Enhancing students' English proficiency

Chungshin Girls' Middle School first graders pose with the copies of The Korea Times and other English newspapers at the school in Songpa-gu, Seoul, on Dec. 9. / Courtesy of Chungshin Girls' Middle School

Middle school teacher utilizes English newspapers in class

Kim Kyung-sook, an English teacher at Chungshin Girls' Middle School

By Chung Hyun-chae

Kim Kyung-sook, an English teacher at Chungshin Girls' Middle School, has actively used English newspapers and their websites for her English class with the sole aim of enhancing students’ English proficiency.

“First I gave easy assignment to my students to compare local English newspapers with American newspapers to prompt stronger participation of the students,” Kim said.

She planned out this activity to encourage students to figure out the advantages of reading newspapers.

Kim believed this process gives motivation to the students learning English.

“They realized that they could get a lot of information and common sense from the English newspapers and started to feel the need to read them regularly to improve English reading and writing skills,” Kim said.

She made the best use of online news sites including The Korea Times’ English education supplementary NIE Times, in which visitors could learn how to read the English daily.

The purpose is to help students practice English reading and writing.

“I often utilized the Junior Writing section where students can practice writing captions for pictures. As the words are already given, what you only have to do is to arrange them in the best order,” Kim said.

“It is an activity that is enjoyable for low-level learners as well.”

Inspired by this activity, the teacher created another one to match the headlines to the pictures.

“Once the students managed to successfully find the right headlines, I told them to try writing an article suitable for the headlines and pictures, based on their imagination,” she said.

For those who want to learn more, she recommended student browse CNN and BBC websites.

“There are language learning pages on those websites which is similar to the NIE Times. Noticeable thing is that visitors can take courses depending on their levels,” Kim said.

In recognition of her teaching method using English newspapers, she won the participation prize at the third Newspaper in Education (NIE) Contest at Yongmoon Middle School in Seongbuk-gu, northern Seoul, last December.

The Seoul Secondary English Teachers’ Association (SETA) hosted the annual contest under the auspices of The Korea Times, the nation’s oldest English daily.

Kim called for consistent attention from The Korea Times to promoting NIE in schools.

“I received a lot of help from the NIE Times which I believe is very effective for learning practical English. I hope the Junior Writing/Reading section on this page, which was halted in 2012, will be updated soon,” Kim said.