Canadian vs. Korean High schools- Part 2

This post is Part 2 of a 2 part series comparing Canadian and Korean High schools. You can find Part 1 here .

Sick Days
As a teacher in Canada, one is entitled to a certain number of sick days each year. Last time I checked, the number was somewhere around 20. You can also use some of these days off for mental health or personal reasons. Anyone who has ever taught before is well aware of how tiring and stressful teaching can be. It's easy to get burnt out. The unions for high school teachers in Canada have fought hard with the government to ascertain these days and no one takes them for granted. If you're sick, you just stay home. No questions asked.

If you are sick as a teacher in Canada, you can arrange a substitute teacher in a few different ways. One of them is just to call your favourite sub and have them come in for you. This method is preferred when the substitute is already familiar with your students and is aware of how you run your classroom. If you know in advance that you will be absent for a conference, you will likely use this method. The other way is to use the automated system. This machine will go down the list of substitute teachers and call each one until someone clicks the button to accept the job. It's impersonal, but it's simple and it gets the job done.

In Korea, the situation with sick days is totally different. Although my contract allows me a handful each year, there is a lot of pressure on the teachers to come in anyway. You could be half dead with the flu, and you'd still be edu-taining up at the front of your classroom. This causes serious problems because then the teachers end up spreading the germs around to one another. The Korean teachers will not take a sick day unless they absolutely must due to a culture of shame, responsibility and the expectation of constant hard work. (This aspect of culture is difficult to explain. It's not to say that Canadians are lazy or that Koreans shame each other into working themselves to death. To really understand this, you'd likely have to experience the culture of both workplaces.)

Additionally, there is no substitute teaching system in place, which confounds this issue even more. No one wants to be responsible for taking a sick day because other teachers in the school have to cover their classes. In a high school where the subjects are so specialized, a lot of the teachers are totally unqualified to teach subjects that are not their own. For example, there's no way I could walk into a 3rd grade high school class here and teach physics. Just like there's no way most of the Korean teachers could walk into my classroom and teach English.  This leads to a period of the students and the teacher just sitting in the room for an hour doing nothing subject-related, or self study.

Vacation
At home, the vacation days for high school teachers are a combination of following the Christian calendar, in addition to the breaks between semesters, professional development days and national holidays. There are about 2 months of summer, 2 weeks at Christmas, one week for March break, time off between semesters, and the smaller breaks like the New Year, Thanksgiving Easter, and May 2-4 weekend. Except for the conferences on PD days, the teachers do not have to be in school and can choose to complete any additional work at home.

The Korean school system follows a calendar centered on Buddhism and lunar holidays. They have longer breaks for Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) and the Lunar New Year. At Christmas and for the January New Year, there is just one day off. PD days do not exist. The national holidays are for Buddha's birthday, Children's Day, Independence Day and National Foundation Day. They also receive the day off work whenever there is a national election. However, the summer and winter breaks between semesters here are really more of a stay-cation. The teachers of the "important" subjects like math, English and Korean must teach additional classes for the duration of the 5 week break and the students must attend. They may have one week off at the end to spend relaxing and prepping for the new semester.

Teaching Style and Technology
The style of teaching in Korea is still essentially what the West would call teacher-focused. The sole purpose of the high school classes is to prepare the students to take the university entrance exam. Thus, the majority of teachers will stand up at the front and deliver an hour long lesson followed by time for the students to complete relevant questions and exercises from the textbook. There is not a lot of group work and rarely an open discussion involving several members of the classroom. (My thoughts: Consequently, a majority of the students here have such a wealth of knowledge about things that Western children might not know. They are extremely familiar with calculus, history, English literature and physics because they have to study every subject and for so long. However, this style of teaching, has lead to little focus on critical thinking and more of a spoon-feeding mentality. It's evident in the classroom.)

A lot of schools in Korea have implemented some expensive technology like the SMARTboard and are equipped with flat screen TVs, projectors and a sound system in several classes. A lot of the lessons are accompanied by PowerPoint presentations and audio tracks in CD or MP3 format. It's quite similar to what you would see used in Canadian high school classrooms.  However, there is little use of manipulatives here and the majority of teachers are still using a chalk and chalkboard approach.

In recent years, Canadian teachers have made the shift to a more student-focused approach. The teacher is to be seen as more of a mentor and facilitator in the classroom. I have rarely seen a classroom in which the teacher will simply lecture for an hour. The teachers are also working within a framework focusing on the students having multiple intelligences and different learning styles. For example, because some students learn best from an audio-visual approach while others do better in a hands-on environment, the teacher will try to incorporate various methods of learning into the lessons. There is a lot more expectation concerning developing "differentiated"  lesson plans that are suitable for students of various academic skill. (My thoughts: There seems to be a higher level of critical thinking but less knowledge of hard facts among students at home. I really enjoy the student-focused style of teaching and I think the students do, too.  However, sometimes I feel the expectation to reach each student's level is mind-boggling and just impossible. Of course, we try our best to accomplish this but now it seems that every student is labeled with one exceptionality or another. Are we testing too much? Expecting too much? Labeling too much? It's complicated...but I suppose no system is perfect.)

There's just so much I could write on this topic but nothing would ever substitute for seeing both systems first hand. I think this is just enough to give you, lovely reader, a glimpse at both!