LEARNER IDENTITY AND TEACHER PEDAGOGY IN THE LOW-LEVEL

LITERACY CLASSROOM

Sue Ollerhead University of New South Wales 20 May 2011

� How well do we know our learners?

� What do learners want to gain from our teaching?

� How do we adapt our teaching practices, and with what effect?

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Silent classrooms

� Teachers provide 95% of input, learners appear disengaged, unresponsive.

� Results in teacher frustration, de-motivation.

� Leads teacher to label learners as ‘unmotivated’, ‘passive’, ‘disinterested’ and so on.

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Reconceptualising the “silent classroom” phenomenon

� Revisit assumption that silent classrooms are solely a result of ‘unmotivated’, ‘passive, ‘unteachable’ learners

� What is it about teacher’s classroom practices that causes learners to be silenced?

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How can teachers help adult literacy learners to find their

voice?

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Selected research sitesPrograms

� Language, Literacy and Numeracy Program (LLNP); AMEP

Teaching contexts� Large vocational institutions; AMES providerLocation� Ethnically and socially diverse commercial hub

west of major city� Large migrant population, 31% born overseas,

23% NESB

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Research participants� Head teachers (n=3)

� Responsible for overall program management, curriculum planning, teacher recruitment

� Teachers (n=5)� Responsible for delivering literacy tuition to low-literate learners

(“marginally post-beginner”)

� Learners (class observation, n=68; focus groups, n=28)� Multilingual, low L1 literacy, low English literacy, median formal

schooling years n=4� Core nationalities: Sudanese, Afghani, Iraqi (also Pakistani;

Ethiopian; Chinese; Vietnamese)

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Research Tools

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Step Instrument/tool Participants Time

1 Documents in public domain (policy,

curriculum, assessment documents)

n/a ongoing

2 Qualitative, semi-structured

interviews

Head teachers 1,5 hr

interviews (x

3)

3 Qualitative, semi-structured

interviews

Class teachers 2 x 1 hr

interviews (x 5)

4 Learner focus group interviews

(conducted in learners’ L1s)low-literate

adult ESL

learners

1 hour interview

(x 9)

5 Classroom observations (audio

recordings, field notes)

Class

teachers;

learners

5 x 2 hr

observation

sessions (x 4)

Total: 40 hrs

Labelling

Source: Head teacher interviews

Institutional culture informing ‘labelling’ of low-literate learners

Learners described as:

‘passive’, ‘unmotivated’, ‘difficult’, ‘slow to learn’, ‘undisciplined’

“We were caught, the Sudanese crept up on us. Maybe four years ago, none of us had taught that kind of learner. Then suddenly, the Sudanese were upon us, and the Afghan women were upon us.”

(Rose, head teacher)

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Theoretical framework

Poststructuralist theory to explore relationship between language and identity

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Structuralist Post-structuralist

e.g. Saussure (1959, 1966)

e.g. Bakhtin (1981, 1984), Bourdieu (1977, 1991), Hall (1997) and Weedon (1997)

Language has idealised, stable and fixedmeanings

Language is not neutral, but understood in terms of its social meaning, in an unequal world.

Linguistic system guarantees meaning of signs.

Language acts are sites of struggle over ‘who has the right to be heard’, ‘who has more claim to truth’, ‘who has more access to power’ in society.

How does poststructuralist theory explain the relationship between language and identity?

“It is through language that a person negotiates a sense of self … and it is through language that a person gains access to – or is denied access to – powerful social networks that give learners the opportunity to speak.” (Weedon,1997)

Language is our identity

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Theoretical frameworkIdentity and subjectivity (Weedon 1997)One is either:

� a subject of a set of relationships (i.e. in a position of power) , or

� subject to a set of relationships (i.e. in a position of reduced power)

Defining characteristics:� Identity is a site of struggle (who has more power, therefore more

claim to ‘truth’)

� Identity changes over time (it develops)

� Identity is multiple and non-unitary

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Multiple identitiesMyself

� Student, teacher, mother, daughter, South African citizen, Australian citizen, British heritage, linguistic identity similar but not quite the same!

Faseh (61 yr old Iraqi learner)

� Teacher characterised as “weak, difficult, negative, doing time and making no progress’’

� Wealth of untapped historical, cultural and linguistic experience not being acknowledged in the classroom

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Why is it important for literacy teachers to accept that their learners have multiple and changing identities?

“The conceptualisation of identity as multiple and changing is consistent with the view that pedagogical practices can be transformative.’’ (Norton, 2010)

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Questions for teachers:

� Which pedagogical practices offer identity positions that limit opportunities for learners to speak?

� Which pedagogical practices offer positions that enhance possibilities for learners to speak?� Role of power relations in the classroom?� How are learners valued when they speak/ remain

silent?

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Investment

� Learners’ desire to learn target language is often ambivalent, influenced by social, historical context. (Bourdieu, 1977, 1991).

� Learners’s invest in target language to gain a wider range of symbolic and material resources, which will increase their cultural capital.

� Investment links a learner’s desire and commitment to learn a language, to their changing identity (unlike motivation)

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Questions for teachers

� To what extent are learners invested in the target language practices of the adult literacy classroom?

� Which pedagogical practices limit/ enhance learners’ investment in the target language?

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The teachers

“Teachers influenced not only by policy conditions, butalso by personal backgrounds, beliefs and attitudes”

(Stritikus, 2003)

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Teacher backgrounds

Pauline Helen Sara

•Teaching for 5 years

•Started in her 50s

•Started teaching with Red Cross, mostly refugees and asylum seekers

•Teaching for 2 years

•High school teacher in Hong Kong, 10 yrs

•16 yr gap from teaching, then TESOL certificate in Australia

•Master’s degree in TESOL

•Teaching, 20 yrs (‘veteran’)

•Former school teacher, “semi-retired”, charity and family responsibilities

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Teacher beliefsPauline Helen Sara

“You have to get involved with learners at this level. Help them with housing, health issues, fill out forms, very time consuming. I don’t mind doing all the extra stuff, that’s the side of the job I love. The thing I hate is the paperwork!”

“A teacher talks and student listens. That’s how I grew up. I always see a teacher as someone you look up to, very knowledgeable, you respect, you don’t question. But here, I am a facilitator, just helping them.”

Perceived friendship and contact with Australian community as crucial for learners.“I’m 50% teacher, 20% friend, I’m 30% counsellor/support. Because they see me as a mum, as a sister, as a grandmother [laughs] and I see my teaching as only about half of what I do.”

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Teacher attitudesPauline Helen Sara

“I actually love the challenge of getting right down to the basics of a language and working out how to present it in its simplest form for people at beginner level. It’s not just about language, it’s about learning about how different people progress at different rates. Learning the reasons why, learning how to be really patient.

“I’ve been trying to do, give them something, maybe I try to work out some impossiblethings. I try very hard to do things in different ways. But it can be very tiring, depressing really.”

“I ask them what topics they’d like. They say, ‘You’re the teacher, and we love you whatever you do’, and I find that difficult sometimes. If they have like a driving fine that will change what I’m going to teach, and I don’t ever stick to what I say I’m going to do. I try to be as friendly as possible and just to have a very relaxed attitude. We are very casual, nothing formal, a very holistic approach.

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Lesson 1Teacher: Pauline

Lesson goals: vocabulary, reading and writing tasks about health related issues and remedies.

Stage 2

� Teacher changes classroom dynamic by inviting students to arrange their chairs in a large circle at the front of the room.

� She initiates a classroom discussion by miming that she has a headache� T: What do you do when you get a headache?’’ � S: take panadol

� S: drink water

� Teacher invites students to repeat the target question aloud and then individually, again paying careful attention to pronunciation and intonation.

� She substitutes the term “have a headache’’ with terms such as “have a stomach ache’’ or “flu”, and elicits various remedies, such as drinking “flat’’ coca-cola.

Lesson 1 (cont.)Teacher: Pauline

Lesson title: Going to the doctor

Lesson goals: vocabulary, reading and writing tasks about health-related issues.

Stage 2

� Remedies are repeated and practised and key phrases such as ‘’take panadol’’ are written up on the whiteboard

� Learners seem highly engaged and stimulated, frequently alternating between their first language, English and mime actions to offer various remedies to different ailments, e.g. picking herbs from plants and inhaling vapours

� High level of humour, with learners expressing mock horror at remedies that are culturally unfamiliar to them, e.g. acupuncture

Analysis of Lesson 1

Teaching practices Identity positions offered

Effect on learners

• Highly contextualised content around real-life tasks•Integration of multimodal pedagogy (mime, drama, chanting) •Perception of English as restrictive, artificial medium of instruction changed as English became used for expression, communication and ownership of meaning•Teacher assumed peripheral, facilitative role

•Teacher drew on learners’ multiple identities as patients, healers, parents, nurturers, consumers.•Teacher used her knowledge of learners’ social and historical contexts to draw on their unique knowledge bases, which made them feel valued.

•Lively, energetic classroom atmosphere•Interaction amongst learners very high•Dynamic learning environment appreciated by learners

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Lesson 1 (cont.)

“I love here at [college] the way the teacher teaches. She lets us laugh and enjoy to learn English. To know more, to try, I’m happy with that. But before that I was at [college] and the teacher talk and talk and I just want to finish. Now I’m so happy I like the way I learn everything.” (Nancy, Sudan)

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Lesson 2Teacher: Helen

Lesson goals: vocabulary (leisure activites), writing short phrases

CLASSROOM TRANSCRIPT 3.1Stage 1: Introduction

1 T: Today we’re going to be talking about ‘Going to the beach’ because that’s what Australians like to do.

2 T: How many of you have been to the beach? [no response, 10 s pause]

3 T: How many of you have been to the beach, huh?[no response, 7 s pause]

4 S1: I go with school, but windy, rainy.5 T: We all take children to the beach. Why? Because they like to play in the sand

and water. 6 T: Even adults like the beach, father, mother, children like the beach.7 T: What else do people do if they don’t go to the beach on a Sunday, huh?8 S2: I go to church in the morning.9: T: They have a barbeque!

Lesson 2Teacher: Helen

Lesson goals: vocabulary (leisure activites), writing short phrasesCLASSROOM TRANSCRIPT 3.1

Stage 2: Eliciting vocabulary

10 T: Now what do you do when you get to the beach?

11 S: [No response, 8s pause]

12 T: What kind of things can you do when you get there?

13 S: [Yawn] Very tired. Must stand

14 T: We build sandcastles. Do we all know sandcastles? Who has seen movies about Cinderella and the Handsome Prince?

15 S: [No response, 6s pause]

16 T: [Further three minute description of how castles have soldiers, drawbridges and moats]

Analysis of Lesson 2

Teaching practices Identity positions offered

Effect on learners

• Large amount of teacherpreparation; materials, worksheets, pictures•Decontextualistedcontent; urban, western•Teacher provided most of the input in form of prepared materials and protracted, rhetorical “teacher talk” (Lightbown and Spada, 2006)

•Teacher offered learners very limited identity position as ‘the other’•Use of the third person ‘They’, ‘people’, ‘Australians’ situates learners outside the discourse•Very narrow view of ‘what it means to be ‘’Aussie’– urban, western, formal•Teacher ignores historical and social context of learners, fails to draw on the unique life experience they bring to the classroom

•The ‘resistance of silence’•Silence can protect learners from humiliation (Duff, 2002: 312)•Silence can be perceived by teachers as lack of initiative or desire to learn•Learners not invested in the language practices of the classroom, unequal power relations between teacher and learners

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Imagined communities

“A desired community that offers possibilities for an enhanced range of identity options in the future” (Norton, 2010)

� Teachers may unwittingly alienate learners who may withdraw from the language classroom

� How can teachers use this knowledge to help learners engage in classroom and wider target community?

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Imagined communities cont.

The case of ‘Yeanor’

Interview transcript 3.2

Y When I’m on my own at home I can feel sad. That’s when I think. I have no company. Sometimes the whole week I have no company. and I don’t have any white friends to encourage me, no work. Like someone to take care of me. Like today you talk to me so I feel fine. You okay with me today, you call me, ask me some questions, so I feel lively. But I don’t have communion, at work, to discuss together … S Do you think it will help if you find a job?Y Any friendly job. Then any friend, with a white colour will help me so much. Sometimes I feel so sad. So sad at times.

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Lesson 3: Market excursion

Learners asked to locate each item at market, and to ask how much it cost. The to record correct prices per unit of each item.

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Lesson 3: Market Excursion

Lesson 3: Market excursion

Analysis of Lesson 3

Teaching practices Identity positions offered Effect on learners

• Highly contextualised content around real-life tasks•Perception of English as restrictive, artificial medium of instruction changed as became used for expression, communication and ownership of meaning•High level of intercultural sharing

•Teacher tapped into learners’ imagined communities (as independent consumers, i.e. market and public transport), as well as their multiple identities as providers; nurturers, consumers.•Encouraged learners to move beyond their existing communities into more intercultural ones, by sharing recipes, thoughts on food preparation etc. •Teacher drew on learners’ unique knowledge bases, which made them feel valued.

Learners highlyengaged and motivated to complete the questionnaire task

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Lesson 3 (cont.)

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“I often need to do this buying but never in English before. I usually go to the store where I know they speak my language.’’ (Gulnaz, Pakistan)

“’It’s useful to compare prices because they are so different at (different) stalls. Working out which one saves me money feels good!” (Thuy, Vietnam)

Looking to the futureDrawing on cultural resources:

� Tapping into learner investment to offer multiple identity positions requires drawing on cultural resources.

� As teachers we need to develop an understanding of our learners’ existing knowledge resources, the richness of their life experience, what they bring to the classroom and Australian society.

� We need people who know social and historical contexts to interpret for us.

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Joseph

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“I was traumatised, I missed my home, I didn’t know whether the rest of my family were safe and I was constantly discriminated against. I thought I’d fled from the trauma, but I was experiencing the same things all over again, here.’’

Joseph Makuei, Community worker, Sudanese Men and Families Project, SydwestMulticultural Centre, Blacktown.

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“Successful integration must be based on practical and long-term solutions. It is not enough to show them Centrelink or the bank, or Medicare, we need to teach them how to completely engage with the community. There’s no point in having the money for three meals a day if every one of them is eaten inside your house, alone.”

Joseph Makuei, Community worker, Sudanese Men and Families Project, SydwestMulticultural Centre, Blacktown.

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Looking to the future

Developing partnerships between teachers and the academic sector

� Very few university adult literacy/numeracy academic courses

� Little empirical, classroom-based research to inform policy making.

� Breakdown in relationship between teachers and academic sector: ‘’fabricated statistics” versus “lack of academic rigour’’

� Lack of professional development opportunities for teachers; little sharing of knowledge or successful practices, affecting “knowledge base”.

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Concluding remarks

� Classroom practices can recreate subordinate learner identities, limiting learners’ access not only to language learning opportunities, but more powerful identities too (Lee, 2008).

� Challenge for teachers is to explore which identity positions offer the greatest opportunity for social engagement and interaction.

� Conversely, if there are identity positions that silence learners, teachers need to acknowledge and address marginalising teaching practices.

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References� ABS (Australian Bureau of Statistics) 1997, Aspects of literacy: Assessed skill levels,

Australia 1996, ABS, Canberra.� 2004, Measuring social capital: An Australian framework and indicators,

Information paper, cat.no.1378.0, ABS, Canberra� 2007, Adult literacy and life skills survey, summary results, Australia, ABS, Canberra� 2008, Health literacy, Australia, 2006, cat.no.4233.0, ABS, Canberra

� Balatti, J, Black, S & Falk, I 2006, Reframing adult literacy and numeracy course outcomes: A social capital perspective, NCVER, Adelaide

� Balatti, J, Black, S & Falk, I 2007, Teaching for social capital outcomes: The case of adult literacy and numeracy courses’, Australian Journal of Adult Learning, vol.47, no.2, pp.245-63

� Bateson, G 2003, ‘Moving the mountain: Halfway there? A whole city approach to basic skills development’, viewed 8 April 2011, www.coreskills.co.uk/index.html.

� Commonwealth of Australia. 2008, Social inclusion, viewed 8 April 2011, <http://www.deewr.gov.au/Department/SocialInclusion/Pages/default.aspx/>

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References� Cumming, J & Wilson, J 2005, Literacy, numeracy and alternative dispute resolution,

MCVER, Adelaide� Falk, I 2007, ‘What should count as evidence for effective, situated policy?’ in

Researching social capital, lifelong learning regions and the management of place: An international perspective, eds M Oxborne, K Sankey & B Wilson, Routledge Taylor Francis, London, pp. 29-40.

� Falk, I & Kilpatrick, S 2000, ‘What is social capital? A study of a rural community’, Sociologia Ruralis, vol.1, no.40, pp.87-110.

� Field, J & Schuller, T 1997, ‘Norms, networks and trust’, Adult Learning, vol.9, no.3, 17-18.

� Figgis, J 2004, Literate Australia: A whole life approach: Report No. 1: Taking literacy to fresh fields, viewed 8 April September 2011, <www.acal.edu.au/publications_papers.shtml>

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� Hornberger, N. 2000. Multilingual language policies and the continua of biliteracy: An ecological approach Language Policy 1(1): 27-51

� Hornberger, N. & Skilton-Sylvester, E. (2000). Revisiting the Continua of Biliteracy: International and Critical Perspectives. Language and Education, 14(2), 96-122.

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References� Lo Bianco, J. & Wickert, R. 2001. Australian policy activism in language and literacy.

Language Australia Ltd, Melbourne� McGuirk, J. (2001). Adult literacy and numeracy practices 2001: a national shapshot.,

Commonwealth of Australia.� McKenna, R. & Fitzpatrick, L. (2005) Integrated approaches to teaching adult literacy in

Australia: A snapshot of practice in community services. NCVER� National Reporting System (NRS) website, viewed 5 July 2009,

(http://www.nrsweb.org)� Norton, B., & Toohey, K. (2002). Identity and language learning. In R. B. Kaplan (Ed.),

The Oxford handbook of applied linguistics (pp. 115-123). New York: Oxford University Press.

� Ollerhead, S. 2010, Teacher agency and policy response in the adult ESL literacy classroom, TESOL Quarterly, vol. 4 (3) September 2010, pp. 606-618

� Pickering (1995). The Mangle of Practice: Time, Agency and Science, Chicago, University of Chicago Press

� Portes, A 1998, ‘Social capital: Its origins and applications in modern sociology’, Annual Review of Sociology, vol.24, no.1, pp.1-24

� Roberts, C, Cooke, M, Baynham M & Simpson, J. (2007). Adult ESOL in the United Kingdom: Policy and research. Prospect, 22(3), 18-29.

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References� Schuller, T & Field, J 1998, ‘Social capital, human capital and the learning society’,

International Journal of Lifelong Education, vol.17, no.4, pp.226-35� Searle, J. (2002). Policy and Passion in ALBE: A discourse about Discourses. Fine Print,

25(2), 3-12.� Shohamy, E (2006) Language Policy: Hidden agendas and new approaches. Routledge.

Oxon� Street, B.V. (1995). Social Literacies: Critical Approaches to Literacy in Development,

Ethnography and Education. London: Longman.� Stritikus, T. T. (2003). The interrelationship of beliefs, context and learning: The Case

of a Teacher reacting to language policy. Journal of language, identity and education, 2(1), 29-52

� Toohey, K. & Norton, B. (2005). Learner autonomy as agency in sociocultural settings. In D. Palfreyman and R. Smith (eds), Learner Autonomy across Cultures: Language Education Perspectives. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

� Wickert, R & McGuirk, J 2005, Integrating literacies: Using partnerships to build literacy capabilities in communities, NCVER, Adelaide.

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Thank you

susan.ollerhead@student.unsw.edu.au

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