This case study with 12 Korean high school emergent bilinguals (K-emergent bilinguals) illustrates how the pedagogical concept of translingual dialogic webbing can be conceptualized based on theories of dialogism and translanguaging. Through a concrete case of classroom activities using a picturebook, the Rough Patch, this article shows how the pedagogical concept of translingual dialogic webbing can be conceptualized and materialized in Korean high school English language teaching classrooms (Korean ELT). K-emergent bilinguals’ translingual classroom discussions as well as translingual and multimodal written responses revealed that translingual dialogic webbing could help Kemergent bilinguals draw on their available meaning making resources, including Korean, English, semiotic modes, cultural knowledge, and experiences, to navigate and construct more nuanced meanings with creativity and critical insights across time and space. By bridging translanguaging and dialogism, this study addresses the critical need for linguistic inclusivity and adaptability in Korean ELT, while embracing students’ diverse ideas, creativity, and the multilingual and multimodal realities of today.

Ballena, Mae Karr Ruth & Shim, Young-Sook. 2018. “Representation of Social Struggles in Korean and Philippine ELT Textbooks”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 26(1). 201~228. The present study investigates the representations of social struggles depicted in middle school English textbooks published in Korea and the Philippines. The data consists of 200 reading selections from 18 volumes of Korean textbooks and 108 reading selections from 3 volumes of Philippine textbooks. A total of 39 instances of social struggles were identified from the data analysis, and the following categories emerged from careful reviews of those instances: (1) social struggles involving social groups, which are further divided into subcategories such as gender, generation, socioeconomic class, social rank, race, and the colonizer/colonized; and (2) social struggles involving resources, which are subdivided into education, basic necessity, and technology. Findings show that social struggles associated with gender, colonization, education, and technology are common among Philippine and Korean ELT textbooks. The data analysis also reveals that Philippine textbooks present a wider array and more in-depth contextualization of social struggles while representational issues on stereotyping, desensitization, and juxtaposition of elements are found in Korean textbooks. Related to the research findings, some educational implications are provided particularly from the perspective of critical pedagogy.

This paper explores students’ and teacher’s experiences with project-oriented learning, as a form of critical pedagogy for Korean English language teaching. The teacher in this study developed and implemented a model of project-based instruction into a Korean tertiary context. The data set consisted of learner journals, teacher journals, and interviews. Six findings were ascertained: (1) The project approach created resistance from both the students and the teacher; (2) Communication between the teacher and the students eased the students’ frustrations; (3) The goal-oriented nature of project work encouraged students to construct linguistic and topic-related knowledge; (4) Group work promoted independent and collaborative learning; (5) The teacher’s role as a facilitator continued to confuse the teacher; and (6) Plagiarism seemed to limit student learning. Based on the findings, two pedagogical implications were drawn: Studentcentered approaches in large low-level classes would require some degree of teachercenteredness in order to respond to language demands; and learner and teacher journals can serve as an indicator of a need for teacher-centered methods.

This paper aims to examine the online learning service called the Cyber Home Learning System (CHLS), which was introduced in 2004 and has been in operation nationwide since 2005. It appears questionable as yet whether the CHLS has obtained a promising outcome. This study, therefore, aims to investigate how many secondary students are currently utilizing the English contents in the CHLS and how they perceive this service. The results of this study indicated that English contents of the CHLS were utilized by only a small number of students, and the contents were rarely perceived as useful. In particular, students perceived that there was little interaction with teachers in cyber space as well as in a classroom setting. Furthermore, five items were identified as the major reasons that hinder students from using the CHLS: lack of promotion; difficulty of self-directed learning; lack of time; low quality; and inconvenience. The results of this study suggest that teachers are influential in affecting students’ perception toward the CHLS, and that it is of paramount importance to renew the CHLS based on the results of a needs analysis.