The overall implementation of the five-day study week, what programs are there to enjoy?
From the first semester of this year, the five-day study week has gone into effect. The five-day study week is a system which requires students to attend classes only in the weekdays, not the weekend. To support this system, Seoul city is currently advertising and opening some great activities for young students. Seoul City is going provide 1,171 elementary, secondary and high schools with an expense of 142 million won(statistics: www.youthnavi.net) to create suitable programs for students to enjoy during their free time in the weekends. Newly created activities are categorized into two parts. One is supported and organized by local schools and the other is arranged by special organizations. The former is consisted of activities which can be performed inside classrooms. Schools usually divide these programs into academic clubs (토요학습클럽), cultural art clubs(토요문화예술클럽) and sports clubs(토요스포츠클럽). The latter arranges most of the activity programs, like meeting with artists, trip to museums, looking into universities and visiting archaeological sites. Most of the students who participate in these programs are elementary students because older students choose to focus on their academic studies and voluntary activities rather than on the provided weekend programs. To find out more about the new system, I personally participated in some weekend activities with students.
In school
Schools within the Seoul district are currently opening some weekend activities. For students who do not go to school during the weekends due to the five-day study week system, these activities will not only look after children with busy parents but they will also be a great opportunity for inventing students’ skills and creativeness. Students are informed about these programs through school newsletters and they can easily participate by signing up for the activities.
On the 24th of March, 14 students of Seoul Guui Elementary School took part in an animation&cartoon program. This was a Saturday program organized by the Seoul Guui Elementary School along with 5 other programs like tennis clubs, badminton clubs, traditional percussion quartet clubs and Chinese language clubs.
Inside a classroom, students were educated about the basic skills of drawing cartoons. A student named Ko Hyun Seung (12) said that he came to draw cartoons because “it is a more effective way to spend my weekends. Although I could just sleep in during the weekends, that would be wasting my time. It is rather beneficial for me to come to school on the weekends and learn some useful skills from the Saturday programs.” Parents who allowed their children to take part in the Saturday programs organised by the school had interesting reasons.
One parent of the Seoul Guui Elementary, Cha Myung Shin (39) explained that the “Saturday Programs are free and has less pressure compared to After-school programs. Although there are only a few classes arranged in our school, these can help children to create useful habits and they can try new things with active participations.”
Activity Programs Outside
From 10 May 2012 to 16 February 2013, the Seoul City has announced that it will be starting a weekend activity program named “Weekend Happy Tour(주말행복투어)”. Each weekend program is established every weekend by 4 different districts of Seoul. A wide variety of activity programs like experiencing farm productions and making cultural art materials are being organized by civil groups and social enterprises which are selected through contests. The first district is supported by ‘Seoul City Mullae Youth Center(서울시립문래청소년수련관)’ (02-2167-0131), the second district by ‘Kwangwoon University’(광운대학교) (02-6715-6650), the third district by ‘Gangnam Seocho Korean Federation for Environmental Movement(강남서초환경운동현합)’ (02-574-7047) and the fourth district is being assisted by ‘Future we make(우리가만드는미래)’ (02-761-2588). Any student who wants to participate can sign up by calling the organizations or by visiting their websites. These groups offer an advantageous prescription for children who are teaching underprivileged and free lunch for participating students.
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On the 17th of March, a historical culture program was held in the Amsa-dong Prehistoric Settlement Site. Elementary students of Geumcheon-gu and Gwanak-gu were divided into groups of 12 and an instructor from the hosting companies was arranged with each group. The instructor explained the historic sites and educated young students about the long history of Korea. An interview with an instructor from the industry ‘Travel story(여행이야기)’ was helpful to understand her views about the weekends programs.
Q. Could you briefly explain the historical culture program?
“Well, you could just think of it as an activity program or a method of private education. It is a spot-experience activity but focuses on history trips. On the weekends, I meet with a group of children
regularly and take them around the historic sites. But since today’s theme is ‘The prehistoric times’, this is the first time I’m meeting with this group of students. On the weekdays, adults and older teenagers usually participate in history trips.”
Q. What is the purpose of activity programs?
“As you know, the textbooks that young students use nowadays care difficult to understand without a spot-experience to places like the historical sites. Rather than just memorizing all the complex information in the textbooks, activity programs can be a more enjoyable way to learn. Many mothers are currently choosing this method to educate their children effectively.”
How about overseas?
Photo Credit: Right-Kate MacDonald and Left-Edward Quensell
Foreign countries had taken in the five-day study week system from long ago. Although it is different between regions, foreign countries tend to focus their main weekend activity on sports. One country in particular, New Zealand I had lived, has great weekend sports clubs. Even though New Zealand students get more time during the week to enjoy sports than Korean students, they still participate in many sports clubs during the weekends to relieve their stresses or just to enjoy sports. Unlike Korea, New Zealand’s student sports clubs are small in size and are relatively very cheap or free. One sports club has students from different schools and it participates in various competitions with other clubs. A professional individual or an experienced parent usually performs as an instructor for these sports clubs. One interesting feature about New Zealand’s sports is that people play different sports according to the season. Due to this, Soccer, Netball and Basketball clubs are very popular during winter and Swimming, Cricket and Tennis clubs are favored during summer.
Weekend programs are currently being well constructed to achieve its goals of deriving creativity, skills and potentials of students. Such fun activities will allow students to have many experiences and spend their times effectively.
Weekend activity programs guide sites
National Parent Service Center(전국학부모지원센터) www.parents.go.kr
Youth Navi(유스 내비) www.youthnavi.net
Saturday School(토요배움터) http://5days.go.kr
Original Character Education Net(창의인성교육넷) www.crezone.net
Sharing Portal(나눔포털) www.nanumkorea.go.kr
1365 Voluntary Work Portal(1365 자원봉사포털) www.1365.go.kr
Youth Voluntary Work Activity Center(청소년자원봉사활동센터) dovol.youth.go.kr
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