Transforming English Language Teaching for Adult Learners in the 21st Century: From Skills Instruction to Lifelong Learning
Transforming English Language Teaching for Adult Learners in the 21st Century: From Skills Instruction to Lifelong Learning
Abstract
English Language Teaching (ELT) for adult learners has traditionally been framed within instrumental paradigms emphasizing short-term communicative skills, workplace competencies, and certification-oriented outcomes. While such orientations have contributed to the practical relevance of adult ELT, they are increasingly inadequate for addressing the complex linguistic, psychological, and sociocultural realities of adult learners in the 21st century. Adult learners today engage with English not only as a functional medium but also as a symbolic resource for identity construction, professional mobility, transnational participation, and lifelong meaning-making. This article seeks to transform prevailing conceptions of adult ELT by advancing a pedagogical framework that moves beyond skills instruction toward lifelong learning, critical engagement, and learner agency. Employing a qualitative multi-source design, the study integrates a systematic review of contemporary scholarship with classroom-based inquiry conducted in an adult EFL context. Data were drawn from peer-reviewed literature, classroom observations, reflective teaching journals, adult learners’ written narratives, and semi-structured interviews. Thematic analysis was used to examine how adult learners experience English learning across linguistic, motivational, and identity-related dimensions. Findings indicate that adult-oriented ELT becomes pedagogically transformative when instruction explicitly integrates (1) experiential meaning-making, (2) critical reflection on language and power, and (3) learner-directed trajectories aligned with personal and professional life projects. Participants demonstrated increased engagement, persistence, and strategic language use when learning was framed as part of a broader lifelong learning ecology rather than a finite course objective.
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