High School ESLL Teachers' Understanding, Attitudes, and Implementation of the Whole Language Philosophy

Abstract

This study examined eighteen high school ESLL teachers' understanding, attitudes, and implementation of the whole language philosophy. The data gathered from a survey suggest that the teachers were generally aware of and had attitudes that supported the whole language philosophy. The third objective, implementation of whole language philosophy, did not prove to be as supportive as the other two objectives. Because whole language is a philosophy that drives classroom practices, it is difficult to provide an exact profile of what a whole language teacher looks like. However, the teachers who participated in this study were not "wholly" whole language teachers. Instead, they were integrating some whole language principles to other teaching/learning approaches. The teachers generally had three misconceptions and they were: 1) Teachers construct meaning for the students; 2) Assessment for whole language teachers objective and simple; 3) Some teachers believed that if they follow some of the whole language principles, then they were whole language teachers.