Contributions and future directions of college Korean curriculum inspired by national standards for Korean (2015)

Korean language teaching in North America saw a welcome breakthrough in 2012 with the publication of “National Standards for Korean Language Learning.” These standards set out for the first time clearly articulated content and performance guidelines for Korean programs spanning levels K-16, and represent an important step toward a more systematic Korean language pedagogy in the United States at the national level. However, the Standards in themselves represent something of an idealization or abstraction, and do not directly articulate how these guidelines can be applied to the realities of everyday teaching. The next necessary step, therefore, was to develop and research specific curricula that put into practice the goals and expectations of the Standards.