‘This made me feel honoured’: a participatory action research on using process drama in English language education with ethics of care

ABSTRACT

This study investigates English as a foreign language learners' emotions and questions the authenticity of the communication in language classrooms in Turkey. To become more aware of learners' emotions and to make a speaking module more engaging, the teacher-researcher decided to utilise process drama as a participatory action research intervention. The data were collected over a three-week process drama. Drawing on ‘ethics of care' and ‘social and emotional learning', the findings demonstrated that authentic communication empowered learners when the content was relevant to their emotion labour. When learners’ emotions are scrutinised explicitly through drama-in-education, they feel respected and more engaged.

KEYWORDS:

• Process drama
• English as a foreign language teaching
• participatory action research
• ethics of care
• authenticity

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Özgehan Uştuk

Özgehan Uştuk (Ph.D.) is a research assistant and a teacher educator at Balikesir University, Turkey. His research interests include drama in language education, English language teacher education, practitioner enquiry, teacher identity, and emotions.