(A) study of teaching listening strategies to Korean college EFL students using learning portfolios

신미영 Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. TESOL Gradua 2016 국내박사

한국 대학생 영어 학습자의 학습 포트폴리오를 활용한 듣기 전략 훈련에 관한 연구 본 연구는 54명의 한국 대학생 영어 학습자에게 학습 포트폴리오를 활용하여 12회의 듣기 전략 훈련을 실시한 후 상위 전략, 인지 전략, 사회 정의 전략을 포함한 듣기 전략 사용 변화와 듣기 선시험, 듣기 후시험 변화, 그리고 그들의 학습 포트폴리오 활용에 대한 인식을 살펴보고자 한다. 양적 자료 수집 도구로는 사전, 사후의 듣기 전략 설문지, 듣기 시험이 사용되었다. 질적 자료 수집 도구로는 학생들의 매 듣기 전략 훈련 후 작성한 자기 성찰 기록 (self reflection), 마지막 주 차에 포트폴리오 제출 전 작성한 포트폴리오 체크 리스트와 포트폴리오 성찰 기록 (portfolio reflection), 그리고 8명의 학생들과의 인터뷰자료가 수집, 분석되었다. 학생들의 학습 포트폴리오는 12번의 듣기 전략 훈련 수업 관련 유인물과 자기 성찰 기록, 포트폴리오 체크 리스트와 성찰 기록을 포함하고 있다. 또한 연구자의 매 수업 관련 연구 일지는 본 연구에 기술된 각 훈련의 수업 일지 기록에 활용되었다. 위의 양적, 질적 자료 분석 결과, 첫째, 전략 훈련 후에 학생들의 전략 사용이 전반적으로 증가하였으며, 그 가운데 특히 훈련 전에는 세 가지 종류의 전략 (상위, 인지, 사회 정의)중 가장 적게 사용되었던 상위 전략 사용이 가장 많이 증가했을 뿐만 아니라 가장 많이 사용되었다. 또한 54명의 학생들의 전략 사용을 수준별 (상, 중, 하), 전공별 (전자, 간호, 지식 경영), 성별(남, 여)로 나누어 분석하였는데 수준별로는 특히 중간 그룹의 전략 사용이 가장 많이 증가하였으며, 전공별로는 지식 경영을 전공하는 학생들의 전략 사용이 가장 많이 증가하였고, 남학생들의 전략 사용이 훈련 전에는 여학생들보다 적었으나 실험 사후에는 더 많이 증가하였고, 여학생들의 전략 사용을 능가하였다. 수준, 전공, 성별과 관계 없이 전략 설문지에 있는 전략들 가운데 듣기 전략 훈련에서 학습된 전략들이 그렇지 않은 전략들보다 더 많은 증가를 보였다. 듣기 선시험, 후시험 분석 결과 후시험의 평균이 선시험 평균보다 높았으며, 변인별 분석 결과에 의하면 하위, 전자 전공, 남학생 그룹의 듣기 후시험 성적이 다른 그룹들보다 더 많이 증가하였다. 학생들의 성찰 기록 분석을 통해 듣기 학습에서 학습 포트폴리오를 활용하는 것에 대한 인식을 살펴본 결과, 포트폴리오 활용 기반의 듣기 전략 훈련을 통해 학습 과정 점검과 평가가 가능하였고 그를 통해 듣기 수업 및 듣기 과정에서 집중도가 높아졌으며 개인 학습 과정에 좀더 적극적으로 참여하는 긍정적 효과를 학생들 스스로 인식하고 있다는 점이 드러났다. 또한 8명의 학생들과 인터뷰는 본 연구에서 사용된 포트폴리오 활용 듣기 전략 수업에 대해 그들이 긍정적인 태도를 취하고 있음을 보여 주었다. 본 연구의 시사점은 다음과 같다. 첫째로 본 연구는 듣기 전략 훈련의 한 가지 방법으로 학습 포트폴리오를 활용하는 새로운 방법을 제시하였다. 또한 학습 포트폴리오를 활용한 듣기 전략 훈련이 학교의 기존 커리큘럼과 잘 통합되어 실시될 수 있음을 시사하였다. 마지막으로 학습 포트폴리오 기반의 듣기 전략 훈련 수업 모델이 교재 개발자뿐만 아니라 교육 과정 개발자들의 듣기 교재를 포함한 다양한 교재 및 과정 개발 과정에서 참고용으로 활용될 수 있으며, 듣기 수업을 구상하는 교육 현장에 있는 교사에게도 도움이 될 수 있으리라 여겨진다. A Study of Teaching Listening Strategies to Korean College EFL Students Using Learning Portfolios There are two purposes of this study: to look into the effects of listening strategy instruction including learning portfolios on college students’ listening comprehension and their strategy use and to investigate their perception of such instruction. In this study, 54 college students received 12 listening strategy instruction sessions. The students participated in the questionnaire survey and listening comprehension test twice before and after the instruction. They also engaged in self-reflection on their strategy use after each listening strategy instruction session and completed portfolio reflection and portfolio checklists before submitting their portfolios. In order to analyze the students’ reflection in their portfolios, NVivo 10 was used; SPSS (V. 18) was also utilized to analyze the students’ responses to the pre- and post-questionnaires on their listening strategy use and the pre- and posttest of listening comprehension. According to the quantitative analysis, first, the overall strategy use of the students in this study increased including the instructed strategies. Among the three types of strategies, before the instruction, socioaffective strategies were the most used, followed by cognitive and metacognitive strategies. However, after the instruction, the use of metacognitive strategies, whose use was the least among the same students before the instruction, showed the most increase. It was followed by the increase of socioaffective and cognitive strategies. After the instruction in this study, the students’ strategy use increased; the use of their metacognitive strategies was the most significantly enhanced. Second, there were three different variables in this study among the students. Generally, regardless of proficiency levels, all three groups (high-, mid- and low-proficiency) showed more increased strategy use after the instruction; the mid-proficiency group showed the most increase. Based on the classification by major, after the instruction, all three different groups showed more increased strategy use; the Knowledge and Management department showed the most increase. In terms of the classification by gender, before the instruction, the male students were found to use listening strategies slightly less than female students; however, after the instruction, the male group showed more increase in their strategy use than their counterparts. In addition, regardless of the students’ proficiency levels, majors, and genders, the increase of these 14 strategies in their use was bigger than that of the overall strategy use increase. Among three types of listening strategies (metacognitive, cognitive and socioaffective strategies), regardless of proficiency, major, and gender, the majority of the students exhibited the most reflection on metacognitive strategies. Despite that the most number of strategies instructed in this study belonged to cognitive strategy types, the instruction seemed to affect the students’ metacognitive-strategy-based reflection more than the other two types partially due to learning portfolio engagement, which allowed them to reflect upon their listening process and strategy use. Based on the qualitative analysis, most of the students recognized that the instruction helped them to enhance their listening skills and the portfolio work in learning to listen strategies also contributed to their listening by allowing them to check their learning progress and evaluate it by themselves not to mention concentrating better in class. A few students acknowledged the positive effects of the instruction on other skills such as speaking, writing, and vocabulary, which resulted from better concentration on and attention to their learning process. The interviews with 8 students also revealed the interviewees’ positive attitude toward the instruction in this study, which is congruent with the students’ reflection. The students’ listening comprehension seemed to improve after the instruction as the increased mean score on the posttest indicated. The low-proficiency group, the Electronics department, and the male group showed the most increase in each group classification by proficiency, major, and gender. In short, the instruction in this study seemed to contribute to the students’ enhanced listening comprehension. One of the pedagogical applications is that EFL students like many Koreans can benefit from strategy instruction in the classroom, just like most of the students in this study exemplified themselves as an example. Also, listening strategy instruction including learning portfolios can be integrated and interwoven in the regular classroom with ease. In addition, teaching listening strategies with learning portfolios can be used as a reference when material developers and curriculum developers create a course or design course books including listening skills.

(The) impact of learning styles on group work

Go, Min Jeong Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. Tesol Gradua 2014 국내석사

The Impact of Learning Styles on Group Work The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of student learning styles on group work. By looking at this issue, this study presents grouping methods for effective group work and suggests the direction to orientate for successful cooperation between students. The research questions are as follows: First, how do the groups perform group work depending on FI/FD? Next, how do the groups perceive the group work? This study was conducted in a listening class for 12 weeks. 12 university students were given the questionnaire presented by Lawrence (1993) to determine Field Independent (FI) and Field Dependent (FD) learning styles. They were divided into groups in terms of those learning styles; one group of FI preferred students, another group of FD preferred students, and the last group of two FI preferred students and two FD preferred students. The students’ journals, instructor’s observation notes, audio recordings and interviews were used. The results of this study were analyzed qualitatively and can be summarized as follows: First, when solving the task, the students in each groupdid not specifically rely on their cognitive preferences. All of the subjects struggled to complete the task, regardless of which group they were placed in. Furthermore, all members of both the FI and FD groups participated in the group work, but for different reasons. Even though every member of the FI group participated in the group work, the group work did not take place actively. In contrast to the FI group behavior, every member of the FD group participated actively. In the Mixed group, the FD students primarily took part in the group work, leaving the FI students in the Mixed group quiet. Next, all of the students in every group said that working together helped them complete the task more so than working alone. Nevertheless, preference for the group work was different among students. The FI and FD groups and the FD student in the Mixed group preferred group work more than working alone. However, the FI student in the Mixed group preferred working individually or in pairs rather than groups. According to the results in this study, instructors should identify individualities in terms of students’ learning styles, and should form based on those traits.

The Effects of Different Levels of Audience Specification in the Writing Prompt on Korean English Learners’ Writing

Ban, Cheing Ran Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. Tesol Gradua 2014 국내석사

The Effects of Different Levels of Audience Specification in the Writing Prompt on Korean English Learners’ Writing The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of three different types of prompts on Korean English learners’ writing. Twenty one Korean English learners and two raters including the researcher participated in the study. Three types of prompts designed by the degree of specification and covering three different topics were employed. Methods to analyze data were Repeated Measures MANOVA and text analysis. Engagement markers were examined either manually or by the corpus. Findings suggest that the effects of audience specification in the prompts on Korean English learners’ writing quality were not found. The specification of the prompts only influenced Korean English learners in the use of engagement markers. Korean English learners viewed topic as the most influential factor in their writing. Vocabulary and audience were regarded as negative factors in the writings. These results reached the conclusion that even though Korean English learners’ exhibited negativity in their awareness of audience alone, the addition of context working together with audience enabled Korean English learners to focus more on the topic of the writing, therein elucidating their thoughts to some extent. Pedagogical implication is provided for teaching audience in relation to the topic for Korean English learners.