Korean Childrens' Socialization and English Learning: A Perspective of Language Socialization

This is an ethnographic case study which deals with two Korean children's socialization and English learning from the perspective of the theory of language socialization (Schieffelin and Ochs, 1986). This study shows that there is a close relationship between children's second language learning and socializing. The two junior high school children tried very hard to learn English through social interactions with their American counterparts in the initial stage of their life in America and, as a result, they learned interpersonal English very quickly. However, as they grew older, their socialization became restricted to their Korean peer group in the Korean church, largely due to their personal experiences with their American classmates and the pattern of their parents' socialization. Since they were separated socially from the primary groups of their host society, they lost many opportunities to learn the advanced English appropriate for their age/grade levels. It was revealed that they had difficulties in keeping up with the content area of schoolwork, particularly in reading, which requires advanced English in the areas of vocabulary, expressions, and reading and writing skills. This study, therefore, has important implication for the parents of non-native English speaker's children.