In an age which is as transformational as it is transforming, education needs to evolve to remain effective and productive.
Traditional teaching methods tend to rely heavily on content learning from textbooks. However, these are no longer sufficient to engage learners today. This is true for many areas, including language learning.
Research has shown that language is best learnt when used in real life contexts, not by rote learning grammar or sentence rules.
In fact, today, English, as other languages, is used primarily for communication purposes and this has changed the way that it is taught in schools and institutes of higher education.
An effective way to include real world opportunities to learn language is by using linguistic landscapes. This basically means using the visible language around us: street signs, billboards, shop names, and even digital displays. In linguistic landscape research, these are considered to be texts.
In a research conducted by a team at Sultan Qaboos University, such linguistic landscapes are being investigated for their potential for language learning, as well as for more advanced linguistics studies. In fact, such studies are of direct relevance to urban designers, tourism specialists, as well as policy-makers.
The team explored various centres of tourist and heritage importance in Muscat and surrounding areas to investigate ways in which the signs around these places could help to develop English language proficiency among undergraduate students.
According to Dr Victoria Tuzlukova, the principal investigator of this project, the study “began with a detailed assessment of the number of languages present, their distribution and the structural features of bilingual signage, based on their digital images. At the qualitative stage, the signs were further categorised and interpreted in relation to their potential for inclusive task-based English language teaching and collaborative experiential learning.”
The study was divided into 4 stages: a pre-visit linguistic awareness task, an on-site or virtual language collection task, a post-visit collaborative meaning-making task and finally, a role-play and simulation task.
Through all stages, students were made aware of language use around them, through hoardings, street signs and boards on heritage buildings. They would then either be taken to such a site or they would digitally explore a unique place, usually in groups.
The teams would then come together to share their findings on the way that language is used, identifying important and frequently used words and phrases, documenting them and creating a reading list with meanings.
The project concluded that using the linguistic landscape as a teaching and learning tool enhances engagement. Students feel more motivated when learning is connected to their surroundings and personal experiences. Instead of memorising isolated words from a textbook, they interact with meaningful language-in-use which they encounter daily. This approach also supports experiential learning, where students actively construct knowledge rather than passively receiving information.
Increasingly, innovative teaching methods are becoming vital to rethinking education. By embracing approaches like the use of linguistic landscapes, educators can create dynamic, inclusive and effective learning environments that prepare students not only to learn English, but to use it confidently in everyday life.
SANDHYA RAO MEHTA
The writer is Associate Professor, Sultan Qaboos University
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
