MULTIMODAL VOICES: A QUALITATIVE STUDY ON ELEMENTARY STUDENTS’ SEMIOTIC EXPERIENCES AND PREFERENCES IN LEARNING ENGLISH

English Language

Despite global reforms in early English education, a significant number of young learners—particularly in multilingual, under-resourced contexts—fail to develop foundational English literacy. This qualitative study examines how elementary students in the Philippines experience, prefer and struggle with multimodal approaches to learning English. Embedded in Multimodal Learning Theory (Jewitt et al., 2021) and Sociocultural Theory (Vygotsky, 1978), the study foregrounds student voices to examine how diverse semiotic modes—visual, auditory, kinesthetic, textual, and spatial—facilitate or hinder engagement and comprehension. Using a qualitative descriptive design, fifteen bilingual students from a public school were interviewed through open-ended, child-friendly questions. Reflexive thematic analysis revealed that learners preferred embodied, playful, and visual modalities (e.g., role-play, songs, pictures), citing these as effective for understanding and emotional safety. Conversely, instruction relying on abstract, text-heavy modes or rapid, English-only delivery created confusion, anxiety, and disengagement. Theoretically, the study critiques monomodal, colonial legacies in English instruction and advances a learner-centered paradigm that values multimodal literacies as legitimate epistemologies. Practically, it offers policy-relevant insights into inclusive pedagogy, suggesting that curriculum reform must center not only on content but also on the semiotic affordances learners utilize to make meaning. The findings underscore the political urgency of listening to young learners in shaping equitable, multimodal English language education in postcolonial contexts.

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