This ethnographic multiple case study aims to examine the impact of creative drama on young EFL learners in South Korea. While working in the field for decades, I have observed the imbalance between the high demands from the public and the paucity of pedagogical and theoretical methods of EFL teaching for young learners. Therefore, I suggest the pedagogy of drama as an alternative EFL teaching method for children in view of the sociocultural and sociolinguistic axiom. In particular, I take Vygotsky’s notion into account, which underpins the social constructivists’ understanding of education. I embarked on the investigation by carefully selecting two case classrooms of children and one case group of teachers; accordingly, the three case studies were amalgamated and reviewed in depth in pursuit of the true knowledge of the context. In order to construct rigorous knowledge, I have followed the qualitative and non-positivist paradigm of analysis by applying a hermeneutical interpretation of the context. In addition, I have adhered to the notion of bricolage, which stresses the researcher’s active role in the course of knowledge construction. The analysis uncovered that the pedagogy of drama enables EFL children to liberate themselves physically and emotionally, and hence promotes an autonomous social interaction that prompts frequent and meaningful oral language use. Moreover, the study indicates that EFL teachers are positively impacted by the pedagogy of drama in that they alter their pedagogical views to become more open, non-traditional and democratic. Thus, they begin to incorporate social interactional and communicative approaches in their EFL teaching. In addition, the analysis reveals that an adequate teacher’s role is a significant factor in enhancing meaningful context building and natural oral language use in EFL classrooms, in which children grow as authentic language users as well as autonomous social beings who convey their true voices.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:723143 |
| Date | January 2017 |
| Creators | Lee, Sujeong |
| Publisher | University of Warwick |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/91490/ |
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