Introduction

The “Global Englishes” (GE) paradigm is situated within the “multilingual turn” in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) and said to be a paradigm that can assist learners in developing multilingual awareness (Galloway & Numajiri, 2020; Rose & Galloway, 2019). This orientation to language education is specified in more detail through the principles of Global Englishes Language Teaching (GELT), in which Rose and Galloway (2019) advocated the need to break free from conceptualizing English as a language to be learned to achieve native-like competence. The learner of English is reimagined as an English user who is capable of appreciating the linguacultural diversity of the language and able to communicate competently in it, regardless of the variety or vernacular used.

GELT’s principles create spaces to promote multilingualism in language teaching, implement translanguaging pedagogy, as well as gain awareness of the diversity of English varieties worldwide. However, in some contexts, it may rely on informed educators to effectively translate its principles into practice. It will be true to say that research in promoting multilingualism via a GE-informed pedagogy is still scarce in Japan, where traditional native speakerist notions of English language teaching remain existent (Glasgow et al., 2020; Lowe, 2020). This chapter intends to fill the gap by examining the following:

  1. (i)

    How do the beliefs of TESOL practitioners support multilingualism in the Japanese TESOL classroom?

  2. (ii)

    What pedagogies are adopted to promote multilingualism in the Global Englishes classroom?

  3. (iii)

    What challenges do teachers face in fostering a multilingual teaching environment?

The authors of this chapter are three experienced TESOL practitioners—Patrick from Singapore, Tiina from Finland, and Gregory from New York City—who have taught English for more than 10 years in Japan. As the reflective teaching movement has helped to enhance the knowledge based on classroom practices, this chapter adopts a collective narrative approach to reflect on the strategies and activities undertaken by the three teachers to promote multilingualism in the GELT classroom.

The chapter outline is as follows: We first establish our identities as multilingual users of English and our GE teaching philosophy. Following this, we describe our local context of teaching in Japan. Next, we discuss our classroom pedagogy and teaching practices in support of multilingualism. We then articulate the challenges we faced as well as reflect on our attempts to promote GELT principles in our classrooms. We conclude by considering the implications for curriculum development and program administration in fostering the use of multilingualism in other ELT teaching contexts outside of Japan.

GELT Principles and the Japanese Context

Researchers in the subfields of World Englishes (Kachru, 1990), English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) (Jenkins, 2009), and English as an International Language (EIL) (Sharifian, 2009), all conclude that the construct of native speakerism is untenable; the extensive literature in this area agrees that the belief that Anglo-American models of English should be the preferred models of use for the English language needs to be eschewed, even if it is recognized that the dismantling of standard language ideology remains a tall order (O’Regan, 2021). In addition, since the sociolinguistic reality is such that the use of the varieties of English is the norm rather than the exception, diversity, and multilingualism, as it pertains to the English language itself, need to be embraced. To combine the perspectives of all aforementioned subfields, Rose and Galloway (2019) have proposed the umbrella term “GE.”

Even though GE research has recently started to gain attention in Japan due to the efforts of Japan-based ELF researchers (Konakahara & Tsuchiya, 2020), English language teaching (ELT) practice in Japan remains committed to the Anglo-American model, as reflected in the fact that Japanese ministry-approved textbook content tends to promote Inner Circle English varieties, with far less representation from Outer Circle speakers (Yamada, 2015). Neoliberal principles have permeated Japanese language-in-education policy discourse, promoting English education reform plans that place narrow emphasis on skill acquisition and communication to enhance English proficiency for global citizenship. Yamagami and Tollefson (2011) pointed out that discourses of globalization are evident in the language policies of Japanese universities which increasingly view English as a medium of instruction (EMI) to enhance student “global competence” and internationalize their campus settings. The Japanese university entrance exam remains entrenched as a de facto language policy (Hashimoto & Glasgow, 2021) that has significant washback on teachers’ practices, making it difficult at the high school level for teachers to engage in GE-informed language teaching activities for multilingual awareness. The aforementioned examples reflect the multidimensionality of native speakerism in Japan. Konakahara and Tsuchiya (2020) lamented that uncritical Japanese adherence to a “native speaker” model “not only creates political inequalities among English-education professionals but also promotes a lack of confidence in English as well as unconscious linguistic discrimination among Japanese people” (p. 9). Therefore, to counter such challenges, and drawing on our unique identities as users of English as a lingua franca, we resist such ideologies and incorporate pedagogical strategies into our classrooms to foster student appreciation of linguacultural diversity.

Our Beliefs as Multilingual Language Users

Patrick

I was born in Singapore to Cantonese-speaking Chinese parents. From the age of five, I was surrounded by family members and friends who spoke English, Malay, Mandarin Chinese, and several other Chinese dialects-Cantonese, Hokkien, and Hainanese. As a multilingual speaker of English, I was quick to embrace multilingualism as a resource for learning foreign languages. It was during my undergraduate days in New Zealand that I realized that I could harness my knowledge of English grammar to master Japanese grammar. For instance, my understanding of the use of passive and active English sentences allowed me to grasp the conjugation of Japanese verbs easily. My knowledge of Chinese characters also facilitated the learning of Japanese kanji. On the first day of my class as a teacher, I usually introduce myself as “Patrick Sensei” and tell students that my country of origin is Singapore, a multilinguistic and multiracial country. To drum in my status as a multilingual teacher of English, I also tell my students that I could speak English, Mandarin Chinese and three other Chinese dialects-Cantonese, Hokkien, and Hainanese. To build rapport with students, I also tell them that I also speak some conversational Japanese. My students usually express surprise and awe when they realize that I can write Japanese kanji on the board to explain difficult English vocabulary.

Tiina

I was born and raised in Eastern part of Finland. During my primary education in the early 1980s, Finland already stressed the importance of multilingualism in education, so I started learning foreign languages from elementary school, Swedish from 3rd grade, English from 5th grade, and French and German from 7th grade. Outside of the classroom, however, I grew up in a completely monolingual Finnish environment. Nobody in my family spoke any other language besides Finnish. Even though Finland officially has two national languages, Finnish and Swedish, I never heard or met anyone speaking Swedish when growing up. I became enchanted with English soon after starting to study it, which resulted in me seeking out opportunities to experience English outside of the classroom, including American TV shows as well as English songs and books. I continued my university studies in the USA so that I could become an expert English user and realize my dream of becoming an English teacher. My life would be drastically different had it not been for learning English. English opened the world to me as well as provided me with a career that I love. I have been teaching English language and applied linguistics courses at undergraduate and graduate levels in Japan for the past 20 years. In my personal and professional life, I mainly use three languages, English, Finnish, and Japanese, a different language in different contexts. It is impossible to separate my identity as a multilingual person from my role as a language educator, and this is evident in my classroom. I wish for my students to see language learning as a tool for enhancing their lives.

Gregory

My parents originated from English-speaking Guyana, South America, and I grew up as an Afro-Caribbean American in a multilingually diverse New York City. My mother’s career as an international aid agency professional required her to develop proficiency in French and Spanish and prompted her to send me to a private international school, where I developed an appreciation for multilingualism at a very early age with French becoming my second language. Having lived and worked in international aid agencies in Togo and Madagascar after college, where I became fluent in French, the former colonial language of those countries, I further became intrigued with becoming a multilingual speaker. These experiences eventually led to my decision to embark on an expatriate teaching career in Japan.

In my 23-year teaching career, I have worked as a regular teacher, head teacher, teacher trainer, and curriculum coordinator in private language teaching chains, private senior high schools, and private universities. My Japanese students generally assume that I am just another American “native speaker of English,” and in the past I had introduced myself as such. However, when I obtained my Master of Arts degree in TESOL and a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics, I started to appreciate my linguacultural and multilingual background more deeply, as I developed research interests in sociolinguistics, multilingualism in TESOL and GELT. I then began to “re-brand” my identity as a teacher, introducing myself to my students as a multilingual individual and highlighting my international travel experience.

Our Beliefs as Multilingual Language Users

Engaging with Linguistic Diversity

Little and Kirwan (2019) have outlined successful strategies for inclusive multilingual classrooms. They advocate the use of reflective talk encouraging cogitation of language use, making use of learner knowledge and experiences, and enhancing language awareness including examining the similarities and differences of languages. Mirroring these strategies, in this section, we will introduce some initiatives we have implemented in an attempt to incorporate multilingualism into our Japanese classrooms with the goal of transforming our multilingual identities to positive educational capital.

Patrick’s Strategies

On the first day of my class, after a brief self-introduction, I usually proceed to describe how I had used English as a non-native speaker of English. I tell students: Although English is not my mother tongue, it is my language of use and preference. To motivate students to improve their English skills, I also tell students about the importance of English, in particular the use of English as a lingua franca (ELF) among Asian countries. But whenever I mention “ELF,” I observe that the majority of students look puzzled and confused. Despite learning English for six years, the majority of Japanese students have very little confidence in their spoken English. Trapped in the stranglehold of a monolithic environment, they have very little opportunity to communicate in English outside the classroom. They also could not comprehend the use of non-native varieties of English because they have very few opportunities to hear other English varieties. In their junior and senior high school, they had exposure to only American English as they were taught by American English teachers.

In my World Englishes class, I show McArthur’s (1987) chart featuring the different varieties of English in the world to help students understand the concept of ELF. Although the class is made up of third-year students from the International Studies and Regional Development department, they are Intermediate learners of English. I tell them: English has gained the status of an international language. There are currently many non-native English-speaking countries in the world which have adopted English as a language of wider communication. English is spoken as a lingua franca—a common language between non-native speakers in Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, and Philippines. From there, I proceed to explain that as a result of the spread of English from the native English-speaking countries such as Australia, Britain, and the USA, there is currently no “one English” but “many Englishes.” To help students consolidate their understanding of the diversification of English, I also show them Kachru’s (1990) three concentric circles of English and the development of an indigenized variety of English known as “World Englishes.”

Realizing that many of my students are unfamiliar with other varieties of English, I also introduce English Listening Lesson Library Online (ELLLO), an Internet audio website that has more than 300 videos in English and features both native and non-native English speakers from different countries. My students usually express surprise when they hear different accents of English spoken by speakers from different parts of the world. I particularly like to show videos which feature fluent English speakers from the expanding circle such as Japan, Korea, or China to remind my students that other non-native varieties of English are equally legitimate and viable for communication in the world.

As a multilingual user of English, I resonate with the belief that the home language of students is central to individual identity and the “default medium” for thinking and learning (Garcia & Li, 2014). In class, I encourage students to express their ideas using their mother tongue: If you cannot say it in English, try to say it in Japanese. My purpose for promoting an explicit presence of their mother tongue is to provide an inclusive learning environment and to reduce their anxiety in communicating in English in class. I also encourage the use of their mother tongue to expand their vocabulary. To help students master difficult English vocabulary in class, I ask students to check the meaning in their mother tongue and then translate the Japanese words into simpler English. For instance, when trying to explain the word “decompose,” I instruct students to find out the meaning in Japanese using their dictionary. When students have understood the meaning of the word in Japanese, I then ask them to explain the meaning of “decompose” in English using simple words:

Decompose → 腐敗 → break down

In class, I also explain to students the syntactic differences between native and non-native English sentences. For instance, I show students the expression, “I went to the university by bicycle.” I then explain that native speakers will normally say “I cycle to the university.” To help students develop a positive attitude to their own Japanese English, I inform my class that although the English spoken is different from the standard English expression used by native speakers, it has no significant effect on our listening comprehension. To help my students internalize the importance of the local language in learning English, I also inform them that contrary to their belief, the current English language has been largely influenced by various Japanese words such as “sushi,” “tsunami,” and “tofu” which have now been accepted as standard English. As a way to remove their prejudice against other non-native English varieties, I go on to ask students to search the Internet for words that have their origins in the local language.

Tiina’s Strategies

Every year when I meet new students in my university English classes, I ask them, “Where do you think Tiina is from?” The students are eager to guess my home country, but after they have suggested Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK, and the USA, they are perplexed. Based on the way I look and sound, they cannot imagine that I may come from a country where English is not spoken as a first language. They automatically label me as a native speaker of English. When it comes to themselves as English learners, I call this phenomenon “Native speaker learner fallacy” (Matikainen, 2019), a belief they hold that to be a competent English user, they should be highly fluent and sound like a native speaker. This ideology continues to disadvantage English language learners in Japan. Most of the commercial materials in the ELT field do not complement a multilingual approach in the language classroom. These materials continue to expose students to native speaker user models and native speakerism ideology. Therefore, one of my main goals in the classroom is to provide successful multilingual user models for my students to help them see themselves as being multilinguals, not merely students studying English as a subject.

One way I do this is by building lessons around Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED) talks by non-native speakers of English. For example, one talk I use is a Japanese architect discussing the design principles of a kindergarten he created. My students are always excited and happy to see a person like themselves talking about their work in English that sounds like their English, not like a “native speaker” of English. These talks also provide wonderful opportunities for language awareness. For example, students can compare the talk with the transcript which usually has been corrected for any “mistakes” the speaker makes. Students find discrepancies in the spoken and written talk and discuss why these occur and what effect they have on comprehension. In the talk mentioned here, the speaker often drops articles or makes subject–verb agreement mistakes. However, these do not interfere with their message, which provides a great lesson to my students about not having to produce error-free language to communicate effectively.

In addition, I attempt to highlight language knowledge as a positive resource. My students are free to code-switch and use Japanese when necessary. I encourage it, especially as a collaborative resource for them to help each other. I also dedicate time for them to summarize their learning in Japanese with each other, ensuring nobody is left behind. They are comfortable writing me emails in Japanese if they are not able to express themselves in English, while knowing that they will receive a reply in English. I believe these small acts reduce their anxiety and increase their willingness to communicate.

Another project-based learning task that I incorporate into my classes is “becoming a field linguist.” Taking advantage of the fact that there are at least three languages in our classroom, the students first work together to learn some new language from their Finnish informant, Tiina, with whom they do not share a common language. They have several sessions with the informant during which they can learn as much Finnish as possible. For example, one group may focus on weather and elicit weather-related vocabulary and phrases from the informant, using images, gestures, and nonverbal language. The goal is to collect primary data on basic lexical and grammatical aspects of the unknown language. After these information-gathering sessions, the students work together to compare the three languages they now know: Japanese, English, and Finnish and produce a written or spoken report. This activity is very popular with students as a fruitful opportunity to expose them to multiple languages in an otherwise monolingual EFL setting. Below is a short excerpt from a past student report in a Japanese university undergraduate elective course titled English for Global Communication:

We found that Japanese and Finnish both tend to repeat the same vowel in the same word, for example, kasa (umbrella in Japanese), and kala (fish in Finnish). This is called vowel harmony. Because of this, we think it is easy for Japanese people to pronounce Finnish and for Finnish people to pronounce Japanese. Because English does not have this, it is one reason why it is difficult for Japanese people to pronounce English…. It was fun to learn that many words are the same in Japanese and Finnish. For example, sora means sky in Japanese but gravel in Finnish and kani means crab in Japanese but rabbit in Finnish. In English and Japanese, some words are the same, but usually these are loanwords with the same meaning. For example, sushi and karaoke.

Gregory’s Strategies

In this section, I provide details about a content course that I have taught and developed about the history and politics of English. This 15-week course has been instructive in increasing students’ awareness about “multilingualism within English,” or variations found within the English language itself. The general structure of the course was largely based on the content of Seargeant and Swann’s (2012) textbook entitled English in the World: History, Diversity, Change. I chose the book not only because it was at the appropriate level to challenge the students, but because of its visual appeal, interspersed with historical images of early English users and examples of multilingualism in public spaces in countries around the world. I have conducted the course in both synchronous and asynchronous formats, incorporating discussions, mini-lectures, reading comprehension  assignments and writing assignments that are based on textbook content (see Table 10.1).

Table 10.1 Course content—The History and Politics of the English Language 
Full size table

In the first month of the course, after introducing basic facts about the English language such as the estimated number of speakers who use it at a basic level through interactive quizzes, I would then proceed to have the students define “English” after listening to a mini video lecture about the notion that there is one English language has now been challenged by researchers. I then introduce Kachru’s Three Circles model (1990) as a basic framework to conceptualize the role, status, and function of English worldwide, assist their comprehension of the model by “sorting” countries into the Inner, Outer and Expanding Circle categories for which Kachru is well known, and explaining why (e.g., large numbers of English settlers, colonization, increased globalization, etc.). I then introduce early historical facts about the language, its influences due to the Anglo-Saxon, Viking, and Norman invasions, and how through language contact, other languages have contributed to the lexical diversity within English.

The second month of the course describes colonization and the British role in it from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. The course distinguishes between three types of colonization as per Seargeant and Swann (2012): displacement (movement of English settlers to establish colonies such as Australia and the USA); replacement (the forcible transfer of African slaves to colonies), and subjection (the indirect rule of the colonial power over large populations in countries like Singapore or India). The course then turns to a discussion of how languages become varieties based on Schneider’s Dynamic Model of Postcolonial Englishes (in Seargeant & Swann, 2012); in this segment of the class, students watch YouTube clips that display fun comparisons of linguistic features of English varieties such as American, Australian, British, Singaporean, and South African English.

The final strand of the course is devoted to developing learner awareness about the extent to which English has become a lingua franca in domains of life such as finance, education, the motion picture industry, linguistic landscapes, and the media among others. The course then turns to focus on English in Japan, where I cover its basic history and current language policies in education. The final class presentation requires students to choose a nation of interest and to work in pairs to describe the history, status, and function of English in a given country. My most recent course featured countries such as Finland, Germany, Nigeria, South Korea, and Taiwan. In these presentations, the students first describe basic demographics about the country. Then they classify the country based on Kachru’s Three Circles Model (Kachru, 1990; Seargeant & Swann, 2012) and provided basic history about how the language came to be spoken there. After that, they discuss features of the English variety spoken in the country and conclude their talks with basic descriptions of the country’s language education policy and discussion questions.

Having taught this course at different universities, I have found that it has been generally effective in shifting students’ attitudes more toward a linguacultural appreciation of the English language and the historical legacy of its global spread. In final course essays, students have commented on the novelty of the topic of GE for them and how appreciative they were of learning about it, linking it to more historical and contemporary macro-processes such as colonization and globalization.

These days, I often hear the word, “globalization”. I thought learning and using English can be a globalization (sic), but I noticed it was not enough. We have learned only American English. To really promote globalization, we have to know about varieties of English in the world to communicate with people all over the world with English. (Student A)

Yet, though students’ attitudes may have shifted toward a positive awareness about the diversity of Englishes spoken, native speakerist attitudes did prevail. Below, in her final assignment, Student B, for example, harbored negative perceptions about the quality of English teachers in Outer or Expanding Circle countries, and advocating for English classes to be taught by “native speakers” there:

Teaching English in a country that originally spoke a different language requires a teacher who can speak like a native speaker in that country. It is also doubtful that English different from native English can be understood by others. This problem is something that I, as a Japanese, should think about, and I think it is a problem that is unlikely to be solved yet. (Student B)

Challenges in Implementation

All strategies we employed derived from current research on multilingualism and GE. While many successes can be claimed, there were unique challenges that we all encountered, as expressed below.

Patrick’s Challenges

It will be true to say that the Japanese EFL English classroom can be a constraint for teaching GE. As I reflected on my teaching experiences, I felt I was trying to teach GE on a small island in the middle of a “Japanese-speaking ocean.” When students moved out of the class, the default language use would invariably revert to Japanese. Students also have practically few opportunities to meet multilingual teachers or students on the campus and outside school. When I explained about English use in multilingual Singapore, I could sense it was difficult for students to visualize themselves living in a multilinguistic society and using ELF for communication with different ethnic groups. When I asked students to try code-switching as a way to understand how multilingual people communicate, my students looked bewildered. After teaching for several years, I realized that it is “unnatural” for Japanese EFL learners to code-switch between Japanese and English, as code-switching is a sophisticated linguistic tool for monolingual speakers to adopt; besides, some students may think code-switching is a language deficit and are reluctant to try it.

To help students understand the importance of code-switching in language learning, I explained to them the various reasons for code-switching in the linguistic landscape of Singapore. I also encouraged students to switch to their mother tongue language if they could not express their ideas in English.

Furthermore, it was also a challenge for me to capitalize on my knowledge of Japanese in my classroom instruction because as a non-native speaker of Japanese, my level of Japanese is simply not up to the mark to foster the metalinguistic awareness of the English language among my students. In addition, I have very little support from fellow colleagues (all are White Native English teachers) who typically endorse a monolingual approach to teaching English and have very little understanding of GEs or using multilingualism as a resource for ELT. School administrators have also fossilized the notion that the idealized English teacher is a White Native English-speaking teacher (Ng, 2018). Although at times I had experienced a deep sense of insecurity about my professional identity as a teacher of English, I continued to hone my teaching skills to meet students’ expectations. On many occasions, I had received positive evaluation on my teaching from school administrators.

The ideology of native speakerism is also fairly deep-rooted among Japanese students. As is often the case, many students still do not believe that their Japanese-accented English has communicative valency and status. To help students embrace the ownership of English, I often tell them: Be proud of your Japanese English. Japanese English is just as good as other varieties. I also constantly remind students of Kirkpatrick’s view on the purpose of language (Kirkpatrick, 2007): Language is not just merely a tool for communication; language is also a tool to showcase our cultural identity.

Tiina’s Challenges

As a TESOL professional, it has proven challenging at times to develop a legitimate teacher identity in Japan (Matikainen, 2019). While I am “fortunate” to embody the idealized “native speaker” in terms of my appearance—Caucasian with blond hair and blue eyes; in addition to my near-native command of English; sounding American—I strongly self-identify as being a non-native speaker of English. Frankly, I do not wish to be considered a “native” speaker of English because that obscures my linguistic and cultural background as well as diminishes my hard work of becoming a competent English user and an English teacher. As a TESOL professional, it is crucial for me to bring my “non-nativeness” to my classroom as it is a vital part of my professional and personal identity. However, in the Japanese context, both from institutional and societal perspectives, this is not always desirable or even possible (Matikainen, 2019). I believe that professional development involving reading literature, attending conferences, and meeting other non-native English speaker teachers has played an important role in allowing me to embrace my teacher identity and has made me feel confident and proud as a non-native English teacher.

In the classroom, the most challenging thing is the fact that Japan and my teaching context are monolingual. Creating multilingual experiences for most students in Japan is extremely challenging. Although a large majority of my students study abroad for a year, their English language learning experience in Japan involves mainly other Japanese students. Therefore, it is critical for language teachers to find creative ways to incorporate multilingualism, both ideologically and pedagogically, into their classrooms. For me, this means finding new ways to embrace and weave my multilingualism into my students’ lives and our classrooms, enabling them to have at least a brief encounter with multilingualism during their university studies. For example, small acts such as teaching my students to greet me and each other in Finnish at the beginning or end of each class have an effect in creating a more multilingual atmosphere. In addition, something that can be done even in a monolingual teaching context is using teaching materials that do not conform to the typical native speaker ideology. For example, using authentic materials such as TED talks by non-native speakers of English, ELLLO listening practice by young people from around the world with different accents, and news reports in English from countries where English is not spoken as a first language can help students understand that English belongs to everyone.

Gregory’s Challenges

One challenge I faced in the aforementioned course was generating interest in countries other than European countries for student research. To counter the tendency for students to adopt Eurocentric preferences in their research choices, I had to pre-select the countries to ensure a wider representation of regions and continents worldwide so that students could truly appreciate the linguacultural diversity of English. Because of this, one student found it informative: “learning how English is taught differs depending on [the] country, [and] the fact that English is used in that domain proves that it is the lingua franca of the world” (Student C).

Another challenge stems from handling students who still have a tendency to harbor native speakerist views. In my more recent version of the course, one of the students who presented on New Zealand, as a discussion question, asked her group audience if “New Zealand English should be promoted in favor of correct English,” with “correct” English being synonymous with the hegemonic UK or American models. I was concerned about her use of the term “correct English” and cautioned her about it, worried that such notion of “correctness” was based on native speakerism. Nevertheless, the same student remarked in an essay “that the more we analyze characteristics of some varieties of English, the more possibilities we get to discover something new about history. I think it is a very interesting and exciting thing” (Student D). This shows that while students may still harbor restricted views about the English language, with exposure they can indeed begin to appreciate the diversity within the language. Therefore, teachers need to generate critical language awareness among their students by enabling them to challenge and question common-sense assumptions and ideologies about English varieties. One activity that could prove useful in critically examining beliefs about standard English ideology is a reflection task. In my class, for instance, students read about and responded to a video clip about Singapore’s “Speak Good English Movement” promoted by the national government. During the task, they realized that there is an indelible connection between language and identity. For example, it enabled them to see how, in some respects, a top-down policy to regulate the use of Singlish, while intended by the government to improve English proficiency, could be viewed as prescriptive in the eyes of Singaporeans who view it as a marker of their identity.

Conclusions and Implications

As evident from our narratives, our decision to engage in multilingual practices is attributed to our personal beliefs about multilingualism as a resource for foreign language learning and our multilingual backgrounds and our identities as multilingual educators. Our collective stories in teaching pedagogies revealed significant insights into promoting multilingualism in the GELT classroom. We believe that it is important to help students conceptualize English as a multicultural language. Teachers must also realize that the home language inevitably plays a role in helping students in acquiring English. Our narratives have also led us to believe that it is necessary to dismantle the ideology of native speakerism in the classroom, which may prevent students from adopting a positive attitude toward a linguacultural approach toward English.

Our attempt to forge a multilingual classroom has several implications for TESOL practitioners. We suggest that teachers should teach students cross-communications skills in English and international relations in the school curriculum. The focus of teaching instruction should deviate from the acquisition of a standard variety of English to a focus on learning “linguistic features, cultural information and communication strategies that will facilitate communication” (Kirkpatrick, 2007, p. 194). It is also important to help students adopt a critical attitude toward ELT. Language education programs should reflect the changes taking place in the use of English and allow students to critically reflect on the traditional practices of teaching English as a foreign language. Finally, in addition to encouraging students to identify and teach the changing features of the English language, there is a need to cultivate teachers’ intercultural communication skills and encourage research on the changing nature of the English language and its pedagogical implications in the TESOL classroom.