The Integration of 4MAT Approach with ASEAN Social and Cultural Links: the Development of an Instructional Model to Enhance Youth’s Intercultural Communicative Competence and Attitudes

Abstract

The process of quality enhancement is essential to improving young learners’ learning outcomes. The 4MAT approach, a multifunctional instructional method integrated with ASEAN Social and Cultural Links (ASCL) may serve as a framework for quality enhancement in order to provide a structure for this process. The paper describes the quality enhancement strategy for youth learning based on a 4MAT-integrated approach with ASCL that is used for a variety of purposes. It describes various applications in education, for knowledge creation, and for the purpose of preservation and sharing, which are effective means for knowledge formation through a secure informal presentation of knowledge with groups, as well as cultural appreciation and knowledge retention. The main purposes of this research is to develop, implement and evaluate an instructional model based on the 4MAT approach to enhance intercultural communicative competence (ICC) and their attitudes towards intercultural communicative language teaching (ICLT) in 120 young learners from 20 communities in Nakornping Sub-District, Chiang Mai, Thailand. The data was analysed using “Efciency and Effectiveness” scores, descriptive statistics, and content analysis. The results revealed that the 8 step model of the 4MAT approach integrated with ASCL may enhance English learning skills and intercultural communicative competence. The outcome of this instructional model, “A 4MAT-integrated Approach with ASEAN Social and Culture Links”, was higher than expected, with the highest level of applicability (E1 / E2 at 90.67/81.63 (80/80) and E.I at 0.6488 or 64.88%). The youth’s post-learning achievement scores of ASEAN studies in English was greater than pre-learning achievement, while their achievement in English was at an exemplary level (81.42% with the Standard Deviation of 0.01). The young learners’ attitudes towards ICLT were positive, and their ICC had signifcantly improved. This study sheds light on the implementation of ICLT in an English as a foreign language (EFL) context of Thai and other similar contexts.