Publication Date

1980

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT)

First Advisor

Patrick R. Moran

Abstract

This project delineates an approach to ESOL that combines the teaching and learning of English with the facilitation of growth in self and cultural awareness - a greater knowledge of one's self and one's cultural molding. This approach involves the examination by students of items from American media, to understand what such items say, what they imply about American culture and for students' own culture (s), and what these implications mean for students themselves. The instructor facilitates this process through the progressive asking of questions - thus the name 'the questioning process' - and simultaneously monitors language usage by students' discussion for use in subsequent language instruction.

The approach delineated in this project evolves from the author's concerns over the political and cultural implications of ESOL. The project's preface is an analysis, subjective in tone, of global evolution, and of the role of American and of ESOL in that evolution. The project's chapters form an objective response to the subjective questions raised by the preface - an approach to ESOL based on the Socratic method, delineated through a set of specific techniques and procedures in the ESOL classroom, and through a set of examples of and materials for this approach. The project's appendix is a narrative of some potentially helpful personal experiences using this approach.

The project is designed to be of use both to those ESOL teachers who wish to use only its techniques and materials, and to those who wish to consider it in depth, as a philosophically-thought-out approach to teaching ESOL.

Disciplines

Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education | Curriculum and Instruction | Teacher Education and Professional Development

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