61st Multiculturalism thriving among children

By Kim Rahn

It was lunch time at Wonil Elementary School in Ansan, Gyeonggi Province, on Oct. 24.

At a fourth graders’ classroom, children were queuing up to get their school meal. Lining up, they were busy chatting, laughing and having a lark, with some boys smacking each other for fun.

Among them were Murun from Mongolia and Mutombo from the Republic of the Congo. They didn’t speak Korean as fluently as their Korean classmates, but it seemed that no one even cared.

It is because the school has many children of foreign parents mainly due to the location of the school ― Ansan, a city with 80,000 foreign residents along with numerous small- and mid-sized factories employing migrant workers.

“Our children don’t care which country a classmate is from. They had a classmate from Russia last year, another from China this year, so they don’t treat friends with foreign nationalities differently from native Koreans,” Sohn So-yeon, teacher at a special class for foreign students, said.

Of the school’s 550 students, about 100 are of foreign origin from 13 countries _ so called children of “multicultural families” comprised of Korean fathers and foreign mothers, and children of immigrant workers.

It seemed that this reporter was the only person in the school who distinguished foreign students from native Korean ones ― when asking Korean children whether they play with foreign friends in the same way as that with Korean friends, they didn’t seem to understand the question at all. Boys said they play football or play card games, while girls said they chat.

When asked whether language barrier prevents Korean and foreign students from mingling with each other, both Korean and foreign students said, “It doesn’t matter.”

Efforts for understand each other

Wonil is one of four model schools in the country designated to run special programs for foreign students.

It has two special classes for foreign children, mostly those of immigrant workers. “Huimangchan (full of hope) Global Village” is a class for newly-arrived students who barely speak Korean where teachers give almost one-on-one classes. “Haengbokhan (happy) Global Village” is that for those whose communication skills in Korean has got better.

At the happy global village, six children were learning names of foods and vegetables in Korean. “We have these foods very often in our school meals,” Sohn said, pointing at “dubu jorim,” or hard-boiled tofu.

After learning the names and having Korean dictation at the special class, the students returned to their own classes where they take lessons together with Korean classmates.

Although children with any nationality now mix with one another, it was not easy at the beginning, said Sohn, who has been in charge of the class for six years.

“When entering school as first graders, Korean and non-Korean students feel unfamiliar with each other, but after a few months, they get close. They are children and sometimes quarrel or bullying foreign students happens. It is then the teachers’ role ― mediating, and teaching them various viewpoints so that they can understand different cultures.”

She said teachers also had to learn different cultures. “Teachers first didn’t know why Chinese and Mongolian students often fought. We learned later that the relationship between the two countries is like that between Korea and Japan. Now we can mediate their disputes.”

Children learn various cultures

Not only foreign students learn Korean language but also Korean children learn foreign languages as they are exposed to them, Sohn said.

“For students who want to learn Russian, we opened an after-school program for the language. They are like, ‘I have a Chinese classmate and I want to talk with her, so I’ll learn Chinese.’ Years ago, some children who didn’t like Japan had a Japanese classmate. They studied Japanese hard because they wanted to have better Japanese speaking skills than the Japanese student’s Korean skills. They later obtained Japanese proficiency certificates.”

Special programs about foreign countries also help students learn various cultures. “It is fun to learn about other countries. Last time I learned about Taiwan, such as how to say ‘hello’ in Chinese and folk games,” Han Young-min, a fourth grader, said.

Sohn said, “We are not an international school, but children can learn international views.”

Unsolved problems

Parents who are immigrant workers are too busy to care about children’s school life and they don’t usually answer phones while working if an emergency about their children happens, Sohn said.

“We leave cell phone text messages, but the parents don’t read Korean. For those whose mother tongues teachers here can speak, we leave messages in those languages, but sometimes they don’t know how to read and write their own mother tongues,” she said.

She said the government should have specialized services for such children, adding such difficulties will be much more serious at ordinary schools having a small number of foreign students.

The teacher also worried about the foreign students’ future after graduation. “Here, students don’t care whether you are black or white. But outside, adults treat foreign children differently, usually in negative ways, so they get hurt. After graduating from here and advancing to middle school, I’m worried whether or not they can develop proper self-respect. Middle schools also have to provide special care programs for children who haven’t fully adapted to Korean culture.”