Teaching English home language to foundation phase learners from diverse backgrounds

Background: Teaching English as home language (EHL) could be a complicated process in a country like South Africa, where there are eleven official languages operating in a multicultural society. This requires capacitating teachers with appropriate and relevant strategies to strengthen their teaching, especially in the foundation phase.Aim: This paper examines the appropriateness and relevance of the extant strategies for teaching EHL comprehension skills to foundation phase learners from diverse language backgrounds.Setting: This study was conducted in King Cetshwayo District, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.Methods: This was a qualitative case study involving four purposively selected grade one teachers in one urban primary in South Africa. Data were gathered through in-depth interviews, field observations and document analysis. Content analysis was used to analyse the data.Results: The two main findings were that (a) the teaching of EHL comprehensions skills lacked the appropriate strategies, and (b) the teachers faced several challenges – including operating under an unclear policy framework, the paucity of strategies in phonological awareness, and the lack of appropriate reflection images to which the learners could be exposed to improve their skills.Conclusion: The study concludes that adequate and regular professional teacher development programmes and activities are needed to enable teachers to do their work more effectively.Contribution: By closely and systematically examining the strategies used by teachers who were non-native English speakers, to teach EHL to leaners who were also non-native English speakers, this study has made important contributions to both attendant theory and classroom practice.