Expression
by Janine Perri, ETA ’15-’16 “Teacher, I am shy. I don’t have a lot of confidence.” Chan Young, one of my best students at Gimhae Jeil High School, sat across the table from me during English conversation club. He spoke English almost as well as a native speaker, yet he rarely participated in class and often hesitated before speaking with me. I could relate. Shyness was a feeling I knew very well, especially when I was his age. “I am shy, too!” I said with understanding. “I know what that’s like. I am an introvert.” Chan Young, usually so solemn, cracked a small smile and shook his head. “No, Teacher. I think you are extrovert.” I felt my smile fade a little. An extrovert? Impossible! He may as well have looked at my brown hair and said, “I think you look like Taylor Swift.” Recovering myself, I gestured toward the front of the classroom. “See this?” I asked. “This is my stage. When I teach, I am an actress. I am actually shy and quiet.” Chan Young was unconvinced. He shrugged, as if to say—“If you say so, Teacher.” In America, I was like Chan Young—a shy, introverted student with my head always buried in a book. When I first came to Korea, I was nervous that my quiet personality would not be effective in a foreign language classroom. I would be teaching students from a culture, with a different language and different expectations of their English teacher. The ETA must adapt to Korea and Korean students, we were told at orientation. For me, part of that change would mean that my face and actions would have to express what words could not. I remembered that during my first few days of teaching. I was setting up my computer in the classroom when a student in the front row said, “Teacher, so serious!” I realized that I had been frowning when the projector would not turn on, so I quickly softened my expression. I did not want to be another “serious” teacher, and I could tell my students felt the same. The changes were subtle at first. I made a concentrated effort over my first two weeks to smile more often and become the friendly teacher my students wanted. By the time I had met all of my students, I was using more gestures and facial expressions to complement the simple English I used. The textbook was boring enough as it was, so I tried to compensate by exaggerating my mannerisms so much that I looked like an entertainer. I smiled and tried to show excitement over the stilted listening exercises in the textbook. I laughed too loudly when my students told a joke. I became an outgoing, sometimes over-dramatic English teacher, feeding off the enthusiastic student choruses of “Hi, Janine Teacher!”. Every action, every emotion became over-exaggerated in an attempt to communicate and–in the case of some less motivated students–cajole or amuse. After all, this was what their foreign English teacher was supposed to do, right? “When you are with English teachers, you are quiet, introverted,” a co-teacher told me a few weeks into the semester. “I was surprised to see how animated you were with students.” “She noticed!” I thought. “I must be doing something right.” But I was not. I had told Chan Young that it was acting. Then I started to wonder–if it was acting, did that mean I was not sharing my authentic self with my school and community? Had I really changed so much, or was it this persona that my students call “Janine Teacher”? Being expressive and an extrovert was so foreign to me it seemed fake. I wanted to adapt to my students and meet their expectations of being a “fun” teacher. But I began to worry that I was turning into something I am not. Midway through the semester, I met with a team of four students, including Chan Young, to prepare for an upcoming debate conference in Busan. As I listened to my students read through their speech about North Korean defectors I was struck by the precision in pronunciation and grammar, but lack of emotion in their delivery. They spoke loudly and clearly, but their hands stayed at their sides and their voices were monotonous. I was surprised to realize that it was, in some ways, like watching myself as a student in America—precise and proper with my words, but guarded and measured with the way I felt. After my students finished speaking, I went to the board and wrote one word: PATHOS. “Pathos means emotion,” I explained. “When you read a speech, you want the audience to feel your words. Make them sad. Make them angry. Make them want to take action!” My students nodded, but they looked confused. “How?” asked Chan Young. That was a good question. I thought for a minute about my teaching—how I often pretended to be excited about textbook topics like sound waves or anger management. I realized I did not want them to be acting to express themselves – and they did not have to for this debate. This was a topic my students and I chose together because we were passionate about refugee crises, in Korea and other parts of the world. Outside of the classroom, we often had discussions about politics and our empathy for those displaced from their homes. This was something they could connect to, could care about, could express. “Can you show us how to do it?” I read their speech, watching their transfixed eyes as I varied my pitch, tone, and emotions to match the words. As I read about the struggles that North Korean defectors faced in fleeing to the South, I felt my throat tighten as I remembered the stories of defectors I have encountered during my grant year. I thought of the North Korean defectors I taught on Tuesday nights, of the old and young students who struggled to find a
Lights
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Army Lessons
by Leanndra Padgett, ETA ’14-’15 When I began learning Korean, little did I expect that I would need to know the sentence, “저는, 군대에서, 군인에게 영어를 가르칠 거예요,” or “I will teach English to soldiers at the army.” But after moving to Hwacheon, a South Korean town close to the northern border, it has become an essential phrase which I have often repeated. The middle school where I teach has an agreement with the military police wherein the middle and high school foreign teachers lead a weekly English class at a local base. In exchange, soldiers tutor our students. Every Thursday, a fellow native English teacher and I walk to the base, which is only about five minutes from my homestay. As we approach the gate, the guards say “Hello!” wave and smile at us before raising the barrier. Then we eat a slightly awkward dinner in the dining hall that is known for quantity over quality. We usually sit at the officials’ table, and the younger guys who we teach are either quite friendly or ignore us completely (usually indicating whether they plan to attend or skip our class that particular week). After eating copious amounts of the rice, greasy fried chicken and kimchi that we have generously been offered, we walk to the conference room that doubles as our classroom. Once the officials clear out, the students make their way in. I have never quite understood how the participant selection process works, but I know that some are there by choice while others are under a type of obligation to attend our class. Different soldiers come each week, but after several months, we have our regulars who keep the visitors and new students on track. There’s Shawn[1. Names have been changed.] who is highly motivated because he will move to Australia soon. He often stays behind after class to ask questions about living abroad. Then there’s Doug, who spoke English while living in the Philippines and has the skills of a native speaker. We rely on him and a couple of others to help translate when our lessons are misunderstood. Others come and go but by now, we have worked with many of the men of this division. Eating army meals, walking through the base and interacting with soldiers gives us, young foreigners teaching soldiers close to our own age, a blurry view of the world of the ROK army. Before Hwacheon, I never envisioned that my time in Korea would include glimpses into such a world, but it has, resulting in unique memories and unexpected lessons. I have been most surprised, not by the discovery that soldiers are just ordinary people, but by the realization that ordinary people are soldiers. South Korea’s compulsory service regulations mean that every Korean man will serve in the army by age 35. While there are career soldiers, many of these men (if not the majority) are just recent high school graduates and college kids fulfilling their national duty. As I consider the danger and solemnity of their roles, I am shaken to think that every one of my rambunctious middle school boys, every one of my adorable male host cousins – every Korean man – will serve in active duty. I understand why my host mom once said that she was happy to have only daughters. While they have various motivations and causes for doing so, all American soldiers choose to enlist. For Korean men, it is a predetermined course; they must join, just as they must attend grade school. This leads to a unique combination of people from all walks of life, many of whom are not individuals that I would peg as soldiers. They are just ordinary people in a situation of conflict, patriotism and camouflage. Even after months of living here, I am still surprised and affected by the mingling of the military world and the Korean Mayberry that is Hwacheon. For instance, one day a few weeks into my grant year, I heard what I assumed was a train roaring by my school, only to wonder how I had missed seeing the train station before. Looking out the school window, past the soccer field and convenience store, I saw tank after tank charging down the main street. It’s just not what I expected in this town with only one traffic light. Then again, I didn’t expect to find a combination stationary and army supply store either. Colorful stickers and notebooks are shelved next to camouflage jackets and army paraphernalia. But no one in Hwacheon seems to question this unlikely combination. Locals know that you have to get to the bus station early on weekends in order to reserve a seat to or from Hwacheon before the soldiers take them all. I have made the rookie mistake of showing up too late and missed my ride because there were so many soldiers going or coming from their weekend vacation. Daily I see mothers, fathers and girlfriends making the most of their beloved soldiers’ time off, as they walk the streets hand in hand. While in no way does the village feel occupied or in conflict, the military presence is strong here. Hwacheon seems to be, not a military town full of ordinary people, but an ordinary town full of the military. Perhaps the most poignant demonstration of this was a moonlight festival that I attended. It was held at an elementary school a few kilometers north of my town, and a few kilometers south of the DMZ. A fellow native English teacher had invited the foreigners in the community to come participate in her school’s festival. There were carnival games, cups of odeng [2. Odeng is a fish cake on a stick, often sold as street or festival food.] and other traditional foods, group aerobics, field day competitions and a concert put on by students and their teachers – who were also soldiers. I had expected to have fun and see something new, but had not anticipated to be