ELT Classroom Research Articles

Incorporating culture and textbook adaptation practice for promoting intercultural competence in ELT: Teachers’ perspectives

It is currently accepted that language and culture are inseparable since culture becomes an essential aspect of learning a foreign language. In the Indonesian context, this broad understanding of the crucial role of culture in English teaching has raised challenges in different contexts for EFL teachers. The recent study focuses on Indonesian Junior High School teachers’ views on integrating culture in ELT and practices of textbook adaptation to help students build intercultural competence. Therefore, to meet these aims, a questionnaire and an open-ended question were employed to collect the data from fifteen participants teaching English at public and private schools in Indonesia. The study results reveal that Indonesian EFL teachers have positive attitudes on integrating intercultural competence in ELT. Still, some of the difficulties confronted by their implementation of textbook adaptation have been highlighted in promoting intercultural competence. This study suggests that EFL teachers in Indonesia should be provided with teacher training relating to textbooks adaptation and teaching culture. The implementation of ICT in ELT classrooms is also recommended. Finally, the redesign of the curriculum with more integrated intercultural competency materials should be taken into account.
 HIGHLIGHTS:
 
 The EFL teachers’ practices deal with textbook adaptation are not well implemented, although they believe that cultural competence in their teaching activities is crucial.
 The English curriculum should give more room for teachers in serving the students based on their needs, preferences, and skills, especially for enhancing students’ mastery on the target language.
 

Attitudes of Foreign Language Teaching Assistants Towards Teaching of English in Pakistani Context

This study aims to examine the attitudes of Foreign Language Teaching Assistants towards the teaching of English in the context of Pakistan. Its importance lies in the fact that it will make the teachers aware of uniquely effective teaching methods. Almost all stakeholders may get benefits from it. The research utilized interview tools. Semi-structured interviews were discussed among the respondents. The results show that the Pakistani teacher assistants view English favorably. They consider it absolutely necessary for employment purpose and professional development. Therefore, they opt for positive attitudes towards teaching English language along with culture in ELT Classrooms. The results also showed that Teaching Assistants after coming back from training, continue to celebrate the value of their own culture too. In the end, the research suggests measures necessary to formulate effective language teaching policies. Keywords: Attitudes, English Language, Teaching Assistants, Pakistan. DOI: 10.7176/JLLL/78-03 Publication date: April 30 th 2021

Teaching Grammar through Literature to EFL Learners: A Corpus Approach

A plethora of researches have been conducted to improve the grammar teaching technique of English language in order to make it easier for the students to learn English in a fun way. To teach the grammar, the corpus approach proves to be very beneficial. The focus of this study is to explore the way how literary poems can be of great use for teaching English language to the students, by using a Simple Concordance Program Scp (4.09). For this purpose, we have selected four English poems. This is an exploratory research. This study investigates the ways in which the application of Corpus Analysis Tool on poems can assist English language teaching. Hence, it makes it easy for the students in ELT classrooms to comprehend the grammatical structures. The results illustrate that the Scp (4.09) tool helps in extracting the words with higher frequency rate but as well as in the teaching of imperative, conditional sentences, present (indefinite, continuous and perfect) and simple past tenses, as it provides the concordances of the words. Further researchers can find out the word collocations by using the same tool. Moreover, the selected poems in this study, can be analyzed through other corpus tools available. This study can also be expanded to the stylistic analysis of the poems. The literary devices used by both poets can be studied, compared and taught to the students.

A Study of Using Nursery Rhymes as an Instructional Strategy in ELT Classroom

Abstract Music soothes, relaxes, and motivates irrespective of age. We listen to music for pleasure among other reasons. It creates a refreshing effect. Nonetheless, it is rarely exploited as a learning tool by teachers and students. Conversely, it occupies a larger portion of student’s and teacher’s interests. The use of music serves a dual purpose: It motivates and, consequently, helps to enrich learning as an enjoyable affair. Music/songs may be used through three levels. It would mark the gradual development of learning using music. First, using music as an element of entertainment, moving on to use it to state the interface between music and learning and concluding with using music to learn specific language skills and linguistic units. The article elaborates on how using nursery rhymes as an instructional strategy in ELT classroom can be effective in language learning skills and grammatical components. Keywords: Music, Pedagogy, Nursery Rhymes, ELT

Technology training for ELT teachers at a Private University in Malaysia

Online teaching and learning are not new experiences in the field of ELT, but the sudden need for everyone globally to go virtual due to the pandemic is unprecedented. Currently,with theCovid-19 pandemic, online classes are beingconducted globally as a short- term emergency response to sustain education through crisis management. This study explores the effect of technology training on the teacher trainees’ preference to use print and digital media in the ELT classroom. As students in schools in the recent past years, the participants who are presently TESOL trainee teachers had never or rarely had the experience of using digital media in the ELT classroom. The study employs a qualitative method based on data gathered online through questions posed to TESOL trainee teachers during their online class on Media Resources in November 2020 – February 2021. A total of 10 TESOL trainee teachers responded to 8 open-ended interview questions posed to them digitally. Data collected was analysed qualitatively by identifying statements that respond to the research questions. Expression used in these statements were categorized to narrow down the themes. The expressions were then uploaded into a Word Cloud to identify the most significant expression that was used repetitively in response to each research question. The findings of this study will inform practice among teacher educators as the current generation of teacher trainees seemto be garnering momentumto improve the use of technology in the ELT classroom with a special focus on digital media and to encourage other ELT teacher trainees to gain confidence to use technology in their future ELT classroom. The above findings show that even though the 10 students had little exposure to digital technology when they were school students themselves, but with appropriate training to use print and digital technology and resources in the ELT classroom, they were confident of using both media resources in the future.

Children’s experiences of agency when learning English in the classroom of a collectivist culture

This paper explores agency in a collectivist culture to investigate whether, and if so how, school-children experience agency as supportive to learning to speak English in the classroom of a collectivist culture. It draws on Ryan and Deci’s (2019) Self-Determination Theory (SDT) to examine nine primary classrooms in three schools in Alexandria, Arab Republic of Egypt. The research involved 281 primary-school-children who completed open-ended sentences about experiences in the ELT classroom, observations of the nine participating classes and 18 individual interviews. Our findings provided support for the universality of the need for autonomy (reflecting agency) in learning to speak English within a collectivist culture, in that the sample children expressed the need for greater autonomy. They also the inter-relatedness of the three basic needs of SDT, competence, autonomy and relatedness. Our findings suggest that children were encouraged by their schooling system to develop Control or Impersonal Orientations rather than Autonomy Orientations. These were sustained through children’s fear of making mistakes and teachers scolding them which inhibited their sense of agency and capacity for speaking in English. Some children found that agency was less inhibited when they did simultaneous pairwork, if their needs for competence and relatedness were also satisfied.

ISLAMIC CULTURAL NOTES IN ELT INSTRUCTION IN THE ISLAMIC BOARDING SCHOOLS OF HARAMAIN NAHDLATUL WATHAN NARMADA, WEST NUSA TENGGARA

Islamic contents and English were taught at Islamic Boarding School (IBS) Haramain Nahdlatul Wathan (NW) Narmada. English is taught as a general subject and compulsory subject as well. An English community (Language Asrama) is established by Kiai. It is aimed at practicing speaking English and exercising public speaking skills. IBS Haramain NW Narmada includes one of the IBSs in Indonesia in which it reflected Islamic values, cultures, and indoctrination in its teaching and learning. The pieces of evidence showed that this institution taught English for students (Santri) as a tool to gain global information around the world. Dealing with the ELT classrooms, IBS Haramian NW Narmada employed some learning strategies reflecting Islamic cultures and values such as syawir, Lalar, Hafal (memorizing), and Setoran (deposit). The strong emphasis on Arabic and English in daily communication addresses the immersion language program. It is a method applied to teach foreign languages. Based on the application, the IBS Haramain NW Narmada applied a total immersion program, in which Arabic and English are the target languages.

A Study of the Teaching-Learning Challenges of the 21st Century at University ELT Classroom

With the increased anticipation of a university degree as a requirement for workforce entry, the criticism of business leaders, and the general public, it becomes critical for institutions of higher education to know what they are offering students, especially the English language and how well this subject is being presented. Therefore engaging and preparing students for life after school is a great challenge to teachers and institutions. Through the implementation of new tools and practice, this study was designed to explore the teaching-learning challenges of the 21st century at the university ELT classroom. The researcher administered a questionnaire to 171 students and 40 faculty members from three universities in Erbil, Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Statistical Package analyzed the data for Social Science, including Descriptive statistical analyses such as the mean and standard deviation, also Pearson Correlation and ANOVA test to compare the groups' responses. The results showed that learning a second/foreign language collaboration skills while in the classroom inside universities is one of the suitable ways for learning in current time. Also, students in universities have been able to assess their collaboration skills when working via group effectively and positively effect their learning of the English language. Finally, the students have tried to develop their skills by using technology as a tool for learning; this is showing as finding in this study that the availability of tools or technology devices positively and effective factor for students to learn second/foreign language and skills in their universities.

Strategies for Withstanding the Inevitable at Ground Zero —An Analysis of Intercultural Sensitivity in the ELT Classroom

This paper is an analysis of how intercultural sensitivity is lived out in the classroom. It draws focus on the importance of intercultural awareness in the context of ELT and how this trait ultimately impacts teachers’ pedagogical decisions and daily teaching strategies. The study shows the dynamics of intercultural sensitivity as teachers grapple with not only the culture stemming from mostly Western published textbooks and their students’ culture, but their own culture as well. The study draws on qualitative data from a case study of expatriate teachers in a Saudi Arabian university ELT context. The data were generated through focus group discussions, interviews and classroom observations.

The Effect of Graphic Organizers on ELT Students’ Writing Quality

Graphic organizers are used in ELT classroom to help the students learn better. It refers to the way the students use graphic organizers in writing. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of graphic organizers on ELT students’ writing quality. This study was a quasi-experimental research design. The experimental group was taught by using graphic organizers. The control group was administered by using conventional strategy. The participants of the research were the second semester students of English Department, in one of the private universities in Madiun. The data were analyzed by utilizing independent t-test and one-way ANOVA based on the level of significance at .05. The result of the study shows that there is a significant difference between the mean scores of the students in the experimental and control groups. The students who are taught by using graphic organizers are better than the students who are taught using conventional strategy. The students in the experimental group perform better on writing quality in terms of content, vocabulary, and mechanics than those who do in the control group. It can be concluded that graphic organizers have a significant effect on ELT students’ writing quality. It is effective to be used in order to help the students write better. The students are successful in generating the ideas of writing and it can create a social community. We recommend for the future researchers to realize other various graphic organizer models into research.

Indonesian EFL teachers’ cognitions and practices related to social justice

The implementation of critical pedagogy has not been well addressed, especially that viewed from the teacher cognition perspective. This project hence aims to study the cognitions and practices related to critical pedagogy by investigating the integration of social justice by high-school English teachers in Indonesia. Two participants who claimed to be critical pedagogy practitioners were interviewed and observed. Interviews were done before and after the class observation. Pre-observation interviews were done in order to identify teachers’ cognition and track factors contributing to the integration of social justice in the ELT classroom. Meanwhile, the post-observation interviews were performed to seek for clarification in relation to the congruence and incongruence between the cognitions and the real practices. Participants’ schooling experience, curriculum demand, and personal beliefs seem to play a major role in the integration of social justice in class. However, incongruence was also recognized between their stated cognition and real practices.

TRACES OF CRITICAL SPIRITUAL PEDAGOGY IN INDONESIAN EFL TEACHERS’ CHRISTIAN-BASED CLASSES

The incorporation of critical pedagogical (CP) perspectives into ELT classrooms has been widely discussed in ELT literature, but how English language teachers in Indonesian schools integrate them in their lessons has not been sufficiently documented. This study aims to investigate to what extent CP perspectives are integrated within the learning process to teach four basic English skills, although the teachers were not familiar with CP. Two in-service English teachers from a private junior high school in Central Java, Indonesia, filled in a questionnaire designed to identify their pedagogical identity. They were also interviewed and observed to further investigate their responses in the questionnaire and to explore the realization of the CP practice. The data was classified based on the components of critical language pedagogy proposed by Crookes (2013). The results showed that as students’ wholeness was acknowledged, the learning process integrated cultural and critical contents to teach a particular language feature. During the learning process, there was a great deal of the inclusion of spiritual values as a way of demonstrating the students’ criticality.

Implementing Assessment literacy in ESL/EFL at Undergraduate Level in Bangladeshi Universities: Imperativeness and Challenges

The paper concentrates on investigating the implementation of assessment literacy at the tertiary level of Bangladesh. It also tries to explore the existing challenges which the teachers face in ELT classroom while implementing effective assessment techniques in evaluating academic examination scripts. In this regard, a survey method involving a questionnaire survey was used to obtain a quantitative insight of the study. After studying the responses from 10 respondents of two public universities of Bangladesh, the researcher attained the findings that demonstrated respondents’ experience and suggestions regarding assessment literacy in English language teaching at undergraduate level in the respective university, which include a number of barriers, like lack of training in achieving assessment literacy, insufficient support from the university, and disparity between learning objectives and assessment techniques. To ensure bonafide assessment literacy, the findings also provided some feasible suggestions, like offering students an opportunity to convert test into learning experiences, ensuring appropriate math between assessment and learner ability and regulating self-assessment on regular basis.

English

English

West Papuan Teachers’ Perceptions on Translanguaging Practices in EFL Classroom Interaction

The belief that the West Papuan teachers applied translanguaging practice as strategy to enhance their students in ELT classroom. This study, investigated the West Papuan EFL teachers’ perceptions on translanguaging practices. It focused to explore the teachers’ knowledge and the teachers’ experience on translanguaging practice in EFL Classroom interaction in West Papuan. The participants of the study were three English language teachers (EFL) who work at state Islamic junior high school of Manokwari in West Papuan. The utterances of teachers’ interview were analyzed descriptive qualitatively using discourse analysis and the data gathered from classroom observations and semi-structured interviews were exposed to structural-coding analysis. The results showed that the EFL teachers have some perceptions about knowledge on translanguaging practice. There were translanguaging is a combination of Indonesian and English in the ELT Classroom, Translanguaging is a material transfer tool, Translanguaging is a safe and productive zone for students to do communication, Translanguaging is the moment for using mother tongue and local language in explaining material, Translanguaging is a strategy to improve and facilitate the understanding of material, Translanguaging is a strategy to enliven the classroom atmosphere. The EFL teachers also have experiences to apply translanguaging practice in ELT classroom. They used translanguaging to appreciate students in process of asking and answer the questions, to facilitate the transfer of material toward students, to assist the students in apply the target language, to respect the students’ questions that use the local language, and translanguaging as a challenge for teachers to master the local language of students.

ELF with EFL: what is still needed for this integration to happen?

Abstract Although a significant number of practitioners are being progressively exposed to English as a lingua franca (ELF) research findings and developments, we still face the challenge of bringing ELF into the ELT classroom in a more systematic way and on a regular basis. It is a fact that once EFL learners move into contexts of use outside the classroom, they naturally become ELF users. To respond to this reality, ELF and EFL need to work together in such a way that the classroom reflects as much as possible what students have to deal with when using English to interact with interlocutors from different linguacultural backgrounds. Under a decolonizing perspective, the article seeks to discuss the feasibility and relevance of this integration, illustrating in practice how an ELF–EFL dialogue can emerge in ELT materials.

Culture and ELT: Cambodian teachers' perception and practice of textbook adaptation to realize intercultural awareness

Currently, it is recognized that language and culture go hand in hand, which means that when we teach a language, we also teach the culture of that language or other languages that appear in the textbooks being used. This wide recognition of the vital role of culture in the second language teaching has presented challenges for EFL teachers in various contexts. This article reports a qualitative study on three Cambodian teachers of English at one school in Phnom Penh. The study aims to investigate EFL teachers’ views and practices of textbook adaptation, as well as how they adapt textbooks to help students develop intercultural awareness in the ELT. To achieve these objectives, the qualitative data obtained from individual interviews, classroom observations, and teaching materials were engaged to shed light on the backdrop of the textbook adaptation and cultural integration in the ELT classroom. The findings in this study reveal an inconsistency between teachers’ views and practices about the textbook adaptation and the teachers’ limited capacity of interculturality-stimulated scholarship that is inherently tied to the development of cultural activities in the ELT classroom. This study suggests teacher training on the textbook adaptation and teaching culture should be provided to the teachers in the context and beyond.

Collaborative Digital Storytelling-based Task for EFL Writing Instruction : Outcomes and Perceptions

Despite a myriad of studies documenting the educational benefits of digital storytelling (DST) on EFL learners’ language mastery, the majority of the research is not grounded in the theory of L2 instruction, say task based language teaching (TBLT). To fill this void, this action research involving 28 students investigated the efficacy of collaborative DST-based task in an Indonesian EFL writing classroom. Anchored in collaborative TBLT methodology instruction of Willis (1996) that met a set of task criteria coined by Ellis (2009), this study aimed to unveil the effect of collaborative DST-based task on the students’ writing skills; how the students perceived the use of the learning approach; and the challenges they encountered. The statistical evidence indicates that there was a significant difference on the students’ pre- and post-writing scores, which indicates that the use of collaborative DST-based task significantly improved students’ writing skills. The writing students perceived that the learning design could promote their English Language skills Development, engagement, motivation, and interpersonal relation. Another finding revealed that the students found the technological and pedagogical circumstances were their challenges. This study offers implications and recommendations for future research and practices for marrying TBLT and technology in ELT classrooms.

Unburdening the Pedagogy of the Oppressed: A Case Study of ELT Classrooms at University Level in South Punjab

Recently, the concept of Critical thinking got much significance in the teaching and learning process. Thinking creatively and critically in the English language beckons our representation in different domains of development as well. The present study is aimed to investigate the on-going teaching-learning process of English Language Teaching at University Level in South Punjab from the perspective of critical thinking. The theoretical insights have been taken from Freire’s Banking concept of education in his seminal work, Pedagogy of the Oppressed (2018). The findings of the study reveal that our ELT classrooms are lacking the creativity and critical thinking at large. Further in our classrooms, the Banking Model of teaching is being practiced where a student remains passive and the teacher is considered as the ultimate source of knowledge. It points out that our teaching and learning process is moving on some faulty lines which need revisions and amendments. It is suggested that the Problem Posing Model of teaching and learning may be adopted in our ELT Classrooms so that our graduates at the university level may think critically and independently.

Critical ‘intercultural awareness’ enhancement: Effects of using asynchronous online discussion with Thai tertiary students

In the globalized era, the interaction between people from different cultures increases dramatically. This affects the way the English language is used, and how the language is taught at all levels of education. Regarding this, English language teachers are recommended to reconsider their current classroom practices in light of the above issue. One basic recommendation is to incorporate other cultural aspects besides just the American and British models commonly used today. However, research on developing learners’ critical ‘intercultural awareness’ (ICA) is rare in the literature, particularly regarding the use of asynchronous online discussion (AOD) at the Thai tertiary level. This study aimed to investigate the AOD use to develop critical ICA and to examine the effects of such AOD use on the learning of Thai students. Twelve ICA-enhanced AOD tasks were developed as instructional instruments. From these, research instruments were developed, including a pretest, a posttest, a self-reported questionnaire, and an in-depth interview. Two groups of Thai students with different English proficiency levels were selected to join the experiment, classified as a high proficiency (HP) group and a low proficiency (LP) group. After AOD implementation, their performances were assessed. Findings revealed improvements in the performances of both groups, with the mean posttest scores being higher in both groups, with the HP group demonstrating better performance. In addition to posttest scores, the participants provided positive perceptions of the AOD tasks, with no significant differences in the perceptions between groups. The interview responses revealed the students’ perceptions that the AOD tasks were challenging, but provided them with an opportunity to think critically about the culturally related questions. This study highlights the benefits of developing critical ICA in an ELT classroom with the AOD use, especially HP students, even though it may not work very well with LP students.