Literacy Encounters in a Non-Anglophone Context : Korean Study Abroad Students in a Malaysian Classroom

The rapid proliferation of study abroad and transnational programmes have witnessed increasing student mobility within the Southeast Asian region that has thrust many learners into new learning environments and cultures. These students come with their own academic literacy practices built on experiences in their home countries and have to quickly shift to a new academic culture in the host country. This research highlights that it is erroneous to assume that academic culture and practices are the same across the region by investigating how Korean study abroad students are navigating their literacy practices in a Malaysian tertiary classroom. Data was collected using interviews, student literacy logs and researcher field notes over fourteen weeks. Findings show that these students were unprepared to deal with the new environment and resorted to literacy practices that they were comfortable with and useful in their home country’s academic culture. This implies that it is important to identify what is similar and different in the two learning environments to help study abroad students adjust and connect with their new learning context.


Introduction
The internationalization of higher education over the last few decades in the face of globalization has given rise to increasing student mobility.The twentieth century has seen a six percent growth rate per annum of student mobility compared to four percent in the last two decades of the twentieth century (Kim, 2008;Findley and Tierney, 2010).With the rapid proliferation of study abroad and exchange programmes, classrooms are also undergoing change and seeing more nontraditional students, i.e. international, non-native English speakers (NNES).
Study abroad, international education or transnational education as it is referred to today, refers to exchange programmes for higher education (HE) students who leave their home countries to continue their studies in a host country abroad.These students usually pursue one semester or one year in the host country and are awarded credit transfer for the courses they pursue here.At the end of this period, they return to their home country and continue with their degree programme there.Most of these study abroad arrangements are between specific universities in different countries and usually involve some form of memorandum of understanding.
Malaysia is viewed as an alternative source of higher education in the Southeastern Asian region with the rapid proliferation of both private and public higher education institutions.The Education Minister in his recent speech at the Education Nation Conference 2011 held in Kuala Lumpur claimed that Malaysia ranked 11 th worldwide in terms of total international student population with 90,000 students already in the country (Chi, 2011).This number is further expected to increase by 2020 to at least 200,000 as Malaysia is all set to position itself as an educational hub in the region.While the majority of the international students are from countries like Iran, Jordan, Nigeria, Bangladesh and the Middle East there is a growing number of students from countries in this region like China, South Korea, Japan, and Indonesia.This paper will focus on students from South Korea.
The Korea Herald states that the number of Korean students in study abroad programmes has increased by more than 30 % from 190,364 students in 2006 to 251,887 students in 2010.This group comprises students who go abroad to pursue degrees which is about 60.7% while another 39.3% go for language study.While Europe and North America are still a choice for these students, more than 67% are choosing to go to countries in the Asia Pacific instead and this includes Malaysia (The Korea Herald, 2011) Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), a public university in Malaysia has one such study abroad arrangement with Woosong University (WU) in South Korea, which allows Korean undergraduates from WU to do one semester here and vice versa.Korean undergraduates come to UKM to pursue one semester of English language learning while Malaysian undergraduates go to WU to further their learning of the Korean language.In 2009, UKM welcomed its first batch of two study abroad undergraduates from South Korea who spent one semester following the first year Bachelor of Arts in English Language Studies (BAELS) undergraduate programme.This cohort will form the sample for this study that set out to identify how these students are coping with academic study in a different environment.

Review of Literature
Students in study abroad programmes come with their own academic literacy practices built on their previous experiences in their home country and find they have to quickly shift to a new academic culture in their host country.Mehdizadeh & Scott (2005) assert the interaction and adjustment is easier when there are similarities in the academic culture between the host and home country.Research has identified limited proficiency in English, beliefs, cultural values, prior learning experiences, personal traits, conception of learning and motivations as factors that affect Asian students in western contexts (Berno and Ward, 2004).
The fact that these students are able to enter a programme because they have met the language requirement does not guarantee they will succeed in the new academic culture (Bacon, 2002;Jepson, Turner & Calway, 2002).Moreover, if the study abroad is for a limited period like one semester there is limited opportunity for adaptation and development.This suggests these students may need coping strategies to enable them to manage in their new cultures.It is hypothesized that to succeed in tertiary learning, students need to be equipped with the literacy practices that will be most meaningful to help them cope with academic demands (Nambiar, 2007;Kucer, 2005;Casanave, 2002).
Research has been comprehensive on how Asian students are adapting to the literacy practices in Western contexts and the findings indicate the challenging and complex nature of academic literacy (Duff, 2007;Zamel & Spack, 2004;Campbell & Li, 2008;Seloni, 2008;Sasson, 2010).Korean students in a Canadian setting for instance, preferred to work with other Korean students or Asians and this resulted in a loss of opportunity of practicing with native speakers (Duff, 2007).Instances of clashes between the host and home countries' academic culture was also problematic for many students who found they had to reset their values and expectations (Zamel & Spack, 2004).Campbell & Li's (2008) work with Asian students in a New Zealand university reveals that generally the students were satisfied with their learning experiences but faced difficulties with language, culture, different classroom contexts, new academic norms and conventions, insufficient learning support, making friends with classmates which led them to feel a sense of not belonging in the classroom.Seloni (2008) worked with six PhD students to investigate their academic socialization processes in an academic writing class and found that these students attempted to bridge the differences between their academic world and the one they were thrust into by means of negotiation.They did not just become a part of the academic community of the classroom but appeared as agents with voices willing to transform the practices surrounding them.Ultimately, what is important in such contexts is to recognize the 'educational history of the study abroad students who have a rich and diversified system of language aptitude to address literacy events' (Sasson, 2010: 12-13) While these findings may reflect the difficulties Asian students encounter in host countries with Western academic literacy practices not much is known about how Asian students cope in other Asian contexts.One study that examined the literacy practices of Asian students in an Asian context is that of Li (2005).Li examined how a Chinese doctoral student was enculturated into an academic setting at a Chinese university.This study although situated in the student's own country points to the importance of a successful collaborative relationship with the advisor-mentor.Evans and Morrison (2010) tracked the learning experiences and identified challenges of Chinese students in a university in Hong Kong to understand how they were coping during the first term at the university.They found that these students had difficulty comprehending and using specialist vocabulary and understanding the professional academic requirements.
These studies evince that regardless of the setting, Asian or Western, Asian students have different understandings of academic literacy because of their previous literacy and educational knowledge.As outlined earlier in this paper, increasing student mobility within the Southeast Asian region has thrust many students into new learning environments and cultures.This research intends to highlight that it is erroneous to assume that classrooms and academic culture and practices are the same across the region by investigating how Korean study abroad students are navigating their literacy practices in a Malaysian tertiary classroom.

Theoretical Framework
The theoretical lens used to view the difficulties and practices of these students will be academic literacies.Academic literacies is one of the three models applied to understanding students socialization practices in education with study skills and academic socialization models being the other two.In this model the concern is with students having to move into new literacy practices and adopt different ways of thinking, talking writing and using language (Crose, 2011;Campbell & Li, 2008;Cumming, 2006).Academic literacies (Lea & Street, 2000) is perceived as both multiple and situated (Barton & Hamilton, 1998;Gee, 2000) and includes a range of practices common in the tertiary learning classroom.These would include communicative practices of listening and speaking and reading and writing.Students in higher education (HE) are confronted with the need to meet and accommodate new learning and literacy practices to become members of the academic community of practice (CoP).Within this situated community, there are shared practices that determine students' participation in the academic discourse which are dependent on student involvement subject to gate keeping by classmates and course instructors (Morita, 2004;Seloni, 2008).
Academic literacies hence, refer to the taking up and adapting to literacy practices within a learning environment.In such a situation Street (2005) what is important are the learning context itself or institution, the lecturers and how prepared they are to meet students' needs and "the need for unpacking and making explicit what is taken for granted in terms of literacy requirement"(p.6).Such a view provides a broader portrait of how students enculturate into a new environment with their existing practices.To portray a clear picture of how students are doing this, the instruments used to collect data focus on their practices during their reading, writing and speaking classes.

Research Context -Varied Academic Literacy Practices
The Korean students came from environments that practiced the grammar translation method to learning English.English was a foreign language to these students and they only began to learn the language in upper elementary school.The focus was on vocabulary drills and constructing simple sentences to use the words.Then in middle school, the focus was on conversation English and they moved to learning grammar in high school.Their teachers were Koreans who taught English using the Korean language, which was acceptable to the students who found it easier to learn this way.The students had to practice translating words from Korean to English and vice versa.They worked with simple exercises like filling in the blanks, grammar, mix and match and slowly moved to reading short passages to answer comprehension questions.The focus was on recognition of right grammar and structure but very little oracy and writing was practiced.In university, they were mainly prepared to sit for the TOEIC -the Test of English for International Communication and their language classes were structured for this purpose.
Most Koreans, parents and children alike are aware of the importance of English and aspired to be members of the English speaking communities so while in high school students usually go to private tuition centers to learn English.It is in these centers the students learn grammar and conversation.It seemed like these students went to these centers to get more practice and enhance their proficiency.These students do not have the opportunity to express their opinions so they do not have the ability to practice speaking.In Korea, there is very little opportunity to practice English outside class as English is a foreign language there just like Spanish or German in Malaysia.Hence, there are no reading materials like newspapers, books magazines and any television programmes and films.
In Malaysia, students learn English from the first year in school and often in kindergarten before they even start primary school.The curriculum is an integrated one where they learn to listen, speak, read and write.Students are provided exercises on grammar, vocabulary sentence construction and a host of activities to help them master the language.In addition, students are taught by proficient English speaking Malaysians who provide ample opportunities for the students to use the language in and out of class.In Malaysia English is very much a second language (ESL) and there are English newspapers, magazines, books, television programmes, movies and other kinds of opportunities to gain exposure the language.In university, students are provided with reading texts and have to read and understand these independently to be able to use the information in the text to present their opinions or write about their opinions.Students are encouraged to use their voices and allowed to be critical of what they read.

Objective of the Study
This research study was designed to understand the process of academic socialization and the difficulties encountered by two study abroad Korean students as they navigate through various literacy encounters in the host country, Malaysia and to learn what coping strategies they were using.The objective of the study is to identify the difficulties with academic literacy Korean students encountered and what literacy practices they employed to overcome these difficulties.The findings of the study will help portray the study abroad scenario within the Asian region to help develop a better understanding of the complexities of literacies here.

Methodology
This case study covered one teaching semester of 14 weeks and involved two Korean undergraduates, a boy and a girl, who were in UKM on a study abroad programme.The students were enrolled into a Bachelor of Arts in English Language Studies (BAELS) programme and were placed with second year Malaysian students in a first semester course.There were only two students as this was the first time this avenue for study abroad was introduced and while the sample is small, the in depth study and use of various instruments to help understand their socialization practices does lead to valuable insights.These students had to do Academic Reading, Oral Communication and Written Communication.Each course was conducted three hours per week so they were engrossed in 12 hours of English exposure every week for 14 weeks.This was almost like an immersion programme for these students considering their exposure to English in their home country.For each course these students had to do different readings, make oral presentations and write different types of essays.
Data were collected using interviews, student logs and researcher field notes to highlight their literacy journey.The interviews comprised a literacy background interview and five literacy experience interviews.The literacy background interview was used to build a profile for each learner and focused on the educational background, types of reading, writing and speaking tasks and experiences encountered in their home country (Korea).The literacy experience interviews focused on the difficulties encountered in their current courses and steps taken to overcome these difficulties.The students kept reflective logs for each course to document their practices, difficulties and sources of literacy encounters.Every two weeks, they would bring these logs to the researcher and these would be used to inform the interviews and generate questions to clarify matters arising.The researcher also kept field notes for every interview and these were used to inform the transcription of the interviews and help identify instances that needed further probing.
The interviews, which ranged for about an hour, were audio recorded and then transcribed for each learner.The transcripts were subjected to multiple readings for difficulties these students encountered and what practices they employed to overcome these and markings made to identify the difficulties and practices in the margins.The literacy logs were also read carefully and the instances of difficulties and practices recorded were used to help in the analysis of the transcripts together with the researcher field notes.To ensure reliability of the analysis a co researcher also participated in the multiple readings and analysis of the data.

Findings
The detailed analysis of the instruments which were employed from the very beginning of the data collection period helped highlight the literacy difficulties these students encountered in the Malaysian classroom and the literacy practices they utilized to navigate through these difficulties over the 14-week period.For the Academic Reading course students had to read various expository texts and had to complete tasks in summary writing.Students were taught how to organize their essays and practiced writing different types of essays in the Written Communication course.For the Oral Communication course the students learnt how to make different types of presentations, ranging from impromptu speeches to farewell speeches.

Difficulties with Academic Literacy
Both the Korean students had great difficulty coping with the system of instruction and evaluation in Malaysian classrooms.In their home country the focus is on recognition of grammar, a skill based system, and they were assessed on these items discretely.In the host country, they had to learn to read and write without much assistance and work on oral presentations independently.In addition, the evaluations were based on their ability to read and understand texts or on the process approach to writing and making successful presentations for different occasions.
Like the students in Evans and Morrisson's (2010) work, these students found their limited vocabulary knowledge hampered their ability to perform well.The students had problems understanding the unfamiliar words they encountered in the texts they had to read for the Reading course.They found the texts too difficult and the sentences too long and complicated.They also had difficulty in organizing and writing their essays because they did not have a store of words that they could use.Having to write out the scripts for oral presentations was also difficult owing to their inability to use appropriate words to express their thoughts.It can be seen that not having sufficient vocabulary was a major difficulty for these students, which affected them in all the courses they had to complete over the semester.
In addition, they were surprised that they had to talk about how they were going to structure their essays in their classes before they began writing them.As the girl student put it, "This is writing class but I supposed to talk".For her a writing class should focus on writing only and this stems from the learning environment she came from where the emphasis was on mastery of discrete items.She was equally astonished that she had to submit a copy of her oral presentation to the teacher before she was able to present orally in class.Even in the reading classes, these students found themselves having to express their understanding of what they had read and they were unprepared to do this.In their interviews with the researcher they mentioned how this was something they found so incomprehensible.They were used to reading to answer comprehension questions to display their ability to understand the text.
These students, like the students in Duff (2007), initially preferred to work with each other in all the classes because they claimed it was easier for them to communicate in their mother tongue, Korean.Having to communicate in English with the Malaysian students was burdensome, as they had to keep referring to their dictionaries to find the appropriate word.Each student was paired with a Malaysian student (a buddy) who helped them in the initial literacy navigation but they tended to rely too much on this student.As the semester progressed and the assignments began to accumulate, the Malaysian student began to play a less important role in their literacy encounters as she had to complete her work.
The Korean students realized they should have worked closely with their classmates rather than only amongst themselves.Interestingly the lecturer did not compel them to work with the host country students initially and when they did request to be paired with others they were not entertained.This was because the other students had already done much of the assignments and were not willing to have to redo them with the Korean students.This points to the role lecturers play in the study abroad experience and the need to highlight the importance of accommodating others in the classroom.
In addition, working only with each other was also not a good idea as they were both not very competent in the English language and usually had their discussions in Korean.When these students did realize they were not helping by working with each other it was already too late to identify new partners.The literature does point to host country students avoiding interactions and group work with study abroad students because of the language barrier (Montgomery, 2010;Jones, 2010).In the case of the Korean students their choosing not to work with the local students and using Korean to communicate only heightened the latter's worry of miscommunication.

Academic Literacy Practices
As the Korean students come from a learning environment that stressed on the learning of English using a grammar-translation approach, they resorted to translation to help the cope with the literacy demands in their new environment.Each of them had an e-translator which they depended on for all their classes.They spent a lot of time translating what they read and heard in class instead of participating in classroom activities.When they had to present their writing outlines in class they chose to write in Korean and enlist the help of their buddy to translate into English for them.As mentioned earlier these students had limited vocabulary knowledge and this was how they overcame that difficulty.
The boy student actually got his mother send him a grammar book, which taught English grammar using the Korean language, and he spent his weekends working through the exercises in the book.He states, "I went to library every Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, I went to library and I learn English.Okay, this is a reading text (referring to book his mother sent him), which is written in English but there's translation in Korean, right…and it covers vocabulary and reading".He felt reading a book which provided translation was the best way for him to learn English and this is mainly because he was comfortable with this method.These students were familiar with the grammar translation method and resorted to learning English in their new environment using this method.It was only much later in the semester that they realized they did not need to understand every word to make sense of what they read and heard.Therefore, while translating every word was comforting to them it was not helping them cope with the classroom literacy practices.The girl student was a little more adventurous and did make the effort to speak to other foreign students and also the local students by participating in student activities outside the classroom.In the end she turned out to be more confident with using the language.
They also referred to the dictionary to help them 'study language' as one learner put it.The e-dictionary was their choice of dictionary and a lot of time was spent trying to find meanings of unfamiliar words while reading the texts in their classes.Their biggest problem was with the vocabulary and without understanding the words naturally they had difficulty understanding participating in the classes.
The practice of relying on one student in the classroom to help them adapt to the new environment was a good one as it meant the study abroad student would have a peer to turn to when necessary.However, overdependence was an issue, as these study abroad students did not venture out of this relationship to seek new ones.They were totally dependent on their buddies to assist them around campus and especially in class.Having this personal tutor instead of a buddy led them to find the easiest and most convenient way to deal with their difficulties in class.That is why they wrote in Korean and got the buddy to translate into English for them for all 3 courses.One good practice they displayed was an awareness of differences between Korean and English syntax.As one learner states, "English pattern…sentence is subject, verb, object but Korean sentence is subject, object, verb".It is established in the literature on second language acquisition that awareness of differences in syntactical organization between L1 and L2 is important to make learning the L2 easier and more efficient (Nambiar, 2009;Taillefer, 2005;Angelova and Riazantseva, 1999).

Discussion
Many researchers (Zamel and Spack, 2004;Berno and Ward, 2004;Morita, 2004;Seloni, 2008) point to the need for students to be aware of the existing academic literacy practices of their host countries to minimize the linguistic, cultural and social conflicts that can arise.These Korean students did not know about the system of instruction and evaluation here and hence found it difficult to keep up with the academic demands thrust upon them in their classes.Having come from a traditional classroom where they were dependent on the teacher as the provider of knowledge and having to contribute in the creation of knowledge in the home country's classroom was a little overwhelming for these students.This inability to recognize different academic norms and conventions prevented them from accommodating and adapting to new literary practices and deprived them of the opportunity to maximize their study abroad stint.
These students expect that reading and writing classes will be similar to what they are accustomed to in their home country especially, since the labels are similar for study genre.Hence, when they are required to present what they understand from their readings and discuss what they are going to write about, they find this disconcerting.This is further compounded by their limited vocabulary and poor ability to speak in English.Their inability to communicate in English affected their performance in the reading, writing and oral communication classes.
The lecturers should be more aware of the presence of these study abroad students and be better prepared to handle their varied expectations on instruction and evaluation.It will be useful if lecturers can provide continuous feedback and monitor these students progress in class to ensure they are benefitting and adapting to the new environment (Crose, 2011).Opportunities should be made available for these learners to interact and participate in classroom discussions and with their peers to make them feel more welcome and less threatened by language inabilities (Scheyvens, Wild & Overton, 2003;Briguglio, 2000).
Since vocabulary is a main problem with these students it would be a good idea if they are briefed on the next lesson so that they can prepare by reading through the passage or working on an outline of an essay or a speech so that they do not waste time trying to understand the demands of the task in class itself Evans & Morrison, 2010).This can help reduce their anxiety and allow them to participate in class.It is also important that they are provided non threatening environments wherein they can practice their language ability and still contribute to discussions.Ideally they should be allowed to provide their insights from the international student perspective which will bring added value to their contribution and help boost their confidence (Sasson, 2010;Seloni, 2008) These students did display the use of certain literacy practices to help them navigate through their literacy difficulties in their host country during their study abroad stint.Considering they were here only for fourteen weeks, they did manage to reap some benefit from their stint here as both students claimed they had improved a little in their academic literacy.They reported that reading academic texts was not as tedious as it was in the beginning as they realized they could read without having to understand every word.They found the writing classes very useful as they learnt how to organize their writing although they did not actually benefit from writing in English.The oral communication classes were in their words "the easiest" and this was mainly because they only had to tell their peers what they wanted to say and have their scripts prepared for them.All they had to do was present this orally in class.
Although only two students participated in the study, the range of instruments used and the 3 courses do cameo the socialization practices of study abroad students in a non-Anglophone context which is rarely explored in academic socialization studies.There needs to be an attempt to listen to these student's voices and address their needs in this era of globalization and internationalization of education.
Further investigations of this nature should also capture the practices and viewpoints of course lecturers as they function as gatekeepers who can mitigate the impact of socialization practices for both groups of students -both home and host country.It would be interesting to investigate to what extent lecturers are aware of the need to relook their pedagogical practices and move towards bridging the cultural differences and varied learning expectations of these study abroad students (Campbell and Li, 2008) while catering for the local students.

Conclusion
The discussion above highlights the main difficulties these Korean study abroad students encountered and the literacy practices they employed in the face of these difficulties.These students found that they had to become familiar with a new learning environment and understand the linguistic, cognitive, socio cultural knowledge of the literacy practices of Malaysian classrooms and "change in ways of thinking, using language and envisioning the self" (Casanave, 2002:36).The underlying philosophy here is to examine a study abroad student's previous literacy experiences to identify what is similar and different; what will contribute and what will not to learning in order to help connect these students with their new context (Seloni, 2008).
This study has outlined some of the similarities and differences between the Malaysian context and the Korean context and highlighted how students complete their study abroad stint by adopting coping strategies to help them navigate through their literacy practices.While it is interesting to note that these students are flexible enough to do this it is also necessary to consider what lecturers and host institutions can do to help these students.It might be pertinent to consider training for students and lecturers from home and host countries to help them assimilate into a new learning environment with minimum fuss.
If Malaysia is truly poised to be the educational hub in Southeast Asia it is pertinent that appropriate measures are taken to prepare for the increased numbers of students from Southeast Asian countries.In the context of a research university like Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia that already has embarked on a MOU with a Korean university, the increased possibility of more students in Malaysian classrooms is a real challenge to contend with.The reality is that even the most competent learner will encounter potential challenges and struggles in a new academic environment with its new demands on the learner (Sasson, 2010;Kingston & Forland, 2008;Hills & Thom, 2005).What is important and what allows a student to be more successful in the study abroad venture is the ability to develop appropriate strategies to cope with the difficulties encountered in the new context and this is where faculty members can play a role.