MULTILITERACIES AND THE PEDAGOGY OF EMPOWERMENT: THE PERSPECTIVE OF SAUDI FEMALE STUDENTS
Abstract
This paper presents a new approach to teaching in the ESL classroom, one that employs multiliteracies pedagogy (MP) which is an approach that we consider to be significant for empowering Saudi female students in a context where English-language teaching must be responsive to the local culture and realities and must be driven by local needs. This is an action research project that was conducted within the female division of a private university in Saudi Arabia. Results show that multiliteracies pedagogy is a useful conceptual lens to employ in a second-language classroom in order to empower students and help them to find their education to be meaningful. Suggestions are offered for enhancing students’ second-language learning and for empowering them by means of this pedagogy. The pedagogical implications for classroom teaching include the recruitment of local female role models, the use of the students’ first language and the role of the teacher as a facilitator.
References
Notes
World Bank, Literacy in the Middle East (Geneva: United Nations, 2002).
Courtney Cazden et al., “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” Harvard Educational Review 66(1)(1996):60-92.
Cazden et al, “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” 60-92.
Tariq Elyas, “The Attitude of American English within the Saudi Education System” Novitas-ROYAL (Research on yourth and language), 2(1) (2008).
Cazden et al., “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” 60-92.
Lydia Le, “Theory & Practice of Literacy - Multiliteracies pedagogy”, accessed April 9, 2016, https://sites.google.com/site/lydialeutstpl/multiliteracies-pedagogy.
Shampa Biswas, “How to Teach Multiliteracies?” The Canadian Journal for Teacher Research (2014), accessed April 2, 2016, http://www.teacherresearch.ca/blog/article/2014/07/03/245-how-to-teach-multiliteracies.
Michael Newman, The Designs of Academic Literacy: A multiliteracies examination of academic achievement. (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002).
Biswas, Shampa. “How to Teach Multiliteracies?”.
Cazden et al., “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” 60.
Amani K. Hamdan, “The Road to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Expatriate Teachers’ Pedagogical Practices in the Cultural Context of Saudi Arabian Higher Education,” McGill Journal of Education [H.W. Wilson - EDUC], 49 (2014): 201-226.
Higher Education Report, 2009, available from https://www.mohe.gov.sa/en/Ministry/Deputy-Ministry-for-Educational-Affairs/Documents/Higher-Ed-Report-June-09-en.pdf.
Amani K. Hamdan, “Reforming Higher Education in Saudi Arabia: Reasons for Optimism” in Fatima Badry and Jonn Willoughby (Eds.) Higher Education Revolution in the Gulf: Globalization and institutional viability. (London: Routledge, 2014):153-178.
André Mazawi, “Public Arab Gulf universities” in P. G. Altback (Ed.) The Decline of the Guru: The Academic Profession in the Third World. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003): 231-270.
15. Tariq Elyas and Michelle Picard, “Saudi Arabian Educational History: Impacts on English Language Teaching. Education,” Business and Society: Contemporary Middle Eastern Issues 3(1)(2010):136–145.
Ghadah Al Murshidi, “The impact of American students and teachers on Gulf students’ academic success,” Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 4, (8)(2014):1576-1585.
Kristina Robertson, “Connect students’ background knowledge to content in the ELL classroom”, accessed on April 9, 2016, http://www.colorincolorado.org/article/connect-students-background-knowledge-content-ell-classroom.
Constance Lavoie et al., “Multiliteracies Pedagogy in Language Teaching: An Example from an Innu Community in Quebec,” Canadian Journal of Native Education, 35(1)(2012):194-224).
Cazden et al. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” (60-92).
Cazden et al. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” (60-92).
Lavoie et al., “Multiliteracies Pedagogy in Language Teaching: An Example from an Innu Community in Quebec,” (2012):196.
Lavoie et al., “Multiliteracies Pedagogy in Language Teaching: An Example from an Innu Community in Quebec”.
Muhammad Raji Zughoul, “Globalization and EFL/ESL Pedagogy in the Arab world,” Journal of Language and Learning 1(2)(2003):145.
Tope Omoniyi, “Local Policies and Global Gorces: “Multiliteracies through Africa’s Indigenous Languages”. Language Policy, 2(2)(2003):133-152.
Lavoie et al.,“Multiliteracies Pedagogy in Language Teaching: An Example from an Innu Community in Quebec”.
Hamdan, “The Road to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Expatriate Teachers’ Pedagogical Practices in the Cultural Context of Saudi Arabian Higher Education”.
Carol Ann Tomlinson, “Mapping a Route toward a Differentiated Instruction,” Educational Leadership 57(1)(1999):12.
Melville Jean Herskovits, Man and His Works. (New York: Knops, 1950), 76.
Hamdan, “The Road to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Expatriate Teachers’ Pedagogical Practices in the Cultural Context of Saudi Arabian Higher Education”.
Geneva Gay. Culturally Responsive Teaching: Theory, Research, and Practice. 2nd Edition. New York: Teachers College Press, 2000.
Aylia Khulaif Alshammari. “Developing the English Curriculum in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: Possibilities and Challenges” Arab World English Journal (AWEJ), 6(4)(2015):369.
Ahmar Mahboob and Tariq Elyas “English in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” World Englishes, 33(1)(2014):138.
Ahmar Mahboob and Ruth Golden “Looking for Native Speakers of English: Discrimination in English Language Teaching Job Advertisements,” Voices in Asia Journal 1(1)(2013):72-81.
Ahmer Mahboob and Brian Paltridge, Critical Discourse Analysis and Critical Applied Linguistics (New York: Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 2013).
Tariq Rahman. “The impact of European languages in former colonial territories: the case of English in Pakistan. Keynote Address from Language Communities or Cultural Empires?” The Impact of European Languages in Former Colonial Territories Conference. (Institute of European Studies at U.C. Berkeley, 2005):22.
Cazden et al. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” (60-92).
Patrick J. M. Costello, Action Research. (London: Continuum, 2003).
Lev. S. Vygotsky, Thought and Language. (Cambridge [Mass]: M.I.T. Press, 1962).
Cazden et al. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures”.
Cazden et al. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” 84.
Veronica A. Thurmond, “The Point of Triangulation,” Journal of Nursing Scholarship 33(3)(2001):254.
Lisa A. Guion, David C. Diehl and Debra McDonald, Triangulation: Establishing the validity of Qualitative Studies. (Gainesville, FL: University of Florida, 2011), accessed on April 13, 2014, http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/fy394.
Thurmond, “The Point of Triangulation,” 253-258.
Kathy Ann Mills,. Multiliteracies: a critical ethnography. (Brisbane: School of Education, Queensland University of Technology, 2006.
Lev S. Vygotsky, Mind in Society: Development of Higher Psychological Processes. (Harvard University Press, 1978):86.
Alaster Pennycook (1999). “Introduction: Critical Approach to TESOL,” TESOL Quarterly, 33(3)(1999):329-345.
Cazden et al. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures,” (60-92).
