Millennial Teaching Literature

Teaching Literature to Millennial ; Challenges and Creative Approach that can be use in ESL/EFL classroom

Introduction

Millennial or Gen Y can be defined as the generation that were born after Gen X cohort around 1980 to 2004. They grew up in an electronics-filled environment and depend so much on the Internet and social network. They are also known as “digital native” as they have been exposed to technology from the very young age. Their grasp of technology, information and digital media trump any of the prior generation. This generation is notable by their access to technological and joint experiences. Millennial students force change in learning surrounding around the world. The technology, with which digital natives matured, has induced

In order to move into a global picture, one needs to learn the language. It is not a luxury anymore to have English as your repertoire but it is necessity in this era we are living in. However, the teachers and the learners of English in Malaysia where the students are not native speakers of English faced many obstacles in their teaching-learning process. The educators must possess an essential skills to be able to teach the students to express themselves using English in class as well as real life contexts. When we talk about teaching English, there are many elements and essentials that can be ventured and one of them is using literature to teach English Language. In Malaysia, at secondary level, the syllabus has been made compulsory for students to learn literature in English classes from form 1 to form 5. However, since most of the texts used are from British and American background, the students, especially those with limited grasp of the language found it very difficult to cope with literature and eventually form a negative perception towards literature in the first place. Although the blame cannot be put solely on teachers, but there are some teacher who taught literature as a normal comprehension or reading materials where the focus are more on grammar, vocabulary and reading while neglecting the important elements which is to appreciate the literature works.

Large number of students in one class. Imagine teaching 50 over students in one class with different background, level of proficiency and interest. Whatever method used, it will be a challenge as it is very difficult to control and maintain the balance of interactions within allocated time.

2. Different school, different facilities. Not all school we have the same advancement of facilities, some school in Malaysia still does not have a computer, well connected Internet and LCD. Hence the teacher will use the best way they know, the traditional way.

3. Functional vs. Aesthetic. As we discussed earlier in characteristics of the millennials learning, they will only focus on goals and objective. The objective of learning the language for them is to be use functionally, in everyday life. They cannot fathom how literature can be part of that.

4. Colonizer Language. There are still sentiments out there in society believing that, if we are learning the colonizer language, culture and literature we are not truly Malaysian and not appreciating our National Language which is Bahasa