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The aim of this study is to explore how the creation of spherical video-based virtual reality (SVVR) influences students' creativity and curiosity in project-based language learning (PBLL). Technology is widely used in various instructional contexts, and due to increasing interest in VR technologies, the current study investigated how SVVR technology in PBLL might influence students' self-assessment of creativity and curiosity. Twenty-seven students participated in an SVVR-enhanced PBL course and were asked to complete two questionnaires on creativity and curiosity. Data from students' reflective journals and teacher notes were also analyzed to investigate implementations for using SVVR in language learning. The findings showed that students' self-assessment of their levels of creativity and curiosity demonstrated statistically significant development. The findings from qualitative data analysis identified English language competence as a factor that could have influenced students' performance during the course. The findings support the potential for SVVR in PBLL for motivating students to embrace new ideas and perspectives while participating in authentic problem-solving activities.

As the pandemic has brought in a paradigm shift in the way we educate and interact with our students, it has also had profound impacts on the practicum of pre-service teacher education. Focusing on the case of 14 South Korean student teachers who completed their teaching practicum in Spring 2020, this paper explores how the new form of teaching practicum, triggered by the current outbreak, affected student teachers' professional development and their views on teaching practice and profession. In particular, it examines the ways by which teaching practicums conducted under unpredictable circumstances negatively or positively affect student teachers' professional identities as teaching practitioners and their motivation to become a teacher. The findings of this study show that the teaching practicum conducted in times of crisis enabled pre-service English language teachers to develop a positive image toward teachers and teaching profession, and realize their potential as innovative and inspiring teachers in the post COVID-19 era.

This narrative study focuses on how Gina, a Korean learner with a Korean immigrant mother and a European-descent New Zealander father, constructed her identities and engaged with Korean as a heritage language (HL) before, during, and after studying abroad in Korea. Gina's transformative experiences illustrate the links between HL learning and learners' understanding of themselves in racial/ethnic/cultural terms. The study highlights raciolinguistic ideologies' complex influence on the HL development and identity (re)construction of learners who consider themselves to have multiple racial/ethnic/cultural heritages. Although Gina's HL learner identity hampered her classroom education during study abroad, her family background provided her opportunities outside the classroom that strengthened her sense of belonging and encouraged her (re)construction of her identities. The study provides practical implications for study-abroad program developers and educators concerning the raciolinguistic ideologies that HL learners who identify as having multiple heritages might bring to their HL learning and participation in study-abroad programs. Being aware of raciolinguistic ideologies, preparing students for how their own and others' ideologies might impact their experiences during study abroad, and providing the means for multiheritage HL learners to share their experiences could all contribute positively to these learners' continued identity (re)construction, HL development, and study-abroad experiences.

In the process of neoliberal globalization, the number of pre-college-aged educational migrants from English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) countries, often referred to as an early study abroad (ESA) student, has dramatically increased over recent decades in many English-speaking countries. Much of previous research on these educational migrants has primarily focused on parents' perspectives and involvement, and ignoring the engagement of and investment made by ESA students themselves. By analyzing transcripts of qualitative interviews with fifteen former early study-abroad students from Korea, this paper investigates how these ESA students narrate their experiences of early study abroad and how they understand their roles and experiences in the process. Findings of this paper show that ESA students' ways of thinking and approaches to their educational trajectory and language learning strongly resonate with a practice of neoliberal responsibilization, by which each student is made responsible for her own choices and their consequences.

While quality English language education is not equally accessible in many EFL countries, neoliberalism and its ideology of language as a neutral skill that everyone can acquire has obscured inequalities caused by the heavy emphasis on English as a dominant world language. Using South Korea as an example, I examine how individuals, especially young adults, living in the neoliberal market economy perceive and recognize the overwhelming emphasis on English as a dominant world language and its underlying mechanisms that contribute to social reproduction in EFL countries. In analyzing the popular Korean discourse Theory of Spoon Class (sujeogyegeublon), I examine how English is beginning to be recognized as an active tool to maintain and solidify social class reproduction, and how the construction of English as a purchasable good then results in feelings of despair, hopelessness and resentment among individuals, especially young adults who need to survive in the precarious job market with rising unemployment rates and prolonged economic stagnation.

As the public health threat posed by the COVID-19 pandemic is still evolving globally, many linguistic minorities are struggling to obtain accurate and timely health information about the disease and its prevention and treatment in their native language. This study argues that existing ethnic online communities can play an important role in dealing with such health information disparities in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. By analyzing the activities and postings on an online community of Chinese international students in South Korea, this paper illustrates that the community functions as a virtual hub that produces and disseminates up-to-date and essential information about COVID-19 and provides a platform for users to share experiences and emotions accompanying the unprecedented situation. This study points out that the participation of Chinese international students in the online community is voluntary and based on established infrastructure because of the presence of a greater number of Chinese students in South Korea. Thus, it urges the government and local authorities to be more aware of the importance of providing adequate support and guidance to linguistic minorities in such uncertain and frightening times.

Purpose: With an increasing emphasis on the reading development of L2 learners of English and a growing body of literature on L2 reading, it is now time to examine what the current research on L2 reading says about L2 learners' reading development and to discuss what would be a desirable future for L2 reading studies. Focusing on the L2 reading of upper elementary, middle and high school students in L1 settings, this study aims to carefully, but critically, explore the major research studies published in the past three decades. In particular, it uses sociocultural and critical frameworks that view language as a social phenomenon and literacy as a constellation of socially contextualized practices to explore the issue of L2 reading. Design/methodology/approach: To identify key findings about L2 reading, a systematic literature review of studies examining L2 reading in L1 settings was conducted. A critical examination and analysis of 91 studies on L2 reading for upper elementary students (Grades 4-12) are presented here. Based on the literature review, the major issues addressed in the previous section are revisited, and the requirements of future research on L2 reading are discussed. Findings: Three major changes have taken place in L2 reading studies--from monolingual/L1-based research to multilingual/L2-based research; developing the socially situated model of literacy (literacies); and adopting a sociocultural and critical lens: L2 reading and L2 reading assessment. Based on the critical review of the major research studies published in the past three decades, this paper identifies the research and approach required to advance the field of L2 reading: the continua of L1 and L2 reading, macro-micro analysis of L2 reading context and diversification of L2 reading research. Originality/value: Based on a systematic literature review, it demonstrates the current trends in L2 reading research, to examine the key findings and implications, and to identify what additional research or paradigms are required to advance the field. The literature review presented in this paper helps language educators, policy-makers and school administers at all levels in both first-and second-language contexts to better understand the rapidly increasing number of L2 English learners in L1 classroom settings.

The process of globalization, along with the advent of Internet technology, has resulted in the increasing presence of written mixed-language discourses produced and used by multilinguals in online spaces (e. g. online chat, instant messaging, and online discussion boards). Despite the fact that multilingual texts have become more visible and accessible, little research has empirically examined written mixed-language discourses and their sociopragmatic values (Sebba 2012). Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork on computer-mediated interaction among English-Korean bilinguals, this study explores how a certain multilingual practice became iconized as an ideological representation of authentic bilinguals and how such ideological constructs influenced their linguistic practices in written interaction. In particular, this study investigates how these bilinguals strategically create and use a non-standard variety of novel respelling forms in order to position themselves as "authentic" bilinguals and differentiate themselves from other potentially "inauthentic" and "failed" bilinguals. Findings suggest that multilingual texts and written mixed-language discourses need to be understood as an ideological site where different language ideologies and historical discourses are articulated, and where multilinguals try to authenticate themselves as legitimate bilinguals in a given discourse community.

This qualitative study of English Korean bilinguals explores the ways in which they legitimize themselves as "good" bilinguals in relation to the discourse of native-speakerism. I first survey the essentialist discourse of native speakerism still prevalent in the field of English language teaching and learning despite the growing criticism; the implication is that the acquisition of "native-like" English competence is the prioritized marker of proficiency for English language learners in both English-as-a-second language (ESL) and English-as-a-foreign language countries. I then analyze ethnographic and qualitative interview data from 20 South Korean bilinguals of English and Korean to examine how they evaluate this problematic preference for native speakerism as well as how they redefine what constitutes "good" bilingual competence in contemporary South Korean society. In opposition to major assumptions in the scholarly literature, the findings suggest that English language learners themselves might not consider the acquisition of "native-like" language competence an ideal goal to achieve. Rather, these bilinguals make a concerted investment in acquiring and displaying socially expected sociolinguistic, metasociolingusitic and discursive competences that are closely associated with "good" and "ideal" bilinguals in a given language community. The article concludes with recommendations for revisiting the issue of native speakerism and ideological presuppositions of "native-like" competence.