English Language Teaching

According to Thomas (1987), though learning is a private process, it is also the result of the external interaction which takes place between the participants viz. the teacher and the learners in the classroom. The language classroom can be considered as a microcosm of society and as such the interaction in the classroom can be considered as a reflection of the communication outside it. The cultural conditioning and defining of the roles of the teacher and the learner play an important role in the teaching-learning process. The feedback that is provided by the teacher is an important part of classroom interaction. This paper attempts to determine the quality of the informal feedback in the English language class and also tries to ascertain the extent to which it is provided to the undergraduate students of Gauhati University. It is believed that the findings will throw light on the quality of classroom interaction and also assist in raising awareness about it's importance. A few aspects of feedback that will be analysed in this paper in an ethnography of communication (EoC) framework are provided below.  How does the relationship between the participants i.e. the teacher and the learners influence the kind of feedback and in turn the quality of teaching and learning in the classroom?  Does cultural conditioning play a role in the classroom interaction? For this study a survey was conducted in three colleges affiliated to Gauhati University. Students and teachers of the General English paper were interviewed with the help of semi

According to Thomas (1987), though learning is a private process, it is also the result of the external interaction which takes place between the participants viz. the teacher and the learners in the classroom. The language classroom can be considered as a microcosm of society and as such the interaction in the classroom can be considered as a reflection of the communication outside it. The cultural conditioning and defining of the roles of the teacher and the learner play an important role in the teaching-learning process. The feedback that is provided by the teacher is an important part of classroom interaction. This paper attempts to determine the quality of the informal feedback in the English language class and also tries to ascertain the extent to which it is provided to the undergraduate students of Gauhati University. It is believed that the findings will throw light on the quality of classroom interaction and also assist in raising awareness about it's importance. A few aspects of feedback that will be analysed in this paper in an ethnography of communication (EoC) framework are provided below.  How does the relationship between the participants i.e. the teacher and the learners influence the kind of feedback and in turn the quality of teaching and learning in the classroom?  Does cultural conditioning play a role in the classroom interaction? For this study a survey was conducted in three colleges affiliated to Gauhati University. Students and teachers of the General English paper were interviewed with the help of semi

Blogging is usually associated with the posting of informal texts, but academic blogs have also become quite popular as they facilitate the exchange of ideas in many fields of study. This paper explores the scope of blogging in making tertiary level students more aware of a few important aspects of academic writing. The two objectives of this paper were to determine whether blogging can i) enable students to understand and practice the mechanics of academic writing, and ii) motivate the learners to write longer texts. The study was a quasiexperimental research that was conducted by the researcher in the classroom. The findings indicate a significant difference in the way learners understand the mechanics of academic writing due to blogging. The findings also revealed that learners are more motivated to write longer text while blogging. This study recommends the use of blogging as a tool in order to teach academic writing at the tertiary level. However, the lack of familiarity with technology among a number of students in India is still a cause for concern.

This study evaluates the attitudes of primary school teachers in Rabha language-majority areas of Assam, a state in India about the use of Rabha as a language of instruction in the light of the new National Education Policy 2020. Fifty one school teachers were surveyed and 15 teachers were interviewed using the triangulation method. This article makes a case for advocacy and mobilization of the community for successful implementation of educational policies. Even well-intended policies might not achieve success if the target community is not convinced of the positive outcomes of the policy recommendations. The findings of the study reveal that though the teachers were overtly supportive of the use of Rabha in the classroom, they displayed subtle resistance toward its use due to the widespread misconception that if education is not imparted in more mainstream languages, students will lose important educational and employment opportunities. The authors make recommendations for carrying out proper advocacy and mobilization drives in order to create awareness about the advantages of mother tongue-based multilingual education.

This study explored the effects of post-reading group discussions on the reading comprehension of twenty university students of intermediatelevel English. Each group read a text and produced individual written recalls. Group 1 responded in writing without discussion; group 2 discussed the text in their L2 (English); the members of group 3 discussed the text in a shared home language; group 4 was a mixed group with mutually unintelligible language varieties while group 5 comprised of speakers of mutually intelligible language varieties. It was observed that the written recalls of the groups that engaged in post reading discussions were more detailed. Furthermore, participants who discussed the text using their home language(s) and other languages in their repertoire had better recalls than the ones that used only English in their discussions. The authors recommend the strategic use of learners' home language(s) in the English classroom.

This paper reports the findings of a study conducted on a group of research scholars from Arts and Humanities in an Indian university. The main objectives were to determine i.) their awareness and perception towards their academic writing needs in English, ii) the strategies that they adopted to deal with the challenges in academic writing, and iii) whether they felt the need for the inclusion of academic writing courses in their course work. The study was a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods where the participants responded to both objective and descriptive questions. The findings revealed the perceived problem areas and the challenges that they face while writing, the strategies they adopt to deal with them and the lack of awareness of academic writing needs among the scholars. Finally, it highlights the 'want' for the inclusion of effective academic writing courses.

Till recently an unaffordable dream for lower middle and working classes, English medium education (EME) is now considered both a privilege and a necessity, and a way out of poverty and social exclusion.
This paper reports on a modest audit of the English language skills of 130 students studying in a low cost private English medium primary school (Classes I through IV) in a semi-urban context.The study seeks to understand
(i) the challenges of learning English as a language of communication in school, in a situation where English is neither the students’ mother tongue nor the language of communication in the community
(ii) the degree of competence achieved by primary students to cope with the domains of use of English (the conversational and the academic). 
The findings of the modest study indicate that
a. in the classroom, students are encouraged to behave like monolingual speakers, interacting with teachers and classmates only in English (except in other language classes)
b. language interaction in the classroom predominantly follows the IRF (Interaction-Response-Feedback) model (Sinclair & Coulthard, 1975)
c. the language of the classroom is routinized, formulaic, and ritualistic, and this is reflected in the students’ oral and written English
d. compulsory interaction in English develops some degree of communicative competence, but does not guarantee grammatical competence, as evidenced in students’ spoken or written English

A parallel education industry largely unaddressed in national language education policy framings, English medium education (EME) in India thrives and is buoyed by the neoliberal constructs of the individual/institutional agency and responsibility for economic success. Most studies on Indian English language education place the inequities perpetuated by neoliberalism as a construction of the elite classes who act as gatekeepers for English, but the issue is far more complex. The chapter argues that the economically stable middle class babysits English and keeps the neoliberal rhetoric alive through investment in EME. It discusses other factors that allow a neoliberal construction of English, such as the absence of national consensus on an 'official' language or on diversity of lingua franca(s) to negotiate life beyond community and state, the role of teachers and the nature of ELT pedagogical practices prescribed by national curricular frameworks. In short, the chapter critiques the overt and implicit ways by which English medium education (EME) in India promotes and sustains the neoliberal regime and provides continual resistance to the implementation of a healthy multilingual education policy.