Making sense of ESOL policy: Tutor perspectives

Abstract

This paper explores tutor perspectives on ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) learners in the UK. Government policy towards ESOL is increasingly driven by an ideology in which citizenship is conflated with the acquisition of English language skills. Underpinning this way of thinking are concepts of Othering and deficiency. My research aimed to investigate how tutors “make sense” (Spours, Coffield, & Gregson, 2007; James & Biesta, 2007) of ESOL policy in the UK, how this informs tutors’ attitudes towards English language learners, and to understand the potential impact that such attitudes could have on learners. The study demonstrates that tutors are influenced in their attitudes towards their learners by the persistent external issues of funding and the contradictory discourse implicit in ESOL policy. Such attitudes can have a tangible effect on learners.

Keywords

• deficiency
• ESOL
• ESOL teaching
• Othering