A Comparative Case Study of NESTs in Two EFL Contexts : South Korea and Finland

This thesis aims to provide an in-depth insight into the perceptions and experiences of native English-speaking teachers (NESTs) teaching EFL in South Korea and Finland. The main focus of the study is to examine the similarities and differences between these two countries as EFL contexts and how NESTs position themselves in respect to them by discussing their thoughts on the respective EFL education systems, their students’ proficiency in English and how EFL should be taught, the global presence of English, and their roles as NESTs in an EFL teaching context. A justification for this comparative study are the various similarities in South Korea and Finland as contexts. An additional motivator behind this study is the gap in international rankings of English proficiency levels between Finnish and Korean EFL learners, despite the high performance of both countries’ education systems in international comparisons. This thesis examines and discusses potential reasons behind this. The methods employed in the study were semi-structured audio-recorded interviews with five NESTs teaching in Korea and six teaching in Finland. The interviews were transcribed and analysed through thematic analysis, with the help of the qualitative analysis software NVivo. The data showed various similarities between the EFL education contexts of Korea and Finland. Both appear to be shifting towards a more communication-based language learning approach, although the emphasis on refining skills in reading and writing remains strong. Both have traditionally emphasised a particular variety of English in the teaching material, but this emphasis is giving way to a more diverse representation of Englishes. Regarding Korean and Finnish EFL learners, both begin learning English formally at a young age, and encounter many similar difficulties due to the linguistic dissimilarity of English to their mother tongue. Furthermore, both are commonly more at ease with written demonstrations of English proficiency, at least in formal learning contexts. The interviewed NEST in both countries agreed that communication practice should be featured more in EFL classrooms, and that using English as the language of instruction can have many advantages, particularly with more advanced learners. Furthermore, many believed they as NESTs had unique strengths as EFL teachers. The most commonly mentioned ones were the ability to provide cultural context for the language, as well as a more intuitive, nuanced understanding of English. Simultaneously, the data revealed that NESTs teaching in Finland were generally more satisfied with the education system and more ambivalent concerning their role as NESTs than their Korea-based counterparts. The Finnish EFL education was also reported as featuring more varieties of English, and the Finnish students were reportedly more motivated to engage with English outside the classroom. These findings suggest that the presence of English, both in the formal education system and in society at large, may be more solidified in Finland than in Korea, which in turn would account for the higher scores on international proficiency tests