Culture as an Influence on Literary Interpretations: Integrating Literature in Order to Teach Cross-Cultural Values in the language Classroom

Jungok Bae,Susan L,Niemeyer 한국영미어문학회 2009 영미어문학 Vol.- No.90

Literature provides cultural themes and values that are beyond the means to increase students' linguistic competence in the language classroom. This paper aims to illustrate the advantages of integrating literature in language classrooms in order to promote students' cross-cultural awareness. We selected three essays from a book entitled Living with stranger in the U.S.A. and outlined a cluster of value differences between American and Korean cultures embodied in the literature. specifically, values related to horizontal vs. vertical relationships between the teacher and the student with respect to the two cultures are discussed: namely, a cluster of values consisting of equality, informality, and contextual roles in the American context; and another cluster of values consisting of hierarchy, formality, and role continuity in the Korean context. The analysis shows that Americans and Koreans can interpret these essays differently based upon their cultural values. Finally, the paper presents a culture assimilator and a critical incident, designed to help promote Korean students' awareness of cross-cultural values.

Reading Ability in Korean as a First and Second Language Achieved During the Early Phase of Korean/English Immersion Education in America

Bae, Jungok 서울대학교 어학연구소 2006 語學硏究 Vol.42 No.1

Ten Cohesion Markers’ Relative Contributions to Coherence

Jungok Bae 팬코리아영어교육학회(구 영남영어교육학회) 2012 영어교육연구 Vol.24 No.2

The present study contends that the notion of cohesion influencing coherence is an oversimplification. The present study examined the relative strengths of 10 cohesion markers as predictors of coherence. EFL children (N = 130) wrote both letters and stories, which were analyzed using repeated-measures MANOVA and path analysis. The number of cohesion markers used in the two writing tasks was significantly different for some types of markers while similar for other types, indicating that the amount of cohesion marker use can be task specific. Frequently-occurring cohesion markers were not necessarily stronger contributors to coherence. Only ellipsis, collocation, and conjunction showed a significant influence on coherence for both tasks, and their magnitudes were fairly weak. The significant cohesion markers, collectively, explained only about 10% of coherence. For both tasks, conjunction exerted a negative influence on coherence. This study supports the ideas in the literature that cohesion should not be the primary factor in determining writing quality; coherence is the result of a psychological process within the reader, who understands the text by incorporating its textual cues through association to existing knowledge by inference.

Reader Expectations and the Validity of Composition Scoring: Implications for Componential Scoring

Jungok Bae(배정옥) 한국영미어문학회 2007 영미어문학 Vol.- No.84

  The validity of writing assessment has greatly improved since performance-based writing tasks have been used as alternative writing tasks. High reliability of scoring has also been demonstrated in numerous essay assessments. A relatively recent dimension of validity that has been called into question in writing assessment is scoring validity. This paper discusses scoring validity, focusing on the question of diverse reader expectations that contribute to doubts about scoring validity. Reader expectations are discussed in categories such as: differing reader views of what is good writing, issues of content conceptualization, characteristics of texts and their effects on readers, and divergent backgrounds and assumptions held by writers and readers. The paper suggests that readers in essay assessments should be aware of these issues. Finally the paper finds implications for scoring validity in holistic and componential scoring and recommends componential scoring as an alternative to holistic scoring where appropriate and feasible.

The Evidence for Equivalence of Parallel Test-forms for Assessing Narrative-task-based Writing Skills

Jungok Bae 한국응용언어학회 2006 응용 언어학 Vol.22 No.1

어린이용 이야기 쓰기 그림 검사의 동형 확인

배정옥(Jungok Bae) 한국교육평가학회 2014 교육평가연구 Vol.27 No.1

반복시험에서 성적을 비교할 경우 측정 동등성이 전제조건으로 충족되어야한다. 이의 중요성에도 불구하고 영어쓰기 평가에서 검사의 동등성 및 동형성을 다룬 연구는 부족하며, 그림기반의 쓰기검사에 관해서는 더욱 그러하다. 본 연구는 '피자'와 '놀이동산'이라고 이름 지어진 두 개의 어린이용 이야기쓰기 그림 시리즈를 개발하고 이들의 동형 신뢰도를 검정하였다. 이 검정을 위해 두 그림을 초등학생들에게 무작위로 배분하여, 피자 집단과 놀이동산 집단으로 구성하였다. 학생들은 주어진 그림에 의거하여 영어로 이야기를 지어 쓰도록 지시되었다. 작문데이터는 Coh-Metrix 코퍼스 프로그램과 인간채점, 그리고 MANCOVA를 사용하여 분석되었다. 두 그림 집단이 기존쓰기능력에서 같도록 통제하고 다섯 개의 쓰기 영역(어휘 다양성, 접속어, 단어 수, 문법, 내용 영역)에서 검정한 결과, 그림 차이로 인해 두 집단의 평균들이 달라지지는 않았으며, 이들 변수의 분산과 공분산 또한 두 집단 간에 유의미한 차이가 없었다. 이 결과는 전체 집단을 초급, 중급, 고급 수준별로 나누어 조사해 보아도 일관성 있게 나타났다. 그러므로 이 두 그림 시리즈는 변별도, 난이도, 그리고 변수들 간의 상관관계에 있어 동형 검사로 확인되었다. 이에 종단 쓰기수행 평가도구로 활용되도록 추천된다. This paper investigated the equivalent form reliability of two picture series, entitled 'pizza' and 'amusement park,' which were developed and have been introduced for the first time to writing education and assessment. The picture series were designed a priori to be equivalent for use in repeated testing. They were administered to elementary school students (N = 68), using a simultaneous random distribution of the picture series, and the students were required to write a story based on the series they were assigned. The stories were analyzed with the Coh-Metrix corpus program, human scoring, and MANCOVA. The findings are as follows. The two series were verified as being equivalent test forms, producing the same test results; they both had the same level of difficulty as well as the same discriminating power. These results held true across different ability groups (basic, intermediate, and advanced levels), indicating consistency of the findings across the ability groups. Therefore, the two series are confirmed as feasible alternate forms and recommended for use in repeated testing to assess changes in writing ability.

Do Good Writers Use More Ellipses in Writing?

Yujin Min,Jungok Bae 한국외국어교육학회 2016 Foreign languages education Vol.23 No.2

Ellipsis has been analyzed, if at all, as a type of cohesion markers by earlier studies. The underestimation of its importance and the lack of attention it has received has resulted in only few empirical studies analyzing the ellipsis as a primary object of inquiry. At the same time, there are conflicting findings on whether the relationship between ellipsis use and discourse quality is substantially positive or insignificant. Aware of these gaps, this study focuses on ellipsis and its subtypes to examine whether ellipses enhance the quality of writing. The study participants were 315 Korean high school students who wrote stories in English. Their writing samples were analyzed for ellipsis use and writing quality. The findings revealed that ellipsis occurrences in writing had a substantial relationship with the overall writing quality. This result was substantiated by a separate examination of the good vs. poor writer groups: Good writers used a significantly greater number of ellipses than did poor writers. Structural and nominal ellipses were the most prominent types of ellipses while clausal and verbal ellipsis occurred rarely. This pattern was held true for both good and poor writer groups. The current study promotes the status of ellipsis as a definitely contributing factor to good writing.

The Effect of Creating a Prior Event in Story Telling

Youngsu Kwon,Jungok Bae 언어과학회 2018 언어과학연구 Vol.0 No.86

This study investigated what effect the creation of a prior event has on content quality in story writing and if the effect varies depending on easy versus difficult topics. Two topics (overslept, digging) were selected; for each topic, two tasks (prior-required, prior-unrequired) were developed. Middle-school students performed one of the four tasks. For the easy topic, the prior-required group had a greater proportion of prior events in the writing but a significantly lower mean for content. For the difficult topic, no significant difference was found in both domains. In conclusion, the task asking students to create a prior event is more difficult and has greater discriminatory power when used with an easy topic and is recommended as a test for selection purposes.

The Influence of Picture Prompt Variation on Writing Performance: 'Series' vs. 'Imagine Before and After'

Jooeun Jung,Jungok Bae 팬코리아영어교육학회 2013 영어교육연구 Vol.25 No.2

This study investigated whether two picture-based prompts, namely 'Series' and 'Imagine Before and After, 'bring about significant differences in the writing quality of students. A total of 124 elementary school students participated in this study. A random half of the participants was given the series prompt and was required to write a story based on the depicted sequence. The other half was given a single-scene prompt and was asked to write a story, imagining what happened before and after. The results showed no significant differences between the two prompt groups in writing quality with respect to coherence, text length, subordination, and vocabulary diversity. However, a greater variety of stories was generated from the group who used the single-scene imagination prompt. It is interpreted that both prompts have the same measurement properties to evaluate writing qualities; they may be used interchangeably to test and improve students' writing qualities. The imagination prompt, however, has a particular value for encouraging students to think with their imagination. From reader perspective, the imagination prompt is suggested because readers can read a greater variety of stories, feeling less bored in the evaluation process.

A Profile of the 11 Functions of ‘That’ Used in Story Writing by English Proficiency Groups

Moonjung Jang,Jungok Bae 한국영미어문학회 2018 영미어문학 Vol.- No.131

The single word ‘that’ has amazing utility because it offers 11 different functions. This study investigated the 11 functions of that which students used implicitly when writing stories. The participants were 4 proficiency groups: 2 Korean elementary-school immersion groups, Korean students in a gifted program (6th-9th grades), and American junior-high-school students. Occurrences of that in the stories were classified into 11 functions, ranked in accordance with mean occurrences, and grouped into 2 larger categories: high-frequency (easier) vs. low-frequency (more difficult) functions. That functioned most often as an object clause or demonstrative pronoun, and least as a subject clause or complement clause. The high-frequency functions were used most often in the stories of the gifted Korean youths, indicating their enthusiasm and fluency. Low-frequency functions occurred most often in the writings of the American junior-high-school students. Low-frequency functions showed a small and gradual increase in the use as students’ proficiency rose. This study enhances educators’ understanding of the use of that functions in relation to implicit knowledge as manifest in spontaneous discourse and proficiency levels.