8/17(금) English eucation in Korea? It sucks.

[Andy(이은택)~]

I’ve seen a TV show and found that we are witnessing something weird recently. Yes, what is not weird or strange in Korea nowadays when we see the lazy and creepy creatures named lawmakers are striding with pride in the hall of parliament, and poor KTX crew ladies suffering the preposterous verdict of ‘legitimate contract work’(which is not legitimate at this case) by the local Labor office of Seoul, and a government which sticks to its own stupor and bloody frenzy to haste KORUS-FTA(Free trade agreement between Korea and USA) done in a limited time span, not concerning whether it will extend grave effects on the quality and shape of people’s life in next several decades? Oh, I’m sorry to get gloomy things out of my mind. It was like I bothered you a lot. Anyway let’s get back to the weird thing that I watched in a TV show. It has some kind of relation to our own club.

Just by chance, I paid a visit to my internet club which I usually download movies, dramas, or TV shows from and found an interesting title, ‘A report on English of Korean society’. Does that ring a bell? You know we have a kind of frenzy or trend of learning English. Even toddlers barely got out of mom’s warm arms are heading for so-called ‘English song institute’ guided by moms’ loving hands, though it seems not more than a nursery center to where nurses tend the kids with English songs to my eyes. And we know there are crowds of students, from elementary schoolers to graduates of university, swarming to the so-called English institutions popping out like mushrooms after rain with various range of tuitions according to each and every own purpose and level of education. Don’t you find it weird? English is getting more clout in Korean society nowadays. We know it is a sort of leverage to climb up the social hierarchy, at least in Korea. But I like to say, ‘Whatever, man. You are a Korean and live here in Korea.’

Actually what I want to bring on the forum of criticism is this. Korean society takes it for granted that people of properties use English to hold a position or assets and, sequentially, want to inherit to the next generations. Maybe you are going to tell that I’m exaggerating the situation. But you know what? The estimated amount of money spent on education last year(maybe it was last year if my memory serves.) was 2 trillion won and the half of it was wholly spent on English education. And considering the tuitions of the private schools, located in Gang-Nam area, where the heirs of modern nobles are gathering to prepare for fancy high schools even from their elementary school years, perhaps at least more than 60% of the total amount of money might be consumed to fill the pockets of the owners of the private English schools.(Anyway it was worth paying. Kids were speaking well, Holly Moley, even better than me.)

Maybe the problems are the more than flourishing English qualifying tests, low quality of English education in public schools, and partially distributed chances of English education. I’m not sure how to make a resolution for this and I’m not a snob to brag about my seems-to-be suave idea like a wise man or a bureaucrat with authority, but feel like to share my eccentric idea with you just for fun.

I think it could reach to a settlement if we would nullify all the lousy public education on English at school and drive the kids to the private English schools with public money saved from the cancellation of English education at schools. Maybe this is going to make messes all around and I just said for fun, but one thing is clear that public English education of todays is lousy and needs revolution rather than only refinement as I said with my funny suggestion. English teachers of public schools should get more educations themselves first to prepare better classes for students. Maybe merging the private institutes with public schools could be a possibility.

And I like the idea ‘immersion education’ presently practiced by a fancy elementary school of Seoul. It means education with English lead by English natives in some classes and with Korean  by ordinary Korean teachers in other classes. They say with through this method 4 years are enough for a student who came in without English experience to write and speak to express their thoughts and most students are able to debate at 5th grade. In my opinion, if the money now spilled to prepare for English tests were spent in something like these better things for improvement of English learning by government, maybe there would be no need for English test or worrying about partial distribution of English education in the future.

- How did you learn English? And what are you doing to polish your English up?

- What is your purpose to learn English and how far do you like to go?

- Have you been in a private English institute? What was your purpose in there and were you satisfied for what they taught to you? If you have not, do you have any plan to go there or let your children go there to learn English?

- Do you think implementing a law for English as a public language in Korean society could be a good resolution to cope with the situation? (some people say so…) If you say yes then why? Or if you don’t like it, do you have suggestions to take care of the lousy English education of Korea?

- In my writing (or essay, article, comment, or whatever you like to call it), maybe you saw the basic concept of immersion English. What is your opinion about it?