APPROACHES EMPLOYED BY SECONDARY SCHOOLTEACHERS TO TEACHING THE LITERATURECOMPONENTIN ENGLISH

Abstract

The goal of this article is to share the results of a research that aimed to find
out how instructors in several Sabah secondary schools approached teaching the literary
component. Eleven hundred and twenty-two English instructors from fifteen different
urban secondary schools in Sandakan, Sabah participated in the research. The strategies
and activities used in the literature class were detailed, and the rationale for their use was
explained. Using a triangulation approach, we gathered information from three sources:
the questionnaire, classroom observations, and focused interviews. An equal number of
instructors (87 in total) filled out the survey, while a relevant case study included the
four-week observation and subsequent interview of two teachers: one who offered the
English option (a TESL graduate) and another who did not (a history graduate).
According to the results, the most common teaching strategies were paraphrastic writing
(mean = 4.05), information-based writing (mean = 4.04), and moral-philosophical writing
(mean = 3.93). This seems to be in line with the results of the case study, which showed
that the two educators used comparable methods in the classroom. The results highlight
the reality that the amount of pupils in a classroom, the mandated literary materials, the
exam-oriented culture, students' attitudes, and language competency all have a significant
impact on the methods of instruction. If the difficulties are not addressed properly, literary
instruction that seeks to elicit personal responses and appreciations from pupils may be
fruitless.