Teaching English Through English: From Teachers' Perspectives

Abstract

For the past few decades, increased opportunities for international communication have created a demand for communicative competence, the ability to handle communicative functions in real life. As a result, a major shift has occurred in the implementation of language teaching, from a grammar-oriented approach to a communicative approach. This increased attention on communicative competence has led the Korean Ministry of Education to develop the 7th National Curriculum for English. In the same vein, there have been strenuous attempts to implement communicative language teaching in the field of language education. However, communicative approaches alone do not seem to guarantee an automatic development of language proficiency. Another factor to consider is the classroom context and the availability of target language input. In Korea, one major factor hinders development of communicative competence in English. Since English is used as a foreign language(EFL), it is limited to classroom settings. As a result, students have little access to authentic language input and limited opportunities to interact with native speakers of English. Considering this need for authentic language input, the Ministry of Education has recently proposed an obligatory use of classroom English in elementary and middle schools. Classroom English(CE), the teaching of English through English(TETE), may be beneficial in an EFL learning context like Korea, in that it is likely to foster communicative interaction between students and teachers or among students. However, to successfully establish classroom English in Korea, it seems essential to understand teachers' perceptions about teaching English through English. The goal of this study is to explore teachers' perceptions about TETE. Their views of TETE will be compared in terms of their schools, majors, years of teaching experience, and the amount of classroom English they use. Also, the study aims to identify difficulties that in-service teachers experience, and strategies they use to overcome these difficulties, as well as to examine their reactions to TETE and classroom English materials.