2019, Vol.20, No.2

Modern English Education 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 1.55

pISSN : 1598-0782 / eISSN : 2586-6141
https://journal.kci.go.kr/meeso

In accordance with the changing scope of culture learning (CL), i.e., intercultural knowledge development, since the 1990s onwards, this study intends to explore the potential of CL through project work concerning intercultural knowledge construction and its experiences within a preservice English teacher education. In other words, the research employs project-based learning (PBL) as a tool to incorporate the principles of constructivism and experiential education. This study modified Stoller’s (1997) PBL model into a seven-step sequence, which was embedded in the midst of a CL course for eight weeks. The study used three data sources collected from eleven participants: group projects, weekly journals, and post-project written reflections. The results are as follows. First, students showed intercultural knowledge construction by: 1) producing four projects, each for a cultural topic of Korean, American, and other international cultures; and 2) expressing they built deep intercultural knowledge, understood the interwoven nature of culture, and developed genuine interest in the cultures. Second, the study identified four perceived PBL’s benefits: metacognitive skills practice, language practice, student-centered active learning, and integration of PBL theory and practice. Finally, PBL’s challenges were identified: many time-consuming tasks, insufficient language competence, unfamiliar cultural topics, and being unaccustomed to student-centeredness.

This study aims to explore Korean students’ pragmatic and grammatical awareness with attention to whether there are any differences between college and university students in their level of pragmatic and grammatical awareness. For this purpose, this study employs a language awareness task, which covers three sub-tasks: error recognition, error severity ratings, and error correction. Correlation analyses show that there was a positive correlation between the college group’s grammatical error correction and their pragmatic error correction and between the university group’s pragmatic error recognition and correction. The results also show that the college group recognized pragmatic errors better than grammatical ones and that the university group outperformed the college group at grammatical error recognition. The analysis also reveals that both college and university groups rated pragmatic errors as more severe than grammatical ones. However, the error correction task reveals the opposite, showing that the two learner groups performed grammatical error correction much better than pragmatic error correction. On the basis of the results, pedagogical implications are provided to help learners promote their pragmatic and grammatical awareness.

This study explores Korean EFL university students’ lived experiences in an extracurricular tutoring program. Using a phenomenological research framework, 59 students’ weekly and final reflective journals and in-depth interviews with seven students were analyzed to determine the essence of their experiences. By coding the data into categories and sub-categories, three major themes and 12 sub-themes were derived to describe participants’ motives for program participation, collaborative learning strategies, and outcomes. In groups, students participated in the extracurricular tutoring program to achieve a shared goal with the support of one another. Their collaborative learning was mediated by using a variety of strategies: making ground rules, establishing and revising learning plans, sharing materials and information, using mobile technology, developing ideas through discussion, giving and receiving feedback, and teaching group members. These strategies were conducive to students’ learning, resulting in their increased English proficiency, acquisition of English learning methods, and confidence in learning English. Central to this study is the idea that collaborative learning is an important process and mechanism for successful English learning and competency development. The findings from this research provide pedagogical insights and implications for learner-centered approaches to English education.