A Study on the Mandatory Activity Based Oral English (ABOE) Course: Prospective Teacher and Teacher-Educator Perceptions

Abstract

The teaching of English language has been problematic in Sri Lanka for decades. Considering this, a new program named ABOE; Activity Based Oral English was launched using integrated approach to teach oral English language skills to primary school students through environmental activities. ABOE is to be conducted by a primary class teacher and not by a separate English teacher. Therefore, primary teachers have to be familiar with vocabulary, phrases and simple expressions related to different themes of Environmental Related Activities (ERA). The main aim of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of the ABOE course taught at the teacher training college while investigating the challenges and the perceptions of both prospective teachers and teacher-educators in following ABOE. The required data will be gathered by evaluating the ABOE course syllabus taught for the prospective teachers at the training college. To investigate the challenges and perceptions, semistructured interviews will be carried out for 5-10 prospective teachers, selected through convenient sampling method until data saturation is reached and for all four teacher-educators of Hapitigam National College of Education. This exploratory study will use a qualitative data analysis method. The effectiveness of the ABOE course will be analyzed by using the Peacock’s model (2009) and the findings of the semi-structured interviews will be analyzed thematically. Moreover, classroom observations will be carried out to gather further information. The key results of this study will benefit the national education sector to find solutions to the challenges faced by both the prospective teachers and teacher-educators in following ABOE in the future along with altering the current syllabus if necessary.