Hellobee

I was about 8 years old when I started attending Korean school at a local church. All the other students were children of first generation immigrants and already spoke Korean fluently at home, so we were there to learn how to read and write. Most of my Korean and Chinese friends attended language school on Saturdays during their elementary school years, and it was actually fun so I never minded going. Though I didn’t attend very long (Korean is a very easy language to read/write), the skills I gained have served me to this day, and I always thought that I would send my own kids to Korean school as well.

But then I fell in love with and married Mr. Bee, who is half-Japanese and half-American (German-Irish). So our kids are 1/2 Korean, 1/4 Japanese, and 1/4 German-Irish. We both wanted our kids to have a strong ethnic identity and learn at least one language fluently, but first we had to decide which language we wanted the kids to learn.

P I C K I N G  A  L A N G U A G E

Pretty quickly, we both agreed that Korean school seemed to make more sense.  Our reasons included the following:

• I’m more fluent in Korean than Mr. Bee is in Japanese.
• We also eat a lot of Korean food at home, since I do most of the cooking.
• We spend more time with my Korean parents and brother, since they live in California while Mr. Bee’s parents live overseas.
• There are more Korean language schools here in New York than there are Japanese ones.

For all these reasons, we decided to send our kids to Korean school. We decided to enroll Charlie and Olive at the beginning of this year right after they turned 3 and 5, as 3 is the minimum age of enrollment. It was a big commitment because it was 4 hours from 9am-1pm every Saturday morning, plus 2 hours of commuting by subway. Because attending Korean school after a full week of regular school is a lot of learning, we don’t have the kids in any extracurricular activities.

H O W  I T ‘ S  G O N E  S O  F A R

The experience Charlie and Olive have had at Korean school is completely different from my own, with kids ranging from full Korean to part Korean, to adopted Korean kids with American parents. The kids do practice reading and writing, but at this age it’s more about learning to speak the language and about the culture.

Before my kids started Korean school, I hadn’t taught them any Korean. I didn’t have many opportunities to speak it organically around them since I speak English with Mr. Bee and all my friends, and my parents speak English fluently as well. Since my kids didn’t speak any Korean before starting Korean school, I knew that it would realistically take years for them to learn very much. Our goal was more for them to be exposed to Korean culture, which was a big part of the curriculum. 2 hours are spent on Korean instruction, and the other 2 hours are spent on cultural electives like Korean art, dance, k-pop and taekwondo.

Olive doing her Korean school homework

I do think 3 is a little young to attend four hours of language school and I wish it were a bit shorter. It’s been fine for Charlie because he has a very close friend in his class, and 5 year olds can take taekwondo with an awesome teacher, which is the highlight of the program for Charlie. Luckily both kids are pretty adaptable to new settings and there hasn’t been too much complaining about waking up so early on Saturdays. The classes at their school are organized by age, and starting from age 6 (Charlie’s class) the classes are taught completely in Korean!

Some parents in our neighborhood have organized a private Korean class for older kids. But exposure to Korean culture was more important to us at this age, so we opted for Korean school and may look into a private tutor with a group of friends when the kids are older.

E T H N I C  I D E N T I T Y

Having an ethnic identity is not something I thought much about growing up because I’m full Korean. But because Mr. Bee is half Japanese, he had a much different experience and thought about his ethnicity often. We’ve talked about what our kids will consider themselves as they grow up. Almost all the Asian kids they know are half. Will they just identify as “Asian” because they are 3/4 Asian and look Asian? By the time they have kids, will their kids identify as “American”? So much can happen in one generation’s time, as we’ve seen with European immigrants.

Prior to attending Korean school, Charlie would say he was Japanese because he knew that Mr. Bee identified as Japanese. Once they started going to Korean school, Charlie and Olive started saying they were Korean. The kids don’t really have a strong cultural identity right now, but it’s something we’re working on.  Once we’re living in the Philippines, we’ll be able to visit Korea and Japan where we both have a lot of relatives, and now that they kids are older, I think they’ll be able to better understand their cultural and ethnic background.

Making kimbap and dduk (rice cake) from scratch at Korean school

As for what we do at home, we incorporate Korean traditions such as eating dduk gook (rice cake soup) and dressing up in hanboks (traditional Korean costumes) on New Year’s every year. They eat a lot of Korean food because that’s what I cook. They’re familiar with Korean cartoons like Pororo. And though they’ve learned very little actual Korean since starting Korean school, they have learned cultural customs such as bowing and more about Korean traditions and holidays.

jesa ceremony at my parents’ house last New Year’s where we honor our ancestors

I’m definitely going to try to keep up their Korean studies while we’re in the Philippines because I want the kids to have a strong ethnic identity. We will teach them about both Korean and Japanese culture, but emphasize Korean language for now since I’m a native speaker and we can start speaking it more at home.

Are you doing anything to teach your child a second language or culture?