Category: Teaching & Methodology

I haven't even touched my [broken link! FIXME] IIRTHW ("if I ran the hagwon") effort in more than a year. I kind of gave up on it as excessively idealistic and not relevant to my goals. But of course, the nature of my job means that I nevertheless think about it frequently.

Yesterday I was having a conversation with my boss about his constant casting-about for new, more effective approaches to curriculum.

It's odd, because I feel like we've reversed roles, somewhat, in comparison to when we first met, years ago. Back then, I thought, and argued frequently, that curriculum design was important, while he said, much to my consternation, that a "good teacher" ought to be able to work with whatever curriculum was on hand. 

I resented this at the time, and took it to mean that my frustrations with curriculum were symptomatic of my not being a good enough teacher. 

Yet over the last several years, I've evolved to a point where I more or less agree with the sentiment. Much to my dismay, yesterday, Curt seemed to essentially disagree when I said something to this effect. I had said that we should focus on improving our teachers, rather than on improving our curriculum. And his reaction was that he didn't see teachers as being the problem. It wasn't a direct rejection of the earlier philosophy, but it certainly felt like an about face to me. 

The context in which I suggested focusing on teachers instead of curriculum was actually a sort of brainstorm I had, during our conversation, about curriculum. Curt is looking at alternatives to the fairly fossilized "Reading-Listening-Speaking-Writing-Grammar-Vocab" subdivision of material that prevails in hagwon. I first went with my prefered notion, what he called "Immersion" but that I think of as "subject-driven" – teaching "subjects" in English, integrating the various functional components.

When Curt rejected that, for the same reason he always does – the dearth of native-speaking teacher to serve as a focus for that style of teaching (a rejection that strikes me as utterly rational if not completely necessary), I decided to suggest another alternative arrangement that I've been mulling over lately, mostly out of frustration with the seemingly excessive complexity of our modest hagwon's schedule. 

This alternative would essentially say we only have 3 types of classes, which is really my observation that we have three basic types of teachers in our hagwon: 

1) integrated class – this is the native speakers (like myself or Razel or Grace), who focus on "subjects" or "topics" in the immersion style mentioned above

2) analytic class – this is the grammar-translation style that is most traditional in Korean English education, rejected by pedagogy but a reality "on the ground" and we have teachers who teach this way and we might as well support them – some are quite good in many respects

3) foundations class – this is the "daily word test", the memorization words and also the naesin (school term tests) style memorization of speeches, essays and other fragments; this also includes the attendance-keeping and counseling aspects of the "homeroom" teacher job. I hate this memorizaiton stuff, not because I don't think it's helpful – I actually strongly believe that it is helpful – but when overly emphasized, it makes English painful, and that discourages students, and destroys motivation. 

Anyway, I laid these ideas out to Curt. He basically said, "that sounds like it's teacher centered." I said, well, but that's OK. If we focus on our teachers' strengths, and develop them, that will benefit the students, in the long run, as our consistency and quality will increase." He asked about how we would decide the curriculum for these new divisions of labor, and I said what he'd once said to me, that it didn't really matter – the focus was improved teaching and good teachers would inevitably choose or develop appropriately good curriculum. He was somewhat scandalized by this notion.

Hence my feeling that the tables had been turned. 

I haven't developed a specific thought about this at this point, mostly just recording here for future reference. 

[daily log: walking, 6 km]

Last week we had a rather competitive debate in my HS cohort (HS means "pre-HS", not High School – they are 9th graders, and are in their last year of middle school in the Korean system). I divided them into teams randomly, but neither team was really working well. Instead, each team seemed to be working to sabotage the other members of their own team. 

I had place an incentive of reduced homework for the winning team. I couldn't understand why the teams were self-sabotaging. I asked, and even explained the word "sabotage" to them in some detail.

The dynamic in the class is complicated by the fact that the class is divided about evenly between some very diligent, hard-working students who always do their homework, and some more slackish students who often don't. One student said explicitly, that he didn't mind if his team lost, because even if he got homework, it was unlikely he would do it. I commented that that seemed like a realistic but regrettable perspective. 

But then I asked, well, why bother anyway, then? 

And Jinu said, in much better English than he normally uses in his speeches, "My only aim is for Jihun to do homework." 

Jihun is one of the diligent ones. He is so diligent, that he is often the best prepared. As such, he has sometimes won one of my homework exemptions in the past. I guess this had caused resentment on the part of his peers, so they were sacrificing their own chance of avoiding homework simply to see him "go down." 

Indeed, Jihun's team lost, and so they got stuck with homework.

The unsurprising thing is, this week – the following week – we met again, and Jihun had done his homework. Indeed, since the other team had won the exemption, and since his own team were mostly slackers, he was the only one who had done homework. He gave his speech, self-satisfiedly. The other students seemed to regret their previous strategy, since my grade sheet filled up with a plethora of zeros, and, of course, as the only one who had done his homework, Jihun won yet another exemption.

I'm not sure if this exemption policy really works the way I want it to. I'm rethinking things, and have temporarily suspended the policy. 

[daily log: walking, 6 km]

We had a meeting today before work started, which I would describe as a kind of "State of the Union"-style presentation by our boss/owner, Curt. Of course, these kinds of things are in Korean… I can kind of follow the gist of it, much of the time, but details are lost on me. 

He seemed very optimistic and professional, and to be honest, I was cheered by it – although he often doesn't seem to have a clue about curriculum or marketing or any of the things that seem so important to running a hagwon, he really does at least a bit of a clue – it's just that he's just up against a lot of inertia – both institutional (i.e. "the way things are done" in the hagwon biz) and personal (he and I share traits of procrastination). 

One thing he did was show us a little video before starting his powerpoint. This is the kind of thing that Koreans working in education often pay a lot of lip service to but aren't very good at implementing, but which on the other hand Western educators take as given… as a kind of starting point. 

The video is in Korean but it's about education in the US, with some observations about the quality and style of education – and attitudes toward education – in the Jewish community in particular. I'll leave it as an exercise for the viewer to figure out the gist of it – it can help you relate to how I feel every day at my job. 

[UPDATE 20180330: Video embed removed due to link-rot, no replacement found. Sorry.]

[daily log: walking, 5.5 km]

I revisted my old standby "absurd debate topic" last week, and discussed with my HSM반 whether or not Santa was a criminal. Without too much guidance, my student Jihun produced this excellent debate essay (as always, student writing is presented "raw" and uncorrected).

The man called ‘Santa’ is a fairy of presents to children. However there is some secrets that children don’t know. I think santa is a criminal. Because I think santa can be a thief, a devil, and a cheat. So I’m going to discuss about why santa is BAD GUY.

First Reason is ‘theft method.’ As you heard from stories, santa always get into house with chimney. And after get into the house, almost every children with pure mind think santa only gives presents. But If santa is not a magician, how could he give them a present? That’s impossible. If they have to give children presents, they need to steal some expensive stuff. And they could afford children presents.

Second Reason is ‘name trick method.’ Surprisingly, as I told you, santa is a kind looking thief. I think that’s a part of wicked act. To cover their image, santa came out with changing their name. You can see when you move ‘n’ to the end of the word ‘santa,’ you might can see the word ‘SATAN,’ means ‘devil.’

Last reason is ‘fraud skill.’ Santa told children should not cry before christmas. Do you think it’s possible? I think only robot can achieve it. Also they lie to all children that they ride flying reindeer. But in my life experience at age 7, I saw that reindeer is a parcel service worker, and my mom is a santa.

Santa is a BAD　GUY, because they theft the stuff, change their name calmly, and fraud to children very well. I think if santa wants children ‘good children,’ they should be ‘good santa’ first.

I think he did very well, striking a good balance between humor and actual debate.

[daily log: walking, 6 km]

Lately I've been feeling pretty negative about my teaching ability. I suppose that doesn't help in terms of my overall affect, either. It's hard to say what is cause and what is effect, though. It becomes a vicious cycle because my self-doubt about teaching seems to lead to lower-quality teaching – I make more mistakes or mis-judgments; I get more "lazy" about tasks that I perceive as needing to be done; etc. Which of course later reinforces my frustration, too.

Earlier this week I made a terrible mistake. I told my HSM반 that I was mad at them that they hadn't done what I'd asked them to do for homework. In fact, I lectured them and harangued them for about 10 minutes.

It turns out, however… that I'd mis-remembered what their HW assignment was – mixing it up with my HST반. Further, the students… they just sat there, looking sheep faced and repentant. Not a single student made any effort to correct me or expressed any confusion over their "failure" to do the right homework. It's kind of a mess of a teaching screw up, because I only realized long after the class was over, that I'd made the mistake. They've already begun doing the "new, revised" homework assignment. It leaves them questioning their reality, and I'm not in any position to be able to "recover from it" with any grace whatsoever. I'm not even sure, if I tried to explain my screw up, that the students would understand – after all, I doubt they're really accustomed to authority figures admitting error, nor would they have a clue what to make of such information. 

I get paranoid that this is some early indication of the onset of some kind of dementia or mental breakdown. The hypochondria kicks in. 

Sigh. Bleagh.

[daily log: walking, 5 km]

I went to a provincial government-mandated "seminar" for foreign English teachers (e.g. E2 visa holders) who work at hagwon, as I do. Somehow, although I don't think it's a new law, I've always managed to avoid having to go for one reason or another (for example last year, I had cancer – heh). 

It wasn't as bad as it could have been, though I was plenty turned off by the stream of almost jingoistic Korean semi-revanchism of the cultural component of the "training." In fact, though, the part actually dedicated to teaching was pretty well done, mostly focusing broad based, inspirational aspects of "why we're teaching." The main speaker, a woman named Kim Jiyeong who has been a USC TESOL professor as well as a consultant to the Korean Education Ministry, had a substantial amount of charisma. 

The worst part of the whole program was the fact that it was in Ansan, which is in the far southwest suburbs of Seoul. Consequently, to attend a 3 and a half hour seminar I spent roughly 5 hours on the subway – 2 and half hours each way. And I had to wake up at 6 am in order to get there on time, which is hard given my normal work schedule. 

Anyway. I was tired when I got home, but didn't want to sleep, because it would mess me up. I forced myself to stay awake all afternoon and watched humorous videos on the internets.

[daily log: walking, 4 km]

Yesterday I had one of the best classes in my entire teaching career.

It was because I was too tired to teach. So when I found Soyeon (a third grader) sitting at my desk, and she announced that she was the teacher, I said, "OK, you're the teacher."

She looked surprised, and actually a little worried, when she saw I was serious. Her smile disappeared. I handed her my basket-o-markers-and-alligators and said, "You need this." She held it gingerly.

We went down to the classroom, and I showed her how to run the computer for the CC class, and then I sat down at the back of the class room and let her "teach" the class. The CC classes play a video and then the students work out what the characters are saying – it's essentially a structured, long-form listening exercise. I follow a very consistent pattern when I teach the class, and Soyeon was able to replicate that pattern quite accurately. She called on students, kept track of points, ran the video through starts and stops and replays as the students figured out what was being said, and in general conducted the class exactly as I might have. When the students argued over points, she said exactly what I sometimes said, "Oh, but that was too easy. So teacher says 'no point'." I had to laugh.

I participated by adopting a "role" – as a sort of recalcitrant student at the back. I deliberately "didn't know" the answers to questions when called on, sometimes. A few times I "broke character" to assist her with the technical aspects of running the video program, but other than that, it was completely Soyeon's class.

What's truly remarkable about this class is that it was the first class in a long time where no one broke into tears over the inevitably competitive nature of the Korean classroom. These are high-ability but quite young kids: second and third graders but in the top 10% in terms of ability in the whole hagwon (including middle school). They all want to be (and are accustomed to being) number one.

Soyeon, especially, has been a very problematic student. She has almost-native ability (I think she lived abroad for some time) but she is a bit naive about the world, immature for her age and is almost a bully as far as wanting to compete with her less-proficient peers. Putting her in a teacher role was a surprisingly and rewardingly brilliant move, because she was forced by the nature of the role "teacher" to be fair and level-headed. Besides, she got to be bossy to her heart's content.

My question is, if I put one of the other students in charge next Wednesday, how will Soyeon handle it? My suspicion – based on the experience yesterday – is that it might go well, because she will have empathy for her peer at the front of the room. I'm going to try it – I'll let you know how it goes.

[daily log: walking, 5.5 km]

It has been a long time since I played 눈치게임 with students in a class, but last night with my Honors kids (TOEFL-style elementary, our most advanced elementary kids) I was in a magnanimous mood and with 15 minutes left in class I told them we could play a game. After several proposals that I shot down as "boring" (they always suggest hangman, but that is just boring to me), I remembered overhearing some other student mention the 눈치game and so I suggested it.

I don't know why I don't play this more often as a reward for good classes – I have rarely seen kids have so much fun with such a ridiculously simple game. It's just a sort of psych-out exercise, but the kids really enjoy it (I wrote a [broken link! FIXME] detailed explanation of the game in 2012). When one student has gotten too far ahead, other kids will diliberately stand up simultaneously as the winning kid, to drag down that person's score. There are all kinds of implications regarding cooperation versus competition, I guess. I wonder how computers would do it? Would they do best being random, or is there some point where there is more advantage?

[daily log: walking, xx km]

Just as I was pondering what in the world to write on today's blog post, my friend Peter (who is currently on a whirlwind return to the US but will be back in a week or so) posted a huge, deeply-thought-out response to my post from yesterday, about the debate topic of whether teachers should teach specific knowledge vs teach self-confidence. I actually agree completely with what he wrote (you can go read what he wrote [broken link! FIXME] here, appended to my blog-post).

When I wrote what I wrote, yesterday, I was very focused on the "other side" of the debate question: the alternative offered by the textbook, in the way it formulates the question, to teaching "specific knowledge," is instead to teach "self-confidence," and my point was that I was becoming more inclined to agree with my students that teachers do not need to be in the business of teaching self-confidence. 

The mistake, of course, is to see these as the only two possible options: we either have to teach "specific knowledge" or we have to teach "self-confidence."

Obviously, there are other choices. Peter includes some "third ways" in his discussion: we can teach curiosity, or teach analytical thinking. My arguably most-talented coworker, "Anne-teacher," has the best answer, maybe: I long ago realized she does not, in fact, teach English at all. She shows her students "how to study." Her students always excel on those Korean exams – far more so than my students, who are learning from me something I rather naively and optimistically refer to as "English," or Curt's students, who are learning from him a topic that could best be characterized as "English grammar as analyzed ad infinitum - but done so entirely using the Korean Language." 

[daily log: walking, 6 km]

We recently tackled a topic in my advanced TOEFL writing class that revealed the gap between US and Korean culture, vis-a-vis attitudes toward education and learning. The topic came from the book – I cannot take credit for introducing it, but it has induced me to a great deal of reflection. 

The question in the book was phrased as followed: "It is more important for a teacher to help students gain self-confidence than to teach them specific knowledge." 

The book required them to write in the CON position – i.e. they were required to disagree. I like this structure for writing exercises, as I find that it encourages clearer thinking when students are "forced" to take a position on a debate topic, rather than letting them choose. 

Anyway, they all wrote very convincing arguments against the idea of it being important to have teachers teaching self-confidence. They all seemed to find this the naturally logical "order of things." 

One student, Charles, I will quote at length (as always, this is pre-corrected, all errors retained verbatim):

First, teacher's rule is to give students specific knowledge and make their students clever and smart. Teacher's basic duty is to give students knowledge. Isn't it? If teachers don't think that it is not important to give them knowledge and giving them self-confidence is more important they should be fired. Teachers should try to make their students smart. Making students self-confidence doesn't make students smart, but giving knowledge to students does. Helping students gain self- confidence is a possible thing for parents to do. Techers don't have to focus on that. …

Second, when students get knowledge, they will gain self-confidence. Many students and even adults feel self-confidence when they know something. A lof of people think the same whqy too. The easiest way to make students confidence is to give them knowledge. When students know they are able to answer any quesitons about specific subject, they will feel confidence. To make them able to answer any questions, teachers need to give them specific knowledge. For instance, if a teacher asks a quesiton about math and if students answer it perfectly they will feel confidence.

Another student wrote:

First, study and self-confidence is distinct from each other. Volition and fervor on study is more important than self-confidence. It is no use to have self-confidence but, don't have violition and fervor even though I have a little bit of self-confidence. Also, teachers have to focus on giving knowledge to students. It's right released to their job: teacher.

Contrast that with (what I think is) the standard American view, which seems to be that teachers need to instill confidence before learning can take place. Given the differential in performance of American and Korean students in academics, I have begun to wonder if that's right. 

Unrelatedly (maybe?), I ran across this quote.

"Always assume that there is one silent student in your class who is by far superior to you in head and in heart." – Leo Strauss

I like this advice. It is worth keeping in mind, definitely.

[daily log: walking, 5 km]

Note: apologies to readers – this blog has been frequently inaccessible over the last several days. This is due to some serious reliability issues at my hosting provider (typepad) which they are attributing to DDoS attacks by hackers. I hope this doesn't become a regular thing. Meanswhile, I'm looking into alternatives with respect to hosting, but any blog migration to new servers would be laborious and slow-in-coming…. Now back to our regular broadcast.

Less than two weeks ago, it just so happened that the debate topic offered up by our textbook in my Newton2-T반 (elementary 5th and 6th graders) debate class was "School field trips are a good idea." At that time, the kids were all adamantly in favor of school field trips, as is perfectly understandable. It was difficult to get some kids to take the CON position in the debate, so I was forced to choose two of them randomly to take the negative side. Nevertheless, they all did a good job.

Here is the debate.

Lo, the following week – last week – the Sewol disaster occurred. The sinking ferry was almost exclusively populated by field-tripping high-schoolers. Suddenly, the kids all were quite opposed to school field trips. School trips are obviously too dangerous, they explained, absorbing the media hype and unfamiliar with statistical thinking.

[daily log: walking, 5.5km]