• Title/Summary/Keyword: English Proficiency

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The effects of Padlet use on writing anxiety and strategy use in online English writing learning (온라인 영어쓰기학습에서 Padlet 활용이 쓰기 불안과 전략에 미치는 영향)

  • Im, Hee-Joo;Lee, Young Lim
    • Journal of Digital Convergence
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    • v.20 no.5
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    • pp.69-75
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    • 2022
  • This study aims to examine how the use of Padlet, an online platform, affects students' English writing anxiety and English writing strategy in online college English writing classes. A total of 64 college students participated in the study and completed the survey including English writing anxiety, English writing strategy and demographic information. For the study, we divided participants into 2 groups, experimental group using Padlet for their writing tasks and control group using college e-learning during a semester. The results showed that students using Padlet used more writing strategies than the students using college e-learning platform. The use of Padlet, however, was not statistically significant on writing anxiety. English writing anxiety was differed by English level, but decreased at the end of semester regardless of English level. The results imply that Padlet is a useful online learning tool for English learners to actively use English writing strategies and even for learners with low English writing proficiency.

Factors related to English communication skills in the dental health service process of clinical dental hygienists (임상 치과위생사의 치과의료 서비스 과정에서 영어 의사소통 능력 관련 요인)

  • Park, Myeong-Hwa;Park, Jong-Tae;Jang, Jong-Hwa
    • Journal of Korean society of Dental Hygiene
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    • v.22 no.5
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    • pp.375-382
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    • 2022
  • Objectives: This study analyzes factors related to English communication skills in the dental health services of clinical dental hygienists who provide dental medical services to foreigners. Methods: Surveys were conducted to measure students' English communication skills. Participants comprised 195 clinical dental hygienists working at dental English study cafes or who provided dental medical services to foreigners. After analyzing the differences in English communication skills, hierarchical multiple regression analysis was performed on the factors related to English communication skills. Results: English communication skill of dental hygienists was 1.96 points out of 5 points. The factors related to the English communication skill of the clinical dental hygienists were foreign patient care, language training experience, overseas living experience, and certified English proficiency. The adjusted explanatory power of this model was 53.0%. Conclusions: Dental hygienists in charge of foreign patients have experience in language training and overseas residence, have a language qualification certificate, and have higher English communication skills. It is necessary to develop English language learning programs based on metaverse to develop the English communication skills of dental hygienists who provide dental health services to foreign patients and to operate a creative educational environment to increase interest in learning English.

Teaching English Prosody through English Poems with Cloned Native Intonation (프랏을 이용한 영시 운율 교육)

  • Yoon, Kyuchul;Oh, Ji-Yeon;Ahn, Sang-Cheol
    • Journal of English Language & Literature
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    • v.56 no.4
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    • pp.753-772
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    • 2010
  • The purpose of this work is to examine the viability of employing the prosody cloning technique in teaching English prosody. Ten native speakers of Korean high school students with similar level of English proficiency participated in the poem self-study experiment. Five of them were grouped into the experimental group and the remaining five into the control group. One popular English poem from a high school textbook was selected and its recording by a professional native speaker of English was used in the experiment. The members of the two groups made a recording of the poem both before and after the experiment. For the study material, the experimental group used their own recorded utterances with their prosody cloned from the professional English speaker, while the control group used the utterances of the professional speaker alone. The acoustic analysis of the recordings by the prosodic foot both before and after the experiment showed that the experimental group performed slightly better than the control group in the realization of the intensity contour of the poem. There were no significant differences in the realization of the intonation contour and segmental durations between the two groups. The recording after the experiment was also subjectively evaluated by a native speaker of English and the scores for the experimental group were slightly higher than the control group. These findings suggest that the use of English poems with the help of the prosody cloning technique is a potentially viable approach to teaching English intonation to high school students. A long-term study with more students is necessary.

Analysis technique to support personalized English education based on contents (맞춤형 영어 교육을 지원하기 위한 콘텐츠 기반 분석 기법)

  • Jung, Woosung;Lee, Eunjoo
    • Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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    • v.13 no.3
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    • pp.55-65
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    • 2022
  • As Internet and mobile technology is developing, the educational environment is changing from the traditional passive way into an active one driven by learners. It is important to construct the proper learner's profile for personalized education where learners are able to study according to their learning levels. The existing studies on ICT-based personalized education have mostly focused on vocabulary and learning contents. In this paper, learning profile is constructed with not only vocabulary but grammar to define a learner's learning status in more detailed way. A proficiency metric is defined which shows how a learner is accustomed to the learning contents. The simulational results present the suggested approach is effective to the evaluation essay data with each learner's proficiency that is determined after pre-learning process. Additionally, the proposed analysis technique enables to provide statistics or graphs of the learner's status and necessary data for the learner's learning contents.

Developing a Curriculum of English Storytelling in a Global Corporation's Context: Focus on Proficiency Building (글로벌 기업에서 스토리텔링 영어교육 콘텐츠 개발과 적용: 능숙도 향상을 목표로)

  • Shin, Dongil;Kim, Keumsun;Shim, Woojin;Kim, Na-Hee;Jeon, Jongwoon;Kim, Sehee;Kim, Joo-Yun;Jeong, Taeyoung
    • The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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    • v.18 no.3
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    • pp.265-278
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    • 2018
  • This study aims to understand how a global corporation's storytelling-based curriculum is developed for improving English proficiency. Little research has been done from the perspectives of global corporation, and a curriculum of storytelling on Stein and Glenn (1979)'s model was implemented inside English Language Education Program of Samsung Display. 10 participants employed at the global corporation were taught by two instructors during the first semester of 2017 language learning program. The curriculum consisted of three modules: event focused, structure focused, character focused. Storytelling elements of each module were explicitly planned and taught by two instructors. All classes were audio-recorded and observed by the other researchers. It was found that there is a need for improving storytelling proficiency in the global corporation, and that storytelling skills can be teachable, learnable, and assessable.

The Study on the Effects of English for Specific Purposes for Korean University Students (한국대학생들의 특수 목적 관련 교양영어수업에 관한 연구)

  • Shin, Myeong-Hee
    • Journal of Digital Convergence
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    • v.12 no.1
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    • pp.549-553
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    • 2014
  • This study is a report of an intensive ESP(English for Specific Purposes) program conducted for the College of Economic students in Korean University. This is planned for the students to enhance their English achievement in comprehending the subject contents which they would learn in the near future. In order to determine whether the course helped the students enhance their English achievement or not, a pre and post test were taken, one at the beginning of the semester and the other at the end of semester. The result of the test shows that this program benefits relevant students, especially lower level students. In accordance with a general accepted view, the English for Specific Purposes(ESP) program is generally targeted for students who expect to learn the basic knowledge of English through mediated courses. Since students already have specific purpose of studying for their major courses, their motivation and interest in the course are higher than the students who don't have any specific purpose. Therefore, this study shows that the students who took English for Specific Purposes(ESP) had higher motivation and interest to study English related to their major courses as the test results were higher than before they had taken the English for Specific Purposes (ESP) program.

Phonological Awareness Integrated Instruction: The Effect of Analogies/Anagrams on Vocabulary Acquisition Scores

  • Pak, Hubert H.
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
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    • v.17 no.3
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    • pp.195-212
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    • 2011
  • Research studies have shown that phonological awareness focused analogies and anagrams can be used as an effective game-based teaching instruction. However, previous studies used analogies and anagrams as separate instructional tools, especially in EFL-related situations. There has been no vocabulary learning in analogies/anagrams instruction provided, nor has there been usage of an integrated workbook for 'vocabulary learning and analogies/anagrams'. This study examined the effect on learners' vocabulary acquisition scores when a truly phonological awareness integrated 'analogies/anagrams and vocabulary learning' workbook was used as an instructional practice workbook. The results show that the phonological awareness integrated instruction significantly increased learners' vocabulary acquisition scores among 40 college students with minimal or basic level of English proficiency.

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Issues of EFL Educational Practice in Korea: A Conceptual Proposal for an Alternative

  • Lee, Jong-Hee
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
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    • v.13 no.3
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    • pp.41-56
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    • 2007
  • This paper, drawing on various secondary sources related to bilingualism and bilingual education, proposes a semi-CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) model as an initial option for Korea's ELT instruction at a primary level, with a subsequent application to a secondary level in mind. It is reported that the current pedagogy focused on early English education and communicative language teaching does not meet the needs of students' EFL proficiency. The main reasons for this are considered to lie in the social and educational environment which impedes EFL students' meaningful and authentic communication in target language. Thus, by exploring a conceptual approach to such a problem, this paper suggests a paradigm of integrating content and language for a reasonable solution.

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The Combined Effects of Metalinguistic Explanation and Self-Correction on Improving EFL Writing Accuracy

  • Kim, Bu-Ja
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
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    • v.15 no.3
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    • pp.83-104
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    • 2009
  • This study examined whether self-correction or metalinguistic explanation might make a difference in the ability to accurately write two English grammatical structures when learners received indirect teacher feedback in the form of underlining target errors in a Korean EFL college classroom. With the goal of helping low-proficiency students improve their ability to accurately write sentences including nonfinite present participial relative clauses and present participial constructions, four groups were formed: a group which received indirect feedback, a group which received indirect feedback and metalinguistic explanation, a group which received indirect feedback and self-corrected errors, and a group which received indirect feedback and self-corrected errors after receiving metalinguistic explanation. The results showed that the effects of either metalinguistic explanation or self-correction integrated with indirect feedback on learners' ability to accurately write the target structures were not meaningful, while the combined effects of metalinguistic explanation and self-correction were statistically significant.

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The effect of L2 experience on perception of Korean nasals

  • Yoo, Juyeon;Kang, Seokhan
    • Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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    • v.8 no.4
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    • pp.63-69
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    • 2016
  • Twenty five English native speakers with two different L2 experienced groups and nineteen native Koreans heard both Korean word-initial nasals (/m/ and /n/) in three vowel contexts (low, mid, and high) produced by a native Korean speaker. The experiment examined the hypothesis that Korean nasals are more likely to be judged or perceived correctly by the L2-experienced English learners of Korean than the unexperienced counterparts. The result showed that L2 experienced group was more sensitive to effects of vowel height in judging the Korean nasals in which the perception of nasals before the high vowels was more subject to it. In addition, place of nasal articulation causes asymmetry relations - bilabial nasal /m/ is more likely to be perceived as plosives rather than alveolar nasal /n/. The study found that the L2 experience has a somewhat limited role in perceiving the nasals correctly in the word-initial position, especially before the high vowels, in that even the L2 experienced English subjects have difficulty in identifying the Korean nasals correctly in this environment. Nevertheless, low L2 proficiency might be accounted for the difficulty in the bilabial nasal identification observed by the L2 experienced group.