Integrating Life Skills and Workforce Preparation Through Foreign Language Teaching

Author Details

In today’s era of globalization, integrating life skills and workforce preparation have become the golden rule of higher education. Life skills not only make the students be future ready but it also opens the pathways towards a healthier way of life. Only the theoretical knowledge of the subject is no longer the only requirement of the world of work. Finding a job has become a difficult task and lack of life skills adds up to this difficulty as inadequate skills result in rejection. Knowledge of a foreign language is day by day becoming an indispensable component. However, in a foreign language class, most of the times, the focus is on making the learners master the language and integration of life skills and workforce preparation is often neglected. This happens because sometimes the teacher is not aware of this important part of language teaching and sometimes the heavy syllabi leaves no time and stands up as a hindrance. Although this part must be taught in early school but it equally plays an important role in higher education. Students with the knowledge of one or multiple languages and life skill and workforce preparation have bright chances to excel in life. Students must be taught how to deal with stress, manage time, work in team, and face challenges as well as changes. This kind of approach is entirely different from the traditional teaching methods and requires a different pedagogy. Through this paper, we will try to highlight how foreign language teaching can integrate life skills and workforce preparation to make the students future ready. We shall also focus on how such pedagogy can be effectively implemented in foreign language teaching.

Keywords

1. Brewer, M, Flavell, H, Do, K, Jonescu, E and Herrero, AG (2018), Interdisciplinary studio-based work- integrated learning: a guide to creating, implementing and evaluating interdisciplinary WIL, Curtin University, Perth.
2. Brown, H. Douglas. (1994). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. (Third Edition) New Jersey: Prentice Hall Regents, Englewood Cliffs.
3. Cornelius, S, Medyckyj-Scott, D, Forrest, D, Williams, A, and Mackaness, W (2008), ‘The virtual placement: an alternative to the traditional work placement in the geographical sciences?, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 287-302.
4. Heckman J and T Kautz. (2012). “Hard Evidence on Soft Skills.” NBER Working Paper 18121.
5. Jackson, D 2015, ‘Employability skill development in work-integrated learning: barriers and best practice’, Studies in Higher Education, vol. 40, no. 2, pp. 350-367.
6. Kay, J, Ferns, S, Russell, L, Smith, J and Winchester-Seeto, T 2019, ‘The emerging future: innovative models of work-integrated learning’, International Journal of WorkIntegrated Learning, vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 401-413.
7. Richard, J. C. and T. S. Rodgers. 2001. Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
8. Schon, D. (1983). The reflective practitioner. How professionals think in action. New York: Basic Books.

Sharma (2023, July). Integrating Life Skills and Workforce Preparation Through Foreign Language Teaching. IPEM JOURNAL OF INNOVATION IN TEACHER EDUCATION, 8(1),39–44.