• English Language & Literature Teaching
• /
• v.13 no.3
• /
• pp.157-176
• /
• 2007

Based on the consensus that vocabulary plays an essential role in improving reading ability, the present study investigates the effects of two different methods of English vocabulary instruction - the traditional wordlist-based vocabulary instruction (G1) and the collocation-based vocabulary instruction (G2) - on improving English reading ability for high school learners. First, the results of the collocation test revealed that G1 and G2 groups attained similar mean scores on the pretests; however, G2 significantly outperformed G1 on the post-test administered at the end of the learning activity. The results proved that students who learned vocabulary in a collocation-oriented setting had better retention through the lexical-chunking achieved by the collection method. Second, in terms of reading comprehension achieved on nationwide academic trial tests, the result was, after considering more tests, that G2 gained a significantly higher mean score on the third and fourth than G1 did, although the two groups yielded a similar mean score on the first and second test. The implication of these results is that collocation-based vocabulary activities had a more significant influence on reading skills than wordlist-oriented ones.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.19 no.8
• /
• pp.565-571
• /
• 2019

This study aims to suggest more efficient ways of teaching English more related to but distinct from major English, based on the needs and awareness of the students of English Education Department. For this, interviews and surveys have been carried out targeting some English Education majors. The results show that the satisfaction level of students is relatively low, marking around the score '3'. While the satisfaction level about classroom environment including the multi-media equipment, and professors' teaching ability, quality and methods is higher compared with other factors, the improvement of English skills and interest-causing levels are lower on average. Besides, this study also includes the surveys on the needs of students for various teaching programs, differentiated classes and qualified instructors. Based on the results, this study makes three suggestions as follows; (1) the opening of some specific English classes for English-education majors (2) the development of English-conversation classes related to English-education majors (3) the development of communication-centered English reading based on English literature.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
• /
• v.5 no.3
• /
• pp.58-63
• /
• 2000

Since some methodologies of using Internet on English reading have been appeared, most of them have just led students to find some articles on the Internet and translate them into their first language. However, these methodologies have been criticized in that they can not provide naturalistic environment for practical English reading. There are some problems in using Internet for practical English reading. First, the level of vocabularies and grammar of articles from the Internet has not been proved to be appropriate for students. Usually, their level is too high for most students. Second, it needs computer using ability as well as English proficiency if a student successfully finds an article which he or she wants to on the Internet in a limited time. Finally, a teacher should be trained to lead students to participate in a classroom discussion to get, appropriate gists of articles. With all these problems, it is difficult only to use articles from the Internet for successful English reading. Therefore, this study tries to find out some critical problems and solve them, and construct English reading courseware system on the Internet.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
• /
• v.13 no.1
• /
• pp.181-210
• /
• 2007

This study is to suggest systematic and effective reading comprehension techniques or strategies to be used in EFL reading classes. According to the definition of reading and reading process, six essential elements of reading comprehension are categorized: 1) reading speed; 2) skimming and scanning; 3) logical organization; 4) pleasure reading; 5) vocabulary; 6) cultural background and world knowledge. To present a more effective teaching and learning approach to EFL reading comprehension than ever, an experiment was performed. The hypothesis of the experimental study was that there would be a difference in students' reading speed as well as reading comprehension and vocabulary between an experimental group and a control group depending upon the teaching approaches (experimental vs. traditional). The result of the study indicates that the experimental teaching approach which intensifies speed reading and pleasure reading techniques as well as 4 other essential techniques of reading comprehension is more effective than the traditional one in teaching and learning reading comprehension.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
• /
• v.10 no.3
• /
• pp.89-112
• /
• 2004

This article examines the ways in which language can be exploited in the manipulation of the reader's interpretation of a text to make him/her take certain lines of thought according to the writer's persuasive intents. Such functions of language provide valid foundations to support the teaching of critical reading skills and to explore an adequate approach to discourse analysis. A pilot study was conducted to find out the extent to which the reader can be coaxed into thinking in some fashions guided by specific linguistic devices employed for ideological texts. Forty-seven subjects divided into two groups (humanities majors and natural science majors at undergraduate level) joined the two-fold questionnaire surveys intended to look at their critical reading abilities. The empirical results indicate that college students whose majors are humanities were more inclined to take a holistic approach in processing commercial advertisement texts and their abilities for critical interpretation appeared to be lower than those of the subjects whose majors are natural sciences, who showed a relatively high tendency to take an analytical approach in decoding the textual facts. As a consequence, pedagogic implications for increasing critical reading abilities have resulted in a set of analytical procedures concerning ideological texts which is linked with instructional guidelines to emphasize the importance of the reader's logical and analytical reasoning power, entirely accepted as a general prerequisite for cracking the covert language gambits.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.15 no.5
• /
• pp.630-638
• /
• 2015

This study examines university students' reading strategies based on English proficiency and reading anxiety. A total of 86 university students participated in the study and completed two questionnaires related to reading strategies[9] and reading anxiety[10]. The collected data was quantitatively analyzed using SPSS 21. The results indicated that advanced and intermediate students preferred to use Problem Solving Strategies(PROB), whereas beginning level readers tended to use and Global Reading strategies(GLOB). There was no significant relationship between reading anxiety and reading strategies. However, there were some differences between two groups. High anxiety students preferred to use reading materials and textual clues and try to focus on their reading when they have a difficulty. Low anxiety students tended to adjust reading pace and try to focus on comprehension and reread when they lost their focus. Based on the results of the study, several implications and limitations were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Data and Information Science Society
• /
• v.23 no.3
• /
• pp.447-455
• /
• 2012

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of reading development program on reading comprehension using meta-analysis method. The authors synthesized 70 studies regarding reading comprehension conducted during 2001 through 2011. The analyses revealed that 1) the average effect size of the reading development program yielded.763, which is regarded considerably large, 2) the effect size of elementary school group was the biggest, 1.030. There were statistically significant differences amongst school levels, 3) the average effect size of published journal articles was 1.250, which is statistically significantly larger than that of dissertation's.700, 4) regarding the methods to measure the effect of reading comprehension, the effect size of reading method was larger, and 5) the effect size of Korean reading development program was statistically larger than that of English reading development program. This study has limitation as it didn't include unpublished manuscripts, conference presentations, and the like, however this study is meaningful in terms that it tried to draw integrated conclusion about the effect of reading development programs using meta-analysis.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
• /
• v.11 no.4
• /
• pp.209-235
• /
• 2005

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effectiveness of reciprocal teaching procedure for improving Korean college students' reading comprehension of English text. In particular, this study sought to explore the qualitative features, if any, in students' use of reading comprehension strategies presented in the process of Reciprocal Reading Procedure (RRP). In order to accomplish the goal of the study, transcripts of the students' dialogues, open-ended questionnaires, and researchers' observation notes were examined. The results of the study showed that the participants used different four kinds of reading strategies in the process of RRP (questioning, clarifying, predicting, summarizing). The findings also suggested that the readers with limited knowledge of vocabulary had difficulty in moving on to the next level. Additionally, future research direction and some pedagogical implications are presented for the practical EFL classroom.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
• /
• v.10 no.1
• /
• pp.1-22
• /
• 2004

The primary purpose of this study is to investigate the applicability of content and formal schemata for processing the scientific texts which encompass the human knowledge of the physical world. In general, schema theory is based on the culture-oriented background of a text. From this point of view, the problem as to whether both content and formal schemata are applicable to the comprehension of a scientific text deserves a focal attention in terms of information processing modes. The results of empirical study indicate that whereas the universality of general knowledge content about the natural world attenuates the tenets of schema theory, the rhetorical organization of scientific texts encourages the application of the schema-based approach; the reader's familiarity with the structural patterns of a text facilitates his reading comprehension.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
• /
• v.9 no.spc
• /
• pp.185-208
• /
• 2003

The purpose of this paper is to examine some of the theories concerning socioaffective strategies, to analyze the dialogues of the students negotiating for meaning of a reading material and to suggest some implications of socioaffective strategies for teaching reading. The examination of the theories - the interaction hypothesis and the sociocultural theory - suggest that the use of socioaffective strategies facilitates more effective understanding of information that is to be found. distributed, and taken in among the participants. The discourse analyses of the students' interaction in a Korean college English reading class show ample evidence of the use of socioaffective strategies that helped them understand the meaning of a text. However, the analyses show that the strategies are mostly used to ask questions concerning the meaning of clauses. Only few analytical questions are raised for some structural and pragmatical features in the text which are crucial to the understanding of its meaning. Imbalance also exists in the types of the questions used by the participants. The analyses indicate that, instead of negotiating more interactively, the students tend to rely upon a more advanced student when they face difficult English sentences. Therefore as a conclusion this paper emphasizes the importance of teaching socioaffective strategies to help students to help themselves to become more cooperative, independent and analytical in reading English texts.