Abstract
When Korean students learn English in school, they are not aware of biased images included in English textbooks. It is because they are being taught passively without critical thinking. As a result, Korean students may easily become biased against other ethnicities. To resolve this problem, it is important to increase the cultural awareness through critical thinking. When students are aware of other cultures, they will be able to communicate with foreigners without bias and will have a good relationship. Another problem is that English textbooks in South Korea include unbalanced images of different ethnicities. Most English textbooks in South Korea contain positive images of European descendants and negative images of African descendants. These biased images influence Korean students to be biased against African descendants. It is therefore important to make English textbooks with fair distribution of images of different ethnicities. Last problem is that the education in South Korea emphasizes so much on the college entrance examination. Teachers and students only focus on getting good scores in the examination. Students only study to prepare for the examination mostly through memorization. Therefore, even through many years of learning English in school, Korean people find it difficult to communicate with foreigners in English. Therefore, if the entire English education system would be changed for diverse elements like culture, Korean students would learn English efficiently for better communication. This project has a purpose to help teachers develop cultural awareness of other ethnicities. Teachers will learn how to criticize biased images in English textbooks of South Korea. To develop critical thinking, a professional development program will be introduced to teachers. This critical thinking will improve teachers’ cultural awareness of other ethnicities. After the completion of the program, teachers will be able to help students increase their cultural awareness of other ethnicities. This cultural awareness will help students avoid racial bias against certain ethnicities. Good communication comes out of understanding other cultures without bias. When students increase their cultural awareness of other ethnicities, they will also improve communication in English with people from many different countries. This project includes a professional development program for high school teachers in South Korea. Although this project cannot change English textbooks directly, this program will help teachers develop their critical thinking especially on biased images portrayed in English textbooks. In this program, the PowerPoint slide show will also present the images portraying positive European descendants and negative African descendants in the English textbooks. These positive images of African descendants, which are not included in English textbooks, have been added to be included in the PowerPoint slideshow for teacher training. This professional development program will let trainees discuss their feelings after they watch the PowerPoint slide show. Trainees will be asked some questions to share their opinions while they think critically about these images. They will talk about the way those biased images have been portrayed.