The South African Language-in-Education Policy (LiEP) states that mother tongue should be the preferred medium of instruction in the Foundation Phase (grade R-3). Primary tuition is therefore currently offered in the 11 South African official languages. The challenge faced in South African schools that offer African languages in the Foundation Phase, is the fact that from grade 4 onwards, education is only available through the medium of English. This results in a vast number of learners having to make a transition in grade 4 to English as medium of instruction. In this qualitative study, I explored the experiences of teachers and learners in this transition. The context of this case study is a poverty-stricken and underdeveloped rural area. SiSwati is the language commonly spoken in this area and English is spoken, heard and read only in the classroom. Purposive sampling was done, including three grade 3 classes and their teachers, as well as the grade 4 learners and the teachers teaching siSwati, English and Mathematics. Data was collected through interviews, observations, document analysis and field notes. Conventional content analysis was conducted. Among the theoretical lenses adopted for the study was Krashen’s input-interaction-output model of second language learning. This informed the process grade 4 learners undergo in learning English as a second language and medium of instruction. The findings of this study revealed that the challenge regarding this transition is not the English language per se, but rather a deficient home language foundation and the quality of teaching offered. The learners’ age at the time of this transition also plays a significant role, as it affects their readiness to switch to another language. The implications of this study relate to the necessity of a solid mother tongue foundation and improved quality of teaching. It is suggested that the admission age in grade 1 be seven years and the actual point of transition prolonged. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Early Childhood Education / MEd / Unrestricted

This study explores how a dialogic approach toward professional development could be used to improve early literacy teaching in multilingual pre-primary contexts. Consequently, the purposes of the research were a) to develop an effective professional development (PD) model for pre-primary teachers that exposes them to research based early literacy texts and dialogic teaching practices for diverse language populations, b) to engage teachers in face-to-face and online dialogic learning, and c) to create on-going networks of teachers engaged in reflective practices for improving early literacy teaching. The theoretical framework, based on Vygotsky’s (1978) and Bakhtin’s (1986) theories, was used as an analytical lens to highlight the centrality of situated language learning and use within a socio-cultural context. The main question of the study is, “How might professional development, using a dialogic approach, transform teaching beliefs and practices for pre-primary teachers from diverse language backgrounds?” The study used a mixed methods research design to document participants’ reflections during focus group discussions, interviews, classroom observations, and in online forum discussions. Purposive sampling techniques were used to select a sample of 33 participating pre-primary teachers. The DeFord (1985) Theoretical Orientation toward Reading Profile (TORP) was administrated to pre-primary teachers selected from two education regions of Namibia before and after the PD. The qualitative data analysis, using Grounded Theory (GT) coding and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) yielded emergent themes that include: a) English second language (ESL) knowledge, b) pedagogical approaches (PA) for teaching and learning, and c) authoritarian discourse (AD). The quantitative pre/post-test results revealed no significant difference in overall TORP scores, but some significant changes on key pre/post-test individual items were noted. The overall results support the hypothesis that targeted PD can modify/change teacher’s beliefs about the relative value of teaching isolated phonics and reading skills versus a focus on opportunities for rich talk, interaction, and having an impact in a cultural moment. The study’s contributions toward knowledge are captured in how to engage pre-primary teachers in dialogic training that may transform held didactic beliefs to acquire ESL knowledge and skills to overcome early literacy teaching challenges in multilingual contexts. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Early Childhood Education / PhD / Unrestricted

Denna litteraturstudie belyser forskning kring olika multimodala material inom engelskundervisning med fokus på barn och ungdomar. Enligt studiens problemformulering, behövs metoder för att ge stöd till en komplicerad språkinlärningsprocess, bidra till elevers motivation samt skapa anpassning för elevers skilda behov vid inlärning i engelskämnet. Litteraturstudies syfte är att belysa vad samtida forskning säger gällande användningen av multimodalt material inom undervisning av engelska i mellanstadiet. Forskningsfrågorna fokuserar på de positiva- och negativa effekter användningen av olika multimodala material kan ha för engelskinlärningen samt hinder och möjligheter de kan innebära för lärares engelskundervisning. Studiens metod har bestått i att söka vetenskaplig forskning via databaser där tidiga sökord gav upphov till viss litteratur som i sin tur bidragit med vidare sökord och kedjesökningar. Materialet studien använt sig av innefattar artiklar och bokkapitel vilka behandlat drama, digitala berättelser, multimodala texter och kollage som pedagogiska multimodala material för engelskundervisning. Studien är inriktad mot elever i årskurs 4–6, men i brist på åldersenlig forskning har material som behandlar elever i både aktuell, yngre och äldre åldrar använts. Resultatet visade på en övervägande del positiva effekter för elevers engelskinlärning, gällande motivation, språkförståelse och kontextuellt meningsskapande. De negativa effekterna som uppmärksammats berör distraktion och sjunkande intresse för visst material relaterat till elevers åldrar. Resultatet visade en jämnare fördelning mellan möjligheter och hinder för engelskundervisningen till följd av materialen. Möjligheterna är att materialen kan skapa samarbete mellan elever i klassrummet och då vissa material baseras på teknik kan de bidra till en innovativ användning av elever. Hindren är att materialen kan skapa missriktad motivation och distraktion som avleder eleverna från undervisningens syfte. Dessutom är materialen baserade på teknik, beroende av att läraren besitter den kompetens som behövs för att använda dem effektivt för undervisningens syfte. Litteraturstudiens slutsats är att multimodala material främst visar på positiva effekter för elevers engelskinlärning men att det även finns påtagliga hinder för engelskundervisningen. Dessutom har studien belyst en rådande brist på svensk forskning inom området.

This study explores the impact of a pedagogic intervention grounded in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014) designed to support language learners’ development of their English argumentative writing skills. The predominance of argumentative writing in school curricula and language assessment reflects the importance of helping language learners master this text-type in order for them to succeed in academic settings. This pedagogic intervention drew specifically on the Appraisal system of SFL to make explicit to students the interpersonal and evaluative language resources they can use to establish authoritative and intersubjective positioning as key means of achieving the overall purpose of argumentative texts. The study documents the impact of explicating to students appraisal resources during class instruction and helping them make more informed language choices as they engage with the information presented in their texts, and shape the interaction with their readers. The study drew on quantitative data stemming from students’ writing tasks and qualitative data in the form of reflection tasks and a research journal to explore the extent to which students’ understanding and use of different appraisal resources could be positively affected by the pedagogic intervention at the heart of this study. The analysis of the findings suggests that the intervention was successful in helping students familiarize themselves with and incorporate appraisal language to effectively convey their intended meaning in the composition of their argumentative texts. The findings also suggest that the teaching intervention contributed to students’ increased awareness of the range of lexicogrammatical choices available to them when they write as reflected in students’ skillful use of these resources in genre-specific ways. This included using appraisal resources to develop well-supported claims, in addition to establishing a critical authoritative position. Discussion of these findings focuses on the value of this type research on the pedagogic applications of the SFL framework as a way of advancing our understanding of how to better scaffold language learners and help them gain greater explicit control of the language resources necessary to successfully construct academic texts. As such, this study argues for the potential affordances of teaching pedagogies grounded in SFL theory in supporting language learners’ academic writing development. This study presents a case for the ability of SFL-informed pedagogies to empower students as writers by offering them new ways of looking at the writing process and using language to engage in advanced acts of meaning-making.

The purpose of this independent project is to give teachers of young ESL-students a collected knowledge of what kind of digital extramural activities the students often do on their spare time and what consequences this have for the formal primary classroom and students’ vocabulary skills. The studies used are found on EBSCO’s ERIC and SwePub, peer reviewed, published between 2010 and 2020, and all available in full text through Malmö university. Informal learning is shown to have a big impact on formal learning, especially for boys who learn mainly through gaming. Girls still score higher on English tests within formal learning, though boys who are frequent gamers score higher within the studies. Gaming seems to help boys keep up with girls in formal English as a second language. The main skill which gaming gives the students is to communicate, hold a conversation and increase their vocabulary. Since gaming is the extramural activity which seems to give the student the most, and at the same time there are students whose families could not afford to game due to costs of computer, tv, games and, in some cases, internet. This could become a socioeconomic factor which the school and the teacher need to consider, especially since results from some of the studies claim gaming to be how the boys keep up with the girls. Not to forget the students who, thanks to informal learning, speak English on a higher level and their right to be educated at their own level.

An increasing number of studies suggest that a positive teacher-student relationship is an important element of successful education. Yet, resources and awareness about how teachers in Sweden can develop skills for supporting positive teacher-student relationships seem to be limited or lacking in popular teaching training programs where almost all focus is put on subject-knowledge and didactics. One potential means of promoting a leadership that endorses a positive teacher-student relationship is through the development of relational competence. Briefly, relational competence can be understood as how the teacher meets a student on a level where the teacher plans his or her actions by knowing the students’ experiences and life situation. This is connected to the teachers' communicative, differentiation, and social-emotional competence (Aspelin, 2018). Such an approach has been demonstrated to be successful in Denmark, where it has been introduced in teacher training programs as well as in the school system. In this paper we investigate to what degree current English teachers in Swedish compulsory school are aware of relational competence as a tool, what features from relational competence do the teacher currently use in their classroom leadership, and what aspects of relational competence teachers perceive as difficult to adopt or implement as a concept. Results show that Swedish English teachers work with relationships in connection with leadership and didactic competence, but that a majority of the informants do not have sufficient knowledge, terminology, time, or training to work with relational competence. Additionally, the teachers find it a challenge to implement the concept when it comes to significantly changing their view in the classroom to include not only the student or situation but the whole interactional situation between teacher and student.

Both grammar and corrective feedback (CF) are important for second language acquisition, though they are not mentioned explicitly in the Swedish upper secondary school curriculum. Moreover, it is not clear which type of CF is most effective in grammar acquisition. This paper aims to consolidate, compare and contrast the findings of several articles examining the effect of CF on grammar acquisition. Two databases were used to find articles applicable to answering the research question. After excluding those that did not meet the criteria, nine articles were used in the end. Although the findings show that CF is effective for grammar acquisition in general, they do not show any type of CF to be superior to another. The factors identified as affecting the results of the studies are target structure, method, language proficiency and L1. Through the studies analyzed, it is not possible to establish the long-term effects of the various types of CF. Nevertheless, the findings suggest that oral meta-linguistic explanation (ME) is beneficial for teachers due to its time-efficiency. In conclusion, CF, being shown to facilitate grammar acquisition for L2 learners in general, has positive effects on English learning in the Swedish classroom. However, more research is needed in order to establish its effectiveness long-term and on a more detailed level.

One can argue that songs offer a useful learning opportunity for learning English as a second language since it includes the combination of music and text. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine in what ways songs can affect the ESL classroom. The aim is further to compare and apply the findings to a Swedish upper secondary school context to examine how development can take place for ESL learners in Sweden. Moreover, the approach to this study consisted of a literaturereview of articles within the research area, which were used to answer the two research questions: To what extent can the use of songs in the ESL classroom stimulate incidental vocabulary learning?Additionally, what are other potential benefits from using songs in the ESL classroom? The results were unified regarding the main question of songs and vocabulary acquisition; all findings included positive effects of songs on incidental vocabulary learning and retention of new words. Moreover, implementing songs in the ESL classroom showed more positive attitudes towards school among students and teachers; in addition, the results indicated on a decrease regarding anxiety and stress among the learners. Furthermore, the Swedish National Curriculum emphasizes the importance of a positive classroom environment for the learners, and the syllabus for English requires a variety of texts, in which songs can offer useful learning conditions for vocabulary acquisition. Therefore, the song-based approach is presented as suitable for a Swedish upper secondary classroom.

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