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In developed Asian countries like Japan and South Korea, young students regularly outperform their American counterparts in reading proficiency. The test scores have been on the decline in recent years, and educators worry that AI could make things worse. NPR's Anthony Kuhn reports on how educators in South Korea are responding by importing an educational model from the U.S.
(CROSSTALK)
ANTHONY KUHN, BYLINE: Students play ball at a public elementary school playground. It's about 50 miles east of Seoul in the city of Chuncheon, where Seoul residents come on weekends to enjoy its mountains, rivers and lakes. Last year, the school began using an educational model based on great books.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Speaking Korean).
KUHN: In one classroom, students are discussing Mary Shelley's novel. "Frankenstein." The teacher asks, Is the Frankenstein monster human? Student Ma Yeonwoo speaks up.
MA YEONWOO: I think we can call him a human being with no soul.
KUHN: The discussion then turns to whether artificial intelligence can be considered human.
MA: Because, like, human invented AI. And AI, like, they are smart, but they don't have creativity.
KUHN: The students read Aristotle, Shakespeare and Korean author Han Kang. Ma Yeonwoo says he enjoys debating and learning from his peers.
MA: If only the teacher talks, we can have one idea, but if we all debate together, like, we can get many ideas together.
KUHN: The model comes from St. John's College, which has its main campus in Annapolis, Maryland. St. John's teachers don't lecture. There are no majors or elective courses. St. John's graduate Lee Yonghwa is a professor of English language and literature at Incheon National University, where he co-founded South Korea's first great books program in 2019. He says the students do not seek answers from external sources like the internet.
LEE YONGHWA: Instead, we engage in collective inquiry, with books and our own reasoning capacity serving as the one common ground and authority. And consequently, students must learn for themselves.
KUHN: It's a different approach from education in South Korea and much of East Asia, which, Lee says, is highly competitive and stressful.
LEE: We all feel that this system leaves students with no time to read and think. Instead, it forces them to memorize facts all day long for all sorts of tests.
KUHN: The aim of memorizing facts is to pass college entrance exams and get into the best universities. Now, Lee says, students' increasing reliance on AI is weakening even those skills.
LEE: Korean students are even losing their old capacity to memorize facts because they collect facts and ideas mainly from AI.
KUHN: And if they can't reason and think independently, he adds, they can't judge the quality of the results that AI generates for them.
(SOUNDBITE OF STUDENTS PLAYING THE RECORDER)
KUHN: In music class, students play the recorder. The great books model can't replace South Korea's test-centered system, but it can supplement it. Last year, the city of Chuncheon established an academic partnership with St. John's College. Yook Dong-han is Chuncheon's mayor.
YOOK DONG-HAN: (Through interpreter) I believe this represents a small yet revolutionary achievement, a breakthrough that challenges established practices.
KUHN: He says that although it's just getting started, students' enthusiasm for the program has already exceeded his expectations.
YOOK: (Through interpreter) I hope that as this initiative spreads, first locally and then beyond Chuncheon, it will motivate us to reflect on our existing education system and engage in fundamental rethinking amidst the rapid technological advancements of today's society.
UNIDENTIFIED SCHOOL STUDENT: An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.
KUHN: In a Chuncheon high school classroom, students are reading Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 "Letter From A Birmingham Jail." They discuss King's ideas about what kind of laws are just and unjust and which laws citizens should obey or disobey. Lee Yonghwa says he's impressed that students connected King's letter to their own country, such as in 2024, when citizens and lawmakers defeated former President Yoon Suk Yeol's attempt to put South Korea under martial law. That fits the aim of the great books model - to create more independent thinkers, more civic consciousness and more democratic societies. Anthony Kuhn, NPR News, Chuncheon, South Korea. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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