One of the things I have struggled with in Korea is face-saving within the classroom. When it comes to dealing with the concept of “face” in daily life here, I have gotten pretty good with knowing how to act. However, within the classroom, it is a different ballgame.
Traditionally, teachers have been pretty highly revered within Confucian cultures. However, that is a fast-fading tradition in Korea, and it is distressingly easy to lose the respect of your students. This in turn means that it is very important to be conscious of the way your students perceive you in the classroom. While this is difficult enough when you are alone with the students, it is doubly difficult when you are a foreigner “co-teaching” with a Korean teacher.
First of all, as a foreigner, you are automatically below the Korean teacher you are co-teaching with. So, it is important to be aware of this fact and what it means for you. As a very independent, generally assertive person, this has been a hard one for me to learn, but I like to think that I have a firm grasp of it now. I would write more, but really, every teacher’s situation is different, and, frankly, I’m sleepy.
The most difficult thing for me, however, is dealing with correcting my co-teacher. 95% of the time I don’t do it in class. I wait until class is over, and then explain it to my co-teacher. You see, if my co-teacher makes a mistake in English and then I correct them in front of the students, they will lose face in front of the students. But, there is a flip side to this as well – since it is seen as rather bad form to make someone lose face, the very fact that I made them lose face will in turn make me lose face with my students as well. So, after one or two “learning experiences”, I have learned that really, as painful as it sometimes is, it is best to keep my mouth shut, at least until the students have left the room.
Your spy found me. At least, I think it was your spy.
I feel the same way about Texas, after spendimg 7 years in Tom DeLay’s district and the heat)
Yep, that was “my spy”.
My hunch was apparently correct!
When I worked at the hagwon I had a hard time with this “Face” thing with my various coteachers. Mostly because I can’t break my American habits. But at the public school I work in I just have one coteacher to deal with. So I took it upon myself to always consider her as higher ranking than me. And kind of follow her actions. If I need to ask her something, I wait to see if she is available.
I think what is important about this cultural aspect is that as foreigners we try not to let it stress us out. I think if we observe more and go with the flow it helps. But after awhile we need to stop counting the times we screw up because it cannot be helped. We were born and raised in a different society and so by nature function differently. It is a balancing act I guess.
Anyways good luck.
@Joy I have just found that for the most part, I sit at my desk, listen to my music, and surf the internet on my laptop. Other than that, I just try to minimize my interactions with her.
Oh the Korean co-teachers! Mine didn’t speak English very well at all and would take notes in class on things that I said so that she could use the same vocabulary/sentences in classes where I wasn’t there. She also liked to correct me (even though I was always right… at least in terms of speaking English, and classroom management). I definitely found it difficult to deal with and am happy that I am no longer in that situation.
@Jen – Yeah, mine’s English is not great, and she does the same correcting thing, even though (obviously) my English is better than hers and, frankly, although I technically have less training (though I did take some education classes in college and went through a year-long TESOL program) I think my teaching technique is better than hers. For a couple weeks, one of my other co-teachers (I teach at multiple schools) was out on sick leave, and the substitute spoke extremely good English (he had been to the US a couple times), and I was sad to see him go.
I was going to ask you: How did you find the job in Mongolia, and how much does it pay? What sort of qualifications were required? Also – how much did the day of tank-driving cost?