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

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.57-76
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• 2005

This study provides a rationale for using project-based learning with Korean students of English in Korea; in addition, it describes the process of creating and implementing project-based learning in the classroom and gives examples of how this unique teaching and learning method has been used successfully to teach learners with different levels of English proficiency. The first two chapters of the study examine the nature of project-based learning by comparing it with related fields of study, such as language teaching syllabi and methods, cognitive psychology, constructivists' views and interaction theory. The latter part of the study deals with issues related to applying project-based learning in Korean English classes. It emphasizes the importance not only of motivating active group effort and participation, but also in creating a trusting, cooperative relationship between group members in order to have a successful accomplishment of a project. The study concludes with implications for future studies.

• Journal of Fisheries and Marine Sciences Education
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.813-820
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• 2015

In recent years, there has been an argument that the academic performance of college students taught in English might be lower than those exposed in Korean under ceteris paribus environment. This paper examined the validity of this argument against the effectiveness of teaching-in-English, using student data from investment courses at a leading national university in Busan. Of a total of 165 students, 77 students took the teaching-in-Korean class (cohort A), whereas 88 students registered for the teaching-in-English class (cohort B). The findings did not support the popular argument. There was no significant difference in academic performance between student cohort A and student cohort B.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.39-53
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• 2002

Recently much research has investigated the role of attention in L2 learning, comparing the effects of explicit learning with those of implicit learning. With this background the research aims at examining the effects explicit focus on form has on L2 learning based on the acquisition of the English article system. The participants were 70 Korean college students who enrolled in English Composition classes. The experimental group received explicit focus on form including grammatical explanation, input enhancement, output practice, and negative evidence (corrective feedback) for two weeks, while the control group was exposed to sufficient input and negative evidence. Completion tasks were administered at the beginning and the end of the semester. In addition, errors in the use of English articles were analysed on their compositions both before and after the different treatments. The analyses of the results show that the explicit focus on form group improved significantly more than the control group, particularly for the definite article 'the', and some changes occurred in the distribution of article errors. These findings suggest that explicit teaching plays a more contributory role than implicit teaching in acquiring L2 knowledge in classroom-based L2 learning.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.109-126
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• 2007

English article has been considered as one of the most difficult areas to learn among ESL/EFL students. The current paper reviews English learners' article error patterns as well as pedagogy in order to teach English articles and to minimize learning difficulties on English articles. Different pedagogy for English articles on the basis of learners' proficiency levels are suggested as each proficiency level student shows a different error tendency; beginning level language learners used the zero article with the most facility while intermediate level language learners used the definite article the most accurately. However, studies about high advanced level learners' error patterns present that these high accuracy rates among beginning level students might be a result of students' plain guessing. Considering these error patterns, pedagogy for advanced level is also suggested.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.103-114
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• 2002

Language plays a central role in everyday communication activities. Therefore, an individual need to be able to use language to communicate with confidence and without fear. One of the major fears that people have is the fear of communication. This fear is most of the time due to a lack of confidence in communicating in a particular language or due to poor proficiency in the language. In some cases it can also be due to attitudinal problems. In the context of teaching and learning English as a second or foreign language, students can have a great fear of using English with confidence. This fear can be an acute one and thus students may avoid using English to communicate. However, non native speakers of English need to be highly competent in the use of the English language for a variety of communicative purposes particularly in meeting the challenges of globalisation and that of the digital age. This article presents some insights on language apprehension found among communication undergraduates who are non native speakers of English.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.56 no.6
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• pp.1047-1065
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• 2010

English inversion constructions are not only hard for non-native speakers to learn but also difficult to teach mainly because of their intriguing grammatical and discourse properties. This paper addresses grammatical issues in learning or teaching the so-called 'predicate inversion (PI)' construction (e.g., Equally important in terms of forest depletion is the continuous logging of the forests). In particular, we chart the grammatical (distributional, syntactic, semantic, pragmatic) properties of the PI construction, and argue for adata-driven teaching for English grammar. To depart from the arm-chaired style of grammar teaching (relying on author-made simple sentences), our teaching method introduces a datadriven teaching. With total 25 university students in a grammar-related class, students together have analyzed the British Component of the International Corpus of English (ICE-GB), containing about one million words distributed across a variety of textual categories. We have identified total 290 PI sentences (206 from spoken and 87 from written texts). The preposed syntactic categories of the PI involve five main types: AdvP, PP, VP(ed/ing), NP, AP, and so, all of which function as the complement of the copula. In terms of discourse, we have observed, supporting Birner and Ward's (1998) observation that these preposed phrases represent more familiar information than the postposed subject. The corpus examples gave us the three possible types: The preposed element is discourse-old whereas the postposed one is discourse-new as in Putting wire mesh over a few bricks is a good idea. Both preposed and postposed elements can also be discourse new as in But a fly in the ointment is inflation. These two elements can also be discourse old as in Racing with him on the near-side is Rinus. The dominant occurrence of the PI in the spoken texts also supports the view that the balance (or scene-setting) in information structure is the main trigger for the use of the PI construction. After being exposed to the real data and in-depth syntactic as well as informationstructure analysis of the PI construction, it is proved that the class students have had a farmore clear understanding of the construction in question and have realized that grammar does not mean to live on by itself but tightly interacts with other important grammatical components such as information structure. The study directs us toward both a datadriven and interactive grammar teaching.

• 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.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.91-115
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• 2006

English immersion has emerged in Korea only recently as an innovative approach to learning and teaching English. Lack of real life experience of using English has been one of the biggest obstacles for Korean learners of English and has resulted in an increasing number of children being sent to English-speaking countries and a huge amount of dollar outflow. This recent innovation is expected to be the magic wand to resolve all these problems. However, setting up an immersion program in a typical EFL context like Korea has brought in another set of issues and challenges. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of a short-term immersion English program in Korea and provide some empirical data to develop programs that can better cater to the needs of EFL learners. A two-week English immersion program was developed and implemented with 57 Korean and Japanese students whose grade level ranged from 4 to 12. The study results show that the program was successful in terms of changing the participants' attitude toward learning English, improving their English skills, enhancing intercultural understanding and competence, and motivating them for further studies of English and other foreign languages and cultures.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.339-363
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• 2010

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the English classes in secondary schools in Korea are in terms of communicative nature. After literature study, COLT parts A and B were used to analyze three kinds of English classes: a common class type taught by a school teacher who had won 1st prize at TEE contest, a team teaching class taught by NNS and NS, and a model class taught by a pre-service English teacher. Their communicative English classes were videotaped and transcribed for analysis by COLT. The results of the study revealed that students participated in the classes mostly as a unit and, therefore, did not get many meaningful chances to speak English. Second, creative language-use opportunities were barely found during classes. Third, the group work seemed to be prepared before the class, not to be done during the class. Therefore it is likely to be learned from memorization rather than meaningful communication. These results suggest English classes in schools be more communicatively oriented for successful English learning. Further study should be conducted in order to make English classes more communicative to help students communicate their genuine messages in English and to help teachers teach English efficiently.