.

[SeoulShakin]

My public elementary school has between 26 and 33 students per class. I am the only native speaker at the school, besides the girl who does our after school classes (but most school's don't have a separate teacher for that). My school has about 480 students total, which I'm told is quite small for an elementary school in Seoul. I have friends who work in schools that have about 900 or 1000 students (though they could be exaggerating). You will likely be the only native teacher at the school. Most of the kids are polite to me. I have a co-teacher for 90% of my classes. I have only had one incident with a rude 2nd grader, and when I mentioned it to the head 2nd grade teacher, it was taken quite seriously, and dealt with immediately. She even called her mother. I kinda felt bad after that. Anyway, hope this helped!

[Scouse Mouse]

My school has over 1400 kids and the classes are 38-40 per class. I am the only FT and I see each class a maximum of once every 2 weeks. As a result they are very excited in the classes and can be a little loud, but then again this is an all boys school... once you lay a few rules they quickly fall into line and the classes are good fun to teach.

I love my job and that is because the kids are great fun.

[Luna]

In my public school I teach 640 students. My smallest class is 38 students. Every class is different for me. I have two awful classes (on Monday, blah) I'm hoping that once the co-teachers start supporting me more when I lay down the law those classes will shape up. Most of my classes are a mix of students who are thrilled to be there, students who don't care at all, don't like English, or are too shy to talk, and students who are blatantly disrespectful.

I have two classes that are an absolute joy to teach.

It's my first time teaching, so I've been struggling a lot with the bad students - especially since it's been hard to get the co-teachers to tell me what kind of discipline is appropriate in this school system. Yeah, I'm having a real problem coordinating with all the co-teachers right now.

[Rapacious Mr. Batstove]

Hey. I work at a public middle school with around 1600 students. The class sizes range from between 35 to 40 students. I have six other co-teachers.

The classes which I see every 2 to 3 weeks are awesome, because I hardly ever see them they are always happy and excited to come to my lessons. Teaching is an absolute dream, it can get tedious teaching the same lessons repeatedly though.

I have never had a student with a discipline problem except for lateness and forgetting textbooks.

Realistically, I don't expect to teach them much so I just focus on a few small expressions and words and make sure they leave with something. When I hear them using the English I've taught them when they pass me in the hall, it's just awesome.

[plasticmustache]

Damn, thankyou all very much.

[ghost]

I am a teacher trainer at one of the Institutes in Korea which give 'refresher courses' to Korean EFL teachers.

The general comments posted are positive, and somewhat surprising, because many of the Korean EFL teachers have told me that a large number of their students don't like learning English. But maybe that is because they teach English in the 'old style way' - books and grammar/translation method.

Looks like you guys out there are doing a good job. It would be interesting to know what some of your typical lessons consist of. I could use that information for my next intake of Korean teachers.

Keep up the good work.

Ghost in Korea

[yingwenlaoshi]

Ha, ha. How the fk on granny's green hill can you teach 40 students English?

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[yingwenlaoshi]

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[yingwenlaoshi]

[jangsalgida]

[xtchr]

[quote="yingwenlaoshi
The big lecture hall classes were conducted in my language. Language clases were tiny in size. Anything, from what I heard, that was a language class with a significant number of students, like Russian or whatever, were bird courses.

Think about that.[/quote]

What's a bird course?