What sustains teachers’ and students’ joy, passion, and enthusiasm for English in three European countries?
Submitted by:
Nicole S Dingwall
Abstract:
This paper draws on data from an international comparative study, LANGUAGES. The study compares the experiences of secondary school teachers and learners (aged 13-15) of English in three European countries: England, Norway and France. English has a different status in each of these countries: it is either a first, second or foreign language respectively.
We aim to identify teachers’ and students’ perspectives on English teaching practices that may be utilised to sustain enthusiasm within the subject. We draw together practices from diverse English teaching contexts, bringing them into dialogue with each other to enhance cross-fertilisation of ideas.
The paper reports on findings from the first year of the project (2022-23). Participants were students and teachers from eight English classes in each country.
We draw on data from: a) semi-structured interviews conducted with students (n=48) and teachers (n=24), focussed upon their experiences of recent English lessons; b) the Tripod 7C’s survey (n=x) where students report their experiences with curricular support, in terms of how lessons spark and maintain their interest in learning English (Ferguson, 2012; Molway, 2021)The preliminary data analyses show different views of their enjoyment of English, which vary between students within classes, across classes, and across countries. They also show that, in some cases, there is a mismatch between students’ enjoyment of English and what teachers think their students enjoy. Finally, the data brings into sharp focus the significance of context in shaping students’ enjoyment and passion for English.