Comments on Donald Freeman and Jack C. Richards's "Conceptions of Teaching and the Education of Second Language Teachers". The Authors Respond

The aim of the study was to investigate how different teaching methods, singing, listening to songs and reciting song lyrics, affect the development of pronunciation of Finnish as a foreign language pronunciation. The second objective of the study was to investigate whether future classroom teachers and future Finnish as a second language teachers evaluate the strength of foreign accent differently. The results indicate that reciting song lyrics is the most beneficial for the development of pronunciation. This teaching method is especially useful for beginners’ level language learners. The future class teachers gave stricter evaluations of foreign accent than the future Finnish as a second language teachers. Based on the results of the study, it could be argued that reciting song lyrics could be used for teaching pronunciation. Further, the results support previous findings that more experienced listeners give milder evaluations than more unexperienced. Thus, it would be valuable for future teachers to gain experience in listening diverse accents.

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African Immigrant Teachers Teaching Young EFL Learners: A Racial Discrimination Study

IAFOR Journal of Education ◽

10.22492/ije.9.1.04 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 59-76

Author(s):

Chinaza Solomon Ironsi

Keyword(s):

Second Language ◽

Foreign Language ◽

Racial Discrimination ◽

Language Learners ◽

Structured Interview ◽

Language Teachers ◽

Mixed Method Research ◽

African Immigrant ◽

Immigrant Teachers ◽

Second Language Teachers

Teaching English language to young learners in an English as a Foreign Language/English as a Second Language context could be challenging especially for African immigrants, as they face varying arrays of challenges ranging from low wages, staff abuse, and other racial discriminations. A lot has been written about racially related issues in our school system yet there are limited works of literature that focus on the challenges of African immigrant English as a Second Language teachers with regards to racial discrimination. To investigate this, a mixed-method research design was used to elicit information from 68 African immigrant English as a Second Language teachers, teaching young English as a Foreign Language learners in 3 countries. The participants were purposively chosen after obtaining written and oral consent from them. A structured questionnaire and semi-structured interview questions were instruments for data collection. Reliability and validity checks were carried out before administering the questionnaire. After analysis, a notable finding was that African immigrant teachers felt unaccepted by the host communities and this made it difficult for the English as a Second Language learners to listen to classroom instructions given by these immigrant teachers. Again, the parents of these learners find it difficult to accept African immigrant teachers teaching their children as they deemed them incompetent to teach them. Other findings of the study were vital in making pedagogical conclusions on racial discrimination issues encountered by African immigrant English as a Second Language teachers. The ways forward for an all-inclusive educational system devoid of ethnic, religious, sexuality and racial issues were suggested.

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TESL STUDENT-TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVES OF PRACTICUM PRACTICES IN A MALAYSIAN TEACHER EDUCATION INSTITUTE

International Journal of Research -GRANTHAALAYAH ◽

10.29121/granthaalayah.v6.i2.2018.1548 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 6 (2) ◽

pp. 86-93

Author(s):

Ramesh Sathappan ◽

Malini Sathappan

Keyword(s):

Teacher Education ◽

Second Language ◽

Student Teachers ◽

Primary Schools ◽

Language Teachers ◽

School Students ◽

Language Class ◽

Management And Development ◽

Second Language Teachers ◽

Self Assessments

This study set to find out the challenges faced by TESL students at a local teacher training institute during their first practicum practices at selected Malaysian primary schools for the 2nd semester of the academic year 2017. This research is of significant value, as the 17 students- teachers’ experiences need to be made known; the findings on the transitional move from a safe protected college environment into the unknown territory of school surroundings. Each of these trainee teachers had leapt into the role of a teacher in the 21st century language class. They would each maintain daily and weekly reflective journals throughout their practicum period to document their teaching concerns and the level of confidence they put into their abilities to teach and manage their primary school students. Thematic areas are discussed in the findings. These findings are triangulated with document reports from their respective supervisors and the school teachers who mentored them. Questionnaires and interviews were conducted. This research enables to shed more lights into the areas of second language teaching in the classroom as the findings would be able to provide more support for future management and development of teacher education. Furthermore, these student-teachers could understand themselves better throughout the month-long practicum. The ability to self-monitor and self-appraise themselves are valuable skills to be acquired by these student-teachers for their personal and autonomous continuous self-assessments to become effective second language teachers.

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