https://www.iatefl.org/
https://www.tesol.org/

Gangwon Chapter Meeting: Words, Glorious Words!

Date: 
Sunday, September 24, 2023 - 14:00 to 16:00
Location: 
Online
South Korea
KR
Contact Email: 

Join Gangwon Chapter online for two presentations, both of which focus on words. More specifically, words from the New General Service List (NGSL)

This meeting will be held online, using the Zoom platform. 

Here is the link.

The passcode is: 591029

The NGSL and the Development of Graded Readers

This talk introduces a new schema for leveling graded readers (GRs). It is extremely difficult to compare series of GRs between publishers, and there is no currently accepted procedure for doing so. Publishers are not always transparent about how GRs are written, the word lists used, the corpora on which those lists are based, or how the schemas are constructed. This talk argues for a new schema which compares headword level with the 500-word band of the New General Service high-frequency word list on which it falls. This new schema enables cross comparison of previously published GRs, can be used to level institutional GR libraries, and can be used by materials developers going forward. This standardization of the GR industry would help empower and inform customers when making their purchasing and reading decisions, and could foster a healthy competition between publishers, as they compete to see who can write the most compelling books at the highest coverage levels.

Paul Johnson (Woosung University)

Paul T. Johnson has an MA in Philosophy and works at Woosong University, Korea. He is the Student Services Manager for Woosong University Online, where he runs the Woosong Online Community Center, and teaches English as a Foreign Language. He is working towards his MSc TESOL with a specialism in Technology for Teaching at the University of St. Andrews. He writes at aniterativeprocess


Using ChatGPT to Help Learners Acquire the NGSL's Core Spoken Vocabulary

This interactive presentation will show how teachers can use the power of ChatGPT to design learning materials that will help their learners acquire, i.e., really learn, the vocabulary contained in the spoken core of the NGSL. After a brief review of the NGSL, and specifically the component elements of the spoken core, the presenter will share a variety of prompts he has used to help create materials that can be used in a classroom setting, or for autonomous language learning. By the end of the presentation attendees will be able to see that while ChatGPT can't replace us (at least not yet), it can certainly do a lot of the heavy lifting for us! There will be ample time for questions and interaction. 

Michael Free (Chuncheon National University of Education)

Michael D. Free has lived and worked in Korea for over 15 years and has taught in a broad range of contexts: public school (all grades from kindergarten through Year 2 high school), vocational (including training for winter Olympic volunteers and staff), and, most recently, university level credit courses. He is currently lecturing at two universities: Chuncheon National University of Education, in the English Education Dept., and Kangwon National University, in the Institute of Liberal Arts. In the former, he is teaching pre-service elementary school teachers a course entitled Intercultural Communication and Conversation. In the latter, where he has spent several years teaching for a few different departments, he now spends his teaching hours in the Institute of Liberal Arts.