1	South Korea, ESL

That's the headline for this recent piece from The Hankyoreh looking at the difficulties foreign ESL instructors have in Korean schools. Hat tips to Ben Wagner and Popular Gusts for this and forthcoming ESL pieces.

The rapid increase in native English teacher assistant teachers is the first part of the policy of strengthening public English education. Statistics of the Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology (교육과학기술부) show that nationwide there were 3,808 native English speaker assistant teachers in 2007, 5,553 in 2008, and 7,088 as of April 30, 2009. The numerical growth of such teachers may or may not be sufficient to strengthen the competitiveness of our country’s public English education. This is because many native speakers cannot perform their duties in Korean schools. While it is true there has often been the view that the main reason for that is “the low quality of native speakers”, the greater reason is that schools do not sufficiently support them in their educational activities.

Native speakers particularly point out problems involved in co-teaching with Korean teachers. Native speakers are absolutely required to co-teach. This is because they do not have teaching certifications. This is why they are known as “native speaker assistant teachers” rather than “native speaker teachers”. The co-teaching system has the potential of combining the best points of native speakers and Korean teachers. The system has native speakers handle speaking and listening, while Korean teachers handle reading and writing. Here, the attitude on the part of the Korean teacher can set an example for disinterested students.

But some say that Korean teachers frequently exclude native speakers from lessons. Steve, a Canadian working in a high school, said, “my biggest problem is that the Korean teachers don’t involve me in lesson planning… They just show up five minutes before the lesson time, show me the lesson materials and say ‘how about doing this today’?” 29-year old Canadian Catherine said, “one day the teacher recently assigned to be in charge of me kept coming to me all throughout a day when there were afterschool lessons planned to just drop off thick piles of paperwork claiming they were reference materials and then leave… Right now, luckily, I work with Korean teachers who tell me in advance what to teach and what portions of the textbook will be covered.”

That is the important variable in the quality of the “teamwork” between Korean teachers and native speakers. Korean schools must take care when selecting the co-teacher who will teach with a native speaker. 24-year old American Beth, who works in a high school, said, “the Korean teachers assigned to us seem to take the attitude of being lucky to have someone to dump extra work on… It would be good if there an education program for Korean teachers, ones who want it, to help us fit into the school and improve our lessons.” Accordingly, they say, while the problem of “qualification-less” teachers gets play in the media, the real problem is “preparation-less” Korean schools that lack high-quality human resources.

25-year old American Sarah, who works in a girls’ high school in Seoul, said, “every week I see 540 students once a week for 50 minute sessions, and there’s no way to develop their speaking abilities in that kind of situation… It would be better to meet three times a week for 90 minutes at a time.” In America she completed a master’s degree in TESOL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) and has experience teaching English to international students, making her an “expert”. Yong, a teacher at girls’ high school K in Seoul, said, “our school has two native speakers giving lessons twice a week instead of once and it seems to be helpful for the students… With 35 to 40 students in a class Korean teachers cannot teach the best possible lessons.”

Furthermore, many Korean schools do not provide even the minimum aid necessary for native speakers’ lessons. After a native speaker is placed in a school the local office of education recommends a three to five day orientation, but teachers say few schools heed that advice. One English teacher at a school in Incheon said, “native speakers are just tossed into clasrooms with less than one day of orientation.” John, a Canadian who has been working in Korea since 2006, said, “native speakers don’t receive any proper training or guidelines from their schools, and usually just get thrown into the classroom… Native speaker teachers should be given many more opportunities for training about teaching.” This would be especially helpful for those teachers who do not have teaching certifications.

It is impossible to overlook that the problem of “unqualified” native speakers is due to the schools that hire native speakers who lack teaching certifications, failing to uphold educational methods and help students. Tommy, an American who has worked in our country since 1996, said, “training on how to teach English to students who don’t use it should last at least a week.”

Korean schools are stingy not only with educational support but emotional support as well. Laura protested, “we have to remember that native speaker teachers are also people with the same thoughts and feelings as Korean teachers… We don’t contribute to unruly school atmospheres, and we didn’t come here just to get money or travel.” Laura added, “I want my co-workers and co-teachers to understand that.” Cal from the United Kingdom, who works in a middle school, said, “for the last two years the Korean media have portrayed native speakers as drug addicts and criminals… I want people to know that most native speakers work very hard for education in difficult environments.”

Some native speakers were criticized for not wanting to learn about Korea, but a greater problem is the difficulty of finding good places for native speakers to learn. 28-year old David of the United Kingdom, who works at a high school in Seoul, said, “the office of educatio has a program to be taught to speak Korean, but my home is too far from the office so it’s hard to attend… I’d like to have two hangul lessons a week at home but I stil haven’t been able to find a teacher.”