No abstract

The effective method to teach grammar to students has been a point of disputation between advocates for language acquisition and linguistics. The study investigated the benefits of the Communicative Method of Teaching Grammar (CMTG) in a Higher Secondary School under Thimphu Thromde. The study was based on the constructivist paradigm and adopted a qualitative case study research design. The study involved twelve students and three English teachers selected purposefully from a Higher Secondary School in Thimphu. The data was collected through one-on-one interviews, Focus group discussions (FGDs), and lesson observations. The data collected was analysed employing the thematic analysis procedure of Creswell & Creswell [1]. The findings revealed the benefits of CMTG. The results showed that the benefits of CMTG included enhancing speaking abilities, fostering creativity, comprehensible input, and the ability for effective communication. This study recommends that English teachers pursue professional development in the Communicative Method of Teaching Grammar (CMTG) and maintain an average class size of 20 to 25 students. This study also suggests providing classrooms with a sufficient variety of technologically advanced instruments. The CMTG should be used to teach grammar to students, and relevant stakeholders in education should provide policy recommendations on how to train in-service and pre-service teachers on its use. The benefits of CMTG could be thoroughly investigated in future studies utilizing a quasi-experimental design.

The study aimed to examine the factors affecting the spoken competency of rural and urban students in Bhutanese Middle Secondary schools. The study employed a convergent mixed method design with the data collection tools of classroom observations, student survey questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews with teachers and students. Five English teachers (3 Males, 2 Females) and 243 students (114 Males, 129 Females) from both rural and urban areas participated in the study. The quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive (mean and standard deviation) analysis by means of a statistical package for social science (SPSS) and the qualitative data were analyzed thematically. The results indicated that the spoken competency of rural and urban students is affected by factors both inside and outside of the school. Language teachers, other subject teachers, non-teaching staff such as librarians, peer influence, teaching strategy, and student attitude are the factors. Furthermore, findings showed that there is no English-speaking environment and no strict policies in both rural and urban schools. If there are strict rules and policies with proper follow-up; there will be an improvement in English-spoken competency. The mean difference from quantitative findings displayed that rural students are not encouraged to speak English as much as urban students. The findings also confirm that both rural and urban students do not have adequate opportunities to speak English. Therefore, the findings recommend that despite the difference in family background, parents, as well as teachers, could motivate the students to speak English even outside the school. The finding also recommends that the school could develop substantial policies such as guidelines or language policies at school that will genuinely help students to develop their spoken competency. Moreover, the respective school teacherscreate a conducive environment so as to expose the students to the target language as the teacher is exemplary to create an English-speaking environment.

This study explored the factors affecting higher secondary school students’ attitudes toward learning English as a second language in southern Bhutan. The study intended to investigate factors affecting the attitudes of Bhutanese secondary students towards learning English as the researcher could not locate any studies done by Bhutanese in Bhutan. The study is conducted to identify the factors that influence the attitudes of secondary school students toward English learning and their performance in English. The study employed the convergent parallel mixed-methods design guided by a pragmatic paradigm. The quantitative data consists of randomly administered questionnaires to 302 students from class IX to XII. The qualitative data was collected through focus group students and semi-structured interview teachers. The study employed simple descriptive and inferential statistical analysis for quantitative data and thematic analysis (Braun & Clark, 2018) for qualitative analysis. The findings indicated that secondary school students possess both positive and negative attitudes toward learning English as a second language. Further, the finding indicated that educational factors such as the classroom environment and classroom teaching-learning strategies are found to have influences on students' attitudes towards learning English. The finding also revealed that the authentic and appropriate textbooks and the use of interesting varieties of teaching-learning materials by teachers affect the attitudes of students towards learning English. The home and community environment such as parental support and the opportunities to speak English in the community are also found to have an impact on student's attitudes toward learning English. The finding implies that a positive attitude towards the English language enhances language learning and negative attitude detriments the learning process. The study recommends the school and the teachers create a comfortable and conducive classroom environment and implement appropriate teaching-learning strategies and materials to enhance the positive attitude of students toward learning English as a second language. The study also recommends parents and the community support and encourage the use of English to enhance students' positive attitudes toward learning English.

Aims: To explore how Place-Based Education (PBE) is implemented in teaching English in lower primary class. It also explored on the challenges and opportunities the PBE offers as a teaching-learning approach. Study Design: The qualitative study with an case study design grounded on the social constructivist worldview was used in this study. Methodology: Purposive sampling was used and collected data from twenty-two participants; five face-to-face interviews with teachers and four focus group discussions (FGD) with class II and III students, the data was also collected from one principal and analysed using thematic approach. Results: The literature shows that PBE principles were used in several fields of education for different purposes. Further, research suggests that principles of PBE can help students to engage in a meaningful learning experience using local community resources and boost students’ communication skills. In addition, the findings revealed that English teachers of lower primary classes implemented few principles of PBE such as learner-centered, inquiry-based, and community as classroom. On the other hand, teachers do not used local to global, design thinking and interdisciplinary approach due to time constraint and lack of experiences. Thus, the teachers do not fully utilize the local and community resources due to lack of competencies of teachers in terms of knowledge and skills to implement PBE approaches. Conclusion: The study recommended that teachers be provided with a monthly refresher course on PBE principles to integrate into teaching English. In addition, administrator, parents and teacher colleagues render full support to implement PBE teaching.  Therefore, future research is needed to ascertain how the principles of PBE are effective in helping learners improve academic achievement.