Teaching English to Young Students in the Post-Pandemic Normal: A Review

After a prolonged period of synchronous online learning due to the COVID19 pandemic, students are back in the physical classroom. The emerging concern now is whether pedagogical instructions should be adjusted to work better in the new normal. In order to address the issue, for the past years, there have been publications discussing the new landscape of English education. Those papers are majorly technocentric, suggesting a new normal with a more prominent role of digital technology both in and out of the classroom setting. Even though the present paper has no intention to devalue the role of technology, it would solely discuss the inter- and intra-personal aspects of learners in the English language teaching and learning. Since primary school students are believed to have been in a more vulnerable position during the pandemic, this paper aims at examining the new normal that English education at primary level should be exercising. By reviewing studies concerning English teaching to young students in the post-COVID19, the paper highlights four implications: interaction, multimodality, personalization and authenticity. First, classroom interaction should be enhanced to make up for the disruption of in-person social communication caused by online learning. Additionally, multimodality, personalization and authenticity can serve as pedagogical guidelines in selecting classroom activities in the post-pandemic context.