LITERATURE REVIEW METHODS & METHODOLOGY
The government in the UK have been driven by many policies in relation to Action research (McNiff, 1997) is allowing the teacher to reflect upon
LEARNER &THE ISSUES
The learner is a refugee from Yemen who fled the war to come to the UK. He has been here
since 2018, however, in Yemen he had no schooling in at any level, due to his family needing
him to work and earn a living for them. This has had a negative impact towards his confidence
and, thus towards his learning. He does not understand any material or teaching that takes
place in class. His confidence and morale in class is extremely low, as he shows little to no
interaction with his teacher or peers. I will support the learner with reading by transforming
his learning with different strategies, and creating dedicated and personalised lesson plans to
meet his needs, and reach his full potential. I will further learn how the learner can improve
his confidence towards his barrier, and experience his growth and change. According to
Kruidenier, (2002) who illustrated that second language learners must be taught reading
strategies that are different to native English readers. The importance of adult immigrants
succeeding in literacy in order to gain employment skills justifies the need to research into the
impact of reading on an ESOL learner today (2020), and in order to gain the skills needed for a
better job and future prospects, they must improve upon their literacy skills, and gain those
qualifications that will help them do so.
A recent government report named ' English for speakers of other languages: Access and
progression' in June 2019 conducted a survey which indicated that one of the main barriers to
learning English were the existing English literacy amongst learners. These learners who had
no form of schooling in their home countries needed more support in classrooms, and
struggled compared to those who had existing education. Intervention for this learner is ideal
and will have a positive impact on his studies in class with his peers, and his improve his
motivation to succeed in his goals for the future.
The Bera guidelines were considered, and consent was sought, and
ETHICS agreed from the participated learner.
Post Graduate Cerificate of Education: PCET
the increase of immigration and the need to produce ESOL classes, in
particular teaching the skills that are needed to guide immigrants and
refugees to work in the wider economy, and become valuable members of
society. In 2001, Tony Blair introduced the Skills for Life strategy amongst
young people and adults, to tackle the increase of low levels of basic
functional skills in the UK. Many employers refused to take on those who
lacked basic functional skills. In order to create more, productive classes for
these learners, the government must ensure educational needs are met, and
not driven by politics. Authors, Hamilton & Hillier (2009) illustrated that ESOL
was always seen as only an immigration problem, rather than an educational
issue, and up until today many councils and boroughs are still lacking the basic
funding from the government for these classes. This carries a negative impact
upon the learners and their ability to reach their full potential. The concern
amongst Ofsted and the Adult Learning Inspectorate were the standard of
teaching and what was being taught, hence the need to further investigate. To
reinforce this further, two modern studies was carried out in 2003/04 and
2004/05 by The National Research and Development Centre for adult literacy
and numeracy that reported how teaching literacy, and implementing
different strategies and methods could help ESOL students achieve their basic
functional skills. The common trends that were noted from these studies were
that students were not given enough time to read in class, the males were the
lower achievers compared to females, and each class held a vast variety of
mixed abilities, affecting differentiation according to needs. The studies did
not however, take into account the strategies used that are proven to be
effective for reading, such as, phonics, comprehension and language
experiences, which was confirmed in Kruidenier (2002) experiment on
reading in adult literacy, whereby he recommended that adult learners would
benefit from these strategies, if repeated, as this would increase reading
fluency. Furthermore, many studies found better progress between those
learners who studied independently, compared to those who did not, hence,
intervention where the researcher and learner are working together outside
class would help to fill these gaps in reading, and amend them during these
sessions. The learners in class may be falling behind due to lack of funding,
resources and time strategies, therefore the need to support ESOL learners, in
particular, Mustafa who is a male and illiterate in his mother language is
fundamental, as a majority of further education colleges like Mustafa’s, who
have placed learners at a disadvantage from the start in allocating them
straight into an Entry 1 class with learners who can read and write.
Research has shown (Gardner, 1985) motivation is one of the
prominent factors in achieving, as improving literacy skills
can take much effort and dedication. Mustafa will only achieve
progress once he shows motivation, and committment to his
studies.
Khadija Awan
their practice in order to improve their own and the student’s
experience of education. Despite this, the validity about this research
was discussed by author (Polanyi, 1858) who argued that action
research is subjective, and unreliable, based on teachers bias
opinions towards the student.
The following methods shall be carried out in this research :
1. Two observations of the learner in class: observing interaction
between peers, their rapport and communication with the teacher
and impact of the teacher
2. 8 Lesson plans: Personalised to meet learner’s needs, The
strategies relate to the cognitive domain, of Bloom’s Taxonomy
(1956) for the learner to use his thinking skills to work out the
features, and meanings of texts.
3. At the end of each session, the researcher will critically reflect on
the impact of the learners learning, his engagement in lesson, and
what he understood. The First lesson will be experiential, in which
the learner will be presented a reading text, and verify what he
understood. This will allow the rest of the lessons to be built upon
the highlighted issues. In the last session, he will be presented with
the same text, and will measure the 8 week progress the learner has
made.
PROGRESS
Once Mustafa is able to begin reading following the strategies I set
him, he will feel he is making real progress and this will impact upon
his self-confidence and create a sense of achievement.
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University Of East London