I would describe myself as a language obsessive, spending a good portion of each of my days learning and reading in foreign languages, with my current ambition being to speak over ten conversationally by the time I reach thirty. I recently graduated with First Class Honours in a BA French and Philosophy degree at UCL, in which I excelled in particular in my French literature modules despite coming from a monolingual household. Furthermore, for the past two years I have been learning Hindi, as prior to Covid-19 it had been my desire to move out there, and I also speak fluent Spanish from my time teaching English in Chile. If offered the post with you in South Korea, not only could I bring my knowledge of French and Spanish to help organise optional classes for the students, but I'd be keen to learn the Korean language from them as well.
My time teaching English in Chile revealed a lot to me about the things that are most useful when trying to teach a class a new language. Most of my students had little hope of leaving the small town of Coihaique where we were situated, and so the desire to learn English itself was something I immediately recognised in them as rather diminished. My teaching approach therefore tried to focus on the ways in which the English language did bare relevance on their lives, as I incorporated elements from video games and films into my class, and did a lesson where I talked about Arsenal football club, my team, and incidentally also the home of superstar Chilean footballer Alexis Sanchez at the time. Such approaches I thought helped keep the class more engaged, and certainly prevented my lessons from being tedious exercises of repetition or copying-out verb tables.
I am outgoing by nature, and really excited by the possibility of working with you in what would be a completely new environment for me, where I am sure I will live up to the challenge. I would hope to convert my wealth of knowledge on language learning itself into a valuable asset for you, and a likeable teacher for the students, and would be sure to engage myself in all aspects of scholastic life.
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