The Secret to a Clean Lecture Is Thorough Script Preparation
3-4 Hours of Sleep a Day "Confident in the Textbook Too"
3.5 Million Cumulative EBS Students, Joining Etoos
Joo Hye-yeon, an instructor, is giving an interview at the Etoos Media Center in Daechi-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.
[Asia Economy Reporter Han Jinju] "An instructor is someone who effectively delivers content, while a teacher is someone who nurtures children."
This is the statement of instructor Joo Hye-yeon (photo), who gave up the title of 'teacher' and plunged into the fierce online lecture market. Joo said, "The role of a teacher is a 'broader form of childcare,' where you have to check if the children arrived well in the morning and if they ate properly, but I was lacking in that aspect."
Joo worked for five years in companies such as securities firms and semiconductor companies before starting teacher certification preparation late and passing the exam within five months. During her teaching career, she gained a reputation through after-school classes and began EBS lectures in 2010 at a colleague's suggestion. From 2015 to 2020, she maintained the number one spot in EBS English student enrollment, with a cumulative total of over 3.5 million students. Then, in January of this year, she moved to Etoos.
Joo said, "While juggling EBS and school classes, I only got three hours of sleep a day. I had to spend time and energy on the children, and I always felt sorry about that. Personally, I wanted to invest more in research, and I thought it was time to take on a new challenge."
Joo Hye-yeon, an instructor, is giving an interview at the Etoos Media Center in Daechi-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.
Joo is well-known for her concise and neat lectures. Her secret is writing out the entire script before filming. She said, "I check the speed of my speech by timing each section and sometimes read it in 30-second segments. I'm not very articulate, and having a camera and staff around makes my mind go blank, so I do this to prevent that." The part she pays the most attention to is the opening remarks.
If you search for 'Joo Hye-yeon' on social media, you can easily find opening remarks handwritten by examinees themselves. She explained, "I started including 50-second opening remarks tailored to the EBS broadcast format, mostly saying what I would want to hear. When writing the script, I focus most on that part. In private online lectures, there are many harsh words directed at students, but since my opening remarks are the first to comfort them, they say it gives them strength."
Joo's skill comes from diligence. Even during her teaching days, she prepared lectures until 3 a.m. and often slept at her desk. She said, "I sleep in bed about three days a year. Because I have to create new learning materials, these days I only get about four hours of sleep a day," but added, "I made the learning materials myself and wrote a lot of textbooks, so I am confident in content creation."
The most emphasized aspect when teaching English is the 'essence.' Joo compares studying English to scuba diving, saying, "Just as peaceful and beautiful scenes appear the deeper you go underwater, you need to grasp the essence of English to truly enjoy reading. When you understand the fundamental parts of English rather than just the passages, the parts you need to memorize disappear and many questions get resolved."
Joo's unique English study method is memorizing a page of sentences from a book and rewriting them on paper. She said, "Muscles have developed in the part of my hand that holds the pen, so I’m embarrassed to show my hand," but added, "Even without learning conversation or writing, it feels like I’m steadily accumulating knowledge, so I keep doing it."
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