한국초등영어학습자의 영어학습 동기와 전략에 관한 연구

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is three-fold: (1) to investigate Korean elementary school learner motivation in English language learning, (2) to examine strategies which they use in learning English, and (3) to study the correlation between motivation and strategies in English language learning.

The subjects were 183 English learners in two elementary schools in Busan, Korea. Thirty questions were used in order to investigate motivation in English learning. The questions were selected from questionnaires of both Cho (2000) and Lee (1999).

Motivation is divided into seven subcategories: self-development, communication, intrinsic, extrinsic, integrative, instrumental, and student motivation by teachers. Strategies consist of six subcategories: memory, cognitive, compensation, metacognitive, affective, and social strategies.

The t-test was used to analyze each of the motivation and strategy items, ANOVA to analyze differences of motivation and strategies related to grades and gender, and Pearson's correlation program to analyze relations between motivation and strategies.

The three major findings are as follows:

1. Self-developmental motivation is the strongest among the seven subcategories of motivations in this study. On the other hand, the sociocultural motivation is the least strong motivation for elementary-school learners of English. Unexpectedly, this study shows that student motivation by teachers is relatively low. Instrumental motivation is stronger than integrative motivation in learning English. Extrinsic motivation is stronger than intrinsic motivation. Girls are possessed of stronger motivations than boys. Regardless of grades, students mainly possess self-developmental motivation in learning English.

2. Elementary school English learners tend to use metacognitive strategies most frequently. This means that Korean elementary school learners tend to spend much time in planning, self-evaluation, and attention in English language learning. Girls have been found to use strategies more frequently than boys. At the higher grade level, learners tend to use more metacognitive and cognitive strategies more often.

3. The correlations between self-developmental motivation and metacognitive strategies are of the highest significance. On the other hand, student motivation by the teacher is in a low correlation with all other strategies.

It is hoped that this study will be of use in studies on motivation and strategies, and contribute to the future improvement of elementary school English education.