The Cultural Responsiveness of the Communicative and Task-Based Instructional Approaches to African English Language Learners in a College ESL Classroom: A Qualitative Case Study

Abstract

In the United States school education system, there are students who are identified as English Language Learners (ELLs). ELLs are multilingual students who speak any other language apart from English at home. While majority of the ELLs are born in the United States, a few of them are immigrants from different parts of the world who later joined the US school system (Zong and Batalova, 2015), and this study focuses on the latter student populations at a college level. Various second language teaching approaches are often utilized by language teachers to make their classroom instructions effective. Lightbown & Spada (2013) state communicative, task-based and content-based instructions, which appear to be commonly used when compared to the grammar translation and audiolingual approaches. The former instructions provide a ground for students to interact, converse, and communicate using the target language, and the students are expected to actively engage in the class discussions and interactions while the teacher facilitates them (Lightbown & Spada, 2013). However, little is known how culturally responsive the communicative and task-based instructions are to African ELLs in a college English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom in the Midwest. In order to address this gab, five African ELLs were selected based on convenience sampling and data were gathered through semi-structured interview and focus-group discussion. After analyzing the data through Miles and Huberman’s (1994) qualitative data analysis procedures, the following findings were reported. The cultural identity of the African ELLs did not seem to align with the principles of communicative and task-based instructional approaches, as the ELLs were raised to speak less but to listen more, avoid eye contact, and keep their head down when conversing as a sign of respect to the teachers. These elements of African cultural identity appeared to inhibit the ELLs from participating freely and actively in the English conversations, interactions, and group works in a college ESL classroom in the Midwest, United States. The study concludes that the communicative and task-based instructions should be culturally responsive to meet the unique needs of the African ELLs in a college ESL classroom.