English classes in elementary school will increase to two to three times a week, from one to two. Parents obsessed with giving their children the advantage at this stage begin teaching their infant children English, a time widely believed to allow them to absorb the language better.

A staffer with a language school says while there are no accurate data, parents' worries have certainly boosted overall demand for English-language kindergartens this year. Since the presidential Transition Committee announced its English education policy, at least 45 English-language schools have newly opened in the Gangnam and Mapo areas.

A staffer at an English-language kindergarten in Seoul's Songpa district says they saw an increase of 50 children in admission every year, but this year 80 more children enrolled. He says the number of new children at other branches in the upscale Daechi and Bundang areas increased by 90-100 compared to the 70 they usually had each year, and that across the board, admissions grew by 30-40 percent. “Many parents who brought their children are nervous if they don't teach them English early, especially given the new English policies that were announced,” he said.

A kindergarten in Seocho that accepts infants from the age of 18 months saw student numbers rise 16 percent and added new classes. Monthly tuition here is a hefty W1.13 million (US$1=W1,009).

It's the children who suffer. Six-year-old Yun-ah (not her real name), who started English kindergarten this year, finishes class by 1:30 p.m. and then does her homework. Every day for an hour, she practices vocabulary and intonation listening to a CD. She also has the two-page daily task of composing full English sentences using words she learned in kindergarten that day. At the weekend, she reads Korean folk tales like “The Sun and The Moon” and writes a summary and book report in English. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, she practices speaking with a native speaker via teleconferencing for 10 minutes. Her homework is graded every month and mid-and final exams come every three months. It is effectively based on these scores that students are divided into classes.

Some children at these expensive English kindergartens even take private tutoring for English conversation and study at other different institutes in order to survive competition there. Six-year-old Eun-bi (not her real name) who goes to an English kindergarten costing a monthly W950,000, has recently started private tutoring lessons with a native speaker four times a week, for a monthly W560,000.

Kim (34) sends her daughter to the same kindergarten Eun-bi attends. She says difficult kindergarten homework was beyond her capacity to help, so she arranged for more through tutoring or study at institutes for her child.

In some cases, the phenomenon reaches the extreme of pre-natal English teaching. Mothers form “study groups” to immerse their fetuses in the language, with members of at least one pregnant moms' online community on portal site Daum seeking study partners.

A new batch of customers at Korea’s so-called naming agencies are parents looking for an English name for their child attending English kindergarten. The agencies claim certain names are more auspicious. One, in Changdong, reports that one out of 10 mothers has been coming for an English name for their child since the beginning of the year. The “naming fee” is much the same as for a Korean name at a minimum of W100,000.

But experts say learning English early doesn't necessarily make for better skills. Prof. Choi Seok-moo at Korea University's English Education department says early bilingual education can in fact hinder the capacity to think logically and acquire the native tongue.

(englishnews@chosun.com )