• Title/Summary/Keyword: EFL teacher

Search Result 46, Processing Time 0.019 seconds

A Korean Elementary School EFL Teacher's Implementation of Teacher-Based Assessment

  • Kang, Dae-Min
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • v.17 no.2
    • /
    • pp.19-37
    • /
    • 2011
  • This study examines a Korean elementary school EFL teacher's practice of teacher-based assessment (TBA), a subject which has been little researched despite the authorities' strong call for its implementation. The classroom interactions for TBA were observed and audio-recorded in eight fifth-grade classes between March and June 2010. Additionally, the teacher and students were interviewed in a semi-structured way. The results showed that the teacher used three types of TBA: assessment of individual students on different topics, assessment of the entire class on the same topic, and assessment of individual students on the same topic. Due mainly to time constraints during class time and classroom management issues, the teacher preferred implementing the first two types of TBA. During the practice of the types, the teacher provided prompts or posed questions in ways that elicited responses which were short in length and easy. Although the third type of TBA was perceived by both the teacher and students as helping students enhance their EFL proficiency and was the most favored by the students, it was viewed by the teacher as having the potential of causing classroom management difficulties. Based on the findings, a number of implications are suggested.

  • PDF

EFL Students' Beliefs and Processing Behaviors toward Writing and Teacher Response

  • Chin, Cheong-Sook
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • v.13 no.4
    • /
    • pp.1-32
    • /
    • 2007
  • This study took a cross-sectional, quantitative approach and profiled EFL students' awareness of the writing process and of teacher feedback. The subjects were 113 college students aged 19-26 years from non-English majors, who were enrolled in three sections of a required English course. According to the scores gained from the essay writing assignment, they were divided into two groups (proficient and less-proficient writers) and responded to an in-class survey. Major findings were that: (1) the vast majority of both groups did not find English writing enjoyable; (2) longer comments gave rise to substantial changes to the students' revisions; (3) the less-proficient writers were shown to benefit from revision significantly more than the proficient writers; (4) Both groups of writers utilized multiple strategies to process teacher feedback and preferred to receive teacher comments using complete sentences rather than phrases or single words; and (5) teacher's marks on grammar and vocabulary claimed to be most conducive to EFL writing development. Several important implications for EFL writing instruction and for future studies are suggested.

  • PDF

Perspectives on EFL Teachers' Responding to Students' Writing at the Semantic Level

  • Chang, Kyung-Suk
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • no.3
    • /
    • pp.185-201
    • /
    • 1997
  • This study explores perspectives on responding to EFL students' compositions at the semantic level. In the last three decades, there has been a shift from product-oriented approach to process-oriented one to teaching writing. The shift has led to the criticism of the traditional view on teacher response. The traditional view has been under attack for its overemphasis upon form and ineffectiveness on improving student writing skill. It is also noted that research into students' reactions to the traditional teacher response has been inconclusive. The process-oriented approach, on the other hand, draws its attention to meaning and the logical development of thought as well as linguistic matters. In this context, the present study discusses what EFL teachers need to take into account in providing the semantic-level feedback on students' compositions. Firstly, teacher response to student writing is on-going; teacher feedback involves teacher intervention in the drafting process, the revision process, and the presentation of product. Secondly, in the writing conferences, the teacher provides students an opportunity to talk about writing, assistance and advice on the content/meaning of the written text, helping them expand and clarify thinking about audience(reader) and purpose.

  • PDF

EFL Learners' Perceptions on English Writing Tasks and Teacher Feedback

  • Chin, Cheong-Sook
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • v.13 no.1
    • /
    • pp.1-26
    • /
    • 2007
  • This study aimed to investigate how EFL learners perceived English writing tasks and teachers' written feedback. The subjects were 82 mixed major college EFL students aged 19-24; the majority were freshmen females. Based on the scores estimated from the essay evaluation test, they were placed into two groups (proficienand less-proficient writers) and responded to an in-class questionnaire. The results indicated that: (1) regardless of writing proficiency, a large number of the students felt that they were just fair writers, which could be derived from low confidence and high anxiety; (2) grammar and vocabulary were perceived as the main features that determined good EFL writers and also prevented the students from performing the writing task successfully; (3) they believed that teachers' feedback contributed to the development of their English writing skills because it helped them apprehend what to improve or avoid in the future, acquire better English usage, and correct their errors; and (4) the proficient writers were more willing to correct errors themselves after being provided clues than the less-proficient writers. Implications of the findings for EFL classrooms are discussed.

  • PDF

Lessons Learned from Twelve Korean Teachers of College-level EFL Writing

  • Kim, Mi-Kyung
    • Korean Journal of English Language and Linguistics
    • /
    • v.3 no.2
    • /
    • pp.181-210
    • /
    • 2003
  • The purpose of the study was to investigate how Korean EFL writing instructors give feedback to their students' writing and what influences their feedback. A total of 12 Korean EFL instructors in Korean universities teaching freshman English and intermediate EFL writing courses provided their feedback given on students' writing samples and participated in interviews. Interviews were analyzed qualitatively with a constant comparative approach and some data from writing samples and questionnaires produced descriptive statistics. The first lesson from the results of the study was that grammar was still the most frequent concern in giving feedback on students' writing. Contrary to the participants' report, comments on content and organization were not produced very often. The second lesson came from the interview data. Some aspects of teacher feedback seemed mostly influenced by their beliefs on L2 writing and experience in teaching L2 writing. The final and major lesson was that teachers chose how they would give comments on students' writing depending on whether they found their feedback helpful in students learning to write. EFL writing teachers can produce effective feedback by clearly communicating their beliefs about L2 writing and criteria in their feedback to students in their EFL writing classrooms.

  • PDF

Effects of Teacher Support on Chinese EFL University Students' Listening Ability in a Blended Learning Environment (블렌디드 러닝 환경에서 교사의 지지가 중국 대학생의 영어 듣기 능력에 미치는 영향)

  • Yang, Ting;Kim, Na-Young
    • Journal of Digital Convergence
    • /
    • v.19 no.12
    • /
    • pp.63-77
    • /
    • 2021
  • This study aims to explore the differential effects of teacher support on Chinese EFL students' listening ability in a blended learning environment. 87 third-year English-major students in a Chinese university participated in this study and they were randomly divided into an autonomy group (n=22), an emotional group (n=22), a cognitive group (n=22) and a control group (n=21). Each experimental group received relevant teacher support during their 17-week course learning while the control group did not. To confirm the effects of teacher support, pre- and post- listening tests were conducted. The results of the paired t-tests demonstrated that all groups showed statistically significant improvement in their English listening ability. The results of the one-way ANOVA for the post-test revealed that autonomy support and cognitive support were more effective than emotional support in improving students' listening ability. Based on the findings, this study hopes to provide insights for EFL teachers in designing and arranging the activities in a blended course.

A Comparison of Korean EFL Learners' Oral and Written Productions

  • Lee, Eun-Ha
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • v.12 no.2
    • /
    • pp.61-85
    • /
    • 2006
  • The purpose of the present study is to compare Korean EFL learners' speech corpus (i.e. oral productions) with their composition corpus (i.e. written productions). Four college students participated in the study. The composition corpus was collected through a writing assignment, and the speech corpus was gathered by audio-taping their oral presentations. The results of the data analysis indicate that (i) As for error frequency, young adult low-intermediate Korean EFL learners showed high frequency in determiners (mostly, indefinite articles), vocabulary (mostly, semantic errors), and prepositions. The frequency order did not show much difference between the speech corpus and the composition corpus; and (ii) When comparing the oral productions with the written productions, there were not many differences between them in terms of the contents, a style (i.e., colloquial vs. literary), vocabulary selection, and error types and frequency. Therefore, it is assumed that the proficiency in oral presentation of EFL learners at this learning stage heavily depends on how much/how well they are able to write. In other words, EFL learners' writing and speaking skills are closely co-related. It implies that the teacher does not need to separate teaching how to speak from teaching how to write. The teacher may use the same methods or strategies to help the learners improve their English speaking and writing skills. Furthermore, it will be more effective to teach writing before speaking since they have more opportunities to write than speak in the EFL contexts.

  • PDF

EFL Teachers' Professional Development: Peer Coaching

  • Bang, Young-Joo
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • v.15 no.2
    • /
    • pp.1-25
    • /
    • 2009
  • The purpose of this study is to explore the potential of peer coaching for EFL teachers' professional development. For this study, 12 college teachers in Korea participated in a 10-week program. They were 7 males and 5 females, ranging in age from 24 to 37 years. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews. Reflective analysis was used to analyze individual interview data. From the findings, two significant categories of peer coaching were identified: positive and negative responses to peer coaching experience. However, the overriding themes that emerged from the data were the benefits of peer coaching. The participants were almost unanimous in their acknowledgement of the advantages of peer coaching, such as reflective support through other's eyes, improved working environments, greater teaching strategies, higher professional self-esteem, and awareness of self-directed learning. Negative responses also appeared, mostly in regard to the working principles of implementation; the major issues of difficulties were time management, complexities of implementation procedure, stress and personal vulnerability, and relative lack of reflection and feedback skills. Demonstrating the participants' experiences towards the peer coaching program, this study provides EFL teachers with useful insights into peer coaching as an effective tool of their professional development.

  • PDF

The Effect of a Web Quests Instructional Program on Developing Saudi EFL Learning Habits

  • Alsamadani, Hashem A.
    • International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
    • /
    • v.22 no.5
    • /
    • pp.220-224
    • /
    • 2022
  • The teacher is considered the cornerstone of the educational process; the quality of education is linked mainly to teachers who perform such a necessary process. The shift in pedagogical thinking has led to progress in looking at the teacher's roles; he is no longer transferring knowledge to learners, but instead, he has become a mentor, a mediator, a planner, an intellect, and a leader. If we analyze these missions from the perspective of mental habits, we will see that they require the teacher to develop the skills of perseverance, listening comprehension, thinking flexibly, controlling emotions, self-confidence, communication skills, and other essential skills. The current research verifies the effectiveness of an instructional program based on web quests in developing habits of the mind of English language students. The study employed a quasi-experimental design. The sample consisted of 46 male students representing two classes. They were assigned randomly into an experimental group (n=24) and a control group (n=22). They were undergraduate students majoring in the English language. The findings showed a statistically significant difference in the mean scores of the experimental and control groups favoring the experimental group. The study concludes with some recommendations to differentiate teaching techniques in EFL classrooms.

A study on the perception of Korean EFL learners on team teaching in secondary English classroom (중등영어교육 현장에서 협동수업에 대한 학습자 인식 연구)

  • Lee, Jong-Bok;Park, Hyeon-Woo
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
    • /
    • v.15 no.3
    • /
    • pp.353-380
    • /
    • 2009
  • The purpose of this study is to analyze the preconceptions Korean EFL learners have about team teaching in the field of English education at a secondary level. Team teaching is a method of teaching where a Korean English teacher works in co-junction with a native English speaker. Generally speaking, when we discuss teaching methods for a foreign language, the most important objective is to improve our communication skills. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect on communication skills when team teaching is employed, and to find ways to maximize the benefit when team teaching. The underlying issues are; firstly, what are the precedent conditions for team teaching? Secondly, what are the best teaching methods and preparations for teaching materials for improving the effectiveness of team teaching? Third, how do the programs for team teaching with native teachers assist in improving the student's communication skills? Ideally, this study will assist in overcoming the fear that foreign language learners have when communicating with real native speakers.

  • PDF