The purpose of this study is to gain a better understanding of the practices and attitudes of EFL teachers concerning the challenges and methods involved in teaching gifted students, specifically in regard to the two most prevalent approaches, enrichment and acceleration. Data for this qualitative study was collected through semi-structured interviews with five EFL teachers and the data was analyzed using thematic analysis. Results showed that teachers perceived lacking resources, difficulties identifying gifted students in their classes and poor attitudes from gifted students as their main challenges when teaching this group of students. The results also showed that the teachers were inclined to favor enrichment over acceleration, stating a fear for negative social effects and acceleration being messy as their reasons. The teachers in this study problematize and criticize the Swedish approach of inclusion while at the same time struggling to find an alternative. The results also showed that the teachers saw acceleration as a natural next step for when enrichment has failed. Given the limited research on linguistically gifted students, it was concluded that further investigation is needed to assess the current effectiveness of enrichment as a strategy in the EFL classroom.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:mau-68317 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Richtoff, Dorothea |
| Publisher | Malmö universitet, Institutionen för kultur, språk och medier (KSM) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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