영어로 글 잘 쓰는 법 - Exercise (1)
14 Nov 2016다음 글은 예전에 저와 함께 공부했던 학생이 고등학교 1학년 때 쓴 글입니다. 그 당시 대원외고에서 주최한 “국제 영어 논술 대회(IEEC, International English Essay Contest)”에 참가하기 위해 쓴 글입니다. 물론 이대로 제출한 것은 아니고, 제가 교정해주었습니다. 영어로 에세이를 잘 쓰기 위해서는 무엇보다 많이 써보아야 하고, 또 자신이 쓴 글을 스스로 그리고 다른 사람에게 부탁해서 교정해봐야 합니다. 자신의 생각을 스스로 점검하고, 또 다른 사람에게도 점검을 받아보아야 글쓰기가 느는 것은 당연하겠지요.
아래의 글을 읽기 전에 제가 쓴 “영어로 글 잘 쓰는 법 (1) – 논리란 무엇인가”를 읽어보기 바랍니다. 그리고 아래의 글에서 논리적 전개에서 무리가 있는 부분은 무엇인지 찾아봅시다. 아울러 문법적 오류를 찾고, 이 글을 좀 더 짜임새 있게 전개하는 방법은 무엇인가를 생각해봅시다. 그 당시 IEEC의 논제는 다음과 같고, 바로 아래에 예전 학생의 글이 이어집니다.
Most of the students in my class chatter with others or sleep during classes. This is the situation we can easily see if we enter a class. There are two apparent reasons for such behaviors of students. They already know what they are learning by taking private lessons or are not interested in studying. For my class the former is prevalent. Students learn things in institutes, come to school, get tired of studying what they already learned, and therefore do not pay attention to teachers.
According to ‘an analysis of Korean parents’ education fervor’ published by Korea Education Development Institute, it appeared that 73.3% of the students are having private education in addition to school lessons by attending institutes, tutoring, and having Internet lessons.
They spend 6.8 hours a week on private lessons and pay 277,000 won per month on the average, consuming 12.7% of family budget and thus bringing a large impact on the family budget.
There are many reasons causing our country’s unprecedented private education boom. Main ones, however, are deterioration of the quality of the public education, Korean parents’ intemperate education fervor, and prevalence of social structure where academic clique is weighty.
Korean public education advocating equalitarianism doesn’t offer courses where students with higher or lower interest in studying can attend to attain right lessons for them, so students’ aptitudes or interests are not considered and teachers are indifferent to them.
Also schools don’t provide students with various courses from which students can gain diverse education and Advanced Placement courses-courses that boarding schools in the US run to fulfill individual students’ wants and needs-where students with high aptitude, ability and interest can take. Instead prevalent is memorization of knowledge needed to enter the college.
Students do not have the chance to speculate and study on their own to have various experiences and broaden their horizons. Prevalent is the injection education in which mutual learning is impossible and students are memorizing things without comprehension.
Many students go to institutes to complement their insufficient and superficial knowledge gained at school. Private education provides students with classified courses for students with different interest or level as well as athletics, arts and music lessons hard to take at school. Besides private teachers show care about individual students and help them in many ways. Namely public education is losing in competition against private education.
In addition to the problems of public education mentioned above becoming indispensable is private education owing to our parents’ passion for education and Korean social structure favoring academic clique which in turn forces students to compete with each other excessively.
I had the chance to see the high schools in the US lately and talked with the students and the teachers there.
I could feel that the US schools are providing students with various courses through wide and well-equipped gymnasiums, science centers, art centers, and many other kinds of facilities as well as numerous qualified teachers.
Provided were more than 200 courses divided into levels and interests. Students were able to choose the courses that are appropriate for them both in aptitude and level, and each class consisted of a teacher and a few students in which discussions are possible so that students can broaden their horizons.
Teachers were always there to help students solve their problems including college counseling.
Private education is unlikely to be taken here. Not only possible was various extracurricular activities but also possible was taking courses appropriate for individual aptitude and level.
Though I am not sure if these kinds of educations are possible since these schools were private schools to which students must pay a large amount of money, there are definitely something that we must learn from them.
It is classified courses that need to be achieved in order to keep students from turning to private education. Not needed are preplanned schedules and lessons for all-though there was the reformation at the 7th Education Curriculum, it is not working-but needed is classified courses which can reflect students’ interest and aptitude most.
Also needed are the creative activities where students can learn music, sports, or arts they like to refine their taste and make them well-rounded people who can lead the world.
Then education must be reformed to allow students to do various activities including experiments, investigations, and discussions to improve their understanding and thinking ability to solve problems on their own.
In order for these reformations to be made the academic clique favoring social structure must be changed. Unjustified is the society where academic achievements overwhelm everything but right is the society where people can live well by improving their aptitudes and abilities not only by attending good colleges but also by doing things they really like and can do well in any places.
When schools perform not as a preparatory school for college entrance but as a place where students can learn to think and solve problems on their own as well as media through which one can specify one’s aptitude and interest, public education will flourish and the opposite will be private education.
The education can improve a country in many ways including politics, economics, society, and cultures. It is reinforcement of public education in Korea that is needed to fulfill most of the demands of society and to consolidate our country’s position in the world.