A Case Study of Two Groups of A1 Level Students in English

Abstract

This study attempts to examine differentiated instruction and its implications in the teaching of oracy skills to young EFL learners. Within this aim, the EFL educational context investigated upon, was a private language centre in Greece where differentiated teaching approaches were applied to enhance students’ oral and aural skills through the implementation of a task-based pedagogical intervention. Two groups of monolingual Greek students, were tested in English through a pre-test, which was of an A1 level, according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). There was a sample of eight students (N=8) in the control group and eight students (N=8) in the experimental group. The control group was taught through a conventional coursebook-based syllabus, whereas the experimental group was taught through differentiated instruction. The comparison between the two groups revealed that the performance achieved by the students of the experimental group was significantly higher. The results, of this research, suggest that the pedagogical intervention used in the experimental group aided the development of students’ oral and aural skills.