To Teach English, Study Korean By Timothy Chambers

February 20, 2004 To teach English, study Korean "I once met an American who taught English in Jeju-do," a Korean friend once remarked. "She spent five years there but the only Korean she learned was 'ahn-nyong,' 'kamsa hamnida' and 'yeoboseyo.' She asked: "Tim, why don't Western teachers learn more Korean?" It's a good question: Why is it so rare for English teachers to study Korean? "After eight hours teaching English," one teacher told me, "I'm beat. The last thing I want to do is study." I appreciate this excuse up to a point. I briefly served a sentence at a hagwon, so I've experienced the fatigue attaching to those notorious "split-shifts." But then I remember my students. Some rose at dawn to attend eight o'clock classes. Others took evening classes after toiling at a full day's work. The more I think about my students' schedules the less inclined I am to accept the "fatigue excuse" on the part of their Western instructors. I'm reminded of the old adage: "If you want to do something worthwhile, but can't find the time, then you have to make the time." But is learning Korean "worthwhile"? One teacher I met was doubtful. "Look," she said, "I'm only going to be in Korea for a year. So why should I torture myself learning a language I'll never use again?" The rhetorical question deserves an answer, which is: If you want to teach English in Korea, then study Korean because it will make you a better teacher while you're here and a better person after you've left. It's not difficult to understand why this is so. For starters, a little Korean-savvy can go a long way in understanding our students' errors. It's common, for example, that students might ask, "How about...?" when what they mean is, "What do you think about...?" As one might guess, the mistake finds its source in students' native tongue: one Korean expression for soliciting someone's opinion is, "Ottokae sengak haeyo?" - where the most literal translation of, "ottokae," is not "what," but "how." "Can we go for a coffee now," our students might ask, "or do you have a promise?"

Again, the error's source is because there are two translations for "yaksok": "appointment" and "promise." The study of Korean can help us empathize with, and explain, our students' mistakes. It can also help motivate our classes. Unfortunately, but understandably, many students adhere to the old saw that "it's better to remain quiet and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt." Whoever coined that phrase never led a conversation class, I'm sure. The result is that students, fearful of embarrassment, remain mute, rather than practice their speaking skills. What to do? Many of us tell students that there's nothing shameful in making mistakes. But I've found a more helpful ice-breaker is to show them that mistakes are a natural part of language-learning. How? By simply recounting some of the errors I've made as I've practiced my nascent Korean. For instance, there are two expressions which mean, "Let's go!": the informal, "kaja!" and the more polite, "kapshida!" I blushingly hope I'm not the first Korean learner to conflate the two, the afternoon I proposed to a friend that we "kajapshida!" Needless to say, this reduced a Korean bystander to giggles. Then there's the time I wanted to order iced coffee. I'd paged through my trusty sajon (dictionary) and read that the Korean words for "ice" and "coffee" were "orum" and "kopi." So I stepped up to the counter and confidently expressed my wish for an "orum kopi." I'm not sure which was more embarrassing: the shop-girl's perplexed stare or the cool observation which followed. "I'm sorry," she said, furrowing her brow, "I don't understand what you're saying." When I recount these exhibits in my own language-learning Hall of Shame, my students gain two things: a chuckle and the confidence that I'd never ridicule their efforts. English is the lingua franca of our age. Too often, Americans take this fact for granted. They forget that English owes its ubiquitous status to millions of people worldwide, who have invested billions of hours in learning it. We owe them the courtesy of meeting them part-way. The ability to recognize this obligation is, I think, one creed distinguishing the mere tourist from - to borrow Paine's phrase - the true "Citizen of the World."