These ones from Christine in the form of a comment on a previous post: Getting a Uni Job.
"I see that many people are asking about their
chances of getting a uni job without a masters or being outside of
Korea... I have my Masters of Ed in Language Education and four years of
teaching experience in public schools in the US and a public language
center in Korea. My problem is that I don't have uni experience... I
have been offered an interview at a uni, but the pay is significantly
lower than my current pay and the vacation is only two weeks more. For
this interview, I would have to fly there and take some time off work,
so I'm not sure it's worth it. In your opinion, will this be my only
chance? I guess I am asking... how are MY chances? I know I read your
uni received 100 applicants at one point; how many qualified people
usually apply to the average university?"
This is a very difficult question to answer, since I've never been on a hiring committee at a Korean Uni. But, I do know that there literally are hundreds of applicants for the top Uni Jobs in Korea. The ones out in the countyside with poor job conditions, not so much!
In my own recent experience of job hunting, I sent out 17 applications, got 3 interviews (one of which I couldn't attend) and 2 job offers. I expect to get at least 2-3 more interview offers throughout the summer (which I will turn down). I have 5 years uni experience, a Masters in the Humanities, a Celta and am a young, North-American female (which Koreans seems to like for some reason), which goes to show how competitive things are. I think the jobs where I didn't get interviews ended up going to people with MA's in Education, TESOL, or English.
So...your chances? It's hard to say. Some unis interview 5 people and hire 3. Some interview 20 and hire 3. This would be an excellent question to ask the hiring committee before taking time off work and flying over. And of course, it all depends on how good you are at interviews. I've had 4 Korean uni job interviews, which resulted in 4 job offers, but some people I know had like 7 or 8 interviews before they got a single offer.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Avoiding the end of the semester crunch
Although I am in the "crunch" this semester, due to being very busy for 12 weeks with the Celta (and somewhat neglecting my uni classes), I usually try to avoid it. Here's how:
1. Make your spreadsheets at the beginning of the semester (I assume everyone does this?!). Although it does take a bit of time (for me, about 1 hour for 8 or 9 classes), I think it saves considerable time at the end.
2. Input your attendance/grades as you go along. Not only does this make sense if you might happen to lose your folder with all that stuff on it (never happened to me thankfully, but you never know), you'll be way ahead of the game come end of the semester. I'd rather do 15-20 minutes a week instead of a marathon at the end.
3. Don't assign homework that is due for the last 2 or 3 weeks. Not only are the students horrendously busy with other things for other classes, it can be quite stressful for you to get everything graded in time. I made the last assignment for Internet homework due 2 weeks before the semester ended, so I had plenty of time to check their grades, and put them in the spreadsheets.
4. I give students a study paper with potential exam questions on it. I make an effort to input a question or two each week, based on the unit that we've just studied. That way, I just have to quickly review it for any errors and then print it off towards the end of the semester.
1. Make your spreadsheets at the beginning of the semester (I assume everyone does this?!). Although it does take a bit of time (for me, about 1 hour for 8 or 9 classes), I think it saves considerable time at the end.
2. Input your attendance/grades as you go along. Not only does this make sense if you might happen to lose your folder with all that stuff on it (never happened to me thankfully, but you never know), you'll be way ahead of the game come end of the semester. I'd rather do 15-20 minutes a week instead of a marathon at the end.
3. Don't assign homework that is due for the last 2 or 3 weeks. Not only are the students horrendously busy with other things for other classes, it can be quite stressful for you to get everything graded in time. I made the last assignment for Internet homework due 2 weeks before the semester ended, so I had plenty of time to check their grades, and put them in the spreadsheets.
4. I give students a study paper with potential exam questions on it. I make an effort to input a question or two each week, based on the unit that we've just studied. That way, I just have to quickly review it for any errors and then print it off towards the end of the semester.
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Reader Question: Inferring good/bad Korean Unis based on # of foreign teachers
This question from a reader who wishes to remain unnamed:
"I was just thinking about good and bad universities in Korea (horror stories, etc).
Do you think there is any relation or association between the # of foreign English teachers at a university and the quality of the job?
How many foreign ESL teachers do you think a quality university should have?"
My answer: interesting question that is quite hard to answer. I can give you an anecdotal answer based on the unis in the city where I live (Cheonan/Asan). My uni has a lot of foreigners (around 30) and it is also one of the best (possibly the best?) in terms of conditions for the foreign teachers (pay, housing, lack of micro-management, OT opportunities, no time-limit, full vacation, basic respect, etc). However, the bad teachers get weeded out pretty fast at my uni, and it seems like 1 or 2 people generally get the cut every semester, so while conditions are good, it's not an ideal place for the slacker or someone who can't get along with the other coworkers.
However, there are 2 other unis around here that have lots of foreigners (30-40-50) who have to put up with things like unpaid camps, mandatory Church services, "free-talking" hours, crappy pay, lack of OT, unpredictable management, and sub-par housing.
As far as the unis with significantly less foreigners...it's kind of all over (just like the big unis) in terms of conditions. So, I think there is really no hard and fast rule! Just do your due diligence before taking any uni job.
And the question about how many foreign teachers a uni should have? Well there are just too many factors to really make any sort of generalization. Is English mandatory? One, two, three or four years of English? Do Koreans teach in the program as well? Is there a big English department? Aviation students? Global Business? What's the total student enrollment? Etc, etc, etc, etc!
"I was just thinking about good and bad universities in Korea (horror stories, etc).
Do you think there is any relation or association between the # of foreign English teachers at a university and the quality of the job?
How many foreign ESL teachers do you think a quality university should have?"
My answer: interesting question that is quite hard to answer. I can give you an anecdotal answer based on the unis in the city where I live (Cheonan/Asan). My uni has a lot of foreigners (around 30) and it is also one of the best (possibly the best?) in terms of conditions for the foreign teachers (pay, housing, lack of micro-management, OT opportunities, no time-limit, full vacation, basic respect, etc). However, the bad teachers get weeded out pretty fast at my uni, and it seems like 1 or 2 people generally get the cut every semester, so while conditions are good, it's not an ideal place for the slacker or someone who can't get along with the other coworkers.
However, there are 2 other unis around here that have lots of foreigners (30-40-50) who have to put up with things like unpaid camps, mandatory Church services, "free-talking" hours, crappy pay, lack of OT, unpredictable management, and sub-par housing.
As far as the unis with significantly less foreigners...it's kind of all over (just like the big unis) in terms of conditions. So, I think there is really no hard and fast rule! Just do your due diligence before taking any uni job.
And the question about how many foreign teachers a uni should have? Well there are just too many factors to really make any sort of generalization. Is English mandatory? One, two, three or four years of English? Do Koreans teach in the program as well? Is there a big English department? Aviation students? Global Business? What's the total student enrollment? Etc, etc, etc, etc!
In news from "Vancouver"
When Koreans (or Americans too) ask me where I'm from, I say "Vancouver." Except "Vancouver," is actually my code-word for "Edmonton." It's just easier than explaining. Anyway, although this is a secret code, I'm sharing it with you today because there is an interesting news story from my hometown.
Suspended Teacher in a fight for High Standards
The gist of it is that there is a new policy in Edmonton high schools that student's final grades are based only on the work that they have completed. If they don't do something, there is no "0," or make-up required. Apparently it's related to the self-esteem movement.
Anyway, I applaud the teacher for standing up against this crap. As an extreme example, I guess a student could do absolutely nothing all semester long, and skip all the tests, but hand in some easy assignment worth 5% of the final grade, ace it and get an A+ in the class. Ridiculous. And it's not like high school in Canada is hard. For real. You can choose how hard you want it to be! When I was a student there were 4 different tracks of classes that you could choose:
1. IB Math for those who want to be taking University-level classes by the end of high school.
2. Math for those who want to attend university.
3. Math for those who might want to enter a community college or trade school involving science/engineering of some sort.
4. Math for those who never plan on setting foot in a classroom ever again after high school.
It's a slippery slope, let's just say that. Kind of reminds me of working at a Korean University where students expect to get an A/A+ just because they've been physically present at most of the classes, even if they've done absolutely no homework or performed well on the tests. And, I have to make my classes almost ridiculously easy (including giving the exact questions that are on the test beforehand) or the majority of my students would fail.
Suspended Teacher in a fight for High Standards
The gist of it is that there is a new policy in Edmonton high schools that student's final grades are based only on the work that they have completed. If they don't do something, there is no "0," or make-up required. Apparently it's related to the self-esteem movement.
Anyway, I applaud the teacher for standing up against this crap. As an extreme example, I guess a student could do absolutely nothing all semester long, and skip all the tests, but hand in some easy assignment worth 5% of the final grade, ace it and get an A+ in the class. Ridiculous. And it's not like high school in Canada is hard. For real. You can choose how hard you want it to be! When I was a student there were 4 different tracks of classes that you could choose:
1. IB Math for those who want to be taking University-level classes by the end of high school.
2. Math for those who want to attend university.
3. Math for those who might want to enter a community college or trade school involving science/engineering of some sort.
4. Math for those who never plan on setting foot in a classroom ever again after high school.
It's a slippery slope, let's just say that. Kind of reminds me of working at a Korean University where students expect to get an A/A+ just because they've been physically present at most of the classes, even if they've done absolutely no homework or performed well on the tests. And, I have to make my classes almost ridiculously easy (including giving the exact questions that are on the test beforehand) or the majority of my students would fail.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
The Celta is done!
...and with a strong finish. An above standard on my last lesson and my tutor said it was one of the best he'd seen at the Celta level. Nice! It was a listening lesson, with speaking/writing as a secondary focus. Here is what I did:
1. Set the context. I had students talk for a few minutes about what types of media are becoming more and less popular these days and why.
2. Pre-task (prediction). The listening was 5 people answering specific questions about their media usage. So, I had the students predict answers to the 5 questions, such as: "Do people prefer watching movies in the theater or at home?"
3. Gist-listening task. Then the students had to listen and see if their predictions were true.
4. Detailed listening task. I had some questions for the students to answer, and I gave them time to read the questions before playing the listening again.
5. Post-task. I had a few discussion questions, based on the listening.
6. Survey. The students had to choose a media-related topic (from a list), make up some questions, survey their classmates and then report the results back to the group. It ended up being a very interesting activity, and covered speaking/listening/writing, which is always ideal.
Anyway, the course is done and I'm back to my normal life activities of having friends (besides those on the Celta course) and exercising, and stuff like that. I got a "Pass B," which is slightly higher than most people who take the course.
1. Set the context. I had students talk for a few minutes about what types of media are becoming more and less popular these days and why.
2. Pre-task (prediction). The listening was 5 people answering specific questions about their media usage. So, I had the students predict answers to the 5 questions, such as: "Do people prefer watching movies in the theater or at home?"
3. Gist-listening task. Then the students had to listen and see if their predictions were true.
4. Detailed listening task. I had some questions for the students to answer, and I gave them time to read the questions before playing the listening again.
5. Post-task. I had a few discussion questions, based on the listening.
6. Survey. The students had to choose a media-related topic (from a list), make up some questions, survey their classmates and then report the results back to the group. It ended up being a very interesting activity, and covered speaking/listening/writing, which is always ideal.
Anyway, the course is done and I'm back to my normal life activities of having friends (besides those on the Celta course) and exercising, and stuff like that. I got a "Pass B," which is slightly higher than most people who take the course.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Celta Teaching Practice 7
It's done! To standard. I tried to combine a reading lesson and a listening lesson (+ some speaking at the end) to challenge myself and in retrospect, I should have just chosen one focus and taken the easy way out. And actually, that's a bit of a frustration for me. You don't actually have to be creative, or interesting, or keep the students motivated and focused, and actually learning to get an above standard. As long as you don't screw up and you have all the stages down, with a good context, it seems like you can get it. If I went into my uni classes with these Celta lessons (that get standard or above standard), it would be crash and burn for the most part.
Anyway, only one more hour-long lesson to go, and it's a listening, which is quite hard to fail since the necessary stages of that type of lesson are pretty straightforward and clear. Grammar or Vocab lessons are a bit trickier because there are more steps to them and with higher levels of students, it might be possible to get caught up on some difficult question or get confused about something. The students I'm teaching now are smart, and really good at English!
Anyway, only one more hour-long lesson to go, and it's a listening, which is quite hard to fail since the necessary stages of that type of lesson are pretty straightforward and clear. Grammar or Vocab lessons are a bit trickier because there are more steps to them and with higher levels of students, it might be possible to get caught up on some difficult question or get confused about something. The students I'm teaching now are smart, and really good at English!
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Top 5 Reason to NOT Teach ESL in South Korea
Although I'm generally happy here in Korea (due mostly to my job situation being such a good one. Ie: getting paid in full/on-time, nice housing, respect from my bosses, no micro-managing, health insurance/pension being legit), it can be a tough place for newbies working at sketchy hagwons or dealing with public school co-teachers and sometimes shoddy housing. I had a rough time in my first year in Korea for sure. Anyway, if you need a dose of reality as to why Korea is not necessarily a land overflowing with kimchi and dwenjang, check out this site:
Top 5 Reasons to NOT Teach ESL in Korea
However, don't just take my word for it. Check out some other teacher's stories and advice.
Prisoner of Wonderland
A-Z of Teaching in South Korea
And of course, check out The Top 5 Reasons to Teach ESL In Korea for a balanced view of things.
Top 5 Reasons to NOT Teach ESL in Korea
However, don't just take my word for it. Check out some other teacher's stories and advice.
Prisoner of Wonderland
A-Z of Teaching in South Korea
And of course, check out The Top 5 Reasons to Teach ESL In Korea for a balanced view of things.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Celta Update
The end is coming, with only 2 more weeks left of the course. And 2 more teaching practices (and all the stress that comes along with it). The transformation of the teachers in my group is pretty amazing (myself included perhaps?). We were all generally clueless (in the Celta way) as to how to go about teaching a reading lesson or a grammar lesson. And now, we can do it on our sleep and pick out the finer details of all the stages when observing our peers.
The best thing about the course is definitely the small size of it. There are 12 of us that get together for the "input" sessions, but then we're broken up into groups of 6 for the teaching practice. It's kind of an ideal size to get to know each other really well and help each other out.
The worst thing for sure is the early mornings and commuting to Seoul. But, of course, that's not the fault of the course and I signed up for it! Thank god for the KTX, which at least makes it fast (albeit outrageously expensive). I'm not sure the 1 month intensive option is really a better choice though. I can't even imagine how exhausting that would be.
The best thing about the course is definitely the small size of it. There are 12 of us that get together for the "input" sessions, but then we're broken up into groups of 6 for the teaching practice. It's kind of an ideal size to get to know each other really well and help each other out.
The worst thing for sure is the early mornings and commuting to Seoul. But, of course, that's not the fault of the course and I signed up for it! Thank god for the KTX, which at least makes it fast (albeit outrageously expensive). I'm not sure the 1 month intensive option is really a better choice though. I can't even imagine how exhausting that would be.
Saturday, May 5, 2012
Peer-Graded Presentations
In my social issues class, I'm having students do a big group presentation, where I assign 50% of the grade and their classmates assign the other 50%. We use the same grading criteria (interesting/good information/visuals/handout). It's the first time I've done presentations this way and the results so far have been quite interesting.
The students assign grades an average of 4 points lower (out of 35). I think it might have something (A LOT!) to do with only 30% of the class being able to get "A's." Or, they might have higher expectations. One thing I have noticed is that they seem to like the presentations that I thought weren't great, and not be so impressed with ones that I liked. For example, one group had an excellent presentation, but they had some technical issues with their Powerpoint. I would never grade a group lower due to technical difficulties, but most of the class did, and commented on it being an issue. And, the students seem to be a lot more forgiving than I am about students reading their presentations (even though I told everyone it was a big no-no). Maybe they feel some empathy!
An interesting experiment and one that I'd probably do again in the future. It definitely prevents people from sleeping!
The students assign grades an average of 4 points lower (out of 35). I think it might have something (A LOT!) to do with only 30% of the class being able to get "A's." Or, they might have higher expectations. One thing I have noticed is that they seem to like the presentations that I thought weren't great, and not be so impressed with ones that I liked. For example, one group had an excellent presentation, but they had some technical issues with their Powerpoint. I would never grade a group lower due to technical difficulties, but most of the class did, and commented on it being an issue. And, the students seem to be a lot more forgiving than I am about students reading their presentations (even though I told everyone it was a big no-no). Maybe they feel some empathy!
An interesting experiment and one that I'd probably do again in the future. It definitely prevents people from sleeping!
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Just a small early-morning rant
So today in my Social Issues Class, 1/2 of the students have a big group project that is worth 35% of their final mark. Last week in class, I randomly picked which students would go this week and which students would go next week (it's a big class, and there is only time for 1/2 the class in one period). One student told me he had MT (membership training) this week, so I made sure his group could go next week. No other students mentioned any issues with dates.
Today (Wednesday) at 8am (the day of the project, which is at 2:10), I was out jogging around campus and I saw one of the students in that class. He told me he had a problem, since one of his group members has a physical test for ROTC (army officer training).
My response: why didn't you tell me in class last week?
His response: we found out Monday morning.
And why didn't you tell me then?
We tried!
How exactly? You have my Twitter, email, phone number, all of which I check multiple times each day. And, I was in my office almost all of Monday morning.
Soooo...what can we do?!
(big sigh), you can go today. It's far too late.
(back to Jackie again): Anyway, what if he randomly didn't see me out jogging? Were they just going to tell me at the beginning of class? I like group projects and presentations, I just don't like the stress that goes along with them. How do other people deal with it?
Today (Wednesday) at 8am (the day of the project, which is at 2:10), I was out jogging around campus and I saw one of the students in that class. He told me he had a problem, since one of his group members has a physical test for ROTC (army officer training).
My response: why didn't you tell me in class last week?
His response: we found out Monday morning.
And why didn't you tell me then?
We tried!
How exactly? You have my Twitter, email, phone number, all of which I check multiple times each day. And, I was in my office almost all of Monday morning.
Soooo...what can we do?!
(big sigh), you can go today. It's far too late.
(back to Jackie again): Anyway, what if he randomly didn't see me out jogging? Were they just going to tell me at the beginning of class? I like group projects and presentations, I just don't like the stress that goes along with them. How do other people deal with it?
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