Youth Constructing Their Identities in the English Language Classrooms. Lesson Studies from Selected Secondary Schools in Malaysia

By Faizah Idrus

About the Author

Faizah Idrus completed her Phd in Education in 2012 specifically in Sociolinguistics from The University of Nottingham, United Kingdom. Her PhD thesis was entitled: The Construction of Shared Malaysian Identity in the Malaysian Literature Classrooms. She obtained her Master’s Degree in Professional Studies in Education from The University of Leicester, United Kingdom and her Bachelor’s Degree in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) from The University of Leeds, United Kingdom. She has written numerous articles related to her field of studies. She has written two books and also an Editor of several compilation books. She has more than 30 years’ experience as a primary, secondary school teacher as well as an academic at Higher Education Institutions. Her interests include but not confined to English as a Second Language, Language, identity and Community and Teacher Education, Culturally Responsive Teaching, Cultural Intelligences etc. She is currently an academic at Department of Language and Literacy, Kulliyyah of Education, International Islamic University Malaysia.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Singapore
• Release date: Sep 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9781543766448

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Copyright © 2021 by Faizah Idrus.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Preface

Introduction

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Conclusion

References

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am grateful to several people who have supported me in completing this book. Prof. Netty, thank you for taking time to carefully read the manuscript, Aliah and Cat who have given their advice and painstakingly went through the text page by page. My sincere thanks also go to my Research Assistants who have been at my beck and calls in ensuring the completion of the draft. Finally, my family members who have been supporting me from the start until the production of this book.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Faizah Idrus completed her Phd in Education in 2012 specifically in Sociolinguistics from The University of Nottingham, United Kingdom. Her PhD thesis was entitled: The Construction of Shared Malaysian Identity in the Malaysian Literature Classrooms. She obtained her Master’s Degree in Professional Studies in Education from The University of Leicester, United Kingdom and her Bachelor’s Degree in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) from The University of Leeds, United Kingdom. She has written numerous articles related to her field of studies. She has written two books and also an Editor of several compilation books. She has more than 30 years’ experience as a primary, secondary school teacher as well as an academic at Higher Education Institutions. Her interests include but not confined to English as a Second Language, Language, identity and Community and Teacher Education, Culturally Responsive Teaching, Cultural Intelligences etc. She is currently an academic at Department of Language and Literacy, Kulliyyah of Education, International Islamic University Malaysia.

PREFACE

Identity construction is inevitable no matter where we are. This book draws on how youth construct their identity at different situation, places and time. Thus, the content of the book is applicable to any youth, parents, teachers or academics.

The core of the book revolves around how lesson studies are used to exemplify how these youngsters ‘want’ to be identified and known. These lesson studies are used in language classes particularly the Malaysian Literature and narratives used in these classes are mostly written by local writers. In the same vein, it also discusses the philosophy behind identity construction. The notion of Third Space is apt as in this context, Youth and ‘Third Space’ are inextricably linked.

This book is different from the rest of identity construction books as the lesson studies are real and happened in real classrooms. There will be vignettes in which stories are told and other youth could relate with and perhaps find solace in that they are no different from others out there. Potential readers will range from high-schoolers, teachers, academics, curriculum developers, parents and guardians as well as anyone for leisure reading.

This book proposes the need to construct a shared youth identity, starting from the classroom, which is facilitated by teachers through the use of Malaysian short stories. This proposition, amidst the differences in cultural, religious and beliefs systems, aims to close the ethnic and cultural divide and cultivate widespread inter and intra cultural awareness.

Lesson studies are the medium in which youth identity is exemplified. They mainly accepted the shared identity concept as a basis for classroom practice, whilst teachers had a range of views about this idea. In the conclusion, the book explores the implications of the classroom practices adopted by the teachers as part of the process of constructing a shared youth identity. It also examines the plausibility of and barriers to creating an awareness of the Third Space through the use of narratives produced by local writers, both as a medium for developing the skills to access the Third Space and also as the container of messages about Malaysian society and identity.

How this book differs from other books?

This book specifies the multicultural context in which lesson studies were carried out. Additionally, the language classroom is central.

What new perspective does it offer?

How youth in multicultural contexts and the current technological revolution negotiate their identities especially in the language classrooms.

Who will be interested in this book?

Researchers, Higher Education Institutions, Teachers, Teacher Educators, Curriculum Developers.

The organisation of the book

The book is divided into 3 parts.

Part 1 introduces the title of the book. It starts with the discussion of who youths are, its definitions, some important dilemmas encircling youths in the 21st century as well as during the Covid-19 pandemic. The discussion also accentuates on how youths function in a multicultural contexts. Then, an analysis of the importance of understanding diversity is presented with first identifying the construct of identity. The concept of multi-faceted development of identity is given, and then the elaboration on the diverse distributions of identity is carefully crafted. In addition, the discussion will also touch on the concept of multiculturalism and its elements in the context of a pluralistic society such as Malaysia.

Part 2 deals with the concept of hybridity and the Third Space. These are the core theoretical concepts that underpin this book. It takes the reader from the formulation of hybridity by Bhabha (2004) to the importance of acknowledging the Third Space for youths in classroom teaching and learning.

Part 3 discusses what Lesson Study is, how lesson study is used around the world, and why Lesson Study is used to highlight youths’ identity in the classrooms. Lesson studies are exemplified via the teaching selected Malaysian Short Stories in the English Language classrooms from different authors. These stories are used by the teachers in selected schools around Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. These lesson studies were the product of many conferences between the English Language teachers of 8 Secondary schools in the Klang Valley. Malaysian short stories used by the teachers were carefully selected in which the plots directly or indirectly highlighted youth dilemmas in constructing their identities in the classroom, at home or during social events. The conundrum in the stories are hoped to bring about discussions and arguments on the development of youth identity.

INTRODUCTION

Youth- Who are they?

The core content of this book was initiated by my doctoral thesis that I wrote back in 2011. The title of the thesis was The Construction of Shared Malaysian Identity in the Literature Classrooms. It dealt mainly on how youth constructed their identities in different contexts, especially in the literature classrooms. Hitherto, writing about and with youths has always sparked my interest as they have a lot of stories to tell, dilemmas to worry about, social media predicament, suitable outfit to choose, picking out the best online shopping platforms and the like. But who exactly youth is?

World Health Organisation (WHO) defines ‘Adolescents’ as individuals in the 10-19 years age group and ‘Youth’ as the 15-24 year age group. While ‘Young People’ covers the age range 10-24 years. In their report on ‘Adolescent health in the South-East Asia Region’ WHO stated that the transition from childhood to adulthood involves dramatic physical, sexual, psychological and social developmental changes, all taking place at the same time. In addition to opportunities for development this transition poses risks to their health and wellbeing. It is not wrong to label this phase as tumultuous. Adolescents according to McKeown et al (2015), are not only developing the cognitive abilities that allow for identity construction, but they are also faced with a wide range of choices and increased responsibility. At this time youth have accumulated experiences from across their social ecology which encourage them to actively construct who they are (Mclean & Syed, 2015; Reidy et al., 2015; Umaña-Taylor, Quintana, & Yip, 2014)

The United Nations in their webpage (https://en.unesco.org/youth) defines ‘youth’ as persons aged between 15 and 24. However, this definition is flexible. According to the World Youth Report (2018), there are 1.2 billion young people aged 15 to 24 years, accounting for 16 per cent of the global population. The experience of being young can vary substantially across the world, between countries and regions, and ‘youth’ is therefore often a fluid and changing category. As such, context is always an important guide in UNESCO’s definition of youth. Hence, in the discussion of Youth in this book, secondary school students from the age range of 13-17 are the focus. Thus the word teenagers, youth, teens and students are used interchangeably in this book. However, all these lables given to them are meant for the same group of people, the youth!

Youth and Social Expectations

Moving from childhood to teenager more often than not would be a tumultuous phase of life. Many experience changes not only physically, but emotionally too. This is common especially in the early transformation from childhood to adulthood. There are too many changes in their environment, especially expectations from family and community members as well as, inevitably relationship demands. There are societal expectations that young adults face that may not blend with who they naturally are as a person. This can be really confusing and can alienate them from their peers. They most likely will get bullied for being different and in more extreme cases victims commit suicide.

Schools, on the other hand are not only expected to teach students moral values, but students are expected to live by them, both in, and out of school. These values teach tolerance of different cultural traditions and respect of others, accepting responsibility for their behavior, showing initiative, and development of self-knowledge, self-esteem and self-confidence. Undeniably, these are expected of them since day one at school. Youth will develop their identities based on these said values. (The development of identity construction will be discussed at greater length in the subsequent section).

With the advent of technology, youth development is advancing by leaps and bounds. This evolution or expansion comes with its perks but also plagued with uncertainty and anguish. Social media is now part if not totally ‘their’ lives. Not very long ago Facebook, MySpace. Snapchat, Tmblr and the like were the dominant spaces in youth lives. The most popular social media networks for teen in 2021 are Facebook, Youtube, Whatsapp, Instagram, TikTok, QQ, Telegram (respectively based on percentage) (https://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-ranked-by-number-of-users). These are percentages based on the access of computers and other technological devices owned by youth. Can we imagine the pressure teenagers go through when they do not own any devices to be at par with their friends? This is another reason why they frequent cyber-cafes and other places where they are able to meet the expectations of their fellow buddies. It is well documented that these cyber-cafes are not typically a place where one could be ‘peaceful’ so to speak.

According to Shekar (2009), internet cafe or cyber cafe is a place where people can get connected to the Internet while eating or have a cup of coffee using publicly accessible computer. While the main activity in the cyber cafe is the Internet, such