Teaching Britishness and ‘Fundamental British Values’ is a policy requirement increasingly placed on educational institutions. Yet the literature shows Britishness is fluid, evolving and often difficult to define for White British and ethnic minority youth, as well as for teachers, raising theoretical and pedagogical concerns about how best to respond to political initiatives. By examining the pedagogies employed by two Art classes in a southeast London school, this research aims to address the implications of Britishness exploration on young people’s relationships with and within multicultural Britain. This ethnographic arts-based educational research examines (i) the complexities of teaching and learning Britishness, and (ii) young people’s discourses of Britishness and belonging. Through emotive artwork created by students, interviews with teachers and paired students, and extensive questionnaires, moving and personal insights into the significances of everyday racialised and classed belongings are investigated. The key findings show young people’s experiences of local and global identities inform their notions of national identity. Students’ sense of Britishness is deeply connected to intersectional and multiple experiences of social class, race and local attachments. Their national identity is often dwarfed by their local identity, and transnational postcolonial identities are also shown to impact upon young peoples’ ways of belonging to Britain. The research describes and supports critical pedagogical approaches to exploring identities and belongings. The emphasis on student voice, respectful and caring dialogue, and collaborative communication led to meaningful and engaged individual and collective critical reflections on students’ stories of Britishness. The research shows teachers often require guidance and support on teaching critically about multiculturalism and social inequalities. The research presents students engaging with identity issues, advancing their own viewpoints, learning about alternative perspectives, and strengthening bonds with peers and teachers. Students felt empowered by having their critical counter-narratives validated and valued. Where students hear others’ stories and tell their own, schools can become critical sites of opportunity for reflection, resistance and hopeful futures.

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This exploratory study has grown out of my interest in learning thinking skills (TS) in English as a Foreign Language (EFL). An aim of TS in EFL is to help learners to understand how they learn, which could help them in using the target language with other learners in language classrooms, and in their social life. The early researchers have criticised the system of teaching methods in EFL applied in Saudi schools, as they claim that it does not produce students who are highly proficient in English. Some of them suggested that enhancing learners’ TS would help to improve the learners’ proficiency of using the EFL. The textbook in Saudi schools is the central material for teachers to follow in the EFL classroom. Thus, this study is investigating the main issues that could promote TS in Saudi EFL: the textbook and the teachers. The purposes of the study are: to find out the extent to which the tasks in the textbook have the potential to support teachers in promoting TS; to discover insights into the nature of classroom activities that teachers use to encourage TS from the textbook and to explore the teachers’ views on the role of the textbook in promoting TS in the English language. These aims will improve understanding of the connection between the potential of the textbook content and the participants’ theoretical knowledge and their teaching practice. The investigation employed research techniques including the following: (1) analysis of the textbook; (2) questionnaire for EFL teachers; (3) observation for EFL classroom; (4) interviews with EFL teachers. Analysis of the third intermediate grade textbook has been undertaken and six EFL teachers from five intermediate schools were involved in the study. Data analysis revealed that 36.71 % of the tasks in the textbook could have the potential to promote TS, and 63.29 % of the tasks in the textbook could not have the potential to promote TS. Therefore, the result of the textbook analysis showed that the majority of the tasks do not have the potential to help teachers to promote TS. Although not all teachers of the observed lessons displayed behaviour helpful to promote TS, teachers who presented potential TS tasks in their lesson encouraged learners’ interaction and students’ engagement more than teachers who presented tasks that did not have the potential to promote TS. Therefore, the result of the teachers’ data showed that having a textbook that has the potential to promote TS is not enough to develop teaching TS in Saudi EFL, since teachers’ behaviour could make the task more or less productive.

This study aims to investigate the ways in which EFL teachers in Saudi Arabia use, design, and evaluate their teaching materials, in a context where teachers are expected to use only the prescribed textbooks inside the classroom. The extent to which teachers supplement and adapt the set textbook is used as an indicator of their willingness and ability to adapt their teaching in response to the needs of the learners in their classrooms. Saudi teachers’ willingness and ability to take control of their personal teaching and learning in this way is investigated using Huang’s framework of autonomy. The study explores the different responses of the teachers in the study to the policy of the Ministry of Education regarding the use of the prescribed textbook and the extent to which through their use, design and evaluation of teaching materials, teachers are able to enhance their professionalism. Data was collected using classroom observations and semi-structured interviews of 6 male EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teachers in Saudi public schools and analysed using Narrative and Grounded theory approaches. The hybrid approach adopted for this study proved useful in uncovering much rich information about teachers’ perceptions about and use of the textbook and the implications of the extent to which they engaged in materials development in response to the needs of their students. The study revealed different perceptions and degrees of responsiveness to the need to adapt materials for the learners in the classroom. In some instances, whilst teachers described themselves as exercising autonomy the observation of classroom practice was not entirely consistent with such a perception. Conversely, some teachers were more proactive in the classroom than responses in interviews might suggest. The study builds on previous work into the trend for learners in EFL classrooms in Saudi Arabia to exercise more learner autonomy and the relationship between learner demands, the capacity of teachers to engage in materials development and teacher professionalism is examined. The study concludes that more research into providing scope for adaptation and variation in the use of textbooks in EFL in classrooms in Saudi Arabia could shed light on how institutional and personal constraints on teacher autonomy could be mediated without jeopardising the quality and consistency of learning and teaching.

This study investigates English language learners’ interaction with paper text and web text reading. Four main research questions shape the study: 1) What evidence exists to suggest that ESL learners use different strategies when reading printed text as opposed to reading web text? 2) What metacognitive strategies do ESL students use and report when reading and learning from printed and web-based texts? 3) What issues do ESL learners identify in relation to their use of the Internet? and 4) What are the implications for ESL pedagogy? While research has increasingly been focused on second language reading, it has primarily been centered on how the learner interacts and decodes printed text. However, little research has been conducted on how the English language learner processes web text, navigates the Internet, or evaluates and comprehends what he/she is reading through the use of digital literacy skills and metacognitive strategies. The intention of this study was to gain insight into the online reading strategies of English language learners in order to explore if there was a need for the Teaching of English to Students of Other Languages (TESOL) profession to teach digital literacy in the language classroom. A subjectivist approach was used to examine the metacognitive online reading strategies of intermediate and upper intermediate ESL students. The present writer acted in the role of both workshop facilitator and researcher during the eight-week study between September and November 2011. Data were drawn from the researcher’s observation notes, interviews with the student participants, group discussions, and student participants’ journals. As a result, data generation included both public views (expressed orally through interviews) and private and reflective views (expressed through journal writing). Thus, the data contained both real time and ex post facto viewpoints. The central voices heard were the researcher and the student participants. The research methodology for the study was interpretive and qualitative. Data triangulation was achieved through a series of interviews and text analysis. The findings of this thesis suggest that while students may appear digitally literate enough to randomly surf the Net, they lack sufficient skills to effectively research and evaluate information online. In addition, the study shows that language learners engage in characteristically different reading practices and strategies when reading print and web text. The research also indicates that there is a need for digital literacy skills to be taught in conjunction with the teaching of the target language in the TESOL settings studied. Recommended pedagogical practices include suggestions to teach digital literacies in conjunction with print-based literacy practices; to provide both TESOL teachers-in-training and seasoned TESOL educators the means to develop digital literacy skills through formal instruction or through professional development workshops; to emphasize the need for lifelong learning of digital skills to keep current with the constant changes and development of digital technology; to reshape TESOL curricula to accommodate digital literacy and language teaching practices to meet the needs of the language classroom in the 21st century; to create literacy lesson sequences that will help the language learner develop, strengthen, and apply critical reading strategies; and to promote the wider adoption of more interactive teaching.

Listening has long been recognised as the most challenging skill for teachers, students and researchers working in the context of L2 English. However, it has also been the least researched of the four language skills, and one that has received the least attention in second language acquisition. This study identified the listening problems, and their causes, experienced by Chinese university students at intermediate level through multiple perspectives. Included in the investigation were learners’ perceptions, their performance in phonological vocabulary tests and their recognition of words from dictation transcription in terms of lexical processing and spoken word recognition, in addition to learners’ self-reflection and the teacher’s reflection after one-semester of instruction and learning. The ultimate aims of the study were to contribute to our understanding of the nature of listening comprehension and the causes of the difficulties it poses for these learners in order to advance a research-based pedagogy to help them improve their listening comprehension skills. A mixed methods approach was employed, integrating questionnaire surveys, participants’ self-reflections, the Aural-Lex tests, and dictation transcriptions conducted both at the very beginning and at the end of the semester. Findings suggest that the main difficulties and the causes of these difficulties in listening comprehension for Chinese university students at intermediate level include the following: limited knowledge of phonology, inadequate vocabulary by sound, and poor awareness of the features of connected speech. The study suggests that Chinese university students at this level need to improve their spoken word recognition and develop an awareness of the organisation of sounds in English connected speech, as these cognitive processes play a vital role in proficient listening comprehension. Similarly, it proposes that researchers and teachers working in higher education in the L2 context should work closely together to address intermediate learners’ needs and difficulties, both theoretically and practically, in order to help them enhance their listening comprehension skills.

This thesis examines the impact of Data-driven learning (DDL) or classroom concordancing on a group of adolescent students in Greece seeking to investigate the degree of motivation to learn grammar when involved in DDL and the effectiveness of DDL in the teaching and learning of grammar. The study introduced concordance-based grammar materials to the experimental group, whereas a conventional grammar book was used with the control group, examining common grammar items and patterns. The analysis of classroom data gathered during DDL sessions offered insights into the improved noticing skills of the participants but also into the difficulties when involved in DDL with regard to unknown vocabulary and the Key Word in Context (KWIC) concordance format, which underlined the need for considerable teacher guidance. The qualitative evidence drawn from questionnaires and interviews suggested that the majority of the participants acknowledged the contribution and potential of corpora, but the degree of motivation to study grammar further varied. Most learners also expressed their preference for concordance-based learning, rather than their previous mostly passive learning experience, and further access to corpora, but without total abandonment of the conventional grammar book. The qualitative evidence was supplemented with analysis of test performances of the two groups, according to which more participants of the experimental group scored higher than those of the control group in each test. All these findings pointed to important gains and represent a preliminary step in the development of corpus-based grammar teaching to EFL adolescent learners.

This study investigated the beliefs about teaching and learning English of nine non-native novice teachers at a private university in Northern Cyprus, and the extent to which these beliefs changed in their first year of teaching. Data was collected over an academic year of nine months by means of semi-structured interviews, credos, classroom observations, post-lesson reflection forms, stimulated-recall interviews, diaries and a metaphor-elicitation task. The study found that novice teachers’ prior learning experiences were influential in shaping their initial beliefs. By the end of the year, change in the content of the teachers’ beliefs was limited. However, the findings also showed that the majority of the teachers’ beliefs were re-structured and strengthened, suggesting that beliefs are dynamic. Analysis of the findings indicated that several factors stimulated change in beliefs; differences in individual experiences; contextual factors i.e. the syllabus, dissatisfaction with student behaviour, and students’ expectations; and becoming aware of their beliefs and practices. Moreover, the study found that novice teachers’ beliefs were not always reflected in their teaching. The analysis showed that inconsistency between beliefs and practices resulted mainly from differences in individual experiences and the restriction of the syllabus. Thus, teachers were not always able to do what they believed would be effective in their classes. Based on the findings, the study argues that novice teachers are involved in a learning period in their first year of teaching and that their beliefs are susceptible to change. Implications of the findings are discussed in relation to teacher education programmes and recommendations are made for further research.

Much has been claimed recently for the role of idiomaticity in L1 acquisition and fluency and many of these insights have been applied, in my view, uncritically in many cases, to the context of L2 use. Until recently, very little attempt was made to test out the applicability of these insights to English as a Lingua Franca by examining naturally-occurring L2 discourse. This thesis sets out to explore the reasons why even successful L2-users may find the phenomenon of idiomaticity difficult. It investigates the apparent paradox between idiomaticity in L1 use and L2 use, whereby for the L1-user, idiomaticity, in all its guises, makes for ease of processing and the promotion of fluency while in L2 use it seems, in some of its manifestations at least, to be error- prone and elusive. Drawing on an original corpus of spoken English as a Lingua Franca, I apply a combination of corpus techniques and techniques of discourse analysis within a sociocultural framework in order to identify the underlying factors that differentiate L1 and L2 idiomaticity. I illustrate the argument by looking at two different manifestations of idiomaticity: ‘minimal’ units of idiomaticity (two word phrases) and more traditional ‘colourful’ idioms. The results suggest that L2-users avoid or have difficulty with ‘native-like’ idiomaticity because L1 idiomaticity involves more than formulaic sequences of greater or lesser semantic opacity; it is a more extended and diffuse phenomenon that generates subtle webs of semantic, pragmatic and discourse prosodies. It is through these situated webs of signification that L1-users achieve fluency and the promotion of self rather than in the manipulation of isolated idiomatic units in vacuo. Note: When I use the terms ‘native’ and ‘non-native’ I put them in inverted commas to indicate to the reader that I do not subscribe to the deficit view of L2 use that these terms are often associated with. My preferred terms are ‘L1-user’ and ‘L2-user’ (Cook, 2002).

This thesis is an investigation of how a group of foreign and local English language teachers and students at the Language Department of the University of Guanajuato, Mexico construct ‘culture’. Through an ethnographic approach, with the use of interviews and classroom observations as the means for gathering data, the stories of eight teachers and twenty four students were explored, in order to unravel their constructions of ‘culture’. Given the abstract nature of the concept ‘culture’, critical incidents from my personal and professional experience were used to spark the participants into sharing their stories. It was through the telling of these stories that the thoughts, ideas and feelings of the participants regarding the Self and the Other were revealed. The construction of ‘culture’ was found to be a complex process in which teachers and students struggle in negotiating diverse sources of knowledge—from the personal (parents and upbringing), to professional and/or public discourses. The processes of relativization, recognition and transformation, as understood in the cosmopolitan tradition, were adopted to explore individuals’ capabilities in constructing ‘culture’. When constructing people and ‘cultures’, individuals are seen to traverse personal and professional trajectories, making the ability to relativize worldviews a challenge. Thus, the cosmopolitan imagination, which foresees Self and societal transformation, is seen to aid the individual in effecting the relativization of worldviews, so that recognition from the perspective of the Other and transformation are made possible. Constructing ‘culture’ was found to be a non-linear process, sometimes smooth and sometimes a struggle. Indeed, this thesis proposes that there are many intersecting factors in the construction of ‘culture’: the concepts which are invoked, the processes involved, and the abilities utilized when deliberating over ‘culture’. The individual is seen to draw upon all of these resources according to the specific contextual factors of the intercultural event.