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Background of the Study

With the formation of ASEAN there has been an influx of glocal students to International

Colleges who lack both Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS) and Cognitive

Academic Language Proficiency (CALP) (Cummins, 2000). Glocal, from the construction of

global and local, refers to students who have remained in their home country while trying to gain

second language proficiency by using English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI). In Thailand, a

member of ASEAN, International education is becoming mainstream as it expands to meet the

needs of students wanting to learn English as a second language. Nonetheless, many of these

“glocal” students have had few if any intercultural experiences, and because of this, learning in

international education can be problematic and challenging. Finding a balance between second

language acquisition, learning, and development would be advantageous for all concerned. In

essence this requires researchers to better understand the background and context, and how it

relates to social cognition, communicative competence and intentions.

Glocal students are particularly common throughout the Association of Southeast Asian

Nations, where local students learn English in a non-English speaking context. These students,

and their parents have hopes of them participating in ASEAN, and are attempting to gain

language skills, and academic knowledge while using English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI).

It becomes apparent when working with these students, that their interlanguage skills are lacking

key cognitive and interpersonal components necessary for learning a second language, and

learning academic content using EMI. These students are in need of distinctive support to assist

them in gaining knowledge from experience, participation, and dialogue. Most teachers wanting

to make an impact on glocal students, find it difficult to have meaningful interactions with

students who are new to using a second language.

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To address these challenges, the following research combined the fields of human

resource development and education to encourage inquiry into learning, development at the

individual, group, and community levels. An interdisciplinary approach yields research based on

particularities that provide insights into the participant’s experience and cognitive development

(Johnson, 2004). As a worldview, the dialogical tradition is similar to constructivism in that it

regards multiple participant meanings, interpretations, and the importance of social interactions

(Creswell, 2013). Nevertheless, these perspectives are often overlooked in favor of quantitative

approaches that are mistakenly seen as more objective due to the use of clearly defined

measurements.

With English as the official lingua franca of ASEAN, countries like Thailand have

initiated country wide Human Resource Development (HRD) projects to help produce proficient

English Language Learners (ELL), only to discover that these initiatives have been unsuccessful

(Global Report, 2014). More than a decade has gone by since passing the Thai National

Education act of 1999 which identified English as a core compulsory subject, but still there are a

number of challenges facing Thai Higher education, especially those identified in a United

Nations report on Thailand Development that suggested English abilities were at a critical stage

(THD Report, 2014). In addition, with the Association of Southeast Nation (ASEAN)

designating English as lingua franca, the Kingdom is looking for ways to develop English levels,

but little has changed after decades of concentrated efforts. Thailand, in its National

Qualification Framework (NQF) acknowledges the importance of Human Resource

Development. Even after decades of compulsory English instruction, and numerous changes in

teaching approaches, Thailand remains at a critical stage.

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Regardless of what approach, English being taught as a second language can be an

endeavor that many students experience reluctantly. In Thailand, where English language

teaching is compulsory learning is negligible. Notwithstanding, this mandatory instruction which

began in 1999 (Prappha. 2008), is linked to low formative test scores, and Thailand continues to

fall well below English language expectations year after year. In 2015, Thailand dropped the

most in Asia from 48th in 2014 to 62nd out of 70 countries, and 14th out of 16 in Asia, beating out

Mongolia and Cambodia (EF). Such discouraging news clearly indicates that compulsory

language teaching in Thailand isn’t meeting its expectations. There could be a number of reasons

for this, and it is not to suggest that only Thailand has concerns, but it is a reminder that learning

a second language is not as simple as taking mandatory instruction. While some Thai schools

claim success, it can typically be demonstrated that successes are the result of language learning

experiences that fall outside normal classroom instruction. Most would agree that the typical

Thai classroom generates students that lack communication competence, while possessing

inadequate reading and writing skills that isn’t preparing them for careers in ASEAN. Still, any

Background should cover the setting and context, and in this instance, a quick background-look

at second language research and development.

Setting and Context

Burapha University, Thailand, rests just a few hours southeast of Bangkok, and has been

educating teachers since 1955. Within the education faculty, a double degree program in which

aspiring teachers spend a few years abroad in the United States to obtain a bachelor’s degree.

Students’ English proficiency varies from beginner to advanced, but the majority of students

have had few experiences using English in an authentic communicative setting while fewer have

used English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI). Students in the program spend an entire year
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with native English teachers for the purpose of preparing them for academic study in America.

While ESL educators may assume that these students would be highly motivated and eager to

practice English, the reality is what is discovered during the duration of this dissertation. Having

taught within this program for seven years, it has challenged my teaching experience, and caused

me to question my knowledge of student language learning experiences, as students continually

demonstrated actions which conflicted with their intentions.

Burapha University, designated a member of the ASEAN University Network (AUN),

has a significant number of glocal students who have chosen to further their education using

EMI. If Vygotsky (1978) and Cummings (1981) are correct, either these learners are using Thai

to engage academic content, or they are not sufficiently learning academic content in English.

This would suggest a change to the International curriculum, or a change in teaching approaches,

or a change in unstated college policy concerning Thai usage in the classroom. Regardless,

research is needed to: (1) explore theory and practice regarding how LEP students engage the

academic content; (2) collaborate with students; (3) improve teaching and learning approaches

based on research. By using (1) educational ethnography we can explore how students are

engaging academic content, by using (2) ALAR/hermeneutic phenomenology and contemplative

education we can encourage student transformation, and (3) improve instruction and learning in

the current context. The researcher, acting as both researcher and instructor can conduct teacher

practitioner research that collects unobtrusive data during regular class hours, with iterative,

cyclical action research and dynamic assessment to improve classroom instruction.

Many of these ‘glocal’, internet savvy students lack Basic Interpersonal Communication

Skills (BICS), Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP), and Common Underlying

Proficiency (CUP) (Cummins, 2000), but they excel at connecting with each other using social
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media. At no other time in history has such an interconnected phenomenon taken place, begging

education to participate. For Higher International Education, the time is right to take advantage

of this phenomenon, and to create web-supported instruction that inspires interconnected

learning. Towards this end, Daniel Goleman and Peter Senge wrote the book, Triple Focus

which encourages a shift in education that promotes three separate but overlapping entities; the

Inner, Other, and Outer, (2014). In their introduction they write the following:

“Imagine this: Someone under the age of eighteen may never have known a world that

didn’t have the Internet… What are the tools that we might give kids today that will help

them on this journey?” (Goleman & Senge, 2014: location 62).

Three such tools are: (1) implementing contemplative and transformative education; (2)

promoting dialogical & trialogical teaching; and (3) enabling knowledge-creation in

communities of practice in which learning takes place through social interactions using

computers, digitized devices, and social media (Stahl, Koschmann, & Suthers, 2006).

Goleman and Senge’s Triple Focus (2014) is a new approach to Education that will assist

administrators, learners, and teachers, in the field of International Higher Education. Applied

appropriately, such perspectives have the ability to generate intrinsic capacities within students,

allowing their anxieties to be transformed; resulting in a sustainable campus that averts rote

learning in exchange for life-long learning. But such changes don’t come easy; moreover,

instructors are encouraged to conduct their own practitioner research that uncover classroom

issues which can be solved collectively and dialogically, and lead towards student learning

(Zuber-Skerritt,). The following review deals mostly with learners and instructors, but

administrators must be on board as well, if International Colleges are to flourish and assist

limited English proficient language learners become English proficient

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In Thailand, students entering International settings with limited Basic Interpersonal

Communication Skills (BICS) are in need of support if they are to adapt and succeed in their new

environment. Each year “glocal” Thai students enter International Colleges with the belief that

English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI) is a passport to English proficiency, but for many the

reality is much different. What’s at stake are individual, group, and community wellbeing. First,

students aren’t knowledgeable in Second Language Acquisition (SLA), and many are under the

impression that if they just study, their English interpersonal communication skills will improve.

Second, with an influx of new “glocal” students, International Colleges will struggle to maintain

a sustainable community of English lingua franca, resulting in a lack of authentic opportunities

for students to engage in English socially. Third, due to the former, students aren’t able to form

supportive groups and participate in communities of practice (Wenger, 1999), while spending

most of their college time struggling to gain Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP)

(Cummins, 2000). Research by Jim Cummins indicated that students could expect to gain

adequate BICS while in an English speaking community between six months to two years, while

it would take between 5 - 7 years to gain CALP (Cummins, 2000). As Cummins explains, CALP

requires an adequate level of BICS which “glocal” students rarely possess (Ibid, 2000). These are

English skills, requiring years of practice that International schools expect students to have prior

to classroom instruction. As more “glocal” students choose international colleges, the chances of

maintaining a community of English lingua franca is reduced that resulting in a lack of

wellbeing.

Understanding student experiences within EMI is contingent on current forms of

interpretive models, and human situated-ness (van Manen, 1997). Moreover, interpreting and

understanding language learning experiences within EMI become comprehensible in light of four

important historical developments in the field of Second Language Acquisition (SLA): 1. Dell
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Hyme’s Ethnography of Communication (EOC); 2. Michael Halliday’s Systemic Functional

Analysis (SFL); 3. Lev Vygotsky’s Socio-cultural Theories (SCT), and 4. Jim Cummins’

BICS/CALP models. Each of these theoretical developments indicate that not only is language

acquired through basic supportive and intersubjective social interactions but so is academic

knowledge. In both second language learning and academic learning using EMI, students need

the support of more knowledgeable others (MKO) (Vygotsky, 1978). It becomes apparent that if

students are to be successful using EMI, educators must have a better understanding of student

experiences, exhibit empathy and compassion. Essentially, this means that teachers and students

must become “reflective, insightful, sensitive to language, and constantly open to experience”

(van Manen, 1997, location 249). This would entail transformation that allows students to

become active participating members of an English lingua franca community.

Prior to the four historical developments mentioned above, SLA was closely connected to

a rationalized cognitive science in the tradition of Noam Chomsky or what has been referred to

as Cartesian Linguistics (1966, 2009). Under this platform, language is considered an a priori

closed system, centered on rational philosophical assumptions dating back to Descartes

(Chomsky, 1966: Lakoff, 1999). This view of language has the following key components which

this dissertation wishes to overcome: 1. A separation between body and mind; 2. Transcendent

autonomous reason; 3. The notion of essences; 4. A rationally defined human nature; 5.

Mathematics as ideal reason; 6. Reason as formal; 7. Thought as language; 8. Innate ideas; and 9.

The method of introspection; in this sense language defines the essence of being human (Ibid,

1999). Under this view “the controlling image is of an abstract, isolated individual, almost an

unmotivated cognitive mechanism” (Hymes, 1972, p272). Because of these characteristics,

language is seen by educators as a formally structured subject that must be learned formally. In
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other words, by learning grammar an individual can begin to become language proficient which

current language theories suggests is wrong (Johnson, 2004).

Language and Language Learning

Through the evolutionary process, humans gained powerful learning mechanisms and

linguistic competencies within their complex environment that contributed to language

acquisition and development (Tomasello, 2003). These mechanisms and competencies are

regularly integrated with intention-reading skills such as shared attention that enable children to

adapt and acquire a functional element of linguistic communication within their complex

environment (Ibid, 2003). These qualities evolved along with other characteristics such as

precise hand movements, movements of the tongue, reflective consciousness, and conceptual

thought which today is merged into more complex processes of human communication that

allow students to learn and develop from their everyday experiences (Capra & Luisi, 2014).

To a profound degree, institutionalized education, resembling an organized complex

environment with an abundance of variables, has disregarded this natural condition especially in

regard to language pedagogy. For example, the communicative sounds and gestures that

surround babies’ daily lives, enfold and unfold contextually while they interact intersubjectively

with those in their environment to permit making-sense of their experiences. Students, on the

other hand, while using English as the Medium of Instruction (EMI) struggle to contextualize

unfamiliar sounds to non-contextual learning experiences. In other words, babies construct

meanings from their everyday language experiences while language students within a confine of

institutionalized variables most often do not. Without a praxis oriented language pedagogy, one

which considers the students’ life world will lack the required essentials necessary for promoting

language acquisition, such as opportunities to interact locally, identify patterns, and allow an
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interlanguage to emerge (Atkinson: Larsen-Freeman). Nonetheless, if teachers can gain a better

understanding of the mechanisms that contribute to language development, a praxis oriented

language pedagogy can help students transform into self-directed and autonomous learners by

making-sense of their experiences.

Second Language Acquisition (SLA) has focused on three main areas: acquisition,

learning, and development, with a recent emphasis on classroom practice as the field tries to

accommodate globalization. But even classroom research has concentrated on the individual

cognitive-computational model at the expense of more dialogical approaches (Johnson, 2004).

Communicative language teaching (CLT), considered the benchmark approach, which implies

communication, emphasizes memorizing and using “pre-packaged” words and phrases

(Atkinson, 2011). In essence, communication requires intent, and since a person cannot speak

alone, it requires cooperation. Cooperation, according to various philosophers of action is

referred to as “shared intentionality or “we” intentionality (Searle, 1995). Shared intentionality

includes joint goals and intentions, mutual knowledge, and shared beliefs (Tomasello, 2008).

Combined, they define human skill sets that exhibit prelinguistically, and sets humans apart from

other animals, or what Tomasello calls “cooperative infrastructure of human communication

(Tomasello, 2009).

These uniquely human skills evolved for the purpose of adaptation and survival in small

intersubjective groups that are based on trust and support. These are characteristics are formed

within family and close friend groupings, but are lacking in a classroom. It is no surprise that

becoming bilingual, or proficient in English requires more than classroom instruction. It requires

self-efficacy to communicate with someone who doesn’t speak your native language, and for

many people this can be extremely difficult. Still, it cannot be overstated, if you do not have the
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intent to communicate with someone who doesn’t speak your native language, you will struggle

to acquire an additional language.

The field of second language acquisition (SLA) has seen significant changes since the

“cognitive revolution” emerged from the interdisciplinary fields that included psychology,

anthropology and linguistics. Moreover, SLA continues to change as does cognitive science, and

the influences of neuroscience, social cognition, and embodied cognition. What we thought

language was back in the 60’s and 70’s is much different than what we think today. While the

concept of Interlanguage remains a significant and central theme, the implications are much

different. The target language is no longer a target, the target being effective communication, or

what Del Hymes originally called communicative competence as an alternative to Noam

Chomsky’s views of competence (1972). Along with this, the acquisition metaphor (AM) has

merged with the participation metaphor (PM) to illustrate the vital role of the learner. Numerous

studies indicated the importance of good teachers, when all learners really need to do is

participate regularly with intention, attention, and awareness. A focused and aware student can

learn regardless of the instructor or instruction. In other words, the language classroom is only a

place of support, but the real acquisition or development takes place anywhere at any time. Still,

language pedagogy must adapt and become praxis oriented, or practical.

Because of this, many college-bound students are depending on English immersion

programs in local Thai International colleges to help prepare them for Thailand’s membership in

the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in which English is the designated lingua

franca. Nonetheless, research performed in Canada indicates that such hopes are overly

optimistic, as those who lack Basic Interpersonal Language Skills (BICS) can expect to gain

Cognitive Language Academic Proficiency (CALP) only after years of study in an immersion
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type program (Cummins, 2000). Moreover, research from Lev Vygotsky (1978) has sufficiently

indicated that scientific knowledge is mediated through language which suggests students will

need to use their native language which suggests limited immersion. Assuredly, International

educators have underestimated the difficulties associated with academic learning in a second

language, and have neglected to use decades of rigorous inquiry in the field of Second Language

Acquisition (SLA). This is not to suggest that all of SLA research is applicable to the classroom,

but it does suggest that second language educators must remain committed to personal

development, research and inquiry if we are to adequately assist our second language learners.

Having an English lingua franca requires a significant number of proficient English

speakers which is difficult to sustain as glocal International Colleges, meaning that students need

to change their intentions and behavior in order to participate in a social context they are not

familiar with. Students with limited English proficiency can improve mainly by participating in

direct communication with others, which can be difficult if the International College does not

have a sustainable community of English speakers or a specific program that emphasizes

interpersonal development, transformation and wellbeing. This suggests that students must

receive specific instruction in these areas in order to become self-directed and participate on their

own. This would include engaging their English speaking instructors, or finding English

speaking peers. While many International Colleges provide Intensive English programs, these

programs can be short in duration, focus on academic preparation, and embedded along with

University arrival programs which are heavily structured on Thai language and culture. What is

needed is a program devoted to individual, group, and community development in which

students use the knowledge from their experiences to become self-directed learners.
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According to Michael Tomasello’s Joint Shared Hypothesis, the act of engaging with

others is responsible for development (Tomasello, 2014). If this is so, Thai students entering

International settings with limited Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS) are in need

of support if they are to engage others, adapt and succeed in their new environment. Each year

“glocal” Thai students enter International Colleges with the belief that English as a Medium of

Instruction (EMI) is a passport to English proficiency, but for many the reality is much different.

What’s at stake are individual, group, and community wellbeing.

First, students aren’t knowledgeable in Second Language Acquisition (SLA), and many

are under the impression that if they just study, their English interpersonal communication skills

will improve. Second, with an influx of new “glocal” students, International Colleges will

struggle to maintain a sustainable community of English lingua franca, resulting in a lack of

authentic opportunities for students to engage in English socially. Third, due to the influx,

students aren’t able to join supportive groups and participate in communities of practice

(Wenger, 1999), as they spend most of their college time struggling to gain Cognitive Academic

Language Proficiency (CALP) (Cummins, 2000).

Research by Jim Cummins indicated that students could expect to gain adequate BICS

while in an English speaking community between six months to two years, while it would take

between 5 - 7 years to gain CALP (Cummins, 2000). As Cummins explains, CALP requires an

adequate level of BICS which “glocal” students rarely possess (Ibid, 2000). These are English

skills, requiring years of practice that International schools expect students to have prior to

classroom instruction. As more “glocal” students choose international colleges, the chances of

maintaining a community of English lingua franca is reduced that resulting in a lack of

wellbeing.
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Research and Development

In International Higher Education, the growing use of English as the medium of

instruction (EMI) has major implications for learning and development, especially for countries

in the so called expanding circle, where English is seldom used culturally but studied as a

foreign language (Krachu, 1992). Nevertheless, institutes proceed with EMI even though the

implications have not been adequately explored. When using EMI, a student can expect three

types of teaching approaches: authoritative, dialogical, or permissive (). While some believe

EMI is a passport to English acquisition and development, major issues and concerns must be

considered, including students’ Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS), and Cognitive

Academic Language Proficiency (CALP) (Cummins, 2000).

However, deciding what to change, and how to affect transformations are difficult

undertakings. In life, driving forces and restraining forces are always in play, and change

managers must first be aware of these dialectical forces that either promote change or maintain

the status quo within ourselves and social groups (Lewin, 1948: 2010). As a starting point, the

learning status quo can be recognized or conceptualized using learning metaphors, specifically

the acquisition metaphor (AM), and the Participation metaphor (PM) (Sfard, 1998). Simply put,

under the AM the mind is a container that is filled with knowledge, or what Paulo Freire referred

to as “banking education” (Freire, 1972). On the other hand, the PM suggests a process which

begins by experiencing a part of a whole (Sfard, 1998). Thus, by examining experiences,

teachers can explore their practice and determine if their teaching activities encourage AM or

PM while students can explore their experiences to determine if they are using the AM or PM.

To discover or uncover the structure of these experiences, and what needs to be changed,

both students and teachers are encouraged to become phenomenologists (Bentz, & Shapiro,
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1998). Herein lies the foundation of this research, that the instructor explores his teaching

experiences, while teaching and guiding the students to explore their own learning experiences.

With phenomenology as the heart, foundation, or umbrella of this research, experiences can be

discovered, and the proper steps can be taken to transform these experiences to improve EMI.

Researching lived experiences can be performed within Contemplative or Mindful

Inquiry, in which the researcher as “scholar-practitioner” is encouraged to be the center of the

research process as both applied philosopher and “knowledge broker” (Bentz, & Shapiro, 1998).

Thus, social contemplative research, or mindful inquiry begins a process of inquiry with the

researcher as participant-observer who not only views his own experiences and practice, but the

participants’ within the classroom environment and the affects related to the interactions.

Nevertheless, it is the lived experiences that are explored by the participants themselves along

with the researcher that makes this research unique. In this sense the phenomenology overlaps

with ethnography, or what has been called ethnomethodology in which participants navigate the

everyday world in which they live (van Manen, 1997, 2014: Detmer, 2013, Rehorick & Bentz,

2013: Gilgun, 2014: Bentz & Shapiro, 1998).

It is within this context where EMI is used on a daily basis that must be explored in order

to uncover those forces that keep teachers and students from reaching their potential. It is only in

context that we can observe the dynamic interactions between participants and their environment

where cognition occurs (Varela, 1999: Bentz & Shapiro, 1998). Nonetheless, first-person

experience has been essentially overlooked in both second language acquisition (SLA) and

human resource development (HRD). Through first-person experience new intentions and

awareness can be developed along with alternative pedagogies that encourage participation, and

that lead to individual, group, and institutional change, or what is considered the core of Human
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Resource Development (HRD) (Swanson, 2011). To be more precise these changes include: (1)

change towards a more communicative and aware individual; (2) change towards more

supportive groups; and (3) change towards a sustainable community of English lingua franca.

The following dissertation penetrates these issues and concerns by challenging positivist and

rationalist epistemologies and assumptions by exploring second and third generation cognitive

science, and Neuroeducation. Furthermore, this research begins by exploring lived experiences,

and recommends that students and teachers become mindful inquires rather than information

processors in which EMI becomes an asset rather than a liability.