Exploring English Medium of Instruction for FET Mathematics Content Teachers: Teaching Pedagogy

Abstract

South Africa is a diverse country which consists of vast multimodalities such as multicultural and multilingual practices and standards. This diversity is integrated into various economic sectors whereby the common practices must be assimilated to achieve specific goals. Therefore, the educational sector is not immune from assimilating these diverse cultural and linguistic practices; hence the language of learning and teaching (LOLT), informed by the geographical location of the dominating dialect, is adopted to enhance the teaching and learning. Conversely, when learners transit from one phase or grade to the other, the LOLT become a learning barrier because English as medium of instruction (EMI) is used as the first additional and/or second language (FAL/L2). As a result, learners grapple with the conceptualisation of subject matter. Using participatory action research (PAR), this paper analyses the use of English as a medium of instruction for Mathematics content teachers in further education and training (FET) where ten (10) FET teachers and five (5) learners were purposively sampled. Structured interviews were conducted to generate qualitative data. In addition, critical discourse analysis (CDA) was employed to analyse the findings. In brief, the paper established that the relevant language and culture of a particular vicinity and the indigenous knowledge system (IKS) derived from traditional games have a direct impact on the development of the pedagogical content knowledge of Mathematics content and aid the acquisition of English as a second language. Therefore, the study established that English as a medium of instruction exposes learners to the international community and leverages their subject content teaching pedagogy across all critical subjects such as Mathematics.