Reflecting ... (METH)

Johnston #4:

It’s already been three years since I’ve graduated from college, and I’ve been in Korea for about a year and half of it. So, compared to some/most of the people in class, I’m very inexperienced and have had a very short professional life. I was introduced to teaching on a whim and after some exposure to it, I became interested in it and decided to continue to follow the path. Ever since I was young, I’ve never had a strong desire to pursue anything, yes, quite sad, I know. I was interested in a couple of things but never loved doing anything. After high school, I went on to college and studied business management and finance to please my parents. Unfortunately, my sophomore and junior years were the worst years of my life. I was very stressed and my health deteriorated greatly. (I had to get my gallbladder removed after my sophomore year because of gallstones.) I couldn’t function without several cups of coffee, I was turning into a horrible person, I became very cynical, etc. Basically, I wasn’t happy. After graduating, I knew I didn’t want to be that type of person. I took a year and basically did nothing except think about what to do in the future and what type of life I wanted to lead. After that period, I decided to give engineering a try since math has always been my forte. Before embarking on the journey, I wanted to take a trip to Korea to see my relatives and friends, and that’s when things changed. I got an opportunity to teach English at a university, and really enjoyed it. I got curious about it and continued working and enrolled in the STG program. I’ve realized that one my strengths which has helped me develop is that I’m a good observer of details. Unfortunately, one of my weaknesses is that I have a horrible memory, so unless I jot things down, I forget them five minutes later. Interestingly, after I started teaching English in Korea, my personality changed for the better. Yes, the person I am is better than the person I used to be. It might be hard to believe. ^^ People say that I smile more than I used to, which might be a behavior conditioned from having to smile while teaching. But, I do think I’m happier now. And I think that is what has guided my decisions in my career path and in life. Sure, there are days when I ask myself why I chose this path, but I’m not ever truly unhappy. And there are days when I want to teach the easy and simple way. I can’t lie, there are days when I do exactly that. And then, I get hit by the waves of guilt. 

[I sort of went on and on about my life after college. I'm sorry if I bored you and if it wasn't relevant to the question...]

#5:

I don’t think I have enough experience nor exposure to the educational institutions. I’ve never worked as an in-house, full-time instructor/teacher, and I’ve worked a little over a year. I guess the only time I’ve felt at the least marginalized was due to my ethnicity, being Korean and looking like a Korean. It’s happened during the hiring process at language centers run by Koreans. After a successful interview, the awkward discussion about pay rate inevitably follows. At three different hagwons (run by Koreans), they told me the same thing: We pay __(amount)__ to the 원어민 teachers (native speakers), so paying you __(amount)__ is quite a lot. So, even though I’ve lived in the States, all my life, I’m not viewed as being 100% native/foreigner. In a way, it’s negative but I think there’s also a positive side to it. I’ve never really felt like an ‘outsider’ amongst teachers or the administration because I’ve been able to ‘fit in’ in both contexts. In terms of having freedom to do what I want in the classroom, I don’t know if I’ve been marginalized in that sense. At the hagwon I’m working part-time at, I’m given a lesson plan/teacher’s manual to follow but given enough freedom to change the details. However, I can’t make decisions on what the student learns.  In my private classes, I have a lot more power, actually, too much to be honest. I can create the curriculum, lessons, the format, etc. (everything), and there really isn’t anyone who monitors me, which I think is dangerous. [There’s a recruiter who finds me potential students (and gets a portion of my paycheck).] So, I can understand how non-native teachers may feel, which might be why they’re pushed to teaching English in a teacher-fronted, grammar-focused setting with the goal of acing an exam. It seems like people want ‘native speakers’ to teach communicative English and ‘non-native speakers’ to teach how to do well on exams. And then, there are native speakers who look like non-native speakers. I always stress that I’ve lived in the States my entire life and that actually speaking English well is different from teaching English well. Also, another reason why I feel as if I haven’t been marginalized that much is because of my education background. Korean society places high value on education, and I was fortunate enough to graduate from a good university (don’t take it the wrong way). It’s quite funny that they think that my degree in a totally different area would make a good teacher just because I graduated from a good school. It’s helped me get my foot in the door and was only possible because I was in Korea. However, there’s the other side of the coin – the quizzical look I get from them: And, what made you want to teach English here?! That’s a story for another time.