• Title/Summary/Keyword: English teaching methods

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A Study on English Education in Private Kindergartens in Korea (한국 사립 유치원 영어교육의 실태)

  • Yang, Ok Seung;Kim, Jin Young;Kim, Hyun Hee;Kim, Young Sil
    • Korean Journal of Child Studies
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    • v.22 no.4
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    • pp.299-313
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    • 2001
  • This study examines the current state of English education in private kindergartens in Korea. Among 1700 kindergarten teachers surveyed for this research, 680 replied that their institutions provided English lessons for children. Analyses of the data collected from these 680 teachers showed : 1) They started to teach English not because of educational considerations but because of pressure from children's parents or kindergarten principals; 2) Most of the English teachers were part-time instructors specially recruited for English lessons. Generally, English lessons were given two or three times a week, with one session lasting for about 20 minutes. A variety of teaching methods and materials were used for the lessons given to children aged three to five. Focus of the lessons was given to listening and speaking words and sentences; 3) Most of the teachers considered the scarcity of qualified English instructors as the most serious problem for providing English education in kindergartens, and they did not want to teach English themselves. They evaluated positively the performance and role of Korean part-time English instructors. The evaluations were generally poor as to native speakers serving as kindergarten English teachers.

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The way to improve EFL reading skill: Focusing on semantic mapping and leveled group activities (의미망 활동과 수준별 학습을 통한 영어 독해력 향상 방안)

  • Im, Byung-Bin;Jang, Se-Sook
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
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    • v.7 no.1
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    • pp.137-160
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    • 2001
  • This paper is to suggest the way to improve EFL reading skill through semantic mapping by leveled group activities. Semantic mapping is a categorical structuring of information in graphic forms or diagrams. It can be used to activate and organize background knowledge on topics in classrooms. For small group activities, the class is divided into higher leveled groups and lower leveled groups of four members based on their grades. The teaching process has three stages: Pre-reading, while-reading, and post-reading. In the pre-reading stage, students discuss what they know about the topic. They map ideas with a brainstorming technique. In the while-reading stage, they read the text about the topic. While they are reading, they could ask some questions they might have and discuss the information in the text and categorize them with semantic mapping. In the post-reading stage, they discuss what they thought of the topic and add some information about the topic with semantic mapping. For the subjects of this study, third grade, middle school students were selected: 41 students for the experimental group and 35 students for the control group. The experimental period covered almost one semester from March to August, 2000. The results were as follows: 1) The students in the experimental group had higher scores in reading comprehension than those in the control group when semantic mapping was used; 2) The use of semantic mapping in reading comprehension was found to be much more effective in the higher leveled group than in the lower leveled group; 3) The results of questionnaires showed that many students became more interested and motivated in English, and semantic mapping helped them to participate positively in reading the English text. Thus, using semantic mapping by leveled group activities can be an effective alternative to traditional teaching methods for teachers who desire to improve reading skill in middle school students' English classes.

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A Study of Comparing Speech Act Data from Two Differing Data-gathering Instruments

  • Suh, Jae-Suk
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
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    • v.13 no.3
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    • pp.77-97
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    • 2007
  • To compare data on the speech act of requests from two different methods, a study was conducted in which both native and non-native speakers of English participated as subjects, and data were collected by means of actual e-mail writing and DCT (discourse completion test). The analysis of requests from the two different data-gathering methods showed that despite some similarities, considerable differences existed between e-mail and DCT requests in several important aspects of requests such as amount of talk, directness level, downgraders and supportive moves which play an important role in making a given request sound less imposing and more polite. Also it was shown that requests of non-native speakers differed considerably from requests of native speakers in terms of the four aspects of requests across type of data-gathering methods. Based on the findings, some suggestions were made for both further research and L2 classrooms.

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A Corpus-based Lexical Analysis of the Speech Texts: A Collocational Approach

  • Kim, Nahk-Bohk
    • English Language & Literature Teaching
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    • v.15 no.3
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    • pp.151-170
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    • 2009
  • Recently speech texts have been increasingly used for English education because of their various advantages as language teaching and learning materials. The purpose of this paper is to analyze speech texts in a corpus-based lexical approach, and suggest some productive methods which utilize English speaking or writing as the main resource for the course, along with introducing the actual classroom adaptations. First, this study shows that a speech corpus has some unique features such as different selections of pronouns, nouns, and lexical chunks in comparison to a general corpus. Next, from a collocational perspective, the study demonstrates that the speech corpus consists of a wide variety of collocations and lexical chunks which a number of linguists describe (Lewis, 1997; McCarthy, 1990; Willis, 1990). In other words, the speech corpus suggests that speech texts not only have considerable lexical potential that could be exploited to facilitate chunk-learning, but also that learners are not very likely to unlock this potential autonomously. Based on this result, teachers can develop a learners' corpus and use it by chunking the speech text. This new approach of adapting speech samples as important materials for college students' speaking or writing ability should be implemented as shown in samplers. Finally, to foster learner's productive skills more communicatively, a few practical suggestions are made such as chunking and windowing chunks of speech and presentation, and the pedagogical implications are discussed.

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Learning a Foreign Language Using Information Technologies for Comfortable Implementation of the Professional Position of a Future Specialist in a Foreign Language Environment

  • Postolenko, Iryna;Biletska, Iryna;Kmit', Olena;Paltseva, Valentyna;Mykhailenko, Olena;Yatsyna, Svitlana;Kuchai, Tetiana
    • International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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    • v.22 no.11
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    • pp.63-70
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    • 2022
  • At the present stage, the main directions of the professional position of a specialist in the implementation of English-language Education are to improve and spread the practice of learning languages throughout a person's life by involving information, communication and digital technologies in the educational process. Computerization of the educational process in Higher Education Institutions is considered as one of the first and most promising areas for improving the quality of education in Higher Education Institutions. The necessity of ensuring timely training and retraining of specialists of various profiles (in particular teachers) on the effective use of domestic and foreign electronic resources with the help of modern information technologies for the implementation of the professional position of a future specialist in a foreign-language environment is noted. The main goal of teaching a foreign language (the formation of students' communicative competence, which means mastering the language as a means of intercultural communication) is defined. The types of speech activity that cover the content of teaching a foreign language are highlighted. The main types of assessment in a foreign language are shown - current (non-classroom), thematic, semester, annual assessment and final state certification. The task of the teacher is drawn, which is to create conditions for practical language acquisition for each student, to choose such teaching methods by means of information technologies that would allow each student to show their activity, their creativity; to activate the cognitive activity of the student in the process of learning a foreign language.

Children's Intelligence, Concept of Conservation, and the Relations With Learning English (아동의 지능, 보존개념의 발달과 영어학습과의 관계분석)

  • Woo, Nam Hee;Kim, Hyun Shin
    • Korean Journal of Child Studies
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    • v.25 no.1
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    • pp.1-12
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    • 2004
  • This study investigated the relations of children's age, intelligence, and the concept of conservation to their learning of English. Ten 4-year-old children from 1 child-care center and 13 7-year-old children from 1 elementary school were tested after completion of 8 sessions of experimental English classes. Children's intelligence was measured by K-WPPSI for 4-year olds and K-WISC for 7-year-olds. Children were tested for number and liquid conservations. A Korean teacher with 11 years of experience of teaching children at American elementary schools taught the 2 groups with the same subjects and methods. Data were analysed by independent samples t-test, Mann-Whitney U test, and Pearson's r. The results showed that children's age and the concept of conservation were related to English learning. No statistically significant relationship with IQ was found.

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The Intensification of Environmental Education Contents in English Subject Education (영어과에서의 환경교육 내용 체계화 및 강화 방안)

  • 이소영
    • Hwankyungkyoyuk
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    • v.12 no.1
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    • pp.99-109
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    • 1999
  • Environment education, which is a principal solution to environmental problems in the world, is being practiced in Korea through the national curricula for primary and secondary schools. However, it hasn't been effective so far to practice environment education within those schools where a variety of subjects are taught. The purpose of this study is to look for the possibility of practicing environment education and thereby to make some suggestions for effective environment education in the field of English education, which doesn't seem to have a close relationship with environment education. This study first specified prospective contents of environment education by analyzing the Seventh National English Curriculum. Then, on the basis of them, the study explored how to practice environment education in the field of English education. Finally, for effective environment education, it made some suggestions and emphasized the importance of consistent efforts.

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A Suggestion on Using Animated Movie as Learning Materials for University Liberal Arts English Classes

  • Kim, HyeJeong
    • International Journal of Advanced Culture Technology
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    • v.10 no.2
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    • pp.98-105
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    • 2022
  • This study's purpose is to suggest a pedagogical method based on using animated movie in liberal arts English classes and to examine the direction that using animated movie as learning material should take. To this end, in this study, the content understanding and expression concentration stages using animated movie are presented. After students learned in class through animated movie, two tests were conducted to investigate the change in learners' acquisition of English expressions. As a result, subjects' learning of English expressions showed a significant improvement over time. An open-ended questionnaire was also conducted to ascertain learners' satisfaction level and their perceptions of classes using animated movie, with learners' satisfaction found to be high overall (77.1%). Students identified the reasons for their high satisfaction rate as the following: "fun and a touching story", "beneficial composition of textbooks", "efficient teaching methods", "sympathetic topics", and "appropriate difficulty". When using video media in class, instructors should maximize and leverage the advantages of video media, which are rich both in context and in their linguistic aspects.

A Study on Interlanguage Transfer through L3 Acquisition

  • Luo, Derong
    • International Journal of Advanced Culture Technology
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    • v.7 no.2
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    • pp.179-187
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    • 2019
  • As the globalization process progresses more rapidly and widely, there has been a ever-growing demand for multilingual learning. Compared with the study of Second Language Acquisition, studies on the Third Language and even Multilingual Acquisition have attracted a relatively poor attention. At the same time, considering current educational environments for ethnic colleges and universities, the effects of college English teaching for minority students can be said to have been 'generally poor.' In this situation, when we try to find ways to improve college English studies for minority students most of whom already can speak two languages or even more, it would not be the best idea to keep following the experiences of traditional Second Language Acquisition. It is necessary first to find out whether there are positive or negative effects in acquiring multiple languages, and then to conduct a profound research on L3 (third language and even multilingual) Acquisition in order to employ more efficient teaching methods for multilingual learners. After conducting a Japanese-teaching experiment on two groups of learners with mono-lingual and bilingual backgrounds, it has been found that there is a positive transfer between different languages. In this paper, following the recent research findings on Language teaching for multilingual learners, I try to show with further supports that when it comes to language education for learners with multilingual backgrounds, we should focus on the advantages they may earn in order to conduct more effective language acquisition.

Integrating Pronunciation into a Classroom and on the Web Courseware

  • Kim, He-Kyung
    • MALSORI
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    • no.41
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    • pp.49-59
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    • 2001
  • The aim of this paper is to suggest possible methods of integrating the teaching of Pronunciation into a typical communicative classroom and consequently on English teaming web courseware. It is hoped that this paper will prompt teachers to understand the current role of pronunciation in communicative English programs and that the web technology can help students improve their pronunciation, which will develop their speaking and listening skills. It also suggests the need for a database of visualized communicative expressions.

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