Employing Native Speakers
Would it be more effective if people who cannot speak English learned English from a native English teacher? Recently, among the demands for reform in the English teaching methods, the voice is raised that English learners should increase their opportunity to meet with native English speakers.
However, the reality in Korea is that there are limited number of native English teachers who can teach English language classes. Not only is there no acknowledgement of how many teachers are available, but there is no awareness of the experience the currently teaching instructors have. It is only estimated that several hundred native teachers are working in Seoul. There are 24 teaching at the British Council, while small and big private English teaching institutes have 2 to 20 native speakers.
These native speakers are thought to mainly exercise a great learning effect in the students' listening and speaking abilities, especially for children. Hong Ki-jeong, the principal of Kangnam Kijun Language Institute said learning was more effective in speaking and listening with the native lecturers, while comprehension and vocabulary were better with Korean teachers. Shin Jong-jin, the principle of Mokdong Wills Language School stated native teachers were early educators, speaking of his own experience of seeing how young children naturally grew familiar with English by interacting with native teachers.
However, Steven Rawlings, the Teacher Development Manager of the British Council's Teaching Center, pointed out that Korean students are accustomed to acquiring passive or receptive skills, therefore, the native English speaking teachers continuously try and provide the students with opportunities to focus on productive skills.
Other places sharing a passion for having native English teachers are large business firms, such as Samsung and LG, where the teachers' qualifications are strictly limited to natives who have graduated from universities, and have majored in English teaching methods as a second language at graduate school. Samsung Group limits the teachers' positions to English literature, English education, or International Studies related majors, and prefer lecturers who have more than 2 years teaching experience in the business skill sectors of business corporations in East Asia.
A source of the LG Group Training Institute revealed that the Group not only conducts job interviews but spends one or two days with the foreigners to see whether they grew up in a proper background, besides checking their ability to teach English.
A problem, though, is that not all organizations can afford to hire native speakers for their English teachers. More than anything, even when there is a qualified teacher, the cost of employment and the problem of guaranteeing secure work becomes a barrier. For foreigners to receive an E2 visa (those handed out to English Teachers), one must be either a graduate of a 4-year university, a 2-year college graduate who majored in English, or have a TESOL (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages) certificate, and also have documents proving employment status at a Korean language institute.
The British Council, which is known to be the best organization for managing native English teachers, requires its teachers to meet three conditions: a university degree, a Cambridge University English Teacher's Certificate, and more than 3 years experience teaching English to foreigners.
One language institute's principal argued that there are only a minimum number of teachers who meet proper qualifications, and even those who are qualified swarm towards Japan, where conditions are better than Korea with higher salaries. As a result, most native teachers are one-time comers or back-pack tourists who teach to earn travel expenses. Neither the Ministry of Justice, the police, nor the municipal education
board committee conduct any formal checking of the number of native teachers.
One language institute's principal in Kangnam indicated that foreigners come to Korea for other purposes such as tourism and just teach for three or four months to make money and then leave, but the students, therefore, cannot get a continuous education. Another problem is that not all qualified teachers actually teach better than unqualified ones. Some language institute managers complain that so-called "qualified" teachers are requested from many institutes and tend to be more carefree than the teachers who do not have qualifications
Parties concerned advise managers to improve their system of employing and managing native teachers, if they judge native teachers truly enhance the education effect. Even though other problems are said to rise, one could make courses where a foreign and a Korean teacher teach, as in Japan. Or one could make a rule of accessing the teaching level or the number of students a teacher can handle, and then spend high costs but achieve high effectiveness. Most of all, however, the people concerned point out that the institutes' management should be supervised so that unqualified native teachers are not hired
(Seo Gyo, gyoseo@chosun.com)
