My First Month in Seocheon

My inner monologue in the Classroom

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a little over five weeks since I started living in Seocheon and teaching at Communal Vision High School. The past month has been a whirlwind of experiences and complete immersion into Korean culture.

When I first matched with Vision and Seocheon, I was terrified of the language barrier and the potential isolation from the other ETAs, and, when I first arrived to my host family and found that they didn’t speak any English, it was a hard transition from the safe, American bubble that was my six-week orientation experience. We communicated exclusively through translation app at first, which was tedious and caused several miscommunications.

Soon (shockingly soon), however, I began to acclimate to my new surroundings. I have four host siblings, which is very uncommon in Korea, and they are a RIOT. They are six, eight, ten, and thirteen, and there is never a dull moment at our apartment. My host mom is basically superwoman because not only does she cook and clean and raise four kids, but she also owns a nail salon. My host dad works for a delivery company, so he isn’t around much. My host mom has me call her 이모(ee-mo), which means Aunt, and she is incredibly patient with me. I feel extremely lucky to be with this family for this experience. Being at home (what I thought would be the hardest part of this experience because of the language barrier) has easily become the most comforting part of this whole deal.

The kids and I eat together every night, and I’ve tried to find other ways to assimilate into the family dynamic as well. I’ve attended my host brother’s soccer games, gone on walks with my host sister, explored cafes with my younger host sister, and played endless games of dominos with my youngest host sib. I’m learning that there are so many ways to bond that transcend traditional communication.

Also, I’m learning a lot of Korean, which was one of my goals for this experience. I am able to put anything that I learn to practice immediately, so that has accelerated my Korean learning by 1000 percent. I am by no means speaking in full conversations, but I can tell that I have already improved in the five weeks since I arrived in Seocheon. If you are looking to learn a language, I would 10/10 recommend the homestay experience for anyone studying or traveling abroad.

Now, as for the teaching… Despite all of the tips and tricks we learned at Orientation, I couldn’t help but feel unqualified and slightly unprepared to practice a profession in which I had no formal training. As with many things I’ve tried though, I just had to go for it and learn from my mistakes. My school is a small, private, and Christian school just outside of Seocheon, which was familiar territory as far as I was concerned. There are six classes with an average of 15-20 students each, and they are honestly the best part of this experience. That doesn’t mean I don’t have my fair share of classroom management issues and such, but they are genuinely such lovable goofballs so that stuff is very minor.

Another perk of this school is that I have complete freedom in the classroom. Each Fulbright Korea ETA has a co-teacher at his or her school, and that co-teacher usually assists the ETA in the classroom in some capacity. My co-teachers are pretty hands-off though, so I get to teach whatever I want and decide on lesson content myself, which has been really fun. It takes a lot of planning, but it’s been so rewarding to plan games and lessons around concepts that I want to impart to my students. So far, I’ve done units on traveling, love languages, American high school, using nouns and adjectives to describe things (aka Pokémon: my boys loved that one), ordering in a restaurant, and music genres to give you an idea about how chill my lessons are.

I have also been able to travel a fair amount since moving here. I should never have worried about the isolation because I am one short train ride away from Iksan, where I can take a train all the way to Seoul or Busan. I visited Sejong for a friend’s birthday, went to Seoul to get my laptop fixed after it broke during my first week (RIP since I use my laptop to show PPTs in every class), and made some day trips to Iksan and Jeonju. I’m trying to balance traveling and staying in town to bond with my host family.

All in all, I feel that I’m learning at an exponential rate about Korean culture and teaching. While it can be overwhelming at times, there are moments when I still think, “I’m really doing it. I’m actually living and working in South Korea.” And I feel kind of amazed that I’m actually here.

Some highlights from my encounters with a completely different culture:

• All teachers and students brush their teeth after eating, and they think it is extremely gross that American students do not.

• Korean children do not have a bedtime. Seriously, my host sibs stay up later than I do most nights, and several other ETAs have had the same experience.

• My biggest challenge in the classroom is sleeping students. In Korea, it is perfectly normal for kids to sleep in class, so at any given point in class, I’ll have one or two sleeping students. Trust me, no matter how much dancing, singing, or projecting I do, they sleep through it all.

• Everyone always greets each other (it’s called insa), so I bow and say “안녕하세요” every time I see a teacher. The funny part is that the students have to insa me as well, so they bow to me every time they see me, which makes me chuckle. I wave back and say hello in English though, so some of them have started to wave and yell “HELLO TEACHER!!!!!!” when they see me.

• Food delivery is huge here. My host mom orders fried chicken every Friday, and it has quickly become the highlight of my week.

• Korea is very safe. Like, super safe. Crime really isn’t a thing around here, and I can feel the difference. People leave their things places, the kids actually play outside, and many people go for walks at night. It’s incredible how much more freedom you feel like you have when you don’t always have to worry about your safety.

• Public transportation here is awesome. Safe, clean, efficient, and, best of all, cheap, it is what dreams are made of for an American that’s used to opposite.

I would be lying if I said that this experience has been all fun and games, but, overall, this has been the craziest, most joyful and definitely most adventurous thing I’ve ever done in my life. I can’t wait to see how much I learn and grow in the upcoming year.