• Asia-pacific Journal of Multimedia Services Convergent with Art, Humanities, and Sociology
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.241-250
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• 2019

The study aims to investigate how international students with over the TOPIK level 3 recognize Korean proverbs. Among the 53 students, 45 students had the qualification of the TOPIK levels. Research results are as follows: 80.0 percentages of those students have studied Korean languages in the language institutes in Korea or their homelands. Only 57.8 percentages of them have learned Korean proverbs. Despite the high interest of foreign students on Korean proverbs, education on their expectations has not been achieved. And they had difficulty recognizing the circumstantial expression of the Korean proverb. Their degree of understanding of Korean proverbs is lower, compared to their TOPIK levels. The absence of systemic education on Korean proverbs makes international students difficult to understand the figurative expression of Korean proverbs. Since many international students want to become Korean language teachers after their studying, the education of proverbs needs to be conducted systematically rather than individually.