Teaching English is Big Business in Korea

This article talks about the educational rat race in Korea and the mania that is taking hold of Korean mom's that want to better their children's chances of getting into tops schools in Korea. This phenomenon and these moms have been nicknamed, Daechidong Moms, after Daechi-dong, Gangnam-gu -- the area of Seoul that is a breeding ground for scholastic achievement. [I almost took a job here teaching Business & Conversational English to adults. I didn't b/c the negotiations with the director didn't go well.]

Graduating from one of the top three -- Seoul National University, Yonsei and Korea University -- means social status and better job and even marriage prospects [wow, all that schooling and studying and homework to score a husband and live life as a wife at home washing vegetables all day]! Conditioning begins early. ForcedEncouraged by their mothers, preschoolers will go to "cram school" (a.k.a. Hagwon, privately-owned institutions) every day after their regular school. This continues into adolescence and young adulthood. Not surprisingly, these kids return home tired and sleepy [they can't even stay awake for the short subway ride home; their shiny black haired heads bobbing away at every twist and turn of the train] late at night.

University entrance exams include testing English aptitude. Enter my point: Teaching English is Big Business in Korea. English is taught as a required subject in regular school. However, since Korean-taught English classes usually focus on English language proficiency tests such as TOEIC and TOEFL, which tend to be listening and grammar-based, with little or no emphasis on spoken English, many Koreans have very limited speaking ability in English. This is why conversational English with a native English speaker is an easy service to sell here.

This is also why you can be hired from across the globe to come to Korea based solely on the fact that you speak English natively. But conversational English 'teaching' jobs represent only about 10% of the English teaching jobs available in Korea [a factoid I created based on several months of job searching using a half a dozen online job boards]. The rest of the lot is serious English language instruction (e.g. phonetics, grammar, syntax, etc.), which is sold by hagwons to Daechidong Moms that want their kids (who are already getting this type of instruction at their regular school) to have refresher English instruction. So never mind the fact that you don't have teaching degrees, prior teaching experiences, professional certifications or qualifications or educational training b/c if you are a native English speaker then you are naturally qualified to teach English, right? Wrong. I'm living breathing evidence to the contrary. To speak English natively is not enough to offer English language instruction.

I'm still writing about this now b/c I often wonder how so many others like me have managed to teach English despite my belief that hiring based on English speech alone is either a brilliant or flawed business strategy that leaves Daechidong Moms broke, Hagwon directors rich, Korean students exhausted and no better prepared for entrance exams and English teachers well paid. I mean, how much would you pay for your child to play hangman with an English speaker?

Of my two days teaching English to preschoolers in Korea, I have this to say: it takes a special person to be a good teacher and I have a WHOLE new respect for the job.