The Impact of One’s Ethnic Background on Learning English

Identity: The Impact of One’s Ethnic Background on Learning English Pronunciations 

Background of the Problem 

Today education is continuously evolving with more exciting subjects requiring to be addressed to provide solutions to modern-day problems. One area that requires a solution in the education sector whereby teaching problems are key challenges that create a bottleneck to the knowledge dispensation and acquisition processes. For instance, the diversity of teachers and learners is one area that must be reviewed and solutions created to streamline the entire processes. Therefore, researchers must focus on specific areas that will help boost the performance of educators and learners. Fundamentally, African Americans and Hispanic students have challenges in their pronunciation, especially when learning English words because of their strong accent and social background ( Eshghavi, 2020 ). Instructors find that some students cannot pronounce words until they reach grade six or seven, which is relatively late for remedying this problem. Researchers have established that students' background influences their accents, making it difficult to pronounce English words ( Kitchen, 2017 ). Background factors such as age, ethnicity and mother tongue highly influence how one pronounces English words. This means that scholars need to find how they can enhance the learning processes of students who are not original English speakers. Such studies can weaken the influence of background factors such as age, language, and culture, significant inhibitors to the learning process.

Theoretical foundations

Social Learning Theory 

A key theory employed in this problem is the social learning theory that focuses on one's background and socialization processes. The theory works under the constructs of both cognitive and behavioral frameworks that embrace attention, motivation and influence. According to this theory, individual learn within a social context with the process being influenced by concepts such as modelling and imitation ( Edinyang, 2016 ). From this theory, one recognizes that a person's learning behavior is influenced by their social environment and background qualities, which reciprocally influence each other. The theory argues that children learn according to the environment they were socialized in such as their ethnic background and language. Relatedly, an African American student, will have problems with learning the English language, including pronunciations due to factors such as mother tongue. A child's learning will be influenced by their socialization environment, which is characterized by their first language. Thus, if one's first language is not English, they will definitely have difficulties pronouncing English words. 

Literature Review 

Several studies have been conducted to understand the challenges ESL learners undergo, especially when learning English words' pronunciation. Few studies have focused on neurocognitive and metacognitive aspects of English vocabulary, especially concerning learning and recall. According to the research by Eshghavi (2020 ), both qualitative and quantitative finding revealed that metacognitive research had positive impacts on the learning processes of ESL students, especially regarding their vocabulary learning. The study determined that there is, a need to include neurocognitive and metacognitive techniques in instructional teaching of the English language . Kitchen (2017) ascertained that students' formal and informal experiences influence their learning processes. The study indicates that the experiences that characterize one's life can influence their learning process, which includes learning English pronunciation. Hence students must see intrinsic usefulness of their view of the learning process. The study by Kitchen reveals that there is a need to conceptualize how students perceive the process of learning the English language, depending on their geographical knowledge. For example, an ESL student from an African country will have to understand how their mother tongue affects the English learning process. 

In the context of EFL, being able to pronounce English words appropriately is a pivotal milestone for students. According to Mu’in et al. (2017 ), there is a significant difference in how ESL and EFL students pronounce English words. Fundamentally, there is a difference in how students from either group pronounce tongue twisters, which are considered essential because they help learners enjoy the learning process. Thus, if a student is not able to pronounce certain words, they will have fun in the learning process. Moreover, tongue twisters are considered a beneficial learning methodology because many students believe that it helps them improve their pronunciations, word fluency, and motivation in learning English language and other foreign languages ( Mu’in et al., 2017). Smith (2020 ), in his study, acknowledges that racial or background factors influence the learning process of an individual, especially concerning how one pronounces English words. One key thing that one must understand from this research is that an individual's ethnic background does influence not only their English pronunciations but also other second languages. Smith (2020 ) concludes that African American educators have to rely on standardized English languages which are in different forms from the one spoken in the US. Hence it implies that there is a need to determine the degree of challenges which no EFL speakers have to endure to be able to speak the English language fluently. For example, researchers must understand the influence of standardized English on one's ability to fully comprehend the pronunciations of English words. 

Summary 

From the literature studied, there is a need for studies that focus on how one's ethnic background influence their ability to learn the English language, which can also be extended to other learning disciplines. The use of standardized English languages differs has been proved unacceptable in different colleges in the US ( Smith, 2020 ). There is a need to accept the diversity of different learners, a quality that stems from their ethnic diversity. For example, African Americans educators use standardized English which lacks intentionality, especially concerning affirming how the standardized English language deviated from the expected rules, therefore leading to the denigration of the language. Consequently, educators worldwide must understand that when it comes to learning new concepts, especially language associated concepts, they must consider the background of their students. 

The proposed study seeks to establish the impact of one's ethnic background on their learning process, especially regarding how they develop their pronunciation mastery. Different studies have proved that a person's background has a significant impact on their learning process, including how to learn to pronounce different words. The current study seeks to understand how one ethnic identity influences this process. For example, the study will focus on how the ethnic background of African American influences their pronunciations. With this knowledge, it will be possible for educators to factor in the diversity of their learners during the knowledge acquisition process. 

What is the impact of online learning on students’ knowledge acquisition?

Is there a relationship between online learning and student’s mental wellness?

What can be done to improve online learning with the aim of enhancing knowledge acquisition and dispensation?

The projected study will take place within the learning institution whereby the target group will comprise of all learners from different ethnic backgrounds. The focus is to understand the influence of one's ethnic background on their pronunciation of English words. For this study, the sample size will be 150 students because such a sample will provide significant insights into how one's background influence their learning and pronunciation of English words. 

The background factor of students influences their ability to learn the pronunciation of different English words.

The projected study will assume a causal-comparative research methodology because it seeks to establish how one's background influences their learning pronunciation of English words. Therefore, there will be a need to identify an independent variable which will not be manipulated during the study. Also, due to the nature of methodology, there will be no need to randomly assign groups which will necessitate that the researcher uses existing groups which will be exposed to the treatment. Principally, the study will assume a quantitative methodology. 

The purpose of this study is to contribute to the body of literature on the best practices of improving learning processes of the English language. 

Open-ended surveys and questionnaires will be the primary data collection methods that will be used in this study. The open-ended surveys and questionnaires will not provide predetermined answers but will require respondents to formulate and provide answers to the questions given. However, it is important to acknowledge the challenges that define the structuring and analyzing open-ended surveys and questionnaires.