Comprehensible input output loop
Chapter 8: Conclusion
As an ELT practitioner and a teacher trainer, I began this study with the notion of finding alternative or supplementary teaching methodologies that could enhance the teaching of ESL in the Malaysian context. This notion arose from the weaknesses that I had perceived in ESL teaching in my own experiences as a student in the secondary ESL classroom, and later as an ESL teacher, and finally a teacher trainer in Malaysia. These perceived weaknesses were also substantiated by studies conducted by Nalliah and Thiyagarajah (1999), Hazita et al. (2010), and Carol Ong Teck Lan et al. (2011), where it was found that the standard of English was facing a continuous decline, and that many Malaysian school leavers were unable to communicate well in tertiary education, as well as in the job market. Within my own teaching context (Nawi, 2005), the problems that were identified were that: i) the majority of the students did not get enough comprehensible language input (Krashen, 1982); ii) the surrounding environment was not conducive in practising English as it is not generally used in everyday life; and that iii) teachers were biased to more ‘traditional’ forms of teaching, which usually meant teacher in the front and student sitting down facing their books (
Nawi
,2008
).This led to my journey into the investigation of the use of drama in education, initially drawing on drama techniques to teach language such as those taught by Maley and Duff (1983), and Wessels (1987), and subsequently experimenting with more advanced techniques used in various forms of process drama such as those proposed by Heathcote and Bolton (1995), Kao and O'Neill (1998),
Miller
andSaxton
(2004
), and Greenwood (2005). As the research unfolded, a research paradigm began to crystallise as I engaged in continuous cycles of self-reflection and evaluation on the development of my own understanding of applying drama pedagogies in the language classroom. I was carrying out reflective practice (M. Griffiths & Tann, 1992; Zwozdiak-Myers, 2011).The central research question that bound the whole study was: What have I learned, as an ELT practitioner, about the use and impact of drama pedagogies?
To guide me in answering this research question, several sub-questions emerged, and these were:
What are changes that in the students’ level of English proficiency after undergoing a drama in ESL course?
What are the changes in the students’ level of English language appropriacy after undergoing a drama in ESL course?
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What changes have I made, am making, and have still to make in my practice?
In navigating this research journey, I investigated three projects in different contexts, as well as different stages of my own personal and professional development. In the first stage of research, I was an apprentice in learning to use drama in teaching ESF/EFL. This apprenticeship was an amalgamation of different learning events that included attending workshops and drama classes; planning and presenting drama workshops; attending and presenting at drama and language teaching conferences, and other similar activities. These learning events also enabled me to learn and exchange ideas from contemporary drama educators such as Greenwood, O’Connor, O’Toole, Miller and Saxton, Dunn, Stinson, and Winston, to name a few. Frame 1 reports the work that formed the bulk of my apprenticeship, learning how to teach using drama under an experienced drama practitioner for the duration of two and a half months. In my ITE, I had already had some exposure to using drama to teach language, but as I delved deeper into my learning journey, I discovered that although I had been equipped with tools, they were akin to a penknife in an operation theatre, where the scalpel was a better tool for the job. The study reported in Frame 1 offers a reflective analysis by a language practitioner mapping the development of his understanding on the types of drama techniques that could be used to teach ESL/EFL in a New Zealand ESOL context. Here, the study also contributes to the developing body of literature on the application of drama pedagogies in New Zealand ESOL.
The second project is divided into two sections, reported in two Frames. The first section reports the pilot study of applying drama pedagogies in ESL in the Malaysian context. The second section provides an account of the reflective analysis of the main teaching programme carried out in the same context, four months after the completion of the pilot. The value of this project is that it provides an example of how an ESL practitioner uses the learning from prior cycles of reflective enquiry to experiment and gain confidence in using drama pedagogies. This project is of particular relevance to using alternative teaching pedagogies, specifically drama pedagogies, in teaching ESL in the Malaysian context. It is also relevant to Malaysian language teaching in general, as it also proposes some views on the role of first language translation in CLT-dominated Malaysian classroom.
The third project is one where I had developed more confidence in applying drama pedagogies in ESL/EFL, and tracks the enrichment process of teaching methodologies crystallised from the previous two projects. The work is relevant as it presents a streamlined form of the methodologies that were applied in adult EFL education in the New Zealand context. Seen through second language acquisition (SLA) lens, the reflective analysis of the project proposes how drama forms contribute to students’ understanding of language through the comprehensive input-output loop created in the new space.
As key components of my learning journey, through the lens of reflective practice, these three projects offer substantial insights into the development of my understanding in applying drama pedagogies in
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ESL/EFL learning. Some of the findings arising from this research have also been reported in earlier publications, which are in Nawi (2013) and Nawi (2014).