[music]
Strawberrykittlesful from Fayetfville USA asks
What are some of the differences between Korean students
and American/Canadian students
Is there anything that's weirder or different
and what about the school system?
So we thought about this for a long time,
even long before we got this question
because it's something that we're really interested in
because we were teachers both in Canada and Korea
so we really saw the differences between the students.
What we've noticed is that in North America
the goal is for students to be a unique person
to find out who you are, what you're good at
and to become different than other people
In the Korean system, it seems like being unique
or standing out from the crowd is looked down upon
Instead you should be trying to be a really good worker
and you find that out by studying really hard and getting really good grades
and in the Korean school system it seems that they're trying to find out
who is the best at studying hard, who is the best at memorizing
and who will as a result be the best worker.
Now don't get us wrong: there are definitely students
who are artistic and have creative opinions
but they are really strongly in the minority.
In North America it seems like you have an art class
or like a sports team or a shop class,
or something that really fits your personality
and you try to find something that really moulds into it
In Korea that really rarely ever happens.
So it's not that they don't have art class or sports teams
but it's a totally different approach than North America
In North America, while you're choosing and fighting hard
to get into something that you want to be good at
In Korea it's like you should do it, but you don't really have to like it
you don't really have to have enthusiasm because
really, a sports team isn't going to do anything for your career.
Now we see that this has a really big impact on student life in Korea
Students in Korea: their job is to be students
They study non stop. They go to school until 4PM
and then they go to another school program. They're studying all the time.
And even for the students that aren't interested in studying
they're just going through the motions,
they're not getting great grades, they're sleeping in class,
but they're going to school.
It's not like they drop out and get a part time job
That's very, very rare.
Now in North America, education isn't really that emphasized,
it's more about socializing. You go to school to see your friends
you go to school for the basketball clubs, you have your part time jobs
but education isn't really the main focus as it is here in South Korea.
Now we're not saying that there aren't hard working students in North America.
Absolutely of course there are
But the difference is that they kind of end up being socialized as well
Not only are they good at school, but they're also part of a team
or they have a boyfriend at school or a girlfriend
or they have friends outside of their school.
It's not just like only studying non-stop.
While in Korea it seems like you must study all the time.
Now one interesting thing that we've noticed is that
South Korean kids seem to be a lot better behaved than North American kids
It seems like South Korean kids are working so hard nonstop
they're being pushed by their parents
pushed by their parents, and they're studying for their university exams
so that when they're finally out of school they're so happy like
OMG I'm so happy! I just want to talk to some friends!
Now in North America it seems that kids are really bored
they're not being pushed by their teachers.
Their parents don't really have that big of an impact
on their education life as well
so in North America kids are just like...meh!
And because of that meh, what happens is that kids
end up drinking, and being bored and destructive
like graffiti or breaking bus shelters
we never see that in Korea. It's so bizarre!
I've never walked past a Korean pack of boys
and was worried that they might pick a fight with me for no reason.
While sometimes in North America I will have that worry,
like, bored highschool teenagers are gonna break stuff.
It seems like bored high school teenagers in Korea
give each other bike rides home.
You'll see two guys on a bike, one of them's on the back
they're, like, drinking soda
It seems to me like, not a boredom...I don't know!
It's like a group of Korean boys are like
We're free from class! Let's enjoy this time while we can!
Let's look at some girls!
Let's, I don't know, play at the PC Room,
Let's play games together,
but not "Let's get drunk and beat somebody up and destroy stuff"
Now we're not saying that you're gonna go to North America
and you're gonna have high school students beat you up
burn your car down, get pregnant and do drugs in the process
But it seems like it's a lot more in the minority here in South Korea
than what we've noticed in North America.
Now altogether it seems that in North America they foster
more of a creative atmosphere for students
They let you socialize more and try to realize who you want to be
Sometimes, though, there's a negative byproduct from too much freedom
when kids get bored and they wind up getting destructive
with their lives and with other people as a result
In Korea, because it seems that they're not socializing as much
learning the ropes like through clubs and part time jobs and stuff like that
It seems like they're developed to be more like a worker
and another part that can happen is that
a lot of people can be suppressing their personalities
and suppressing their uniqueness
just to become part of a drone working crowd.
and I think that can be really sad.
But then the positive byproduct is that
you have a society in which people aren't as destructive and breaking things
they're more respectful and it's a lot safer here.
So I think the bottom line is that
we are personally very torn about what system is doing it right.
In Korea you're fostering respect for society,
people are working hard, they know how to push themselves
and they have a very innocent, normal high school career,
but then on the other side, North America
is experiencing personality. You have love, you have loss,
freedom, socialization, and it changes who you are,
but then the problem is that you don't feel safe all the time there
While in Korea you can feel safe, but then
people can feel repressed and sad.
I don't know. What do you do?
The balance between the two is really difficult
You gotta get something in the middleground, right?
Hardworking and lack of individuality
versus too much individuality and violence
So that's it for this TL;DR
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Yes, because a lot of people don't realize that we have
two different channels for this.
That's right. We have our bonus channel and we have our main channel.
What channel are we on now?
We're on our bonus channel.
We should do something additionally bonus.
Should we make a third channel?
Oooh. OOOOHHHH!
Is it for Spudgy?
Spudgy channel!
I'd just sleep all day. Ooh Spudgy channel.
GONG!
Sexy Music