The New Dork

The Korea Times posted an article yesterday touting Twitter as a significant force in this week's elections. While I knew that Korean people knew about Twitter, because I have often been asked if I was on it-- usually before being barraged with questions about Obama-- I didn't know that many Korean nationals actually use the site. Though the article seemed to possibly be overstating the case-- a 400,000 person presence on Twitter significantly turned the outcome of elections?-- it brought me back mentally to 2008 in the US and to the feeling of familiarity and home.

I suppose, though, that I shouldn't have been as struck by this as I was. After all, one of the top 3 aspects of Korean culture that foreigners here name as most notable is TECHNOLOGY. I was initially surprised when I learned this-- I probably would have said something about kimchi, or the Korean work ethic myself-- but that is probably just because I am completely technologically challenged and so do not have my eyes open to that sort of thing; my grandparents and I relate well when it comes to stuff like computers and text messages. With a little research, however, I came to learn that Korea is in fact the seventh most wired country in the world, and is ranked second only to Hong Kong in Asia according to Forbes magazine, which doles out its rankings not only on based on tech-usage, but tech-friendly government policies. So it seems that Korea and technology experience a mutual loving relationship.

I have certainly seen this mutual embrace reflected by my students. These kids are all about their computer games. It is literally all they claim to do, aside from study, sleep and eat. In my classes, it has even gotten to the point that anytime I am teaching a lesson related to hobbies, I qualify that speaking about computer games is off limits, just so they have the opportunity to learn some new vocabulary. Even so, their resolve to talk about computers is unshakable. Today, I asked a student what kind of house he wanted to have when he grew up, and he answered that he wanted a house with four P.C. rooms devoted solely to gaming. At home, a statement like that might have earned that student a few less-than-kind snickers, but here it garnered a roomful of enthusiastic nods of agreement.

I'm always looking for ways to harness this enthusiasm for technology to excite the students about English. Recently, I've been translating songs into text lingo and having them compete to decode the songs and guess the name of the artist. I've also come across this remake of Empire State of Mind called The New Dork- Entrepreneur State of Mind. The students in my advanced classes completely get a kick out of it, because the lyrics all refer to a world they can relate to well.