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This essay addresses the transformation of Korean higher education (HE) that has occurred since COVID-19, with a focus on the digitization of teaching and learning. Digitization has impacted both remote and traditional universities and colleges. While remote higher education institutions (HEIs) have been quick responding to the changed situation, traditional universities and colleges have also been searching for various instructional methods in their online as well as traditional classrooms, experimenting for the best methods for learners. National policies have also supported this digital transformation of HEIs which has had results of the engagement of more adult learners in HE gaining credits, certificates, and academic degrees online. While new ways of being 'learner-centered' have been intensively explored in these processes, some concerns such as the competency gap of institutions and instructors, and the deepening digital divide among learners have emerged, which needs attention from policymakers, researchers and practitioners in HE.

As our society has advanced in the era of digital transformation, education has been transformed from knowledge-centered to competency-centered to solve future problems in the light of unpredictable changes and events in our lives. Programming education provides the basic knowledge needed, and fosters higher-order thinking skills in the process of generating and converging ideas to solve problems. However, in Korean elementary schools, it is mostly based on a lecture-based instructional design and focuses on knowledge delivery, which has limited the educational effects of programming. However, productive failure (PF) focuses on learning concepts in authentic problems, and lets the students generate different solutions and discuss them in an acceptable environment, with the result that they fail to solve the problem. Therefore, this study developed a PF-based educational program and tested it on sixth-grade students in a Korean elementary school. The results showed that the computational thinking (CT) and creative problem-solving (CPS) skills of the experimental group were significantly greater than those of the control group, with a medium effect size for CT and a high effect size for CPS skills. To generalize the results and increase the applicability, follow-up studies should expand the subject of the study, develop specific teaching guidelines for teachers, and invent various learning problems appropriate to the students' level and different domains of learning.

The purpose of this research was to investigate the possibilities and opportunities for ASEAN and Korea student exchange programs in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era, by focusing on the needs of non-participating ASEAN students. To do so, this study conducted an online survey to analyze ASEAN students' understanding, views, expectations, and reasons for not participating in student exchange programs to Korea, while investigating their considerations and preferences for future participation. The findings revealed significant differences between ASEAN students in terms of nationality (especially Vietnamese students), academic field, and gender. They also highlighted the rising role and importance of hybrid and online modes of student mobility, that grew in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, there is a need for universities, government policy makers and educational scholars to reflect the emerging new needs of students concerning ASEAN-Korea exchange programs in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era.

Purpose: This article explores the literary work of a teacher and activist, Yi O-Deok, as a lens to approach historically and culturally embedded notions of humanization in education in Korea. Anchored in the ethos of "Asia as Method," this study offers a unique perspective that exemplifies the importance of the local sociocultural context in Asia in enriching our understanding of universal concepts. Design/Approach/Methods: This study adopts a methodological approach centered around the examination of Yi O-Deok's work and his influence on critical literacy education. Key source materials include Yi's extensive five-volume diary and the various literary pieces he edited from the 1950s to the 1980s. Findings: Yi O-Deok's philosophy on humanizing education, deeply influenced by local contexts, provides a distinct, non-Western perspective. It offers a critical counterpoint to Western-centric educational paradigms and enriches the broader understanding of humanization in education. Originality/Value: The uniqueness of this study resides in its focus on children's writings, affirming faith in the unfiltered expressions of their pure spirits encapsulated in the raw "languages of the soil," which have persevered through the sociopolitical upheavals of Korea's modern history. This in turn strengthens the call for a nuanced, non-Western interpretation of the concept of "humanization" in education.

An important educational goal is enabling students to learn scientific concepts. The scientific concepts learned in class are developed within students' cognitive structures. Despite the successful application of Semantic Network Analysis (SNA) to study these cognitive structures, there has been limited examination of students' concept networks based on their individual characteristics. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the differences in students' characteristics based on their cognitive levels, which influence their thinking and behavior. To analyze these differences, this study compares concept and connected concept networks, focusing on photosynthesis, a challenging life sciences topic. The study's results indicate that students could not clearly distinguish concepts by subtopic, but there were changes in the concept network after class. Although the types and number of concepts students knew were similar depending on their cognitive level, the concept network structure differed. Additionally, some students could not distinguish between similar concepts. Thus, teachers are advised to differentiate between similar concepts during instruction and address personal variables such as students' cognitive levels.

The present study aimed to analyze the developmental trajectories of English achievement and exposure time through private education, utilizing univariate and multivariate latent growth curve analysis. This study used a subset of the Gyeonggi Education Panel Study data from 2012 to 2017. The results indicated consistent disparities in the growth of English achievement, depending on the student's proficiency levels at the starting point. In particular, the early exposure to private tutoring was significantly and closely related to the initial status and the growth trajectory of English achievement. When the sample was classified by urbanicity, the findings suggested that the gap in English achievement was likely to increase over time across the two regions, with a stronger correlation with private tutoring found in urban areas. These results underscore the need for educational intervention for students in less advantageous conditions, and they provide valuable pedagogical implications for teaching English in the Korean EFL context.

This study proposes that the gestures of an agent tutor in a multimedia learning environment can generate positive and negative emotions in learners and influence their cognitive processes. To achieve this, we developed and integrated positive and negative agent tutor gestures in a multimedia learning environment directed by cognitive gestures. The effects of emotion type on cognition were examined in terms of cognitive load, learning motivation, and achievement. The subjects were 46 university students in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea. The students were divided into three learner groups: cognition, cognition + negative emotion, and cognition + positive emotion. The learners watched a tutorial lecture on the Notion note-taking app by an agent tutor. Data analysis was conducted using one-way ANOVA to determine the cognitive load, learning motivation, and achievement. The results showed that the positive emotion design was more effective in terms of intrinsic cognitive load, learning motivation, and achievement but had a higher extrinsic cognitive load. However, even the negative + passive group showed more positive learning than the cognition group. Although this study focused on gestures by an agent tutor, it implies that such gestures in multimedia learning contexts must be informed by emotional as well as cognitive design to provide a more meaningful learning experience.

The pressing issue of climate change demands an informed future generation, yet how aware are students? This study dives into the varying levels of climate change awareness among 1,079 Korean and 2,507 Indonesian primary school students using a sophisticated survey tool developed by Lee et al. (2021). Surprisingly, while both groups exhibited high levels of awareness, significant cross-cultural differences were uncovered. Indonesian students demonstrated higher levels of action, concern, belief, attention, and policy. This stands in stark contrast to Korean students, who, despite having a higher understanding of causes and effects, showed lower levels of belief and attention to the issue. These findings not only challenge us to rethink our educational strategies but also underscore the critical role of cultural contexts in shaping environmental awareness. This comparative analysis reveals startling insights into the complexities of educating the next generation about climate change, setting the stage for urgent educational reforms.

With the aim of providing holistic approaches to education, social and emotional learning (SEL) has gained significant attention within school systems across the world. SEL has been defined as the process through which individuals understand and regulate emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy towards others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions. In an effort to integrate SEL into the academic domains of science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM) and to promote cross-cultural collaboration, three institutions came together to deliver a groundbreaking program for elementary school students from California and South Korea: the Global Summer Academy. The impact of SEL is even greater when students observe adults collaborating to establish a nurturing environment, modeling positive behaviors, and consistently promoting social and emotional concepts and skills. Thus, forming community partnerships across contexts and settings is an ideal strategy for enriching student learning and development. SEL activities such as mindfulness practice can aid students in regulating their emotions during STEAM tasks, enabling them to better reflect on and address their successes and failures. Such a reflective process not only improves student learning outcomes, but also facilitates the development of persistence, resilience, critical thinking, and growth mindset. Therefore, integrating SEL principles within STEAM activities not only enriches the academic experience, but also equips students with the social and emotional skills necessary for personal growth. To assess students' learning (i.e., what they learned, what they enjoyed, challenges they faced), brief interviews were conducted with all participants at the end of the week-long program. This feedback suggested four key themes -- problem solving, relationship skills, self-awareness, and emotion awareness.

In this study, we investigated media reports and literacy research in four nations--China, Morocco, the Republic of (South) Korea, and the United States--about the relationship between adolescents' literacy and use of digital media, or digital literacy. We present short "snapshots" of adolescents' digital literacy in each country and then compare these to findings in a report about adolescent literacy and uses of digital media published by the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA). Our analysis indicates significant variation across countries in both literate traditions and adolescents' access to digital media, and notes that these interact to create unique conditions for adolescents' digital literacy in each country, even as, across the four nations, adolescents' capacity to innovate and solve problems with digital access seems constant. In conclusion, we are cautious about making global claims about the state of adolescents' literacy worldwide but point to important findings about how the use of the internet in schools seems to have a positive impact on reading performance and offer some implications for classroom practice.

This study analyzed data from the Korea Welfare Panel Study to identify changing patterns in social exclusion among South Korean youth and determine the influencing factors. The study examined 345 youth from 2012 to 2021. A fuzzy set theory and growth mixture model was used to measure social exclusion and identify patterns and the associated factors during this timeframe. The main findings are as follows. First, the social exclusion gap among South Korean youth that emerged a decade ago has continued, with high, middle, and low levels of exclusion identified. Second, the analysis revealed that looking at the demographics, being female, having less education and lower personal and household income increased the likelihood of falling into a relatively higher level of social exclusion. Based on the results, policy recommendations are suggested to mitigate the social exclusion gap among Korean youth.

Studies on how smoking media literacy (SML) is associated with susceptibility to smoking among adolescents in South Korea and Vietnam are scarce. Thus, we examined the association of SML with susceptibility to smoking among adolescents in these countries to initiate a collaborative global health program. In total, 460 adolescents (Vietnam: 277, South Korea: 183) aged 15-18 completed an online cross-sectional survey. SML was measured using the 15-item SML scale. Susceptibility to smoking was measured by three questions on future smoking and if offered a cigarette by a friend. A multiple logistic regression model explored the association of SML with susceptibility to smoking. The study revealed that higher SML was significantly associated with lower susceptibility to smoking among Vietnamese, but not South Korean adolescents. Further studies to identify pathways between other factors associated with SML and susceptibility to smoking are needed to develop culture-specific intervention strategies for smoking prevention.

This study aimed to investigate the effects of a violence-prevention education program using empathy (VPEP-E) on elementary school students. This quasi-experimental design examined fifth-grade students' (a) empathy level, (b) perception of violence, and (c) permissive and negligent attitudes toward violence, using a pre- and post-test design. A total of 101 students participated: the experimental group (n = 48) received eight sessions of VPEP-E, whereas the control group (n = 53) received violence prevention education through classroom lectures. Significant differences were observed between the groups' empathy level (t = 6.81, p < 0.001), perception of violence (t = 2.79, p = 0.006), and permissive and negligent attitudes toward violence (t = -2.21, p = 0.030; t = -2.02, p = 0.046). Thus, a school-based VPEP-E may help elementary school students. Long-term studies evaluating behavioral changes from VPEP-E implementation are needed for establishing the effects on violent behavior.

This study examined the extent to which textual enhancement and task manipulation affect the learners' attentional processing and the development of second language (L2) grammatical knowledge. A total of 73 Korean college students read an opinion news article in one of four experimental conditions: (1) textually enhanced, careful reading, (2) textually enhanced, expeditious reading, (3) textually non-enhanced, careful reading, and (4) textually non-enhanced, expeditious reading. For the enhanced conditions, the target L2 construction, i.e. the use of English participle phrases in the restrictive use, was typographically enhanced using a different color. In addition, the reading task was manipulated in terms of the speed and the manner of reading, i.e. careful reading to remember textual information as accurately as possible or expeditious reading to figure out the gist as soon as possible. While reading the article, learners' eye-movements were recorded with an eye-tracker to measure the allocation of attentional resources as well as reading processes. In addition, stimulated recalls were collected for qualitative analysis of learners' attentional processes. The results revealed that both textual enhancement and task manipulation had significant effects on the way participants allocated their attentional resources during reading, while it did not affect their knowledge of the target constructions as reflected in their grammaticality judgment scores.

This study examined teachers' digital tool use through latent class analysis (LCA) and identified predictors that separated the emergent subgroups of teachers. Data from the PISA 2018 teacher questionnaire were employed to analyze the teachers' digital tool behaviors in ICT (Information and Communications Technology) strong countries: Germany, Korea, and USA. The LCA suggested three subgroups of teachers, with similar percentages in each country: 'minimal users' (Class 1: 22-33%); 'moderate users' (Class 2: 46-60%); and 'versatile users' (Class 3; 17-21%). Cross-national similarities were also found in the profile patterns of 'minimal users' and the variables predicting the subgroup membership. The single most important factor of digital tool use across the three countries was teacher training in ICT, either during pre-service training or through in-service professional development programs. Notable cross-national differences were found, however, in the profiles of 'moderate' users and their use of specific types of digital tools. Discussion concludes with practical suggestions to enhance teacher use of digital tools.

In this study, the influence of socio-cultural factors on attitudes toward artificial intelligence (AI) was investigated. In total, 1,677 Korean middle school students were selected to participate, and a test tool was used to measure the attitude toward AI. As a result, according to socio-cultural factors, middle school students' attitudes toward AI were affected differently by gender- or AI-related experiences. In particular, students experiencing difficulties because of socio-cultural factors showed a more positive attitude toward AI if they had an AI education. On the other hand, interest toward AI and programming experience had a significant effect on attitudes toward AI and was not affected by socio-cultural factors. In particular, students with high interest toward AI or experience with block- and text-based programming languages showed significantly positive attitudes toward AI. Hence, the disparity in middle school students' attitude toward AI according to socio-cultural factors was found.

The use of immersive virtual reality (iVR) technology creates an infinite set of possibilities for language learners both inside and outside the traditional classroom setting. In contributing a deeper understanding of language education with iVR, the present study explored how low-proficiency level English learners perceived iVR and how iVR benefited language learning. This mixed-method study included qualitative data (screen and in-class recordings, post-interviews) and quantitative data (pre-and posttests, post-surveys). Twenty-five 4th graders in a Korean elementary school participated in this study and the study explored their language learning experiences with an iVR platform, Immerse. Findings showed that the students perceived the activities in iVR as motivating, enjoyable, and useful for learning English. Specifically, the current study investigated students' behavioral, affective, and cognitive engagement. The results showed that the iVR learning environment had a positive impact on students' engagement in all three dimensions. The pre- and post-test results indicated that learning outcomes were significantly enhanced after the iVR sessions. The study suggests pedagogical implications to effectively utilize iVR technology for language learning based on the results.

In Korea, there are cases where nurses use abusive language while teaching new nurses. Nursing students who observe and experience this kind of violence question themselves if they will be able to perform well in such an environment. This descriptive research study examined the mediating effect of negative emotions and the regulated mediating effect of resilience in the relationship between indirect experiences of violence and career identity. Junior- and senior-year students in the nursing departments of nine universities located in Gyeonggi Province and Seoul were recruited using snowball sampling from August 1st to August 31st, 2021. A total of 254 participants completed the questionnaire. Data were analyzed using the SPSS PROCESS macro. The factors that affected career identity were indirect experience of violence ([beta] = -0.1978, p = 0.0001), negative emotions ([beta] = -0.2364, p < 0.0001), and resilience ([beta] = 0.3107, p < 0.0001). Resilience ([beta] = -0.1113, p = 0.0112) had a moderated mediating effect on negative emotions. The index of moderated mediation of negative emotions and resilience was statistically significant at -0.0284 (95% CI [-0.0549, -0.0046]). As a result of this study, when students see a violent situation, they have negative emotions such as fear of making a mistake, and their confidence in nursing performance decreases. In order to avoid this situation, they avoid their career path. In this study, it showed that the greater the resilience, the greater the ability to overcome it. Violence itself needs to be improved, and resilience strengthening programs are needed for children and women exposed to violence.

Debate is a universally acknowledged competency for its vital role in fostering essential skills such as analytical reasoning, eloquent communication, and persuasive argument construction. This is relevant in both formal educational settings like classrooms and informal venues such as after-school clubs. Traditional debate training methods often face challenges in facilitating personalized learning, primarily due to the difficulty of securing a debate partner. However, the emerging field of generative AI offers a promising alternative. This study evaluates the effectiveness of DEBO, a debate education application that utilizes ChatGPT, an advanced language model by OpenAI. Focusing on university students actively involved in a debate club, six volunteers tested DEBO and participated in interviews to provide insights. The findings reveal that DEBO notably enhances divergent thinking and features a comprehensive analytics dashboard for in-depth performance analysis. However, there are few limitations including occasional shortcomings in debate quality, minor inaccuracies, and the need for faster response times. The study underscores the transformative potential of advanced language models like ChatGPT in reshaping debate education, while also identifying areas for further improvement.

This study examines the various needs of new professors at a Korean university, focusing on professional development issues and English language challenges for those required to teach in English due to English-medium instruction (EMI) policies. Through a qualitative analysis of coaching reports, we explored the specific needs of professors in various academic fields, such as pedagogical methods, course management, and the demands of teaching and research. This investigation highlights the distinctive challenges faced by new professors due to EMI policies. These demands not only add another set of language related challenges, but may compound the other typical professional challenges of new professors. These results can inform those involved in university faculty coaching. The results also show limitations of typical coaching programs at Korean universities, difficulties with EMI policies, and a need for further professional development programs for professors, especially for those in EMI contexts.

This paper examines the significance and potential of educational practices of evening junior high schools (yakan chugaku). After World War II, evening junior high schools were established for children who could not attend daytime junior high schools, and later those who had not completed compulsory education beyond school age began to study there. After the Act on Securing Educational Opportunities Equivalent to Ordinary Education at the Stage of Compulsory Education was enacted in 2016, new evening junior high schools have gradually begun to be established. This paper provides an overview of the history and present of evening junior high schools and then discusses the case of Osaka Prefecture, where the most advanced emancipatory educational practices, so-called "liberation education (kaiho kyoiku)," have taken place since the 1970s. It focuses on the practice of Kim Hyangdoja, a second generation Zainichi Korean who teaches at an evening junior high school in Higashi-Osaka City. She and her colleagues have sought a way for marginalized people, especially first-generation Zainichi Korean women, to become aware of their historical and social position. We considered the significance of her practice, "Writing my history with photos," similar to Paulo Freire's literacy education. We clarified that this practice is not only for making personal history, but is also an arena for expressing the identities of different social groups.

This study raises a critical question: 'what does it mean to be smart teachers in the era of technology?'. To provide a concrete and comprehensive answer, the authors analyse multiple discourses revolving around SMART education, an education technology reform initiative in South Korea. This article critically examines the significance of SMART education as dominant discourse to shed light on the formation of smart teachers. The results show that SMART education is conceptualised as 'panacea' that can practically solve all kinds of educational problems, which leaves no choice for teachers but to accept it. The authors also analyse teachers' perceptions and practices by drawing on interviews conducted in a Korean smart city, where the SMART education was first enacted. It is argued that smart teachers are supposed to be 'adaptive' to survive by proving themselves as 'compatible'. This article concludes that it is necessary to imagine more diverse versions of smart teachers.

Little information is available on d/Deaf and hard of hearing (d/DHH) learners' L2 development. Their limited auditory access may discourage them from taking standardized tests, highlighting the need for alternative ways of assessing their L2 development and proficiency. Therefore, this study suggests adopting processability theory, which demonstrates a universal order of L2 development. Interviews with d/DHH learners and their teachers were conducted to explore their current difficulties in regard to understanding their L2 development. Also, we conducted brief speaking tasks to suggest alternatives to testing the L2 development of learners who are d/DHH in comparison to typical literacy learners. The result showed d/DHH students' L2 developmental patterns are similar to those of typical hearing peers, suggesting that d/DHH students and hearing learners share difficulties in similar areas when learning English. Teachers highlighted the lack of appropriate English tests to determine the d/DHH students' L2 development.

Although competent argumentative writing is important for academic success and daily life, it is difficult to teach, especially in middle schools where English is taught as a foreign language (EFL). Previous research has indicated that extensive reading or writing improves the descriptive writing skills of EFL students. However, it is not certain whether the positive effect of extensive reading or writing applies to other domains such as argumentative writing, which is demanding but crucial. In this study, we explored whether the argumentative and descriptive writing skills of middle school EFL students could develop naturally, i.e., via extensive reading or writing, without direct instruction, using descriptive writing as a comparative variable. A total of 297 EFL middle school students in South Korea were divided into three groups: the first group read books ("n" = 119), the second wrote about various topics ("n" = 117), and the third (control) received extended regular instruction ("n" = 61) over two semesters. Pre- and post-writing tests assessed argumentative and descriptive writing. Our results indicated that reading and writing exercises significantly improved argumentative and descriptive writing competence, but regular instruction did not. However, descriptive writing improved more than argumentative writing, particularly in terms of organization, content, and mechanics. Extensive reading or writing may constitute a feasible option for improving general writing skills. However, more context-specific methods to enhance adolescent argumentative writing in EFL schools are required.

This study was conducted with two goals in mind: (1) to explore the mediating roles of L2 enjoyment as a positive emotion and L2 anxiety as a negative emotion in the relationship between Informal Digital Learning of English (IDLE) and L2 willingness to communicate (L2 WTC) in an exam-oriented EFL context, and (2) to further examine whether gender and educational stage play any role in these relationships. Participants include 1,265 Korean EFL learners (764 secondary and 501 tertiary students; 400 males and 865 females). Moderated mediation structural equation modelling results found: (1) L2 enjoyment and L2 anxiety partially mediated the relationship between IDLE and L2 WTC. L2 enjoyment was a stronger mediator than L2 anxiety; (2) IDLE affected females more than males in terms of reducing their L2 anxiety; (3) L2 emotions played a similar mediation role for secondary and tertiary students. These findings advance our understanding of how emotions mediate the association between IDLE and L2 WTC in relation to individual and contextual differences.

This study aims to develop and validate the Principal Competency Inventory (PCI), an instrument used to assess a principal's leadership competencies that promote student learning in South Korea. An extensive review of prior work was conducted to understand the theoretical foundation related to school leadership and the competency construct of the PCI derived from the Behavioural Event Interview of principals. Then, the psychometric procedures used in developing and validating the PCI were followed. The significance of this study and its practical implications for the use of this new instrument was discussed. From a theoretical and practical standpoint, this study contributes to the school leadership field by describing development and validation procedures, identifying where evidence of the reliable assessment instrument is lacking, and utilising the advantage of the competency-based framework. Also, the analysis of this study provides international perspectives about school leadership practices, thus supplementing the prior Western-focused literature in this field. In addition, this study offers useful information for policymakers and principal leadership development program designers who want to assess and evaluate principal leadership competency.

English-medium instruction (EMI) has been implemented in higher-education institutions around the world. This study examines the states of EMI-related professional development (PD) for Korean science and engineering professors and their perceptions of such programs. Faculty members at the three major science and engineering schools in Korea participated in a questionnaire survey and the follow-up interviews. The results show that the vast majority of them had not participated in pre- or in-service PD programs and had negative attitudes towards certified EMI-related PD programs mainly due to their institution's strong emphasis on their research performance rather than the quality of their teaching. The study offers suggestions for future directions of EMI-related PD at institutions with a similar tendency.

Since the dynamics and forms of cyber violence evolve at the same rapid pace as technology platforms, we used social big data to develop an ontology for cyber violence victimization in South Korea. Following the seven-stage ontology development process, we extracted keywords from 3,075 social media data sources including online articles, comments, and blogs. Focus group interview data was also obtained from 40 adolescents and 5 cyber violence experts. The analysis identified domains for (1) participants subdivided by age, school level, sex, form, and relationship; (2) protective and risk factors by individuals, family, friends, school, community, and online systems; (3) types by form and method of violence; (4) characteristics by media and distinct features; (5) outcomes by individual and relational/social; and (6) interventions and policies by personal coping strategies, services/interventions, and laws/policies. These findings provide a multi-faceted perspective on cyber violence victimization experiences in South Korea. In addition, the results elucidate the newest types of cyber violence in real-life terms.

This study examines adolescents' media use after receiving media education, specifically, media education received through Newspaper in Education (NIE) at school and parental mediation at home. The study verifies whether media education stimulates social participation by analyzing adolescents' self-expression. Data collected through the Korea Press Foundation's 2019 survey on media use among students aged 10 to 18 in Korea (N = 1,905) were analyzed. Students who experienced NIE used various types of media to access news and consume news more sensibly. This type of news use influenced adolescents to become more active in self-expression and encouraged social participation. In addition, the relationship between parental mediation and social participation is sequentially mediated by adolescents' sensible news use and self-expression.

By looking at the relationship between workplace culture and gender identity, this research examines ways to potentially improve women's satisfaction and perceptions of female workers in this presently disadvantageous work environment in Korea. Drawing from previous criticism for having prioritized inter-group processes over particular social identities, this research uses Social Identity Theory as the main theoretical framework in two studies to structure the factors affecting workplace environment, specifically workplace culture for women and working women's satisfaction with communication. The first study applies intra-group analysis to examine the impact that the gender composition of a school has on gender identity, and it examines the relationship between organizational gender composition and women's perceptions of workplace culture by employing an experiment within a survey, which contains scenarios of an imaginary workplace, to Korean female college students (n = 439). The results demonstrate women attending women's colleges displayed stronger gender identity than those attending co-ed colleges on two dimensions of gender identity: in-group ties and centrality. The second study surveys Korean female workers (n = 171) to examine the same relationships while more deeply looking into the effects of gender composition of the workplace on women's satisfaction with communication. The main finding shows that for a sex-integrated organization, women who attended women's colleges denoted higher communication satisfaction with supervisors and same-sex coworkers than women who attended coed colleges. Implications of these findings and future research directions are discussed.

This longitudinal study examined the mediating role of teacher support in the relationship between academic burnout and self-esteem among adolescents in Korea. A total of 154 adolescents (13 years old) were followed up for 4 years at 1-year intervals. Path analysis indicated that the developmental trajectory of academic burnout (i.e. the intercept and slope) leads to a lower level of teacher support (T4) and self-esteem (T4) after controlling for the effect of gender and self-worth. Moreover, teacher support mediated the relationship between development of academic burnout and self-esteem. The rate of change of academic burnout, as well as its initial value, exerted an indirect negative effect on self-esteem through the mediator of teacher support. It has been generally accepted that low self-esteem is the cause of academic burnout. However, our findings indicate that academic burnout might be an influencing factor of self-esteem, implying that the causal relationship between self-esteem and academic burnout should be reconsidered.

Education for sustainable development (ESD) refers to education on the values and behaviors necessary for a sustainable future and society where everyone receives high-quality benefits. In the era of the fourth industrial revolution, convergence thinking is emphasized as a method of ESD. Therefore, this study aims to derive a model for developing open convergence subjects for ESD. The idea for this model was derived by combining the process of establishing a Convergence Department at Rey Juan Carlos University in Spain and the unit activities of Kyoto University in Japan. The challenges of failing to achieve the original goal and purpose of convergence due to emphasizing specific majors were solved by defining requirements for the model. Convergence subjects that meet the requirements are developed by following the order of the proposed model. In the future, a convergence subject pilot model will be applied using the proposed model to present and operate a course development process called "technology and future are seen through the window of currency". [Note: The year (2022) shown on the PDF is incorrect. The correct citation for this article is v9 n1 2023.]

While metadiscourse use has been well-attended in second language (L2) writing research, relatively less effort has been made in documenting changing patterns of metadiscourse use among L2 writers. The present study addressed this gap by probing a diachronic change of interactive metadiscourse in research articles published in "English Teaching" across a span of 40 years. Using the corpus of 931 articles written by Korean L2 writers, we examined whether, and to what extent, interactive metadiscourse use in academic writing had changed over time. Our findings revealed an overall increase in the frequency of interactive resources mainly driven by a significant increase of evidentials. The observed pattern of change in interactives suggests that academic discourse within the applied linguistics community in Korea is becoming more persuasive and reader-oriented over time, consistent with Hyland and Jiang (2018) who reported a dramatic rise in interactive metadiscourse in the global discourse community of applied linguistics.

This study investigated the role of competition in academic settings by conceptualizing competitive engagement and examining how competition self-efficacy defined as confidence in one's ability to outperform others could mediate learner engagement and self-determination to learn English as a foreign language (EFL). Within the context of a videoconference EFL course, a cross-sectional research design was employed during the fourth semester of remote teaching in South Korea due to COVID-19. Statistically significant relationships existed among variables. Students reported high levels of cognitive and behavioral engagement but low levels of competitive engagement. Through structural modeling, competitive engagement emerged as a conceptually unique form of engagement. The relationship between competitive engagement and self-determination to learn English when attending an EFL videoconference course was fully mediated by competition self-efficacy. Partial mediation was observed in the relationship between cognitive engagement and self-determination. These findings suggest that both competitive and cognitive engagement are powerful indicators of learning outcomes, especially when learning EFL.

The study explored the social perceptions of young children's use of smart devices in South Korea using big data methodologies. Big data methodologies allowed to uncover underlying thoughts and feelings about young children's use of smart devices that had not been discovered in existing studies. The study extracted raw data from three different groups: the public, the journalist, and academia. Then, the study conducted keyword frequency, sentiment analysis, and CONCOR analysis with UCINET 6.0. The results of the study revealed that each group viewed young children's use of smart devices in a different way. The public was interested in effective use of smart devices while the journalist focused on educational aspects. The academia focused on parents' perception of smart devices from a developmental perspective. Regarding the results of sentiment analysis, they showed that each group had different opinion on young children's use of smart devices. The public had an ambivalent attitude toward young children's use of smart devices. While the journalist showed a positively inclined attitude, the academic had a negatively inclined attitude.

Postulating that academic papers can positively impact the actual teaching practices of science teachers, this study analysed the process of understanding and utilising academic papers by science teachers to teach scientific creativity in their schools. The 45--hour graduate course of three science teachers was explored to identify the difficulties teachers encountered in trying to understand academic papers and to discover how to solve these difficulties. Second, which aspects should be considered when developing teaching materials for scientific creativity to be used in schools were analysed. A transformation model of an academic paper was proposed to understand this process, and the results were organised accordingly. According to this model, it was emphasized to translate academic papers from a general and abstract state to a local and concrete state. Therefore, the role of science educators as knowledge translators was discussed for more practical and effective use of academic papers in school. This study is expected to contribute to research-based teaching by linking academic research with teaching practice.

This study explored the dominant discourses on online distance education (ODE) that emerged in South Korean society before, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors conducted a topic modeling analysis of 8,865 news articles published by 24 South Korean media outlets between 2019 and 2021. Using the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) algorithm and social network analysis software (NetMiner), the top five topics and the top ten words associated with each topic were identified from each period. The authors observed significant changes not only in the number of news articles but also in the depth of the conversations published each year. The results have revealed several key points. First, ODE, previously considered marginal and abnormal, gained in normality across all educational levels in Korean society. Second, ODE discourses have been shaped by the unique cultural, historical, and technological infrastructure in South Korea. Third, a clear division between social-justice-oriented and business-oriented ODE discourses reflect a persistent inequality in Korean society. Finally, ODE discourses matured in 2021, with more critical and realistic perspectives on both the positives and negatives of ODE. The useful implications of such insights for post-pandemic ODE research and practice are further discussed.

The purpose of this study was to classify the active job behaviors of Generation Z (Gen Z, born after 1995) elementary school teachers and investigate relevant variables that significantly affect such a classification. A total of 375 Gen Z elementary school teachers who passed the National Elementary Teacher Qualification Test and had worked in elementary schools in South Korea participated in this study. The data collected identified the types of active job behaviors among Gen Z elementary school teachers using cross-tabulation through Latent Profile Analysis (LPA). A multinomial logistic regression analysis was conducted to identify the predictors that influence the types of active job behaviors of Gen Z elementary school teachers. The results were as follows--First, there are four types of active job behaviors of Gen Z elementary school teachers: Ideal, relational, non-participatory, and passive job performance types. Second, teacher efficacy, learning agility, organizational commitment, and principals' transformational leadership influenced the types of active job behaviors of Gen Z elementary school teachers. The results offer insights into the human resource management of Gen Z elementary school teachers and have significant implications for improving the active job behavior of Gen Z elementary school teachers.

In South Korea, curriculum is revised, made public and implemented under a system known as a nation led curriculum. The South Korean national curriculum was completely revised 10 times between 1946 and 2015. At present, a complete revision is underway to replace the current 2015 national curriculum which is called the 2022 revised national curriculum. This study aims to analyze stakeholders' responses to the YouTube public hearing on social studies curriculum according to the 2022 revised national curriculum in South Korea in order to understand the context and causes of the issues that emerged. Text mining, semantic network analysis and word cloud techniques were employed to identify issues. As a result, three issues were identified in the social studies curriculum: the balanced development of general elective subjects in high school; the separation of social sciences and geography and division of textbooks in middle school social studies and the separate listing of four subjects, specifically geography, social sciences, history and morals. The issues revealed in this study provide beneficial implications for future social studies curriculum development, revision as well as the development of future research.

This study investigates the social construction and continual (re)production of the cultural "Other" through educational materials, focusing on Korean middle school English textbooks. Twelve middle school English textbooks from four publishers were collected and analyzed, with a focus on how they (mis)represent cultures and practices of minority groups. Utilizing critical content analysis to examine both visual and written texts in the textbooks, this research uncovers recurring patterns of exoticizing and commodifying Hawai'ian culture, homogenizing African culture, and romanticizing Indigenous peoples. The findings contribute significantly to our understanding of how cultural representations in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) textbooks shape perceptions and influence societal dynamics. They also illuminate how these representations reflect and perpetuate Eurocentric colonialist discourse. Moreover, the results underscore the importance of equipping educators, especially English teachers, with critical literacy. This empowers them to identify hidden power relations that reinforce stereotypes, and actively engage in the construction of a more inclusive and equitable society.

This study aimed to compare the effects of self-regulation, goal orientation, and speaking anxiety on speaking performance between metaverse and face-to-face contexts. We randomly assigned 253 Korean middle school students to either metaverse or face-to-face groups for 12 weeks of English-speaking lessons. Before and after the experiment, students completed speaking tests and submitted a post-questionnaire. Structural equation modeling and multi-group analysis revealed that student attributes had a similar impact on speaking performance in both settings. Specifically, self-regulation and mastery goal orientation positively influenced speaking performance, while speaking anxiety had a negative effect, regardless of the context. Furthermore, self-regulation played a mediating role in reducing speaking anxiety in both settings. This implies that metaverse-mediated and face-to-face classes offer similar learning environments, where students can leverage their goal orientation and self-regulation skills to manage speaking anxiety. Ultimately, students can enhance their speaking performance by employing self-regulation strategies and nurturing a mastery goal orientation, irrespective of the learning context.

Pronunciation plays a crucial role in oral communication within a second language. Recently, the interest in English language learning among elderly adults has led to increased participation of older learners in lifelong education programs in Korea. However, there is a paucity of empirical studies on this specific learner group. This article investigates the pronunciation problems frequently encountered by elderly Korean learners of English in their language classrooms. Thirteen participants, aged 60 years or older, took part in this study. To identify their pronunciation difficulties with specific segmental features, each participant was administered a modified diagnostic test adapted from a test developed by Baker (1982). Overall, the results show that elderly learners face greater challenges with consonants than with vowels. Among the consonants, they struggle more with pronouncing /z/, /[voiced, alveo-palatal, fricative consonant]/, /[voiceless, dental, fricative consonant]/, and /[voiced postalveolar affricate]/ compared to other segments. Additionally, Pronunciation difficulty varies significantly depending on age and the duration of time spent abroad, while no significant difference is found based on gender. This article discusses possible pedagogical implications for pronunciation instruction targeting elderly learners and presents the limitations of the study.

This study explored high school students' perceptions of using AI chatbots in English learning. Specifically, it aimed to gauge the breadth of chatbot utilization and discern perceptions surrounding potential challenges linked to their use. Thirty students from a high school took part in the survey. Data analysis involved frequency, mean and an independent sample t-test. The findings are as follows. First, students recognized the importance and value of chatbots highly and perceived their usability positively. However, their previous experience with chatbots did not sway this perception. Second, students perceived using chatbots in English learning as very beneficial. Especially, those with chatbot usage experience have a more positive perception compared to those without experience. Third, students were relatively aware of potential ethical issues with using chatbots. They were particularly concerned about plagiarism and copyright issues and potential personal information breaches regardless of their experience with chatbots. They also perceived potential educational issues, fearing over-reliance on chatbots might hinder their exploratory learning or lead to copying assignments directly, missing out on learning opportunities. However, those without experience were more skeptical than those with experience. The implications and suggestions derived from these findings are also discussed.

The COVID-19 pandemic has created many formidable challenges for educational institutions around the world. This case study sought to gain insight into South Korean university students' satisfaction with online learning during the pandemic. It also obtained participant recommendations for improving online learning. Participants included 20 South Korean students studying at a university in central South Korea. Data included open-ended surveys, a focus group, and semi-structured interviews. Most students had mixed feelings in regard to satisfaction with online classes. A salient result is a need for more interaction in online classes. Students also provided a wide range of recommendations to improve online learning. Through these recommendations, university educators and administrators can better optimize online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic and after the crisis has dissipated.

This study examines the return to education in South Korea by comparing metropolitan areas with non-metropolitan areas. It utilizes the Korean Labor and Income Panel Study from 2018 and 2019 for analysis, alongside the Mincer equation. The findings indicate that female workers have a higher return to education compared to male workers. The Oaxaca decomposition method reveals that private academies contribute to increasing differential treatment between men and women, whereas public education reduces the gap. Additionally, the regression discontinuity design method shows that the university premium is significantly different by region.

Using cognitive dissonance theory, this collective case study examines professional identity tensions in three international preservice teachers from a graduate TESOL program in South Korea (Korea hereafter). Reflective journals, interview transcripts, admission essays as well as participant-produced drawings were analyzed. Additionally, consultations with faculty members, interviews with government officials as well as a review of related documents were used to gain further insight into the interplay between international education and professional identity tensions. It is argued that international students in TESOL experience unique identity tensions associated with institutional, discursive and regulatory forces residing in the host country. Insights obtained from the study provide a better understanding of the support international teacher candidates need from their host institutions and can inform policymaking.

With recent improvements in machine translation (MT) accuracy, MT has gained unprecedented popularity in second language (L2) learning. Despite the significant number of studies on MT use, the effects of using MT on students' retention of learning or secondary school students' use of MT in L2 writing has rarely been researched. The current study investigates the effectiveness of using machine translation on Korean middle school students' L2 writing over an extended period of time. This study evaluated the complexity, accuracy, lexical diversity, and fluency of four versions of the students' writing (pretest, MT-assisted version, posttest, and 2-week or 4-week retention tests) and measured errors in punctuation, spelling, vocabulary, and grammar in each version. The study employed a quantitative research method including descriptive statistics, repeated measures ANOVA, and paired t tests. The results showed that fluency, accuracy, and complexity significantly increased in the MT-assisted version in every aspect of writing, but decreased in the subsequent versions without MT (post- and retention tests). Decreases occurred more frequently with grammatical items than with lexical items. Despite the decreases, all of the items measured in the study scored higher in the retention tests than in the pretest, which indicates that the use of MT had a positive effect on L2 writing.