The present study aimed to analyze the developmental trajectories of English achievement and exposure time through private education, utilizing univariate and multivariate latent growth curve analysis. This study used a subset of the Gyeonggi Education Panel Study data from 2012 to 2017. The results indicated consistent disparities in the growth of English achievement, depending on the student’s proficiency levels at the starting point. In particular, the early exposure to private tutoring was significantly and closely related to the initial status and the growth trajectory of English achievement. When the sample was classified by urbanicity, the findings suggested that the gap in English achievement was likely to increase over time across the two regions, with a stronger correlation with private tutoring found in urban areas. These results underscore the need for educational intervention for students in less advantageous conditions, and they provide valuable pedagogical implications for teaching English in the Korean EFL context.

In light of the expanding use of technology in education, we attempted to analyze how Korean college students perceived the use of Machine Translation (MT) tools in the classroom. Specifically, this study attempted to explore students’ perceptions of their ability to use MT tools and to measure the reliability of the MT-generated output, along with measuring students’ general sense of confidence in English learning. This research analyzed 183 EFL college students’ responses to an online survey, and a one-way ANOVA was used to test for the differences in the averages of three groups. The results of data analysis revealed that 1) Among beginners, intermediate learners, and advanced learners, those self-identifying as advanced had the highest scores on all the factors measured.; 2) There was a significant mean difference in students’ perceptions of the ability to use MT tools, their beliefs regarding MT’s effectiveness as a learning tool, and affective attitudes towards the use of MT tools between beginner and advanced groups. Based on the findings, pedagogical implications for the effective use of MT tools in the Korean EFL classrooms, and suggestions for future research were presented.

This study explores Korean EFL learner preferences and perceptions of digital composing (DC) with innovative online technology tools during the implementation of emergency remote learning measures. The research compares learner use of text-based DC and voice-based audio asynchronous online discussion (AOD). This paper investigates the following research problem: What digital modes of interactive, online instructional design can serve as appropriate, learner-accepted replacements for offline instruction? One prior finding indicated that Korean undergraduate EFL learners preferred text and audio DC to video modes. To follow up, this paper investigates 57 learners’ preferences and perceptions toward text-based and voice-based DC, and compares the results. The data analysis methods employ paired-samples Tests, and a thematic analysis to identify issues raised in student comments. The results reveal that learners’ levels of user satisfaction with voice-based audio AOD and their ratings of its perceived usefulness confirm that it can be a satisfactory, effective, and preferable task for engaging learners in digitally-mediated four-skills practice. Another finding is that utilizing a voice-based audio module did not significantly alter learners’ course satisfaction when superseding a text-based module. These findings inform pedagogical practice with empirical insights regarding learners’ use of digital technologies, levels of acceptance, and DC preferences.

This article aims to suggest a model of critical literacy in English as a Foreign Language (hereafter EFL) contexts. The paper will introduce previous critical literacy models in first or second language teaching and learning and those in EFL contexts. Then, several empirical studies based on the models are introduced suggesting important issues to consider in implementing critical literacy in EFL contexts. A model of critical literacy in EFL contexts is, consequently, suggested with the three key elements for successful critical literacy implementation in EFL contexts, language for criticality development, affects and criticality development and citizenship and criticality development. The model pursues balancing conventional literacy education, critical literacy education and citizenship education. The researchers suggest balancing conventional skill-based literacy, affective pedagogy, and citizenship education with the development of critical literacies. Teacher-initiated practice and guidance, incorporation of community-sensitive topics and materials, and students’ active participation are key elements practitioners should consider in their adaptation of critical literacy instruction in EFL contexts.

This study aimed to compare the effects of self-regulation, goal orientation, and speaking anxiety on speaking performance between metaverse and face-to-face contexts. We randomly assigned 253 Korean middle school students to either metaverse or face-toface groups for 12 weeks of English-speaking lessons. Before and after the experiment, students completed speaking tests and submitted a post-questionnaire. Structural equation modeling and multi-group analysis revealed that student attributes had a similar impact on speaking performance in both settings. Specifically, self-regulation and mastery goal orientation positively influenced speaking performance, while speaking anxiety had a negative effect, regardless of the context. Furthermore, self-regulation played a mediating role in reducing speaking anxiety in both settings. This implies that metaverse-mediated and face-to-face classes offer similar learning environments, where students can leverage their goal orientation and self-regulation skills to manage speaking anxiety. Ultimately, students can enhance their speaking performance by employing selfregulation strategies and nurturing a mastery goal orientation, irrespective of the learning context.

The present study explores the educational potential of multiliteracies-based pedagogy to enhancing pre-service teachers’ creativity-convergence competency in an EFL literature classroom. To examine the pedagogical effect, both quantitative and qualitative data were analyzed, including the pre- and post- creativity-convergence competency tests, participants’ course evaluation questionnaire, and students' reflective journals. The results from the quantitative analysis indicated that multiliteracies pedagogy employed in the EFL literature classroom enhanced participants’ creativity-convergence competency significantly (p<.05) in its all components, including creativity, problemsolving ability, convergent thinking ability, and self-efficacy. The findings in the analysis of participants’ views on the positive potentials of the multiliteracies pedagogical approach in fostering learners’ creativity-convergence competency were identified as follows: (1) use of multimodal resources in the communication process promoted their creativity-convergence competency, (2) transformative practices served as the facilitator to foster creativity-convergence competency, and (3) critical literacy practices helped them develop problem-solving ability and self-efficacy. The paper ends with some pedagogical implications and suggestions for further research.

This study investigated the effects of multisensory memory strategies of pairing visual and aural learning strategies of aural lexical advance organizers (LAO) and read-alouds on 146 Korean high school students learning the meaning and pronunciation of 18 unfamiliar English words. In this quasi-experimental design, the control group learned the words on a single mode of written LAO and silent reading as opposed to two treatment groups of aural LAO and silent reading, and of aural LAO and read-alouds, respectively. The effects were tested three times via pre-, post-(immediately after learning), and delayed (30 days later) tests. The immediate and long-term effects were examined by detecting the differences across the three groups in post- and delayed-tests by one-way ANOVA, and the retention of effects was examined by paired t-tests in each group across the three tests. The results indicated that pairing aural LAO and read-aloud strategies was most effective in learning and retention of both vocabulary meaning and pronunciation.

This study aimed to explore the role of inference making in the relation between vocabulary knowledge (breadth and depth) and reading comprehension for 487 ninthgrade Chinese EFL students who were categorized as either struggling or adequate. Path analysis was used to examine both direct and mediated effects. The results indicated a statistically significant indirect effect of vocabulary knowledge on reading comprehension, mediated by inference making, for the entire participant group. However, there were notable differences between the struggling and adequate readers, as evidenced by distinct path diagrams. For struggling readers, the indirect effect of vocabulary breadth on reading comprehension through inference making was significant, while that of vocabulary depth was not significant. For adequate readers, both vocabulary breadth and depth directly explained reading comprehension. These results are discussed in the EFL context, encompassing assessment and instructional implications for EFL readers with varying levels of reading abilities.

This study explored rhetorical devices and their effect on forming coherent and cohesive wholes in the writing of 61 EFL students. When analyzing their writing using the five-paragraph essay format, 57% of students deviated from the format, with some resorting to their L1 rhetorical structures (the indirect group) and others employing rhetorical preferences presumed to be deterministically influenced by their L1 (the hybrid group). Only 43% adhered to the format (the direct group). Neither the indirect nor the hybrid groups were inferior to the direct group regarding the length and quality of the writing; the direct group was not necessarily better received than the other two. The indirect group had a discernible (even if not statistically significant) impact on the length and quality of the writing. The indirect and hybrid groups were found to have slightly stronger control over cohesion indices. The two groups challenged the Englishonly orientation of the five-paragraph essay by negotiating rhetorical structures, thereby doing translingual dispositions.

This paper presents a case study of developing a blended reading program for Korean EFL middle school students using a process drama methodology to generate intrinsic motivation to read, improve reading comprehension and language fluency, and foster twenty-first-century skills such as creativity, communication, and cooperation. For the development of the reading program, a needs analysis was conducted using student questionnaires and diagnostic tests. From results of the needs analysis, sample lessons were designed based on the process drama methodology following its planning principles and strategies. Based on feedback from teachers and students after piloting the sample lessons, the blended reading program was finalized. The proposed blended reading program is expected to help Korean EFL middle school students build a positive attitude toward reading English books and develop reading comprehension, language fluency, and 21st-century core competencies. It will also encourage English teachers to use innovative teaching methods in English education.

This study aimed to investigate the effect of visual input enhancement (VIE) on the comprehension of reading texts and the learning of two grammatical forms: English relative clauses and articles. Individual learners’ working memory (WM) capacity was also tested to explore its impact on the effectiveness of VIE. A total of 48 Korean college learners of English were assigned into three groups: (a) relative group receiving VIE on relative clauses (b) article group receiving VIE on articles, and (c) a control group receiving no VIE. Results showed that VIE did not have any negative effect on the learners’ reading comprehension. Rather, it had positive effects on the learning of the two grammatical forms. According to the findings, VIE on relative clauses enhanced the learners’ receptive knowledge of the grammatical form, whereas VIE on articles enhanced the learners’ productive knowledge of the form. There was a potential link between the effectiveness of VIE and the learners’ working memory processing ability. Pedagogical implications are also discussed based on these findings.

This study investigated the role of competition in academic settings by conceptualizing competitive engagement and examining how competition self-efficacy defined as confidence in one’s ability to outperform others could mediate learner engagement and self-determination to learn English as a foreign language (EFL). Within the context of a videoconference EFL course, a cross-sectional research design was employed during the fourth semester of remote teaching in South Korea due to COVID-19. Statistically significant relationships existed among variables. Students reported high levels of cognitive and behavioral engagement but low levels of competitive engagement. Through structural modeling, competitive engagement emerged as a conceptually unique form of engagement. The relationship between competitive engagement and selfdetermination to learn English when attending an EFL videoconference course was fully mediated by competition self-efficacy. Partial mediation was observed in the relationship between cognitive engagement and self-determination. These findings suggest that both competitive and cognitive engagement are powerful indicators of learning outcomes, especially when learning EFL.

The purpose of this research was to investigate the characteristics of Korean college students’ writings, which have been produced without or with the help of machine translation tool in the classroom. Specifically, this research attempted to investigate the linguistic characteristics of the students’ writings, and types of errors identified in the writings. Twelve pieces of writings from three college students were collected for analysis. Two online word analysis programs, Word Counter (2023) and LIWC-22 (2023), were employed for data analysis. The findings of data analysis found out that 1) The students’ drafts consisted of 22.8 sentences including 303.9 words in 3.6 paragraphs on average. 2) In the students’ drafts, ‘unique’ words (46.8%) were included a lot more than ‘difficult’ words (27%), and students tended to write their essay writings in an unfiltered or impromptu way rather than an analytical way regardless of their English language proficiency levels. 3) The highest frequency of errors was seen in grammatical errors (41.7%) followed by lexical errors (31.6%). Based on the research findings, pedagogical implications and suggestions for the effective use of machine translation in English writing classes were presented.

The purpose of this paper was to provide a theoretical outline of why critical media literacy (CML) should be included in Korean English education teaching practices and teacher training curricula. CML is a pedagogy designed to sensitize students to ideological meanings embedded in media that socialize people into specific values, beliefs, and behaviors. This paper begins with a review of theoretical foundations of CML including the symbolic nature of human consciousness signification and the processes of socialization, which are theoretically encapsulated within the dialectic among post-structural theories of discourse and representation. A review of literature on CML and its application to English as a foreign language (EFL) is then presented. Applications of CML include situated inquiry, discussion, creation of group multimodal projects suggests, how it fosters the development of critical thinking skills, the acquisition and use of new vocabulary idioms, and transforming student perceptions of themselves and their society.

Adopting a conversation analytic framework, this paper examined the delay and potential indeterminacy of teacher’s repetition as an other-initiated repair (OIR) strategy, which took place at the third turn of the Initiation-Response-Evaluation (IRE) sequence in one-on-one tutoring sessions. Tutor-tutee interactions for a Korean secondary student were transcribed and analyzed along with notes used in the class. Data showed that when repetition was used as an OIR strategy, it was delayed and inaccurate. The learner was sometimes unsure whether the teacher’s repetition constituted a repair initiation regarding her prior turn. Furthermore, the learner could not successfully recognize which part of the repeated phrase should be repaired. Prior studies have confirmed that repetition can promote learners’ interactions rather than simply highlighting error while also giving learners an opportunity to correct their errors themselves. However, the analysis in this paper suggests a potential risk associated with using repetition as an OIR strategy at feedback turn in instructional discourse.

Using vocabulary learning strategies allows learners to gain vocabulary autonomously. This study presents data from a self-report survey of Korean university students comparing meaning discovery strategies they employ to comprehend unknown singleword items and unknown idioms. Survey data recorded strategies used by learners, and effectiveness of these strategies measured by rates of correct meaning discovery. The survey revealed that learners relied on context clues, dictionaries, and vocabulary analysis for both idioms and single word vocabulary items with equal effectiveness. Dictionary use was the most effective strategy for correct meaning discovery for both types of vocabulary, although context clues might be a positive factor for idioms but not for single-word items. Data also showed that learners tended to apply strategies methodically rather than heuristically but that methodical application did not necessarily translate into higher rates of correct meaning discovery. Implications for learners and paths for further research are discussed.

This study explored how task complexity, writing behaviors (i.e., pausing and revision behaviors), and writing performance (i.e., task completion, coherence and cohesion, language use, and expression and tone) influence and relate to each other. Thirty advanced-level Korean EFL undergraduates completed writing tasks differing in complexity. A combination of keystroke logging and stimulated recall interview was employed. It was found that the simple task group showed a greater number of pauses and revisions related to lower-order writing processes, whereas the complex task group showed longer pauses related to higher-order writing processes. While task complexity had no influence on writing performance, writing behaviors revealed significant relationships with text quality. In the simple task group, pause length and revision were negatively related to writing scores, whereas pause frequency revealed mixed results. In the complex task group, consistent negative relations were found between pausing behaviors and text quality, and fewer revisions were related to better scores in expression and tone.

This study examined how Google Jamboard-based autonomous knowledge-sharing advanced language proficiency and motivation in an online intermediate–high EFL communication course. For one semester, 30 Korean first-year college students shared their learning experiences beyond the classroom, enhancing their English communication competence via a weekly Jamboard. The students speaking and perceived proficiencies and motivation changes were examined. Overall speaking proficiency increased, except for pronunciation. Students acquired the ability to selfstudy, but this was insufficient for oral practice because distance learning limited direct interactions. Perceived current proficiency increased, but imaginary proficiency and English importance did not. Their ease in using English in their daily life improved, and they felt the gap between the current and imaginary proficiencies decreased. The ideal L2 self increased, based on instrumentality and integrativeness. This finding indicates that students understood that they were undergoing the process of becoming fluent English speakers. Hence, well-organized self-directed activities can promote autonomous learning behavior to improve language proficiency and motivation.

The present study aims to categorize common word choice errors in Korean EFL writing and help teachers understand students’ word choice patterns. This study reassures that both L1 and its background cultures affect language learners’ choice of vocabulary in English learning. Korean first-year undergraduate students with low levels of English proficiency participated in this study. The students were required to carry out a writing log, a collection of nine pieces of weekly assignments of paragraph writing during the semester. They were allowed to use any type of automatic translation such as Google Translate or Papago for revision and editing. The errors that the students produced were classified into three categories, and significant findings were obtained regarding lexical errors caused by literal translation, cultural differences, and L1 word order. The findings are interpreted in terms of cultural and linguistic differences between the first and target languages. They can give ideas for teachers to instruct EFL writing strategies on students’ word choice errors.