During personal interviews, a range of mothers were first asked to define who is a native speaker. Mothers were asked about their preferences for both native English teachers and Korean English teachers in terms of their gender, age, years of teaching experience, professional qualification and what aspects they considered the most important. In the pilot stage of the study the mothers were presented a selection of photos (with no biographical information) from which they chose their preferred teacher and were asked why. Our findings from the initial research indicate that Korean mothers do hold explicit preferences not only for White native English speakers of a particular race and nationality, but also for gender, age and physical appearance. While professional qualification and experience may have played a role, the mothers’ interview data did not suggest that they were viewed as a prominent factor. Our initial data also indicates that there is a clear division on the mothers’ choice of who is more appropriate to teach particular skills. The mothers almost exclusively felt that native speakers were preferable for conversation and best during preschool and early elementary school years when the focus on test results is minimal. They preferred a Korean teacher for teaching grammar and writing and believed that once students are in middle school a combination of both native speaker and Korean speaking teacher is ideal.

The pilot study’s results generated a variety of new questions. The data collection and methodology of the study’s second, and current, stage, is essentially the same yet in addition to first seeing the photos with no biographical data, they then see the same photos with biographical data provided. In doing so the mothers are able to see information on the individual’s first language, race, country of origin, age etc as well as their educational background and professional experience during the second phase of the photo examination process. In doing so, we aim to learn whether professional qualifications can trump physical characteristics.  The second stage of the study has only just begun, but initial data indicates that Korean mothers do consider professional capability more important than they demonstrated in the first study. They do not appear to blindly consider a teacher’s nationality, gender, age and physical appearance in a vacuum. If teachers are able to manage their students appropriately and pass on content knowledge to their child skillfully, they are acknowledged as good teachers. This is encouraging news with respect to general assumptions about non-native English speaking teacher (NNEST) inequality in Korea.

However, the data does not divide so evenly, singling out a qualification as the most important determining factor. All things being equal, most mothers still held preferences for the White native speaker. What is their reasoning? The final data is still being collected but we are considering the role of socio-economic mobility and the role that a child’s exposure to Western English speakers means to mothers. Korean society takes a serious view of academic and professional attainment. Personal networks and cliques are extremely important when negotiating through school and adult life. Yet socio-cultural exposure is also a significant factor in broadening one’s personal knowledge and one’s ability to easily move and interact in a variety of contexts The opportunities available influence social position, income, and marriage. In other words, we are examining our data to learn if mothers of different socio-economic classes place different values on exposure to a White native speaker teacher. If a mother already knows that her child belongs to the upper classes and is ensured a range of opportunity and mobility, there may be less desire for their child to have a White native speaker English teacher. Yet if a mother understands that there will be limited opportunity to interact with Western native speakers or go abroad, exposure to a White native speaker in the classroom may be of higher value not necessarily to expose her child to ‘authentic’ English, but rather to an image of global power. In addition, having a White native speaker teacher is more expensive that a Korean English teacher. So, having a White native speaker shows you can afford it and associates you with a socio-economic position. Several of our interviewees have discussed these points. So, in fact, we may learn that the myth of the native speaker is fueled not so directly by racial bias, but what much of Korean society is fueled by, a means to obtain a better socio-economic position.

Stay tuned to ESL Geek to learn where our final research will be written up and published. Currently, you can learn more about our initial stage of the project from the presentation summary published in the KOTESOL International 2007 Convention handbook or by contacting us directly.

Authors
Kyung-Ae Oh, M.A. TESOL (Missouri State University), is a professor
in the Division of General Education at Soongsil University, Seoul, where she teaches English. She has been teaching TOEFL, TOEIC, and other subjects of English at language institutes and universities in Seoul for over 10 years. She also volunteers as a Korean as a foreign language teacher for migrant workers. Her research interests include language and identity and language and gender.

Kara Mac Donald, Doctorate of Arts & Master in Applied Linguistics (University of Sydney) is a professor at Hanyang University, Hanyang-Oregon TESOL Program (Seoul), where she is involved in teacher training. Her interests are in issues related to NNEST and the role of accent, race and gender in TESOL.

Jocelyn Graf, M.A. Applied Linguistics (University of Illinois, Chicago), is the assistant director of Hanyang University’s English Writing Lab (Seoul), where she supports biomedical scientists writing for publication. She also volunteers as a translator and interpreter for migrant worker advocacy organizations in Korea. Her research interests include linguistic ecology and multilingual environments. 

I skipped out on the plenary. Not because it wasn’t going to be interesting - motivation is a field that I’m quite interested in, but rather because I was with a new friend who would be leaving the city that afternoon and this would be the last chance to sit and talk. Long time reader and infrequent commentor Jmac is a great guy and I hope to keep in touch with him in the future.

After lunch, I went to Bill Snyder’s presentation on LexTutor. This presentation was excellent and informative. I later approached Bill, whom I know outside of KOTESOL, about guest lecturing in my course How to Teach English using the Internet. Bill kindly agreed and will give a modified version of his presentation to my students later this semester. I wanted to give this information myself, but don’t yet understand it well enough to present it.

The next presentation I attended was also done by a friend, Scott Miles. Scott is the author and series editor on a new series of books teaching reading skills. The series is titled Essential Reading and is designed in a unique way. It’s targetting specifically EFL students in an Asian context. The readings were chosen to be engaging and relevant to Asians at the university level, i.e. material that they would be interested in reading on their own. Each of the readings was also written in a way that it would provide information that students were unlikely to know previously despite being familiar wiht some of the topics. Furthermore the readings were selected to elicit an emotional response and as Scott put it, this means that sometimes “they are not entirely safe”. But if they students respond emotionally they are definitely engaged. Finally there is support for ER built in. There are excerpts from graded readers and each book also has 2-3 graded short stories at the back. All attendees came away with a free copy of book 3.

After this, I missed the rest of the conference. I got stuck in conversation in the hall and ended up being late for the next presentation and the one after that as well. It’s my own fault, but the conversations were good, edifying and entertaining. This conference was a great opportunity to meet people, learn new things and network with other dedicated teachers. Hope everyone who attended enjoyed the conference and to all the readers that I met breifly It was good to meet you and I hope we get a chance to connect again in the future.

This conference has reinvigorated me and convinced me to get back into giving presentations as well as working towards materials development with some of the major publishers.

Unfortunately the ER colloquium extended into the next presentation slot so I had some free time. Yah, coffee. A short walk down to Starbucks and I was properly caffeinated. I also used this time to hit up publishers for samples of extensive readers and am expecting inspection copies in the mail over the next couple of weeks.

The next event was Jeremy Harmer’s plenary speech. I was quite looking forward to this as Harmer is the author of the first book I ever read on teaching theory, The Practice of English Language Teaching, and really helped me to become a better teacher. Not only is Harmer a brilliant author he is a dynamic, exciting and funny presenter. If you ever get the chance to see Harmer present be sure to go, you won’t be disappointed.  Harmer clearly does not live in an ivory tower and can easily connect with the audience. Just watch out for teachers, in the audience, who suggest that the word ”I” is the most important ”verb” in the English Language.

Harmer’s presentation went a little long and I was unable to make the next session. A short bit of walking around followed by listening to Neil Anderson talk about ACTIVE reading. Active English is the acronym in the image to the left. It is also the title of a series that the talk was promoting. The talk was quite interesting and was more academic than commercial.

At 2:00 I went to Thomas S.C. Farrell’s talk about reflective practice. This was a very interesting presentation. One thing that stuck with me was the idea that teachers may think a class went well or poorly but how do we know that. Teacher response is often I think, I feel, It seems that… Farrell actually asked a teacher one day and she responded with I think the class went well. He encouraged her to ask her students for confirmation and she found some out in the hall and asked them and apparently they felt the opposite of this teacher. It’s necessary to get concrete evidence.

Additionally Farrell further talked about teacher beliefs about how we teach vs how we really teach. He recommended setting up audio or video recorders in your class and then watch/listen to yourself to see if you teach the same way you believe you do. Turns out that quite often ones actions do not match ones beliefs. I am planning on actually recording myself before the end of this semester just to test this out.

I skipped out on the 3 pm presentation and went to Starbucks again. However at 4:00 I went to Marc Hegelson “So You Want to be an Author” presentation. This was really informative as there was a lengthy Q&A with Hegelson, an editor, a publisher, and a marketer from Pearson Longman. I definitely came away with some good ideas to apply towards the book that myself and a friend are writing.

Dinner
After dinner myself and a few others went out for dinner. I went with long time friend and co-author of the book I am writing DH. Jmac long term reader of this blog and infrequent commenter. It was really great to finally meet him and hope to meet again though he lives rather far away in the countryside. Also went out with two other teachers from my university who work in a different department and surprisingly read this blog though they did not know they worked at the same school as I do. Great conversation all around.

Korea TESOL Members and Friends,

Interest in our upcoming International Conference (October 27-28) is high. There have been a large number of pre-registrations on the final day of the regular pre-registrsation period. Because of this and the proximityof the Chuseok holidays, we have decided to extend the online pre-registration period for three more days to midnight Thursday, October 4th.

We hope you will take advantage of the pre-registration discounts, and consider the Friday tour of the Paju English Village. There are still seats available. See our web site for specifics.

For more details on the Conference in general, access the Conference pages on the KOTESOL web site.

If you haven’t done so already, familiarize yourself with the new and improved web site and KOTESOL accounts. All KOTESOL members were given a individual member account and instructions for accessing and using it. Member pre-registration and onsite registration both require accessing your individual account, for which you will need your username and password.

Pre-register and avoid the onsite registration lines.

The Conference Committee is hard at work to make this Conference the best ever.

Take advantage and pre-register today.

KOTESOL 2007:
The 15th Annual Korea TESOL
International Conference

Oct. 27-28, 2007
Sookmyung Women’s University, Seoul