Enforced online teaching is slowly giving space to teacher fronted education, and we are going to examine how such a reversal as expected is not resulting in the total replacement of online language teaching. English language teachers continue to use online resources to teach selective reading skills (
In this study, it is discussed how the post-pandemic teaching has changed the way language teachers teach and language students learn languages, more specifically reading skills in L2 and to demonstrate why many language teachers have chosen to hybridize their language teaching methodologies. Analyzing the responses from interviews conducted with language teachers and students, it is also shown how we are entering a more target-oriented era of hybrid teaching, where teachers use digital tools to teach some reading skills, and face to face settings to teach other reading skills.
The focus of this study is centered on Pakistani English language teachers and students. These participants have been chosen because online teaching and the resulting hybridization is a relatively new norm for many middle-class students and teachers in the country (
Previous research did not focus on how online education is used for developing some reading skills, and how offline education is used to develop other reading skills. It is the aim of this study to fill the research lacuna by discussing when online and offline methodologies are used to teach specific reading skills in the target language, English, to undergraduates. In this study, reading skills, such as reading fluency and intensive reading comprehension are examined to demonstrate which reading skills are taught online, and which reading skills are taught offline, or in the hybrid manner.
Many researchers have studied the phenomenon of transitioning to online education during the pandemic (
Research on prepared teachers’ expectations and experiences with online teaching during the pandemic was also conducted in Netherlands. A survey of 200 Dutch teachers showed “a significant change in the perception of teachers regarding their resolutions to implement technology in their lessons in the post-corona era” (
In his qualitative interview-based study of 59 teachers and principals,
Some researchers have investigated teaching of language through online platforms in different contexts. According to
Some studies have shown how L2 reading skills can be taught using digital devices (
This study was based on semi-structured interviews conducted with teachers and students of English in Pakistan’s Sindh province. The interviews of the participants were conducted in January, 2022. Before conducting interviews, the participants were briefly informed about the study and its aims. The participants were contacted one by one via WhatsApp, and they were asked relevant questions. The participants responded either by recording voice notes or by typing WhatsApp messages.
A short WhatsApp message inviting participation for this study was sent to twenty English language teachers and twenty English language students. These participants were on the researchers’ contact list. However, fifteen English language teachers and ten students of English were selected for this study because at the time of this study, the teacher participants and the student participants were engaged in teaching and learning of L2 reading skills respectively.
Purposive sampling technique was used to select 15 English language teachers from Pakistan’s universities and 10 students of English language were also chosen from these universities. According to
Semi-structured interviews were used as instruments to collect data from the participants. Semi-structured interviews were used because these were helpful in exploring in-depth responses (
Questions were sent as voice notes via WhatsApp, which were responded by the participants. Typed questions were sent to some of the participants (two teachers and two students), and they sent typed answers via WhatsApp. The language of the interviews was English. To encourage detailed answers, probes were also used through follow up messages. A total of 10 questions were sent to the participants.
Students were invited to share their responses regarding selective choice of language teaching methodologies by their teachers. For instance, which teaching methodologies for teaching reading do you find effective? Reading skills, such as scanning, intensive reading, word identification, and reading fluency were described to the student participants. Scanning was defined as a type of reading that involves focusing on a specific aspect/theme/feature in a text. Intensive reading was defined as a type of reading focused on both major and minor details in a text. Word identification was defined as an act of identifying a class of a word when reading a text. This included identifying whether a word is a noun, an adjective, a verb, or an adverb, etc. Reading fluency was defined as the ability to read with speed, accuracy, and proper expression.
The participants gave detailed answers using WhatsApp voice notes and texts. These voice notes were manually transcribed. The participants’ responses were qualitatively analyzed drawing upon
In this section, research findings are presented and analyzed based on two broader themes:
In this sub-segment, teachers’ responses in relation to teaching of reading skills are discussed based on two sub-themes:
Reading skills, such as reading fluency which means the ability to read with speed, accuracy, and proper expression, are taught using offline means in the teacher fronted classrooms. Why teachers do this is discussed in this section.
Shafquat: “Since it focuses on individual involvement and increased attention, I teach reading fluency to my students in the face-to-face classes. I am unable to provide more focused support in online domains”.
Muzaffar: “This requires more practice that’s why it is easier to teach reading fluency in face-to-face classroom. I am doing this in my class, though for some other language skills I may, when necessary, use online sources and platforms, such as Zoom, Eventbrite, etc.”.
When it comes to teaching reading fluency, many teachers prefer face-to-face language teaching to online language teaching strategies. Shafquat confirms this fact, and states two reasons for doing this. The first reason relates to individual involvement, and the second reason concerns increased focus by the teacher required in improving reading fluency of the learners. Thus, face-to-face interaction is preferred when teaching reading fluency because it is said to facilitate individual participation and increased focus. According to
Muzaffar also shows that learning reading fluency in physical, teacher fronted classrooms is much easier because students get more opportunities to practice, which may not be the case in online language teaching. Muzaffar also mentions that there may be an opportunity to use online language teaching methodologies. In the words of
Intensive reading refers to the type of reading where students are asked to read and note all details-minor and major- in a text. Teacher participants’ responses regarding using offline ways of teaching intensive comprehensive reading strategy are presented and discussed in this section.
Shima: “Intensive reading comprehension requires more time, energy and focus which may not be applied in online contexts. Every individual need special care/teaching and perhaps different reading extracts are needed to suit learners’ reading interests. In online domains, I just cannot impose a text and ask students to read it carefully. I like to ask students to choose their interesting extracts and read them intensively and I ask questions to check their intensive reading comprehension”.
Kashif: “For intensive reading and teaching it is a skill, offline ways of teaching are the best. If need be, I will switch to online sources. There is no coercion, so I do what I feel my students like and easily learn”.
Shima says that intensive reading comprehension can be developed in a better way if taught in face-to-face classrooms. The reason stated is that it requires more time, energy and focus which may not be possible in online domains. Moreover, developing this skill needs special language teaching care, and creating interest among students, which may not be easy in online contexts. However, in offline teaching, many texts are not easily available as compared to their availability in online language teaching. Kashif shows a tendency towards hybridization of language teaching methodologies because it can allow him to combine both the traditional and online teaching methodologies to achieve his teaching goals effectively. In the words of
Students also shared their views of the learning of reading skills using offline ways. Their responses are given here. For the students who did not understand ‘reading fluency’ and ‘intensive reading comprehension’, the terms were explained. Reading fluency was defined as the ability to read with speed, accuracy, and proper expression, while intensive reading was defined as a skill of reading that involves intensive focus on both minor and major details when reading a text.
Aamir: “I want to practice my reading fluency in front of my teacher to know if I am reading right and punctuating at the right place. This is done better in the physical classes”.
Asad: “Reading fluency and accuracy comes when we are constantly monitored by our teachers in face-to-face teaching. In online teaching, every student may not get equal chance due to the slow net or other problems”.
Junaid: “Intensive reading in students can be developed by a teacher’s intensive guidance possible only in offline domains. We live in interior Baluchistan (Pakistan’s province), and we don’t have a good network connection to develop and practice such intensive skills”
Responses given by student participants show that teacher’s guidance and monitoring are important techniques to help students develop their pronunciation. Incidentally, it should be mentioned here that for learners’ reading skills appear to focus on pronunciation, while for the teacher’s reading comprehension appears to focus on understanding of texts, and that is why
Junaid says that digital divide can pose challenges to make online learning effective. Therefore, the learner supports offline face-to-face teaching, when it comes to teaching reading comprehension and other skills. Reading skills focused in the online domain are now discussed.
Reading skills focused on in the online domain are now discussed.
Scanning is the process of quickly reading a text focusing on a particular piece of information, figures, names, etc. For instance, a scanning exercise can involve students focus on looking for words which learners do not know. A total of 7 teachers stated that they like to use online sources and digital tools for teaching reading skills, for scanning, and word identification. The teachers’ responses are given below:
Sara Khan: “I use PowerPoint slides and these slides include either short stories or essays. The PowerPoint slides contain extracts taken from these sources. I do some scaffolding and allow students to scan the texts. When I invite my colleagues to give a talk on the topic, slides are shared using Eventbrite, Zoom, Microsoft Teams and other online platforms”.
Abdul Wahid: “Online resources are multiple and there are many options of sharing readings from a wide range of contexts. Such readings can develop scanning skills of students. I am of the view that such wider options of sharing online readings cannot occur when teaching only takes place in offline domains and there is no recourse to online sources”.
Mansoor Ahmed: “I recommend and share online websites using email or WhatsApp with my students and share many interesting readings to enhance their scanning skills”
Sara says that she used online platforms, such as Zoom, Eventbrite, and Microsoft Teams to teach the skill of scanning to her students. PowerPoint slides are often shared via these online platforms when an invited teacher gives a talk from a distant area. Mansoor says that he used email and WhatsApp to send required readings to his students. Since these tools are connected with the internet and give access to online websites via the links shared, these can be described as online tools of teaching.
Sara used PowerPoint slides as an online teaching methodology along with scaffolding technique to share ideas about how to scan a text. Scaffolding refers to the support given by teachers to their students as students develop new concepts or skills. For instance, a teacher responded that she plays online videos on a multimedia screen to help students understand what scanning is and how it is done. This type of support using online videos is also a type of scaffolding. Sara shared excerpts using slides taken from short stories and essays to help her students practice the skill of scanning. Using these online platforms and pedagogical tools shows what
Teacher respondents’ answers in relation to the use of online resources and platforms for teaching scanning skills and word identification skills (identifying whether a word is a noun, verb, adjective, adverb, etc.) follow.
In this context, word identification refers to the act of identifying a class of a word whether a word is a noun, verb, etc. For instance, teacher shares some sentences/reading texts and ask students to identify nouns, verbs, or other parts of speech. In this sub-section, the teacher participants’ responses about teaching the reading skill of identifying parts of speech are presented and discussed. See below.
Saleem: “Although things have become normal, and I now take physical classes but the things that I learnt when teaching online during the pandemic are here to stay. For instance, I used Zoom in an effective way to teach word identification to my students. Though they struggle in English, I switch to the basics. Using Zoom cursor, I point to a highlighted word on the shared screen and ask my students to identify it. Using Zoom features, the students raise their hands, and I successively ask many students to unmute themselves and answer my questions”.
Aijaz: “I invite many teachers online who share e-board using Eventbrite and teach reading skills to my students. The students learn how to read by identifying parts of speech, such as verbs”.
Saleem says that when the lockdown was eased, teacher fronted classrooms became a norm. However, using online platforms, such as Zoom to teach word identification to students was retained as an effective, online pedagogical tool, because as the response shows, it enabled students to participate in the learning activity by using raising hand and unmuting options in Zoom.
Aijaz uses, with the assistance of other teachers, e-board as methodology to teach the reading skill of word identification to his students. Such maintenance of online teaching techniques in the post-corona era shows what van der Spoel et al.
Students’ responses in relation to the use of online resources for teaching reading comprehension (scanning) and word identification were also recorded, and these are now presented in this section. Many of the responses correspond to the responses given by the teachers, and coherent patterns and congruent progression can be noticed in the responses given by both students and teachers. However, there were some exceptions. For instance, a student respondent discussed how digital divide can make learning online a challenging task for many students living in underdeveloped areas.
Ahmed: “Before the virus came, we had face-to-face classes. But the virus changed everything. Our universities were closed, and lockdowns were imposed. We switched to online classes. At first, we struggled, but slowly we grew accustomed to it. Our teachers would share many reading sources and we were given opportunities to discuss our reading comprehension skills with teachers and students from different contexts. That became possible due to online teaching, and we learnt reading effectively. Even after reopening of schools online teaching of reading continues (scanning)”.
Minhaj: “Reading comprehension, such as scanning became visually attractive. Beautiful slides that contained reading material were used to help us learn comprehension and other reading skills. Even after the pandemic, we ask our teachers to use slides to teach us reading comprehension and other skills. By other skills I mean reading to understand meaning and skimming, etc.—Sometimes, we use e-dictionaries to help us understand meaning of difficult words when reading a text”.
Lutf: “After the reopening of classes, I was digitally literate. Everyone else had become a digitally competent person. We chose to use these skills for learning English language skills, such as comprehension and word identification”.
Abid: “Learning became more hybrid. Now, we are digitally prepared to cope with educational crises because some of our language skills, we learn online, and these include the word identification skills easily”.
Ahmed implicitly shows that the outbreak of the pandemic changed the ways of language teaching in different contexts. Classes moved to online platforms, while after the lockdowns were lifted, traditional classes commenced. However, the effects of the online language teaching methodologies used during the pandemic are going to stay for a longtime, especially if they help both teachers and students achieve their teaching and learning goals respectively. In the same vein, Ahmed says that their teachers have chosen to teach scanning using online teaching methodologies.
Minhaj refers to the phenomenon of collaboration used by learners as a strategy in online language teaching methodology. According to the participant who gave the response, online slides shared via online platforms allow students to share their process of learning and engage in the act of collaborative learning, which in the words of
The responses given by Lutf and Abid can be examined as two of the main reasons why online teaching has been maintained in the post-corona era for teaching certain reading skills. Lutf shows that during the lockdown, many students and teachers had developed digital literacy, and many teachers and students wanted to maintain it, and thus they continued using online language teaching methodologies. In addition to digital literacy, online teaching via Zoom and other platforms made word identification skill much easier, therefore, online language teaching was even used after the physical classes commenced (see response of Abid). According to
Reading involves a range of skills. These include comprehension, decoding, reading fluency, word identification, scanning, skimming, etc. The reading skills focused on in this research include intensive reading, scanning, reading fluency, and word identification. The teacher respondents in this pilot study are selectively using online and offline resources depending on the reading skill to be taught. For a reading skill to be taught, a text is necessary. It appears that online sources though they may provide a range of reading texts may not cater to the personal interests of learners who may want to select their diaries, etc. As for scanning, teachers preferred using online platforms, such as Zoom, Eventbrite, Microsoft Teams for teaching reading. They also shared a wide range of reading texts with students via either email or WhatsApp. They mostly used PowerPoint as a tool to make online learning happen, especially when invited guest speakers were taken on board. Much like scanning, the reading skill of word identification was also taught online.
Learners also responded that they have developed digital literacy because online teaching is becoming a norm. They sometimes even asked their teachers to employ online tools and share videos related to reading skills of scanning and word identification. This shows how learners, much like teachers, had adjusted to the new ways of learning. As for intensive reading and reading fluency, teachers used face-to-face language teaching methodologies. The reasons of doing this related to more focus and care required in these two reading skills. Individual needs of students were also realized by teachers, and thus they preferred teaching these skills in teacher-fronted classrooms.
Students were also comfortable with these methodologies because they were of the view that in teacher fronted classrooms, their intensive reading skills and reading fluency could be better monitored by their teachers. This shows how both students and their teachers had adjusted to both online and face-to-face teaching methodologies to teach specific reading skills. In this study, it was discussed how teachers use different language teaching methodologies to teach different language reading skills, such as scanning, word identification, reading fluency and intensive reading. Teachers used online platforms, such as Zoom, Eventbrite, and Microsoft Teams to teach scanning and word identification skills, while they taught reading fluency and intensive reading in the teacher fronted classrooms.
Much like previous findings (
Much like teachers, students also preferred different modes of language teaching and positively responded to the ways of teaching used by teachers. Unlike other researchers’ findings that focused on teachers using online language teaching to develop students’ language skills (
The pandemic has made teachers and learners aware of the range of media that can be used online. Much like previous findings (
It is hoped that language teachers will use appropriate methodologies online or offline to teach specific language skills not only in reading but also in the teaching of writing, speaking, and listening skills. It is also hoped that there will be efforts taken by teachers to match their preferences to the preferences of their students.
Although this study used a limited sample, much bigger sample could be used to report same findings and draw similar conclusions. This study will help many teachers to decide which teaching methodologies should be used when teaching a specific reading skill. It will help both teachers and students to make intelligent and suitable use of teaching and learning methodologies when dealing with a reading skill.