Korean English Teacher" Use of English Dictionaries and Instruction on their Use
There is little research on the users of dictionaries in Korea. The user research, however, is essential to developing better dictionaries. Hence, this study aims to explore the actual conditions regarding Korean English teachers’ general use of English dictionaries. English teachers were chosen as the subjects because they instruct the use of dictionaries to other users, especially students, as well as use dictionary themselves. Thirty teachers from elementary, middle and high schools respectively (total 90) participated in this research. The research was conducted using questionnaires that consisted of two main parts: The first part was designed to analyze the teachers’ use of dictionaries and the second part aimed to investigate the teachers’ instruction on the use of dictionaries. The data were coded and factors were examined by means of quantitative analysis. It was found that English teachers in Korea used Korean-English and English-English dictionaries which are well structured and easy to use with full contents in order to prepare teaching materials and develop handouts other than text books. In addition, most of teachers said that students must be taught how to use dictionaries in the first grade of junior high school.