Communicative language teaching for Thai EFL students and classroom silences in English medium instruction

Chatchawan Chaiyasat
Ramkhamhaeng University, Thailand
Arthit Intakaew
Rajapark Institute, Thailand

The subject of psychological and sociocultural factors influencing English language learning has attracted a great deal of pedagogy researchers' attention. The purpose of this experimental research was to investigate Thai EFL students' silence in the classroom during the pre-and-post implementation of the communicative language teaching approach in an English-medium instruction program in a Thai university context, and to explore the underlying reasons behind this phenomenon. A purposive sampling technique was used to recruit 53 first-year students at an autonomous public university where English is employed as a medium of instruction. A mixed-methods approach to the collection and analysis of data was employed. The findings suggest that the level of silence shown by the students in the classroom environment after the communicative language teaching (CLT) approach had been implemented, was lower than the level of silence experienced in the class prior to the CLT approach being implemented. The significant reasons regarding the students, the teacher, and the Thai cultural concept behind this decrease in students' silence, and the pedagogical implications of that result, are discussed.
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Authors: Chatchawan Chaiyasat is a lecturer at the Institute of International Studies, Ramkhamhaeng University (IIS-RU), Bangkok, Thailand. Also, he is a PhD candidate in Human Resource and Organization Development (International Program) at the Graduate School of Human Resource Development, National Institute of Development Administration (NIDA), Bangkok, Thailand. His research interests are discourse analysis, metaphor study, corpus linguistics, English for specific purposes, cross-cultural communication, cross-cultural management, human resource development (HRD), business ethics, leadership, corporate sustainability and responsibility, equality and diversity, training and development, and employee well-being. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1882-5997 Email: chatchawanchaiyasat@gmail.com Dr Arthit Intakaew is currently a lecturer at the Department of International Language Teaching, the Faculty of Education, Silpakorn University, Nakhon Pathom, Thailand. His research interests are English language teaching, English for specific purposes, language testing and evaluation, research methodology, psychometrics, quantitative and qualitative research, mixed-methods research, passenger ground service, research methodology in airlines business and tourism management, and tourist guides. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6533-3485 Email: frenchkid390@gmail.com Please cite as: Chaiyasat, C. & Intakaew, A. (2023). Communicative language teaching for Thai EFL students and classroom silences in English medium instruction. Issues in Educational Research, 33(4), 1324-1341. http://www.iier.org.au/iier33/chaiyasat.pdf