• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.127-152
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• 2006

For the past 20 years the process approach to writing has been popular in second language writing classrooms. However, there have been very few studies conducted in Korea with regard to the composing processes and the effects of proficiency on writers' usage. The present study attempts to begin to fill this gap. Three groups of college students with different writing proficiency participated in the study: the advanced group, the intermediate group, and the beginning group. The verbal protocol of their writing processes revealed that they approached writing tasks differently. While the advanced writers focused on generating texts and ideas and examined their writing at both global and local levels, the other two groups of students tended to focus on evaluating text at the local level and generated fewer ideas and less text. The findings from this study are then compared to those of some major studies of the composing process as conclusions are subsequently drawn about the specific needs of Korean college writers.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.55-68
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• 2002

Since the introduction of literature in reading and writing during the 1970s, considerable research has attempted to determine whether literature has significantly positive effects upon enhancement of reading proficiency. It is said that literature extends our knowledge of the world. Through books, we can experience other people's thoughts, experiences, and ideas (Frye, 1964). This paper explored the role of children's literature for the teaching of reading through the literature-based instruction. It focused on why and how children's literature serves as an important context for enhancing learner's reading proficiency of English. It also discussed the authentic use of literature-based strategies for practical classroom use, and suggested the future directions for research toward the literature-based instruction in the domain of reading comprehension.

• International journal of advanced smart convergence
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.121-127
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• 2018

This paper develops and builds an Integrated Assessment System for National Competency Standard Professional Basic. The integrated evaluation system for basic job competency in the National Competency Standards is developed to conduct examination by means of computers, smartphones and tablet PCs. The system can be used for the basic job competency test, examination for online cyber universities, job competency examination for enterprises, and the listening, reading, and speaking test in the foreign language proficiency examination and is even better in terms of facility investment and saved operating costs as well as efficient use of spaces in comparison with conventional evaluation schemes. Even greater synergy effects can be achieved by providing support for the integrated evaluation system for basic job competency in connection with the NCS qualification system. The evaluation system has been tested and practiced at a specialized high school and can be applied to the NCS education evaluation of the college and four-year college and to the selection examination of new employees of the company.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.77-98
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• 2005

The purpose of the study is to investigate whether focus-on-form instruction is effective in promoting accuracy in writing and to make some suggestions regarding education in business English writing. For this purpose, an experiment, of which the participants were 29 college sophomores taking a course in business English, was made. The learners received instruction in the English nouns followed by modificatory phrases or clauses through the focus-on-form techniques, feedback and explicit explanation. The results were as follows: First, the learners who received focus-on-form instruction improved accuracy in writing. Second, there was a correlation between the learners' English proficiency levels and the effects of focus-on-form instruction. Third, the high level learners showed more positive attitude toward focus-on-form instruction than the low level ones. To promote accuracy in written business communication, the following suggestions were made on the basis of the results: First, focus-on-form instruction should be incorporated into a content-based business English class. Second, repeated focus-on-form instruction is needed. Third, learners' English proficiency levels should be taken into account when focus-on-form instruction is given.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.239-265
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• 2010

This study investigates the effects of corpus-based vocabulary tasks on the acquisition of English vocabulary in an attempt to explore the influence of corpus use on EFL pedagogy. For this to be realized, a total of 40 Korean high school students participated in the study over a 4-week period. An experimental group used a set of corpus-based tasks for vocabulary learning, whereas a control group carried out a traditional task (i.e., the L1-L2 translation) for vocabulary learning. To assess learning gains, the students were asked to complete the pre- and post-treatment tests measuring the word form, meaning, and use aspects of target lexical items. Results of the study indicate that in the experimental group the corpus-based vocabulary tasks were beneficial for the learning of word forms and use. In particular, corpus-based benefits were greatest in the low-proficiency EFL learners' collocational aspects of vocabulary use. On the other hand, in the control group, the traditional vocabulary tasks benefited the meaning aspects of target vocabulary items the most. In addition, survey results revealed that most students were positive about the corpus-based learning experience although some expressed reservations about the heavy cognitive load and the time-consuming nature of the analysis of corpus data primarily due to learners' lack of language proficiency.

• Journal of the Korean BIBLIA Society for library and Information Science
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.5-27
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• 2019

This study analyzed the effects of comic book reading program on Korean proficiency and acculturation of youth with immigration background, by conducting a six-month reading program with five teenagers with immigration background. Ten comic books were selected from published by School Library Journal, based on the themes - that are related to the lives of youth with immigration background - and interests of participating teens. According to the literacy skills test conducted before and after the reading program, the participating teens' Korean proficiency has generally improved, particularly in the areas of interpretation and vocabulary. In terms of writing, grammatically incorrect sentences, phrases, and expressions have declined. Most participants showed stable adjustment to Korean culture, but one participant who felt still insecure of her ethnic identity deeply empathized with one of the characters of the books, and shared the difficulties of living as an outsider of a society. The participants of this research learned or rediscovered the joy of reading through this comic book reading program; at the end of the program, many of them expanded their interest in reading novels, books without any illustrations.

• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.435-442
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• 2011

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are a class of brominated flame retardants (BFRs) which have taken much interest recently due to their potential hazardous effects to human body and ecosystem. Many countries and European community prohibits the usage of certain BFRs in electronics and electronic devices (e.g. RoHS). In this perspectives, Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS) has designed and practiced proficiency testing programs based on the ISO/IEC 17043 in order to assist laboratory accreditation activities. The programs for interlaboratory comparisons include congeners of PBDE (PBDE-154, 183, 206, 209) in high impact polystyrene (HIPS). A sample bottle that contains 10 g granular HIPS was distributed to 35 participating laboratories and the test results were calculated by the statistical procedure using z-scores to evaluate performance of each laboratory. The results and the laboratory's performance were discussed.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.53-68
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• 2012

This study investigated the speech intelligibility of Korean-accented and native English focus speech for Korean and native English listeners. Three different types of focus in English, broad, narrow and contrastive, were naturally induced in semantically optimal dialogues. Seven high and seven low proficiency Korean speakers and seven native speakers participated in recording the stimuli with another native speaker. Fifteen listeners from each of Korean high & low proficiency and native groups judged audio signals of focus sentences. Results showed that Korean listeners were more accurate at identifying the focal prominence for Korean speakers' narrow focus speech than that of native speakers, and this suggests that the interlanguage speech intelligibility benefit-talker (ISIB-T) held true for narrow focus regardless of Korean speakers' and listeners' proficiency. However, Korean listeners did not outperform native listeners for Korean speakers' production of narrow focus, which did not support for the ISIB-listener (L). Broad and contrastive focus speech did not provide evidence for either the ISIB-T or ISIB-L. These findings are explained by the interlanguage shared by Korean speakers and listeners where they have established more L1-like common phonetic features and phonological representations. Once semantically and syntactically interpreted in a higher level processing in Korean narrow focus speech, the narrow focus was phonetically realized in a more intelligible way to Korean listeners due to the interlanguage. This may elicit ISIB. However, Korean speakers did not appear to make complete semantic/syntactic access to either broad or contrastive focus, which might lead to detrimental effects on lower level phonetic outputs in top-down processing. This is, therefore, attributed to the fact that Korean listeners did not take advantage over native listeners for Korean talkers and vice versa.

• Journal of the Architectural Institute of Korea Structure & Construction
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• v.35 no.12
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• pp.173-180
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• 2019

Construction work is a labor-intensive industry, which is required systematic production activities using materials, manpower, and equipment. Among them, manpower resources play a very important role in achieving efficiently production in the organization. Construction work is highly dependent on construction craft workers, and the level of proficiency can be directly related to the construction productivity and quality. However, a rapidly aging construction craft workers in Korea, is being replaced by a foreign construction craft workers because of advoidance of new laborers in the construction site. In the future, if the continuous development and management of construction manpower is not made properly, it may be lead to adverse effects such as setbacks in production, delayed completion, faulty construction, industrial disasters, and decreased productivity in construction site. In this study, it was proposed four important factors for work capacity management of construction craft workers. These were ensuring of physical strength through the health management of construction craft workers, securing of proficiency through career management, ensuring of productivity through work capacity and establing of informatization through work capacity management. By introducing a systematic system, it is possible to improve construction craft workers' professionalism, enhancing the level of welfare, reflecting the realities of labor costs, increasing the quantitative and qualitative levels of construction craft workers, Futhermore it was demanded the continued interest and policy support for the realization of effective management of construction craft workers.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.14 no.10
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• pp.127-136
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• 2016

Purpose - This study investigated the effects of lectures in the English medium (EML) on understanding and learning outcomes. Sixty percent of EML lectures in Korea also use Korean for further support. Thus, this situation needs to clearly distinguish the specific impacts of the EML classes on learning outcomes. Here, we use the same English materials, including PowerPoint slides and video content, given in the Korean and English lectures. The difference between the lectures becomes only whether the lecture is delivered in Korean or English. Thus, we can clearly identify whether the language difference makes any difference in learning outcomes. Research design, data, and methodology - Our sample consisted of 91 students taking an international business course the spring of 2015. All course materials, including textbooks, PowerPoint slides, exams, video, and support content, were presented in English. Survey data and exam results were used. Students filled out their student identification number and name, so we could match the surveys against the exam results. Results - First, results show that whether the lecture was delivered in English or Korean was an important factor when students chose the class. Second, English proficiency related to international business and general English levels were higher in the English class than in the Korean class. However, the understanding of key concepts and reading abilities of international business newspapers were the same for students in both classes. Third, teaching materials and lectures were the most important material for the understanding of key concepts in the business major. Fourth, the exam results showed no difference in performance of the students in the English versus the Korean class. This shows that EML classes were not necessarily detrimental to the understanding of major concepts of the lecture. Thus, it is important that researchers carefully design empirical settings to study the effectiveness of EML. Conclusions - The English lecture can be as helpful for enhancing knowledge in the business major as the Korean lecture. For further research, various English lecture forms can be considered to distinguish the effects of the English lecture.