English Private Research Articles

Private school pupils’ performance in GCSEs (and IGCSEs)

ABSTRACT Using rich longitudinal data from the UK’s Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), the authors compare the performance of private and state school pupils in age 16 national examinations (GCSEs) in England, where private schools are particularly well resourced by international standards. Performance among pupils attending private secondary schools is superior. However, this raw difference ignores the highly socially selective nature of the English private school system. Adjusting for socioeconomic background, the overall performance difference between the sectors disappears. The picture is also quite different when considering English, Maths, Science and Arts subjects separately. Implications are reviewed for debate surrounding the role of private schools and the emphasis of lower secondary state education on core subjects at the expense of Arts subjects.

Learning English in the ‘shadow’: Patterns and implications of English private tutoring in Vietnam

Private tutoring has grown in prominence on a global scale. While research in this area has increased in recent decades, there remains a lack of focus on English private tutoring. This gap is particularly evident in Vietnam, where research on English private tutoring has not kept pace with its growing popularity. This article sheds light on the prevalence of English private tutoring among students in public high schools in Vietnam. The study examines the rate, patterns of enrolment, the reasons for its popularity and the perceived effectiveness of English private tutoring. Based on questionnaire data collected from 583 urban, regional, and rural school students, the findings revealed an enrolment rate of over 75%, with notable disparities in enrolment patterns among students in different socio-economic areas. However, despite the prevalence of private tutoring, the research findings revealed a modest impact of such tutoring on student academic performance, evidenced by over 75% of the students reporting slight improvement in their communicative skills. Irrespective of academic achievement levels and backgrounds, private tutoring has been a widespread and normalised educational practice, reflecting the nature of social and educational competition. The study emphasises the need for more proactive measures to regulate the practice before it is well-engrained as part of the culture.

A narrative inquiry into EFL tutors’ career trajectories through social cognitive career theory

Despite the prevalence of English private tutoring (EPT) in EFL contexts, scant literature has focused on its tutors’ career experiences. This narrative study, underpinned by social cognitive career theory (SCCT), inquiries into the career trajectories of three EFL tutors in Mainland China. Data were mainly collected through three rounds of narrative interviews. Tutors’ photos representing significant career moments supplemented the interview data. Based on their narratives, these participants experienced ‘zigzag’ career trajectories that featured frequent turnovers, lengthy work gaps, and identity shifts from institutional tutors to start-up owners. Informed by SCCT, this study unveils that tutors’ career trajectories were shaped by their self-efficacy beliefs associated with personal attributes and prior experiences. Tutors’ trajectories were also shaped by their outcome expectations from material and social perspectives, and contextual influences, including personal opportunities and barriers, institutional management, and socio-political factors like the ongoing ‘Double Reduction’ policy. These findings are discussed in order to inform other tutors to visualize and organize their career development within the context of policy constraints and, furthermore, offer implications for tutorial institutions to retain tutors for instructional consistency. This inquiry also demonstrates the potential to apply the SCCT model to understanding teachers’ career development in the ‘shadow education’ context.

Private Tutoring as a Relief or Burden? Changes in Parental Beliefs About Young Children's English Learning in China

AbstractThe increasing trend of early English education has promoted the rapid growth of English private tutoring (EPT) for children, which garners attention in research as a global educational phenomenon. In China, EPT for children experienced a fervent expansion under neoliberalism. However, a recent policy (Double‐Reduction Policy) has banned EPT for preschoolers (age 3–6), creating a unique context where state‐led neoliberalism prevails. This study employs narrative inquiry to investigate the changes in beliefs about young children's English learning among three Chinese parents who enrolled their children in EPT. Data were gleaned through interviews, observations, informal conversations, and collection of parent‐recorded videos and artifacts over a year of fieldwork. The findings reveal that parents hold contradictory beliefs at different times, and the belief changes were interacted inextricably with the tensions experienced by these parents, including pressure from EPT and challenges from the policy. EPT was initially perceived as relief but eventually became burdensome. This study sheds light on the dynamic and intricate nature of parental beliefs, as well as the tensions arising from the interplay between neoliberalism and policy shifts in China. The findings have implications for parents, TESOL practitioners, and policymakers who involved in English education decisions for young children.

A Longitudinal Study of English Achievement of Korean EFL Young Adolescent Students: Focusing on Initial English Proficiency, English Private Tutoring, and Urbanicity

A Longitudinal Study of English Achievement of Korean EFL Young Adolescent Students: Focusing on Initial English Proficiency, English Private Tutoring, and Urbanicity

Corso, esclavitud y resistencia: Afroespañoles del Gran Caribe en la Norteamérica colonial

Drawing on eighteenth-century newspaper records from New York, Boston and Philadelphia, in addition to archival sources from New York, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, this study interrelates Spanish and English privateering in the Greater Caribbean and along North America’s Atlantic Coast with the unfortunate phenomenon of the enslavement of African-descendant and Indigenous sailors from the Spanish territories in the British colonies. It focuses on group escape attempts as one strategy employed by Spanish-speaking enslaved people to achieve freedom.

L2 motivation in shadow education: analysing students’ L2 learning experience in online English private tutoring

ABSTRACT With a focus on the neglected ‘L2 learning experience’ component in Dörnyei’s L2 Motivational Self System (L2MSS), this study investigated secondary students’ L2 motivation in the context of online English private tutoring (EPT). Through narrative inquiry, students narrated their EPT experience online and reflected on it in comparison with that in the face-to-face environment. Through an initial questionnaire, in-depth interviews and follow-up conversations with 12 senior secondary students in Hong Kong, the study revealed the participants’ generally negative L2 learning experience in online EPT. This negativity stemmed from constant distractions and poor concentration, limited interaction with the tutor and peers and insufficient learning support in the online environment. These experiences disengaged and demotivated the students in the language learning process. The findings contribute to our understanding of the L2 learning experience component in L2MSS and the impact of L2 contexts on students’ L2 motivation. The study indicates that, for our participants, there are some irreplaceable elements in face-to-face tutoring (e.g. physical proximity, facial expressions), lack of which affected students’ engagement and motivation. This highlights the importance of researchers and practitioners in language education taking into account learners’ situated contexts and immediate learning environment when conducting relevant studies on L2 motivation.

Cambodian Secondary English Private School Students' Attitudes Toward English Public Speaking Class

Cambodian Secondary English Private School Students' Attitudes Toward English Public Speaking Class

A longitudinal study on content learning of EMI students in Vietnam from Bourdieusian perspectives

Abstract English as a medium of instruction (EMI) has increased rapidly. This study adopts a Bourdieusian framework to investigate two research questions. First, it examines whether there is a change in the content learning of EMI business students over time. Second, it explores the connection between students’ social milieus and their academic performance in an EMI tertiary context. The study collects GPA scores and background survey data from EMI and Vietnamese-medium instruction (VMI) students over a two-year period. The findings reveal that EMI students experience a greater decline in learning when transitioning from year 3 to year 4, compared to VMI students. Additionally, students with higher levels of cultural capital, as measured by English entry grades and English private tuition time, experience a drop in their academic performance. From a Bourdieusian perspective, the EMI group lacks the necessary form of capital to reproduce their class privilege in relation to the VMI cohort over time. Theoretically, the study reinforces the notion that EMI serves as a mechanism of cultural reproduction that aligns with the unequal distribution of resources. Empirically, it contributes to the understanding of EMI’s impacts, and its implications for policy implementation in Vietnam and similar contexts.

Understanding and meeting the professional development needs of English educators at a private tutoring organization in China

This qualitative multi-case action research study emerged from an awareness that teachers at an English private tutoring organization in China needed professional development related to guided reading. To assist them in this endeavor, an innovation configurations map for guided reading was developed for teachers at this organization. Participating educators of this study developed their knowledge and skills as they received responsive and mediated guidance from a learned other, as well as their use of the innovation configurations map. The effects of this project show what can result from professional development initiatives tailored to meet teachers’ needs within this sector.

The governing law of contribution claims: looking beyond Roberts v SSAFA

The governing law of claims for contribution, where the applicable law of the underlying claim is a foreign law, has long posed a knotty problem in English private international law. The Supreme Court's decision in Roberts v Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association considered this issue in the context of the common law choice of law rules. This article considers the decision in Roberts and claims for contribution falling within the scope of the Rome II Regulation, the Rome I Regulation as well as the Hague Trusts Convention. It is argued here that claims for contribution arising out of the same liability should be considered as “parasitic” on the underlying claim and should prima facie be governed by the applicable law of the underlying claim.

Limping Marriages: Race, Class, and the Rise of Domicile-Based Divorce Jurisdiction in the British Empire

Abstract In this article, I trace the development of domicile as the basis of divorce jurisdiction in English private international law. The maintenance of English domicile became closely related to the retention of ‘white’ identity, with white British subjects who became domiciled in non-white colonies such as India being relegated to racially ambiguous statuses. The domicile rule limited the remedy of divorce to those who were financially well-off and able to travel to the courts of the metropole since English courts refused to recognize divorce decrees granted by British Indian courts based on residence. As a result, innumerable British subjects who obtained a divorce in India remained married in Britain, i.e. were stuck in so-called ‘limping marriages’. To remedy this situation, a separate divorce regime was enacted for British subjects residing in India but domiciled in England and Scotland, but it replicated the class barriers of the original domicile rule. Law, therefore, played a significant role in the creation of the mutually constitutive but unstable categories of class and race.

Unraveling EMI as a predictor of English proficiency in Vietnamese higher education: Exploring learners’ backgrounds as a variable

One key objective of English medium instruction (EMI) programs in non-Anglophone countries is to improve students’ English skills in both academic and professional environments. Despite the high cost and the popularity of the program policy, there remains a lack of empirical studies on the link between attending an EMI program and students’ English proficiency. This paper employs data from 111 students majoring in international business from a top Vietnamese university to compare English competency, measured by the Duolingo Test, between students enrolled in an EMI program and their counterparts who are taught the same curriculum but in the native language, through Vietnamese medium instruction (VMI). Controlling for different social backgrounds, the study shows that participation in EMI is associated with better English test performance. Analysis using multiple interaction terms shows that male EMI participants, or students coming from lower-income households, having lower English scores in high school, and attending more English private tutoring would benefit more from EMI. The analysis sheds light on potential socioeconomic obstacles to accessing EMI and English skill development. Follow-up interviews similarly show the relevance of demographic backgrounds to the students’ perceptions of EMI and their English proficiency. The study provides clear evidence of substantial associations between EMI and English skills. Further studies are needed to establish the causality of the results.

The Abu Dhabi Global Market and Its Transplant of English Private Law

Abstract A grand experiment took place in the Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM). This relatively new special economic zone adopted English law as its operational law through a decision by which such a transplant would become instantly applicable. While such instant transplants have generally not fared well in the past, in the present instance, the ADGM experiment seems to have produced tangible outcomes. This is largely due to the fact that the introduction of English law was accompanied by the establishment of a court composed of judges with vast experience in the application of statutory and common law. In addition, both the court and its various stakeholders are in ‘dialogue’ with the courts and institutions of England, in the sense that English precedent is generally followed subject to the exigence of the ADGM. This species of transplant is viewed by the author as a successful model, albeit one suitable for a jurisdiction with significant financial resources.

Coming out of the shadows: investing in English private tutoring at a transition point in Kazakhstan’s education system during the global pandemic

ABSTRACT Unequal access to language learning resources has been exacerbated by the global expansion of English private tutoring (EPT). Despite its popularity, no study has examined the implications of EPT during the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, this mixed-methods study explored the nature and effectiveness of EPT that first-year Kazakhstani undergraduate students had experienced over the previous 12 months during the COVID-19 pandemic. It was informed by Benson’s (2011) model of language learning beyond the classroom. Data were collected through a close-ended questionnaire and semi-structured online interviews. The study found that 318 out of 750 (42.4%) had experienced EPT, and 64% of respondents had received face-to-face EPT although it was considered a health risk during the pandemic. All the interviewees perceived EPT sessions as an encouraging environment for coaching towards the university entrance examination and expanding their knowledge. They attributed this mainly to the individual attention they obtained from their tutors, which was lacking in online classes with their English teachers due to teachers’ indifferent attitude to students’ questions and the limited duration of video conferencing sessions. The participants acted agentively by evaluating the advantages and drawbacks of online EPT. Pedagogical implications and areas for further research are suggested.

Education as an international export

A growing portion of international schools are franchised branches of schools originally founded in other countries. The first of such schools opened in 1996 and there are now almost 100 globally. Expansionist schools are primarily elite, English private schools, with concentrations of their franchises developing in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and East Asia over the past quarter of a century—particularly in mainland China over the past decade. This study explores how such schools adapt the language and focus of their marketing and, in doing so, sustain their privilege across various contexts. A qualitative textual analysis is conducted of the websites of 11 schools run by Dulwich College and Harrow School, the first brands to expand overseas and with the most extensive networks of schools today. A lens of international schools as enclosures of privilege is used to demonstrate how schools adapt themselves and their framing. The study finds the promotional focus of the schools depends not just on whether they are the founding school or a franchise, but also on their relative ages, and on their varying locations within specific sociocultural contexts. An emergent hybrid model, catering to both local and international curricula, blends the local with the global and complicates the conventional notion of the international school. Finally, the study suggests that further research is focused on the franchising of elite education, particularly as the focal point of expansion begins to shift away from the mainland Chinese boom of the past decade.

Riding the global wave of elite English private schools

Demand for elite English private schools overseas is increasing and their numbers have risen rapidly in the first two decades of this century. With little research focussed on this type of international school, Bunnell (2008) discusses their first ten years, and the reasoning behind their initial appearance in Thailand. In this paper I examine Bunnell’s work and explore different views of these international elite English private schools. I reflect on the growth since Bunnell’s research and, using Kapferer’s model of globalisation (2005), re-position the globalised elite English private schools in relation to different school groups and their business models. I follow their progress and development over their second decade and argue how their primary task may have shifted focus, before discussing the increasing use by these international schools of accreditation and affiliations for the purpose of legitimisation. I conclude that these newer, globalised international schools have shifted from an ideological base to one of capitalism, noting how the globalised elite English private schools have branded themselves to support their longevity in an increasingly crowded market.

Language Learning Autobiographies, Identity Texts, and Critical Teacher Education

This paper explores possibilities of using language learning autobiographies as a form of identity texts in order to produce suggestions for critical teacher education. Specifically, we examined what insights we might gain by reframing Korean pre-service teachers’ autobiographies as a form of identity texts to develop reflective teachers, who affirm their identities and language learning histories. We thematically analyzed autobiographical reflection papers on English learning experiences of 73 undergraduate students enrolled in a compulsory elementary English education course at a public university in South Korea. The analysis revealed the predominance of referral to English private education experiences and a sense of linguistic insecurity felt by these pre-service teachers, who would later teach in public schools. Based on these findings, we provide suggestions for critical teacher education to foster critical language awareness and identity investment for the students. We conclude that language learning autobiographies, while incorporating characteristics of identity texts, might be a useful tool for critical pedagogies.

A Self-Directed Teaching Method to Improve English Skills

In this study proposes integrating a Self-Access Learning into classroom or activities to improve English instruction. Students can learn English independently in library areas or English-only spaces at the Self-Access Learning Center. In the Self-Access Learning, counseling teachers help students listen and talk in English according to their interests, English skills, and learning styles.
 Several European, Hong Kong, Japanese, Singaporean, and Australian Self-Access Learning employ self-directed learning to improve English fluency This may be a great example for English education in our nation and encourage self-directed English language study.
 This study developed a five-stage self-directed English hearing and speaking instructional model: orientation, pre-test, learning plan, counseling, and self-study.
 Most participants' self-directed English learning increased during the 4-week Central University College of Education field application. The program taught individuals to study independently and customize their learning. The study recommended reward and follow-up strategies for self-directed instructional-learning models and field application.
 Foreign languages need self-directed learning. Learner-centered education lacks self-directed learning. Teacher-centered education reduces self-directed learning, motivation, and learner expectations. English private schools are societal issues.
 This chapter highlights our nation's major English education concerns and study goals. is also needed to understand why English accounts for a considerable amount of private school costs.

The "secrets" of English private tutoring in China: Chinese students' experiences of study abroad test preparation in cram schools.

English private tutoring, a.k.a. "shadow education" has been an important way that international students rely on for overseas test preparation. Despite the plethora of research on private tutoring in various countries and regions, scarce research focuses on the type of EPT that prepares students for overseas tests. Therefore, this study investigated the experience and perceptions of EPT in preparing for overseas writing tests of 187 Chinese students through retrospective interviews and questionnaires. The present study investigated Chinese students' experience in and perceptions of EPT for study abroad writing test preparation. The results showed that most students received EPT in writing in various ways at cram schools and they devoted themselves to EPT in cram schools intensively. They favored EPT in cram schools mainly because the test-taking strategies taught there could help them obtain a higher grade on the writing section in overseas tests. With respect to writing teaching in cram schools, the most frequent teaching activities included teaching test-taking strategies and providing writing templates. Although most students acknowledged the usefulness of EPT in writing in terms of preparing themselves for the writing test, it was not necessarily the case for improving their general writing abilities. The students believed that the writing instruction was test-oriented and had a ceiling effect in improving their general writing abilities. However, with enough long time in EPT, the cramming nature of cram schools can be less obvious.