• 영어어문교육
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• 제6호
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• pp.219-239
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• 2000

There has been a growing enthusiasm in Korea for the early education of English as a foreign language (EFL). The present study examined the validity of the Critical Period Hypothesis in terms of the Universal Grammar (UG), in three different types of learning contexts - first language (L1), second language (SL), and foreign language (FL) learning contexts. While previous research findings in L1 and SL learning contexts suggest that UG principles and parameters are accessible to language learners only for the early years of lifetime, this article argues that their results - and even the methods - cannot be applied to EFL settings and that independent studies on the EFL context are, required. It also proposes the recent UG notion of functional categories as the most appropriate subject in the discussion of Korean EFL learners' access to UG. Findings on foreign language contexts, including the author's own, strongly indicate that UG is not sensitive to learners' starting ages in FL settings. If young children in FL contexts cannot develop their interlanguage grammar based on UG, the existing teaching methods for young children should be revised.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제15권3호
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• pp.37-44
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• 2023

This study investigates perceptual confusions of English fricatives among 121 Korean elementary school English as a foreign language (EFL) learners with shorter periods of learning English. The objective is to examine how they perceive English fricative consonants and to provide educational guidelines. Two sets of English fricative identification tasks-voiceless fricatives and voiced fricatives-were administered to participants in a High Variability Phonetic Training (HVPT) setting. Their phonemic awareness of the fricatives was visualized in perceptual confusion maps via multidimensional scaling analysis. The findings are explored in terms of the impacts of Korean EFL learners' L1 linguistic aspects and a comparison with L1 learners. Learners' phonemic awareness patterns are then compared with their relative importance in speech intelligibility based on a functional load hierarchy. The results indicated that Korean elementary EFL learners recognized English fricatives in a manner largely akin to L1 learners, suggesting their ongoing acquisition progress. Additionally, the findings demonstrated that the young EFL learners possess sufficient phonemic awareness for most high functional load segments but encounter some difficulties with one high and one low functional pair. The findings of this study offer suggestions for diagnosing language learners' phonemic awareness abilities, thereby aiding in the development of practical guidelines for language instructional design and helping educators make informed decisions regarding teaching priority in L2 classes.

• 영어어문교육
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• 제12권2호
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• pp.61-85
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• 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.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제9권2호
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• pp.69-76
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• 2017

The current study investigated whether Korean learners' English-learning environments, especially target English accent (General American English (GAE) vs. Southern British English (SBE)) and English-language experience affected their production of English vowels. Thirty six EFL learners, 27 ESL-US learners, and 33 ESL-UK learners produced 8 English vowels with a bVt frame (beat, bit, bet, bat, bought, bot, boat, boot). The learners' productions were acoustically analyzed in terms of F1 and F2 frequencies. The overall results revealed that the learners' target accent had an effect on their production of some English vowels. The EFL and ESL-US learners' (especially, female learners') production of bought, bot, boat, and boot, which show characteristic differences between the GAE and SBE accents, was closer to that of the native American English (AE) speakers than the native British English (BE) speakers. In contrast, the ESL-UK learners' production of bought and bot demonstrated the opposite pattern. Thus, the impact of target accent was not demonstrated across the board. The effect of the learners' different English-language experience was also rather limited. This was because the EFL learners' production was not much different from the ESL-US learners' production, in spite of the ESL-US learners' residence in the US for more than 9 years. Furthermore, the Korean learners, irrespective of their different English-language experience, tended to produce bit and bat with lower F1 than the native AE and BE speakers, thus resulting in bit and bat to be produced similarly to beat and bet, respectively. This demonstrates the learners' persistent L1 effects on their English vowel production despite the learners' residence in the English speaking countries or their high English proficiency.

• 영어어문교육
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• 제12권1호
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• pp.1-27
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• 2006

This study investigated how EFL readers critically read texts which are written in English. Although critical reading has been discussed in advanced EFL and ESL contexts there has not been much research on the critical reading of beginning EFL learners. Many educators are recommending that a critical perspective be adopted so that L2 learners can become empowered rather than indoctrinated. In this study, the researcher has examined the critical reading practices of five beginning level EFL readers in Korea and five first language readers of English in the United States as they read a news editorial article. The significant findings were discussed related to critical reading practice of L2 readers. The findings of the study can help the educators in English education in improving the curriculum, the teaching methodology and the learning theory for EFL reading for critical reading.

• 비교문화연구
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• 제48권
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• pp.223-252
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• 2017

본 연구의 목적은 서로 다른 두 유형의 챗봇(음성기반 챗봇 및 문자기반 챗봇)이 한국 EFL 학습자의 말하기 능력 및 학습자 인식에 미치는 영향을 파악하는데 있다. 실험 참가자는 총 80명으로, 한국에 있는 한 대학교의 신입생들이었으며, 모두 교양 영어 말하기 수업을 듣는 학생들이었다. 참가자들은 무작위 하게 두 실험집단으로 나뉘어 16주 동안 서로 다른 두 유형의 챗봇과 10번의 채팅에 참여하였다. 실험 전후 참가자의 말하기 능력에 변화가 있는지를 알아보기 위하여 사전사후 말하기 시험을 진행하였고, 챗봇을 이용한 영어학습에 대해 인식변화가 있는지를 살펴보기 위해 사전사후 설문조사를 실시하였다. 말하기시험결과, 챗봇을 이용한 한국 EFL 학습자들의 의사소통능력은 유의미하게 향상되었고, 그 중 문자기반 챗봇이 의사소통능력 향상에 더욱 도움이 되는 것으로 나타났다. 설문조사결과, 챗봇기반 영어학습에 대한 학습자들의 인식은 긍정적으로 변화하였고, 그 중 음성기반 챗봇에 대한 인식이 좀 더 호의적으로 바뀐 것으로 조사됐다. 본 연구는 EFL 상황에서 챗봇기반 영어학습에 대한 새로운 가능성을 모색하고, 효과적인 챗봇활용을 위한 제언을 도출하고 있다.

• 한국게임학회 논문지
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• 제16권3호
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• pp.7-16
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• 2016

본 연구는 영어를 외국어로 배우고 있는 한국 EFL 초등 학습자들의 부족한 영어 노출 시간을 연장하면서 말하기 능력을 향상하기 위한 방안으로 게이미피케이션을 접목한 스마트 러닝 과제학습을 설계했다. 경쟁, 보상, 맞춤형 캐릭터 등의 게임 요소를 영어 교육에 접목한 '교육 게이미피케이션'의 일환인 본 연구는 모의실험에서 발견된 개선점들을 반영해 주의 집중 시간이 상대적으로 짧은 초등 학습자들에게 과제 학습이라는 부담을 줄이고 영어 말하기 게임을 재미있게 받아들여 적극적인 게임참여를 유도하는데 중점을 뒀다. 특히 영어 문장을 만드는데 어려움을 겪는 학습자들이 '카카오 톡'의 장점인 즉각적인 상호작용과 음성 녹음 기능을 활용한 실시간 및 비실시간 게임을 통해 실력 향상과 더불어 자기효능감도 고취시킬 수 있는 교육 게이미피케이션의 다양한 시도가 요구된다.

• 영어어문교육
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• 제8권1호
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• pp.15-38
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• 2002

This article explored 9 EFL learners' emotional reactions they experienced in order to locate sources of EFL apprehension in university-based classroom settings. As part of further establishing construct validity of the measure (the FLPAS) Kim (2002) developed, lengthy interviews were adopted with focus on sources of discomfort with a variety of forms of language learning tasks. Findings showed that the interviewees confirmed most of the statements in the measuring tool, thereby increasing the trustworthiness of the measure. Specifically, the following themes or categories emanated from the analysis of interview data: (a) anxiety about performance in EFL classrooms; (b) EFL anxiety or discomfort about difficulties with cultural understanding; and (c) EFL anxiety induced by instructor and instruction.

• 영어어문교육
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• 제17권3호
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• pp.273-290
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• 2011

This paper presents a case study involving one Korean primary school student and people around him in order to explore the reading process in English of a young Korean EFL learner and to investigate the social context in which his reading takes place. Six participants were included in the study (one primary school student and five adult participants). The student participant was asked to read a text in English and translate what he read into Korean and the teacher participants were asked to listen to the student's reading. Semi-structured interview was used to collect data from the student as well as five adult participants (his private tutor, his parent, his state school teacher, and two other state school teachers). The analysis reveals four characteristics of the way a young EFL learner approaches reading: word-by-word reading, disconnected word recognition, selective use of cues, and lack of awareness of difficulties. The four characteristics of Kilsu's reading suggest that reading can become a wild guessing game for young foreign learners, if they give selective attention to unimportant cues while reading. The pedagogical implications of this study are also discussed to help teachers designing reading lessons for young learners.

• 디지털콘텐츠학회 논문지
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• 제18권6호
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• pp.1101-1107
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• 2017

본 논문은 스마트폰의 플랫폼에 내장되어 있는 자동음성인식 기술을 활용하여 영어 학습자의 발음에 대한 즉각적인 문자 피드백을 제공하는 모바일 기반 발음 교수법이 영어 학습자의 자음 발음 (V-B, R-L, G-Z) 인식과 출력에 미치는 영향에 대해 연구했다. 특히, 자동음성인식 기술을 이용한 모바일 기반 발음 교수법을 사용한 그룹, 전통적인 교사 중심의 발음 교수법 그룹, 그리고 이 둘을 합친 하이브리드 교수법 그룹으로 나누어 영어 학습자의 발음 평가 결과를 (인지, 출력) 비교, 분석했다. ANCOVA를 이용한 분석 결과, 영어 학습자의 발음 출력에 있어 하이브리드 교수법 그룹이 (M=82.71, SD =3.3) 전통적인 교수법 그룹 (M=62.6, SD=4.05) 보다 유의미하게 높은 결과를 나타냈다 (p<.05).