World News for Students of English

25-03-2021 07:00

South Korea’s Nokdo Island has only a few children, and the number of people who live on the island is going down quickly.

There are three children in one family and a school opened for them a few years ago. There was no teacher and she had to come from South Korea’s mainland.

South Korea became the world’s fastest aging society and in 2020, it had the lowest birth rate in the world. In the 1970s, many big factories opened in South Korea and women had to work there. Also, living in big cities became very expensive and families could not have many children. Many men and women decided not to have children or to have a special surgery which stopped them from having children.

Nokdo children like living there because it is quiet there and the air is clean. Sadly, they would like to have friends they could play with.

Difficult words: mainland (the country or continent without islands), aging (growing old), birth rate (the number of births which happen during a period of time in a place).

You can watch the original video in the Level 3 section.