English education in Korea

When I prepared English education presentation, I learned many things from this. Although my major is English, I don’t know a lot of issues about English education before this presentation. It was a chance for me to think this matter carefully. English is always never-ending cycle in Korea. English is not our mother tongue, but the essence of student’s skill is English. Every student, even the kindergarten student is crazy about learning English in Korea. Some people called this situation, ‘English fever in South Korea’.

           I was really shocked about 98% middle schools divide classes by student’s English level. When I was a middle and high school student, I always take English class with my classmates. Our schools are never grouped students by our English level. So I have no experience about putting students in different English classes. Some people insist that this way is not particularly good for students. They say that low-level students will feel a sense of incompatibility and also the atmosphere in this class will be bad. In my book, I think that this way will be more effective. Every student’s English proficiency is totally different. In other words, it is very difficult to teach different levels of students by the one teacher.

           Because of the current president, English education will be changed to ‘NEAT’ from KSAT. And this is the hot debate in Korea until now. NEAT is quite different from KSAT. So, many students and parents start to confuse about variation of English education environment. And I think that this is quite a sudden change. The new English education should be phased in the long-term and do not confuse students.

           In conclusion, we should think this matter deeply and put various reports together about English education. President does not operate English education under his own power. It is the sensitive matter for many students, teachers and parents. We have to find the best way of English education step by step.