초등학교 영어 교과서에 나타난 동사 연어(collocation) 분석

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to analyse the verb collocations used in elementary school English textbooks that are the main language inputs to Korean students. Through Simple Concordance Program 4.09, the frequency of the verbs has been calculated and 15 verbs have been selected. High - frequency verbs such as go, like, want, help, have, play, meet, look, come, see, wash, take, turn, get, and join shown in the elementary school English textbooks are analyzed in this study. This study examines all examples of the verb collocations and analyses collocation patterns of high-frequency verbs. Also, the forms of collocation mainly considered in this study are ‘lexical collocation’ and ‘grammatical collocation’ of Benson's collocation types. The following are the results of this analysis: First, most of collocation types are ‘free collocation’ and ‘weak collocation’. For example, there are the collocational types such as ‘like apples’ and ‘go skating’. Thus, it is easy for students to understand the meanings. Second, the most frequent pattern of collocations in the textbooks is ‘verb+noun’. In the order of frequency, there are forms of ‘verb+pronoun’, ‘verb+to infinitive’, ‘verb+preposition’, ‘verb+adverb’, ‘verb + gerund’ and ‘verb+predicative adjective’. The grammatical collocations in the textbooks are simple in construction. Third, most of the lexical collocations consist of very easy words that most students know. Mainly, the words relate to sports/hobbies/leisure, food and animals. Fourth, many forms of collocations such as ‘have a cold’ and ‘play soccer’ are revealed repeatedly. Fifth, polysemous verbs are presented simply. For example, the verb play is used with just two meanings ‘enjoy’ and ‘perform’. Sixth, the delexicalized verbs such as have, make, take and get showed simple forms and meanings. ‘Have’ has several different meanings but the other words just have one meaning and the use of the verbs is limited to a small number of varieties. On the basis of the above findings, the following are suggested for collocation education. First, the English textbooks should organize the various meanings, uses and collocations of high-frequency verbs properly and systematically based on the school year while considering native speakers' corpus data. Second, a corpus for the beginners that allows students to explore how lexical items are actually used and how they collocate is needed. Third, teachers who have a clear understanding of different kinds of collocation will be able to help learners study in the best possible way. Thus, a well designed guideline is needed to help teachers develop a clear understanding of collocations.