A PHENOMENOLOGY ON COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE OF BSED TERTIARY EDUCATION STUDENTS THROUGH THE LENS OF LANGUAGE TEACHERS: STRATEGIC COMPETENCE IN FOCUS

The purpose of this qualitative research study was to generate an in-depth understanding of the lived experiences of BSED-Tertiary education students on their communicative strategic competence through the lens of language teachers in some Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in Tagum City. Utilizing the purposive sampling, the fourteen research participants who are language teachers were identified and grouped for in-depth interview and focus group discussion. Data carefully analyzed using coding and thematic analysis. Results emerged from the experiences, struggles and difficulties of the language teachers which include having students with diverse backgrounds, handling students struggling to communicate due to anxiety, encountering passive students, and experiencing difficulties with students who have low self-confidence. Language educators adopt a range of strategies to deal with the challenges such as fostering a positive learning environment, providing different learning activities, assessing the students’ performance using rubrics, and encouraging students to speak up. To mitigate these encounters, teachers need to know and assess students’ background in communication, let students embrace mistakes and criticism in speaking, encourage and motivate students to communicate using English language, continue to learn strategies in communicative development through attending relevant seminars for communicative enhancement and tailor approaches to student needs. The results imply that significant changes and improvements should be considered and implemented in some Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to tailor approaches in enhancing the communicative strategic competence of the students. More importantly, it highlights the importance of appropriate strategies and approaches promoting the continuous development of the students in their strategic competence.