125 research outputs found
Service-Learning: Boldy going where EAL students haven't gone before
Get PDFService-learning is an experiential pedagogy which integrates curriculum and volunteer service through ongoing reflection. Research suggests that service-learning offers notable benefits for post-secondary English-as-an-additional-language (EAL) students. However, most of the researchers have studied EAL students within the United States; far fewer have examined EAL students in the Canadian context. This paper reports on a study of the impact of service-learning on EAL students at a Canadian university in British Columbia. A first-year service-learning elective has been offered at the university since Fall 2009. This course is taught by faculty from the ESL Department who have a Master’s degree or equivalent in a related field. This study investigated the impact of the elective on EAL students’ English proficiency. Data were collected from students through surveys, interviews, and journals. Additionally, the grade point averages (GPA’s) of EAL students in first-year university English composition were examined, comparing those EAL students who took the service-learning elective (Group A) with those who did not (Group B). Grade analysis showed whereas Group B had a GPA of 2.15 on a 4.33 scale for first-year English composition, the subset of Group A who took first-year English composition in the semester immediately following service-learning achieved a GPA of 2.55. The results supported service-learning as an effective pedagogy for EAL students.Peer reviewe
Service-Learning: Boldy Going Where EAL Students Haven't Gone Before
Get PDFService-learning is an experiential pedagogy which integrates curriculum and volunteer service through ongoing reflection. Research suggests that service-learning offers notable benefits for post-secondary English-as-an-additional-language (EAL) students. However, most of the researchers have studied EAL students within the United States; far fewer have examined EAL students in the Canadian context. This paper reports on a study of the impact of service-learning on EAL students at a Canadian university in British Columbia. A first-year service-learning elective has been offered at the university since Fall 2009. This course is taught by faculty from the ESL Department who have a Master’s degree or equivalent in a related field. This study investigated the impact of the elective on EAL students’ English proficiency. Data were collected from students through surveys, interviews, and journals. Additionally, the grade point averages (GPA’s) of EAL students in first-year university English composition were examined, comparing those EAL students who took the service-learning elective (Group A) with those who did not (Group B). Grade analysis showed whereas Group B had a GPA of 2.15 on a 4.33 scale for first-year English composition, the subset of Group A who took first-year English composition in the semester immediately following service-learning achieved a GPA of 2.55. The results supported service-learning as an effective pedagogy for EAL students.Peer reviewe
Text mediation and collaborative meaning-making: Language support for an EAL academic author
No full textWriting for international publication in English poses considerable discursive challenges for EAL (English as an additional language) academics. In non-Anglophone settings, where assistance is limited, many turn to local English teachers at their university for ad hoc language support. However, the impact of these part-time text mediators on specialized texts is uncertain and doubts persist about their capacity to understand and shape meaning beyond language. This case study investigates how a language mediator helped a Chinese hematologist to convey his intended meaning when revising a submission for a medical journal. We show how mediator-author collaboration draws on their respective expertise to shape academic texts. While the mediator’s independent revisions mainly fixed language issues, her interaction with the author effectively addressed deeper structural and rhetorical challenges. Transcripts of conferencing sessions revealed how the mediator’s rhetorical and linguistic strategies complemented the author’s disciplinary knowledge to co-construct meaning and the articulation of complex ideas. By comparing the mediator’s solo efforts with the outcomes of collaborative interaction, we demonstrate how their partnership transformed the manuscript into a publishable text. These findings have important practical implications
What is success? Re-examining definition of success of EAL learners through an autoethnography
Get PDFAutoethnography allows us to “go beyond simply looking at the artifacts or just the surface and to focus much more on the personal, the hidden, and the less obvious” (Lapidus, Kaveh, & Hirano, 2013, p. 34), and it is becoming more important to illustrate a constructive relationship between diverse professional communities, as English as a global language acquire local identities and local professional communities develop socially situated pedagogical practices (Canagarajah, 2012). This paper explores identity negotiation of the author, a transnational EAL student and a teacher through an autoethnography. Using concept of “audibility”, “agency”, “nobody”, and “somebody” (Kettle, 2005) and communities of practice (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998), this paper unpacks the complexity of identity negotiation of an EAL student, and how it affected her teaching. It also provides an opportunity to rethink the definition of success
The impact of multilingualism and multiculturalism on teacher education in Ireland : Meeting localised needs in a global classroom
No full textThis chapter explores the impact of multiculturalism and multilingualism on the Irish education system. More specifically, it provides teachers' and educators' reflections on initial teacher education and professional development, teachers' classroom practice, and English as an Additional Language (EAL) policy issues. The author elicited these reflections through 34 semi-structured interviews with secondary school teachers and teacher educators. The subsequent analysis highlights the key trends and differences within and between the respondent groups. Findings indicate the need for a joint response from the Department of Education and educationalists across the sector in order to better prepare teachers for multicultural and multilingual classrooms. Moreover, in the increasingly globalised world where cultural and linguistic diversity is becoming the norm, subject teachers take on the role of language teachers, not only in a general sense but also in terms of subject-specific discourse. This, in turn, requires the inclusion of language awareness in teacher education programmes and as part of a much more flexible continuous professional development (CPD) offer. Finally, the chapter argues that closer cooperation between the key actors is essential for an improved and targeted response to the needs of teaching and learning in a global classroom.</p
An investigation exploring the extent ‘EAL Steps for Classroom Integration’ is effective in primary school language teaching
Get PDFThe purpose of this study was to ascertain teacher perspectives on the use of ‘EAL steps for Classroom Integration’ as a tool to support teachers of international new arrivals with their daily planning; from teaching suggestions for themselves to preparing suitable activities and assessment. A need was felt for the research following the understanding that although there is ample information available for teaching English as an additional language in schools, research has shown teachers to feel underprepared from the absence of clear guidance. The author has carefully selected and presented information ‘in a nutshell’ and offered it to participants to guide their professional duty of ensuring integration of new arrivals in their classes.
Data was collected through two interviews and a focus group. The interviews, taking a before and after approach directly compared responses, with the focus group as an opportunity to corroborate findings. This short study saw an impressive turnaround in approaches used by participants who were able to engage learners and see progression through the changes that had been made to teaching strategies. It created confident and proficient, practicing EAL teachers with motivated learners, leading to the recommendation that ‘EAL steps for Classroom Integration’ should be widely available
An investigation exploring the extent ‘EAL Steps for Classroom Integration’ is effective in primary school language teaching
No full textThe purpose of this study was to ascertain teacher perspectives on the use of ‘EAL steps for Classroom Integration’ as a tool to support teachers of international new arrivals with their daily planning; from teaching suggestions for themselves to preparing suitable activities and assessment. A need was felt for the research following the understanding that although there is ample information available for teaching English as an additional language in schools, research has shown teachers to feel underprepared from the absence of clear guidance. The author has carefully selected and presented information ‘in a nutshell’ and offered it to participants to guide their professional duty of ensuring integration of new arrivals in their classes.Data was collected through two interviews and a focus group. The interviews, taking a before and after approach directly compared responses, with the focus group as an opportunity to corroborate findings. This short study saw an impressive turnaround in approaches used by participants who were able to engage learners and see progression through the changes that had been made to teaching strategies. It created confident and proficient, practicing EAL teachers with motivated learners, leading to the recommendation that ‘EAL steps for Classroom Integration’ should be widely available
Deconstructing the 'Beauty Myth' in the EAL Classroom
Get PDF[eng] Addressing gender-related topics in the English as an additional language (EAL)
context has been defined as an important teaching goal in the curriculum
requirements set by the recent Ley Orgánica por la que se Modifica la Ley
Orgánica de Educación (LOMLOE). However, it is an area that has not yet been
fully explored in EAL classrooms. This education proposal aims at tackling this
absence through the deconstruction of gender stereotypes, with a particular
emphasis on ‘the beauty ideal’ in literary texts, and the extension of their influence
through popular culture.
To this end, students of the first course of Batxillerat will work with two different
narratives. First, the portrayal of Helen of Troy in Greek mythology and artistic
representations, as an example of the beauty standard and how the stereotypes
around the concept of the ‘beauty myth’ have been constant in Western literature
and other media. Second, students will have to engage with a critique of the
‘beauty myth’ through a careful reading and analysis of the first part of the poem
“Beautiful” by Carol Ann Duffy (2002), where the author rewrites the story of
Helen. By using authentic materials and their correlating activities, students will
not only have the opportunity to develop multiple competencies gathered in the
LOMLOE — including critical thinking, linguistic communication and value and
respect towards gender differences, rights and equality, amongst others —, but
also the different skills and grammar involved in the development of their learning
progress. Finally, students will use all the analytical elements, vocabulary and
grammatical structures worked in the previous sessions in their final project,
which will consist in creating a comic about the ‘beauty myth’ through the figure
of Helen. The ultimate purpose of this learning situation is to introduce a topic
which is meaningful beyond the limits of the classroom because students must
become aware of different forms of oppression, normalised through myths, fairy
tales or stories that affect the way they understand gender and consequently the
construction of their own identi
EAL instructors' attitudes towards game-based learning adoption in education: Obstacles and opportunities
No full textDue to the importance of game-based learning (GBL) for teaching and language learning, numerous studies (Hamzah, et al., 2015; Sánchez-Mena et al., 2016; Teo et al., 2019) have looked at students’ acceptance of GBL for language acquisition. However, little research has been conducted on teachers’ attitudes towards GBL in English as Additional Language (EAL) and English as a Second Language (ESL) contexts. Qualitative study on the obstacles and opportunities of GBL from the perspective of teachers is underreported in the literature. Hence, the objective of the current study is to explore teachers’ attitudes towards GBL as well as opportunities and obstacles in an EAL context.
The study used a survey and interview to collect data. The survey data was gathered from eight university EAP teachers. Four of the survey respondents participated in interviews to explore the opportunities and obstacles of GBL. The quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and the qualitative data was analyzed through thematic analysis and description. The findings of the survey data revealed that the factors of usefulness, attitude, and social influence contribute to the use of GBL. The analysis of the interview data highlighted some themes associated with opportunities of GBL such as student-centeredness, self-discovery, improvement of different language components, fun learning, and motivation, while three themes, namely preparation time, reluctance to use, and learning style, were highlighted as the obstacles of using GBL. The implication of the study is that teachers acknowledge the benefits of GBL but they need support and further professional development to help overcome the obstacles of GBL.game-based learningEnglish as a second language teachersEnglish as additional language teachersopportunitiesobstaclesunified theory of acceptance and use of technolog
Identity and textual engagement: experiences of three international students writing a doctoral thesis in EAL
No full textThe integration of the voices of other researchers is central to displaying scholarship in a doctoral thesis. It entails complex negotiation of prior texts in the context of one's own study. While, there is an expectation that such work results in an 'objective' tone, self-representation or identity is rarely absent in theses in most disciplines. For international students, who use English as an Additional Language (EAL), being objective and yet projecting an identity and a voice can pose considerable challenges. The present study draws on findings from a qualitative inquiry that has involved interviews with three international students and analysis of excerpts from drafts of their doctoral writing to examine how identity is constructed in the act of textual engagement. The term 'textual engagement' embraces acts such as integration of quotations in texts using conventions of citations and the evaluation of the quoted text/s as evident in the drafts. In the present thesis 'identity' has been discussed using Ivanič's (1998) concept of self-representation. Ivanič‘s (1998) construct of a writer's identity in terms of the autobiographical self, possibilities of selfhood, the discoursal self and the self as author dimensions in academic writing has been applied as the overarching theoretical framework in the present study. The thesis explores issues faced by international EAL students as they negotiate other texts and simultaneously project an identity of their own. It particularly focuses on how EAL writers position themselves in relation to other texts to construct a discoursal self and how they negotiate with other texts, consciously or unconsciously, to project the self as author dimension in their doctoral writing. The literature on the incorporation of prior studies in academic writing is rich in studies on plagiarism. However, many of these studies do not take into account the complexities that quoting from source texts involve, particularly for students writing in EAL. Other strands of the literature point out that using the voices of others‘ to negotiate space for one‘s own research or engaging with other texts to construct one‘s argument requires an understanding of the discursive practices of a discipline. Scholarship becomes the basis on which an original contribution to a discipline can be made. Displaying this scholarship can be challenging for many EAL doctoral writers who may have had limited exposure to reading in English prior to undertaking doctoral studies. Consequently, in incorporating other texts, they may struggle to present an appropriate voice in their writing. Drawing on the larger theory of intertextuality and the tools afforded by genre theory to analyse the construction of arguments, the present study seeks to understand these difficulties. The exploration of evaluation to deconstruct the self as author in the student writers‘ texts has involved the use of the APPRAISAL theory (Martin and White, 2005). The findings of the study suggests that in the writing of a thesis, a common possibility of selfhood is envisioned by the writers – that of being bilingual scholars and original contributors to the field. The autobiographical selves that the writers bring to the act of writing shape every aspect of the writing. In the context of the present study, where textual engagement and identity projection are investigated, interviews and the examination of the participants‘ texts suggested that the doctoral writers were not naïve about the demands of engaging with other texts in their work. However, the imperative to be objective and to take up a stance in relation to other texts was confusing. This issue in conjunction with anxieties about their competence in English is responsible for the varying degrees of self-assurance evident in the texts analysed in the study. The textual analysis suggests that textual transformation is seen as a major difficulty. However, positioning oneself in relation to the collective voices in the discipline is less so. Nevertheless, despite these infelicities in their work, the discoursal self projected is that of emerging scholars attempting to make an original contribution in their field. In all three texts, a non-adversarial stance is adopted. However, the self as author is different in each text and is related to the reading positions adopted by the individual writers. Surface irregularities in terms of grammar, syntax, semantics, inappropriate citation practices and the lack of critical analysis may diminish the quality of doctoral writing produced by EAL users. Nevertheless, the struggle to be bilingual scholars and original contributors is evident in the texts analysed. Pedagogical responses to difficulties in the area of textual engagement need to be addressed in the larger context of critical inquiry, knowledge construction, disciplinary practices and self-representation/identity discussions in texts. A triple-layered doctoral writing pedagogy is suggested. Harnessing linguistic theory and providing opportunities for social interaction and meaning negotiation is crucial in helping students develop rhetorical knowledge that would enable them to project a confident identity and facilitate competent textual engagement
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