This action research explores an effective teaching method for EFL teacher’s questioning types in a Korean online university context. By reviewing the previous studies on teachers’ questioning types which have been categorized mostly by cognitive linguistic tradition, this study sorts out the different questioning types from socio-linguistic perspective using the Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) framework. These new categorized questioning types are applied to instruct the participant students (57) who were majoring in English and were mostly interested in TESOL (Teaching English to the Speakers of Other Languages) certificate program provided by the online university in Korea. Using a series of lecture content, two assignments, and an online discussion board, these newly added questioning types (offer and request types replacing command) were successfully taught in an online lecture entitled ‘Classroom English and Communication’ in the first semester of 2021. With a mixed analysis method, this study explains the procedures of various classroom tasks and analyzes the assignment data and online discussion board texts. This teacher classroom communication consisting of instruction and questioning needs to be reconsidered due to this study’s findings and its pedagogic implications that are clearly based on socio-linguistic perspectives.

This study examined the language choice for modality patterns to express the degree of probability specifically in email texts based on Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) analytical framework. Participants were students enrolled in an English writing composition course at an online-based Korean university. They were required to write an email thanking their professor, in which they stated their future plans (definite or indefinite) with a degree of probability. The text analysis was compared with two groups of students' scores (high-scoring group n=40 and low-scoring group n=29), based on an assessment of the course assignment. After building up two learner corpora, UAM Corpus Tool version 3.0 was used to analyze the language choice closely using a modality system of the SFG framework. The high-scoring group showed more range and frequency in the use of modal verbs combined with a modal Adjunct or another modal expression. Explicit teaching on the importance of expressing the appropriate degree of probability using a range of modality devices, rather than relying heavily on the primary modality (choice of modal verbs) is highlighted as a pedagogical implication.

Ko, Bo-Ai. 2018. “Thematic Patterns in Formal Email Writing of Korean EFL College Learners”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 26(1). 31~59. This study explores the Theme types and the thematic progression in the formal email writings of Korean EFL college learners, based on the Theme-Rheme analytical framework of Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG). Data was collected from 99 college students, enrolled in an English Writing Composition course during the second semester of 2017 via a cyber university in Korea. Their main writing activity involved email writings in the form of requesting primarily based on the Genre Approach. Text analysis was conducted with the comparison of the high- scoring group (15), the medium-scoring group (15) and the low-scoring group (15), based on assessment of the course assignment. Employing the coding step of identifying the Theme and Rheme of each T-unit, the text analysis sought to figure out which Theme types were used for each T-unit and which thematic progression patterns were used for overall text flow and cohesion. The key finding was that there were certain discourse-specific thematic patterns of formal email writing. Among the range of thematic features, this study will highlight marked Themes, interpersonal Themes and thematic choices of nominalization for the purpose of formal email writing texts.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of the genre-based approach on ESL children’s writing both at school and at home. Among genre writing, narrative writing was chosen for more detailed text analysis based on systemic functional grammar (SFG). Apart from their increasing control of schematic structure and other linguistic features, the ESL children expanded their range of process types so remarkably that various experiential meanings were constructed in each child’s narrative writing style. This study found that the genre-based approach helped ESL children to take their first steps into the world of narrative writing by explicitly supporting its schematic structure and other elements. The ESL children seemed to develop their own styles of narrating using the same genre-based approach at school, which proves a paradoxical truth in the sense that the genre critics often point out the lack of individual creativity due to the ‘stifled’ genre pedagogy. Creativity, particularly in the case of the two ESL children, came after jumping on the ‘springboard,’ which is a proper support system in their genre writing.