Hyounjeong Yoo
Current Program: PhD in ALDS
| Phone: | 613-520-2600 x 6514 |
| Email: | HyounJeongYoo@cunet.carleton.ca |
| Office: | SP 340 |
The idea to research willingness to communicate and language anxiety is rooted in my own experience as a second language learner and educator. Since 2015, I have taught Korean language courses at a university in Canada. Before that, I taught Korean in multiple regions including China, Japan, Hongkong, and Germany. My experiences teaching in diverse regions have given me insight into how to efficiently run a classroom; they have also helped me build a profile of the types of learners who sit in my classes. However, even after accumulating more than a decade of teaching experience, I am still pondering how to accommodate the variety of learners’ preferences and aptitudes while conducting classes at the university level. After embarking on my teaching journey in Canada, a region that was completely new to me both culturally and linguistically, I encountered several challenges in the classroom. The most challenging thing to consider was that the teaching materials and strategies that work for one group of learners may not work for a different group of learners. Although most of my students have a profound desire to communicate with their interlocutor or target community, they suffer from unsatisfactory communicative abilities. Their helplessness was the starting point of my research; I wanted to optimize their communication skills in a classroom setting because it is often the only location where they are exposed to Korean. This led me to my current endeavour of pursuing a Ph.D. My goal is to find ways to help students overcome foreign language anxiety and increase their willingness to communicate in their target language.
Areas of Interest:
- Korean as a Second Language
- Willingness to Communicate
- Language Anxiety