Yoo graduated from Kangnam University in 1995 with a BA in business and received a master's degree in business at Aston University in England. Afterwards, she returned to Korea and began teaching preparation for the TOEIC English proficiency test, which is still widely taken in Korea. "I leave home around six-thirty in the morning and give TOEIC lectures from 7 a.m to 2 p.m. I teach about 1,000 people, 200 in each of the five classes," she says. "After the lectures, I head over to the Yoo soo-youn English Center, which I established, around 2.30 p.m. When I'm done there, I head back to my classes and lecture from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. I usually handle three classes of 200 people. My day officially ends when I get home around 11 p.m. I usually go to sleep at 1.30 a.m. in the morning after I check online posts and comments related to my lectures. I haven't slept for more than five hours a day since I became an adult."
And most importantly:
Constantly juggling a busy schedule, Yoo has no time to put on makeup.
She certainly puts in the work. You'll remember the Korea Herald profiled Yoo a few months ago, but put her annual salary at two billion won.
Yoo analyzed the past seven years of TOEIC questions and found that 800 key words appear most frequently. This means students should learn these key words thoroughly instead of simply checking their definitions in a dictionary, she said.
Another tip for test takers is that knowledge about usage matters in TOEIC. "Most students think they know the words like 'reveal' and 'emerge' but when it comes to specific usage, many do not know how to use such simple yet useful words properly," Yoo said.
Taking simulated TOEIC as a practice is recommended but an analytical approach is needed, Yoo said. "Once students complete one set of TOEIC questions, they should sleep on the questions they have missed. Why did I fail to get the right answer? What is the purpose of this question? Asking these questions can be really helpful in reducing errors and set a direction for self study," she said.
You can find a bunch of her videos on the internet via a Naver search. Yes, I know that Korea has a different interpretation of "English" than native speakers do, and that Koreans are interested in English as a test subject rather than English as a language, but when I read about these millionaire Korean English teachers, I can't help thinking someone's pulling a fast one on the public. I definitely cringe when colleagues show me their study materials and the errors just jump off the page. Certainly if people complain about "unqualified" native speaker English teachers who have an incomplete knowledge of grammar, for example, it's also a legitimate concern when Korean English teachers earn large salaries but struggle with speaking and pronunciation. But, well, as we know, it's a matter of priorities, and for Koreans standardized exams that test English grammar and vocabulary are extremely important, while communicative competence really isn't at all.
Anyway, you may also remember that in July Yahoo rather lazily reported on the phenomenon of rich English teachers in Korea. Though Korean teachers are among the highest-paid in the world, earning millions of dollars a year certainly isn't the norm, nor does
"If you want to strike it rich, go teach in South Korea"
as the report begins hold true for foreigners teaching here.
6 comments:
I got a laugh out of her comment that many Korean English teachers attended her lectures to learn her teaching style. Yoo lectures in a large hall filled with 200 adult students. Test-taking tips can be delivered through a mass lecture, but language acquisition is not developed in that medium. An effective high school teacher of English should NOT be lecturing in front of the class.
I wonder if she really makes 1 billion a year. She may bring in that much in revenues, but after subtracting expenses, her actual earnings may be much less. I also wonder if she didn't pass a white envelope or two to the newspapers to get them to write glowing reports that will bring in more students.
Teaching for a test is different than actually teaching the language. That she's able to effectively (?) communicate with 200+ students affirms her celebrity status or charming whatever - or she's telling them exactly what they want to hear... Or she's Korean version of a tele-evangelist...
To play the devil's advocate here for a minute, she is encouraging students to learn 800 words, while it might not make some students fluent, I do know that it is 800 more words than my worst middle school students. Anyone who works in public schools or who has used the the dreadful middle school English series knows that vocabulary is rarely taught in any comprehensible manor so learning 800 words might actually be helpful.
On the other hand, Koreans seem to be somewhat susceptible to sloganeering, and the whole self help pandemic. Just go to any English book section of a Korean book store, and you will find that many of the books that aren't English text books are about getting rich, living your best life now, or are from the Chicken soup for the soul series.
English falls into that category here. English is about like a self help or diet book, and to this lady's credit she is earning her money with the amount of work that she is doing. It just goes to show what the market will pay for and what people think they want.
This guy apparently makes 10 times that much by preparing students for the university entrance exams.
http://news.naver.com/main/hotissue/read.nhn?mid=hot&sid1=102&iid=112439&oid=055&aid=0000166102&ptype=011&cid=307180
My wife (Korean) said it the best way I have ever heard it:
"These teachers are not teaching English, they are teaching TOEIC".
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