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For this case study, I have chosen India, specifically Delhi where the majority of the

population speak Hindi with others speaking Urdu, Punjabi and Bengali. Hindi has become

the lingua franca in India and more acceptable through the different social levels. English

is now considered to be more of a ‘door opening key’ rather than giving the social status

that it once did (ET Bureau, The Economic Times, 2022). The acquisition of English can

provide both social and economic opportunities in India and overseas. With the global

expansion of businesses based in countries such as Australia, the UK and Canada,

opportunities for employment have risen and having a strong command of both written and

spoken English would benefit an individual exponentially. As India becomes increasingly

significant in the global economy, there is a greater willingness to become proficient in

English (Chin, Prekash & Azam, 2010). Proficiency in spoken English is particularly

desirable (Pearson, 2024). By enrolling their children in private language schools, parents

would be creating pathways to opportunities not afforded to non-English speakers. The

students are currently attending primary school and aged between 10 and 11 years old.

Typically, they learn their first language, in this case, Hindi, several times a week. They also

attend English lessons as part of their weekly timetable and some learn Urdu as a third

language. The learners are currently working between A2 and B1 of the Common European

Framework, so they are considered to be between basic and independent speakers,

listeners and writers.

Drawing on current teaching experiences, there are several methods that would enhance

and support the L2 learners and this approach of engaging several different pedagogical

approaches would allow for a wider range of effective teaching strategies (Brown and Lee,

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2015). Children aged from 10-11 years have a limited attention span, around 20 to 30

minutes (Shakibaie, 2021), so any activities should be engaging, short and energetic to

maximise learning, retention of concepts and information being taught. Keeping the

learners motivated would also be a challenge. They attend the lessons at the behest of

their parents and, after full days at school, ensuring that the learners are engaged and

motivated could prove challenging. As young learners, the activities they engage in should

encourage them to use the second language without fear, so music, games and song give

them a mix of voices (Lightbown and Spada, 2006) rather than being singled out to speak.

This less formal way of teaching encourages participation.

To encourage engagement, the learners need to be taking part in activities, such as real

world ideas and creative and critical thinking problems where they feel intrinsically

motivated to learn as discussed by Ellis in his Principles of instructed language learning

(Ellis, 2005). Using contextualised themes with these young learners will support them in

creating communicative competence and combining several second language acquisition

teaching methods would encourage and develop language skills. There are significant

overlaps in methodologies (Nagy, 2019) so this supports the notion that a balanced

approach to Second Language Acquistion (SLA) would be a combination of teaching

methods to create a relaxed and informal learning environment. Krashen’s affective filter

hypothesis addresses the need to be aware of the emotional states and feelings of the

learners so SLA can take place. Students who are stressed and tense or bored will

frequently ‘filter’ out input and so acquisition becomes less likely (Lightbown and Spada,

2006). Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) allows for a broad, more informal

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approach toward learning because, by its nature, it is not prescriptive and allows for

teacher interpretation (Johnson and Morrow, 1981) and can also be contextualised to the

learners (Savignon, 2017).

Activities with a group of learners at the A2-B1 levels could be role play, interviews and

analysis of simple news articles and weather forecasts to provide authentic materials,

language games, scrambled sentences and picture strip stories (Johnson and Morrow,

1981). Savignon points out the CLT is not solely the use of face-to-face communication

and that writing and reading activities are of equal importance (Savignon, 2017). These

reading and writing activities though should still be based around authenticity. The use of

authentic materials when using the CLT method is important to stimulate spontaneous

interactions (Nagy, 2019). Materials such as magazine articles, podcast transcripts that

are about subjects the students can engage with, for example, interviews with YouTubers,

actors and musicians would spark their interest and begin those spontaneous

conversations between the children.

These interactions, along with intentional activities are part of Richard Schmidt’s (1990)

noticing hypothesis, where, by developing a self-awareness and noticing the input

(Lightbown and Spada, 2006), the input becomes intake and self-correction occurs (Unlu,

2015). As the students engage in group and partner interactions and tasks, their ability to

correct one another, in a non-judgmental manner, will lessen the anxiety around speaking

the target language, allowing for language acquisition. This interaction supports

Cooperative learning, as a pedagogical approach and builds teams who must work

together to succeed (Brown and Lee, 2015). With students aged 10-11, this kind of
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camaraderie builds trust and confidence and allows the students to both self-correct and

peer correct with no loss of face which is important at this age.

As Brown and Lee point out, language teaching methods have become more eclectic as

further research into L2 acquisition has been done (Brown and Lee, 2015). The

Suggestopedia or accelerated learning method created by Georgi Lozanov, allows learners

to explore language acquisition in a relaxed, non-judgmental manner, immersed in the

target language through role-play, games, music and song as some of the approaches

utilised. Activities where choral speech is used allows for those less confident students to

participate with their peers and there is less fear of mistakes (Ur, 2012). Music, drama and

storytelling are ingrained in the Indian culture and, with the popularity of Bollywood

musical films in Indian culture and Hollywood and Broadway musicals in English speaking

cultures, these types of activities would be fun and encourage participation. Including

these as learning activities, a translation is created between the two cultures (Norris and

Tsedendamba, 2014). Languaculture (Agar, 1994), ties the language with the culture so the

students would be able to acquire an understanding of the emotion these bring out in the

target culture. Language is intertwined with culture and so the activities that the student

would be completing would have focus on rules, values, attitudes and beliefs (Brown and

Lee, 2015). Authentic and up to date digital experiences, such as the use of social media,

would also expose the A2 and B1 learners to the cultural norms of the target language.

Facilitating Zoom or Webex meetings with a partner school in an English speaking country

would provide opportunity for SLA conversation, questioning and exposure to culture. For

this age group, it would also provide the ‘comprehensible input’ that Krashen suggested in

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his input hypothesis (Thornberrry, 2016). This would be another opportunity for some

learners to use language spontaneously in ‘real operating conditions’ (Thornberry, 2005, in

Becker and Roos, 2016).

While the CLT method allows for students to have control over their learning as the main

communicators, it also relies on textbooks and, while they have a place, unless the

activities are relevant, well-structured and coherent, often textbooks can be overwhelming

and confusing for learners. They can also be a very dull and uninteresting way to learn

(Nagy, 2019). Short textbook activities can be chosen as a support to consolidate either a

prior activity or as an extension of a verbal or kinesthetic activity but not as the basis for a

lesson. In Krashen’s Natural approach, textbooks are secondary to authentic language

materials (Nagy, 2019). His input hypothesis discusses input being slightly beyond the

current capabilities of the learners proficiency (Lucas, Villegas & Freedson-Gonzalez,

2008) and discerning selection of input would lead to greater output. This would encourage

extension of the learner’s SLA, but Krashen’s natural approach does not allow for teacher

correction unlike the CLT method where the teacher would facilitate the activities to

encourage student led learning, note any errors and these could be addressed during more

formal, focused activities (Johnson and Morrow, 1981). Until the learners are able to notice

their grammatical and lexical errors, any corrections should be teacher directed to ensure

that any initial misconceptions are dealt with.

Having had extensive experience teaching 10-11 year old primary students, my approach

to teaching has been challenged and has developed through conversations, observations

and collaborations with colleagues throughout my professional career. Students learn

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best when they are given opportunities to converse, explore and create within

contextualised tasks which mirror the CLT method. SLA teaching should involve some level

of immersion in the language through play, music, drama, practical activities such as

cooking, art and conversation but also some more formal, teacher directed tasks to create

‘noticeability’ so that the students begin to self-correct as they recognise errors. It is a mix

of several methodologies that encourages student-based learning with teacher support

but with gradually less direct teacher correction and more student accountability. Student

directed learning encourages a more relaxed approach, independence and autonomy. It is

my firm belief that anxiety that arises from the fear of failure can dramatically hinder the

ability to learn and this is certainly true of SLA.

When students develop the ability to self-correct and notice errors, their confidence grows

and learning becomes more of a natural process with far greater uptake and engagement.

An SLA learning program for this age group that incorporates the approaches discussed

and links not only to the culture of their country but also the pre-teen culture of social

media, YouTube and celebrity, would motivate, excite and engage.

(Word count:1602)

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