초등학교 3학년 학생들의 영어 선행학습 실태 연구

Exploring Korean elementary school students’ prior learning of English before 3rd grade

In Korea, English is offered as an elementary school subject beginning in the third grade, but many students start to learn the language even earlier through private tutoring. The disparate learning experiences of these “head start” English students create unavoidable ability gaps in elementary school classrooms; many teachers consider this inequality to be the most problematic factor impeding the normalization of public English education. In this study, as we explore the overall state of Korean third graders’ experiences learning English on an earlier schedule, our goal is to generate suggestions and foster solutions to these classroom discrepancies. We conducted a questionnaire survey to investigate parents’ experiences and views of their child’s prior leaning of English before 3rd grade. The results reveal that eight out of ten Korean parents have admitted that they allowed their children to study English with a private tutor or in cram schools prior to the onset of formal English education. The results further revealed that Korean parents firmly believe English is vital for their children’s future. We have made some suggestions to improve the current state of classroom discrepancies in terms of English ability among students in this study.