So for the readings this week I did what was brought up in class. I read the abstract/introduction and conclusions and kind of skimmed through the middle parts trying to pick out relevant details. I must admit that this is not a skill I’ve perfected yet and still struggle to get the whole gist of the readings by this method. I suppose practice will help.
Anyway from what I did read, I thought that Jo’s paper wasn’t that interesting and had no real point to it. It just kind of explained what most people know in Korea about the education system with a few stats thrown in here and there. I suppose it could be interesting to someone completely new to Korea who would like to know a little more about the education system. She only managed to write a couple of paragraphs about English education which what I thought was the main purpose of the paper. It was way off remarkable and she only had 4 references to back her work up. That’s nothing compared to shins paper where they must have had close to 100 references and definitely seemed a lot more thorough. This paper got me thinking more and questioning myself as a teacher in Korea. I began to compare myself to what sort of a teacher I would have been if I stayed in England and taught there! I would be different for sure.
Yea, the Jo article was meant to juxtapose with the Shin reading. Jo definitely gave a bland summary of the English teaching context in Korea, and further, I think she positioned teachers and learners in somewhat problematic ways. In other words, she gave us a "party line" summary of the 'scientifically managed' curriculum. Shin worked more on a 'human' scale and thus I think it was easier to relate her ideas to our own teaching experiences. Good reading....
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