Korean English teachers' perceptions of the "teaching English in English" policy

In Korea, education policies focusing on English have long invited challenge and raised major social issues in many ways. Teaching English in English (TEE) is one of the government-driven policies to improve students‟ communicative competence. The main thrust of TEE is to have most or all English language teaching done in the target language to improve students‟ communicative competence. The extent to which the L2 is used in the TEE classroom is considered to be the key factor in the success or failure of TEE. Research points out that the use of L2 only in the EFL classroom is a good practice since teachers are the students’ primary source of linguistic input (Turnbull, 2002). However, many English teachers in Korea are themselves somewhat limited in their fluency, and there are few opportunities for students to practice English in natural settings in Korea. Moreover, studies of L1 use in the learning of an L2 show that use of the L1 can play a positive role in the activities (Cook, 2001), and can be a useful cognitive learning tool in SLA (Anton and Dicamilla, 1998). Thus, there are questions as to how feasible TEE is as a policy at this time. This study investigates the conception of and attitudes towards TEE of the major policy practitioners, i.e. English teachers. 43 Korean English teachers were surveyed by means of a questionnaire asking about their experience of and attitudes toward TEE.Department of EnglishThesis (M.S.