Types of comparison and contrast

The comparison of first and second language acquisition can easily be over­simplified. At the very least, one needs to approach the comparison by first considering the differences between children and adults. It is, in one sense, illogical to compare the first language acquisition of a child with the second language acquisition of an adult (see Schachter 1988; Scovel 1999). This involves trying to draw analogies not only between first and second language learning situations but also between children and adults. It is much more logical to compare first and second language learning in chil­dren or to compare second language learning in children and adults. Nevertheless, child first language acquisition and adult second language acquisition are common and important categories of acquisition to com­pare. It is reasonable, therefore, to view the latter type of comparison within a matrix of possible comparisons. Figure 3.1 represents four pos­sible categories to compare, defined by age and type of acquisition. Note that the vertical shaded area between the child and the adult is purposely broad to account for varying definitions of adulthood. In general, however, an adult is considered to be one who has reached the age of puberty.

Figure 3.1. First and second language acquisition in adults and children

Cell A1 is clearly representative of an abnormal situation. There have been few recorded instances of an adult acquiring a first language. In one widely publicized instance, Curtiss (1977) wrote about Genie, a thirteen-year-old girl who had been socially isolated and abused all her life until she was discovered, and who was then faced with the task of acquiring a first language. Accounts of "wolf children" and instances of severe disability fall into this category. Since we need not deal with abnormal or pathological cases of language acquisition, we can ignore category Al. That leaves three possible comparisons:

1. first and second language acquisition in children (C1-C2), holding age constant

2. second language acquisition in children and adults (C2-A2), holding second language constant

3. first language acquisition in children and second language acquisi­tion in adults (C1-A2).

In the C1-C2 comparison (holding age constant), one is manipulating the language variable. However, it is important to remember that a two-year-old and an eleven-year-old exhibit vast cognitive, affective, and phys­ical differences, and that comparisons of all three types must be treated with caution when varying ages of children are being considered. In the C2-A2 comparison, one is holding language constant and manipulating the differences between children and adults. Such comparisons are, for obvious reasons, the most fruitful in yielding analogies for adult second language classroom instruction. The third comparison, C1-A2, unfortunately manip­ulates both variables. Many of the traditional comparisons were of this type; however, such comparisons must be made only with extreme caution because of the enormous cognitive, affective, and physical differences between children and adults.

Much of the focus of the rest of this chapter will be made on C2-A2 and C1-C2 comparisons. In both cases, comparisons will be embedded within a number of issues, controversies, and other topics that have attracted the attention of researchers interested in the relationship of age to acquisition.

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Presenting, practising and revising vocabulary

As with structures (see Section 1: Structures: grammar arid functions), there are a variety of ways of introducing, practising and revising vocabulary.

Presenting a vocabulary set via a visual/oral context

As with the presentation of structures, introducing vocabulary through a visual/oral context is very effective, especially with lower level students and with children. It is particularly useful when the teacher wants to present a set of 'concrete', demonstrable words and expressions on a particular topic. You can proceed in a way which is very similar to that outlined in the inductive approach to presenting a structure (see pi 29), with a few notable changes:

Example The teacher wants to elicit the words for food and drink that the students already know and then introduce some new items of vocabulary before going on to practise ordering food in a restaurant.

1 Illustrate the meaning using visual aids (pictures and drawings or, if possible, real food and drink).

2 Say the words. Don't forget to include any grammar words that make up the lexical item: for example, the preposition o/as in a bottle of mineral water. At this point you can write the words on the board, or you can leave this step until later.

3 Check the students' understanding of the meaning of the items. (For ideas on how to do this, see below.) In steps 2 and 3 involve the students as much as possible: elicit what they already know and encourage them to help one another.

4 The students practise saying the words. Concentrate on the pronunciation -the sounds, the word stress and, in items of more than one word, the way the words link together (see Section 3: Pronunciation). 1.et the students repeat after you or from a model provided on cassette, together and/or individually.

5 If you haven't already done so, write the words on the board. Mark the word stress, note what parts of speech the items belong to, any spelling points worthy of note, contractions, punctuation and capital letters where appropriate. Write down examples of the language item in sentences - try to make the sentences personal and memorable to the students.

6 Give the students time to make a note of where the information is recorded in their coursebook or to copy the information in vocabulary notebooks under the topic heading of Food and Drink. You can encourage the students to include any 'memory triggers' - a picture or diagram, a translation, information about how the word is pronounced, the use of different colours for different parts of speech, etc.

7 Any further practice activities you organize will depend on the vocabulary items and whether you expect the vocabulary to be for receptive use only (ie students can understand the word or expression if they see it written or hear it spoken) or for productive use (ie they should be able to use the item correctly and appropriately). For the former it may be enough to give some controlled or guided practice activities: filling gaps in a text with words from a given list or matching words and definitions, for examp

2 Vocabulary

If you want to provide freer productive practice you may plan to integrate work on vocabulary with some productive skills work. For example, after you have revised and introduced some food and drink vocabulary the students can take part in a roleplay set in a restaurant where they read a menu and choose and order food.

In addition, you may often want to set vocabulary-learning homework. You can decide on the words and expressions to learn and give a short test during the next lesson. Alternatively, you can ask the students to choose, say, ten words or expressions from the day's lesson to learn. The next lesson you can then put them in pairs and ask them to test each other. In this way they learn their own list and get further practice in the words their partner has chosen to learn.

Vocabulary

If you want to provide freer productive practice you may plan to integrate work on vocabulary with some productive skills work. For example, after you have revised and introduced some food and drink vocabulary the students can take part in a roleplay set in a restaurant where they read a menu and choose and order food.

In addition, you may often want to set vocabulary-learning homework. You can decide on the words and expressions to learn and give a short test during the next lesson. Alternatively, you can ask the students to choose, say, ten words or expressions from the day's lesson to learn. The next lesson you can then put them in pairs and ask them to test each other. In this way they learn their own list and get further practice in the words their partner has chosen to learn.

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Many people have contrasted two approaches (called, rather unhelpfully, deductive and inductive) for introducing students to specific aspects of language.

The deductive approach

In a deductive approach, students are given explanations or grammar rules, for example, and then, based on these explanations or rules, they make phrases and sentences using the new language.

In the following example, elementary students are going to focus on the present continuous tense.

The teacher starts by showing them pictures of people doing certain actions (painting a house, fixing the roof, cutting the grass, etc). He or she then models a sentence about one of the pictures ('He's painting the house') before using a series of devices to draw the students' attention to the grammar of the present continuous ('Listen... he's... he's... he is... he is [ using a gesture, perhaps fingers or hands coming together to show 'he' and 'is' joined together to make the contracted form]... he's... he's... painting... listen... paint... ing... paint... ing... he's painting the house'). Students then repeat the sentence, before moving on to the next one ('He's fixing the roof), where the teacher once again models the sentence, and again draws the students' attention to the construction of the present continuous by isolating parts of it ('he's', 'fixing'). The students then repeat the second sentence. The teacher now cues the students with a prompt ('paint') and the students have to say 'He's painting the house', or 'fix' and they say 'He's fixing the roof. They then use what they are learning to make sentences about the other pictures, and as they do so, the teacher corrects where necessary (see pages 97-98).

It can be seen that this explain and practise approach to teaching aspects of the language system looks very much like a straight arrows sequence (see page 54) in which the order of elements is engage -> study -> activate. It suits some students and language points very well. We will see an example of this kind of procedure on page 88.

The inductive approach

In a so-called inductive approach, things happen the other way round. In other words, instead of going from the rules to the examples, students see examples of language and try to work out the rules. Thus, for example, after students have read a text, we might ask them to find examples of different past tenses and say how and why they are used. This boomerang-type lesson (where the elements occur in the sequence engage -> activate ->study) is especially appropriate where language study arises out of skills work on reading and listening texts.

If we want students to understand how speakers in informal conversation use certain phrases as delaying tactics (or to buy 'thinking' time) we might - after letting them listen and respond to someone speaking spontaneously - get them to listen again, but this time reading a transcript of what is being said. The task we give them is to find language used for buying time - hoping that they will identify phrases like 'you know', T mean', 'yeah', 'mmm', etc.

If we want students to understand how certain words collocate (see page 75), we can, if we want, tell them about the words and their collocations. That is what we would do in an explain and practise sequence. But in an inductive approach we prefer the students to find this information out. If we are teaching 'body language', therefore, instead of tell­ing students which verbs like 'wave', 'clench', 'wag', etc collocate with which nouns such as 'hand', 'arm', 'teeth', 'fist', etc, we can send them to monolingual learners' dictionaries (MLDs) or computer corpuses to see if they can work it out for themselves. Such discovery activities ask students to do the work rather than having everything handed to them on a plate by the teacher or a grammar/vocabulary book.

Discovery activities suit some students very well; they enjoy working things out. Many people think that the language they understand in this way is more powerfully learnt (because they had to make some cognitive effort as they uncovered its patterns) than it would have been if they were told the grammar rules first and didn't have to make such an effort. However, not all students feel comfortable with this approach and would still prefer to be 'spoon-fed'. A lot will depend on their level. It is generally easier for more advanced students to analyse language using discovery procedures than it is for complete begin­ners. The boomerang sequence is often more appropriate with students who already have a certain amount of language available to them for the first activation stage than it is with students who can say very little. Discovery activities are especially useful when students are looking at the construction of specific language for the second or third time. When we ask them to look at the use of different past tenses in a story and to work out how they are used and why, we assume that they 'know' the individual tenses. The detective work they are doing now is intended to expand their knowledge and revise things they are already familiar with.

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Different kinds of listening

A distinction can be drawn between intensive and extensive listening. As with reading, the latter refers to listening which the students often do away from the classroom, for pleasure or some other reason. The audio material they consume in this way - often on CDs in their cars, on MP3 players, DVDs, videos or on the Internet - should consist of texts that they can enjoy listening to because they more or less understand them without the intervention of a teacher or course materials to help them. It is true that there is not at present a body of material developed for extensive listening as there is for extensive reading, but this looks set to change in the foreseeable future. Already, many simplified readers (see page 100) come with accompanying CDs on which the books are read or dramatised. Students can also use tapes and CDs to listen to their coursebook dialogues again after they have studied them in class. There is a growing number of podcast sites from where students can download free materials. And another way of getting students involved in a form of extensive listening is to encourage them to go to English language films with subtitles; as they hear the English dialogue, the subtitles help them understand; as they understand, they will, to some extent, absorb the language they hear.

Intensive listening is different from extensive listening in that students listen specifically in order to work on listening skills, and in order to study the way in which English is spoken. It usually takes place in classrooms or language laboratories, and typically occurs when teachers are present to guide students through any listening difficulties, and point them to areas of interest.

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Sometimes, despite the best judgment of the teacher (or the materials designer), listening material seems to be too difficult for students to understand. However many times the teacher plays the track, it just doesn't work. The teacher then abandons the activity and everyone loses face.

There are a number of alternatives to this scenario which can help.

Preview interview questions

Students can be given the questions of an interview and are encouraged to role-play what might be said before listening to it. This will have great predictive power.

Use 'jigsaw listening'

Different groups can be given different audio excerpts (either on tape or CD, or - for some of them - as audioscripts). When the groups hear about each other's extracts, they can get the whole picture by putting the 'jigsaw' pieces together.

One task only

Students can be given a straightforward task which does not demand too much detailed

understanding. For example, we can get them to describe the speaker on the recording - the sound of the voice will suggest sex, age, status, etc. Such an activity offers the possibility of success, however difficult the listening passage.

Playa/the first segment only

Instead of playing the whole recording, teachers can just play the first segment and then let students predict what's coming next. Our third example in Chapter 10 (see pages 139-142) was a version of this.

Play the listening in chunks

Break the audio track into manageable chunks so that students understand the content of a part of it before moving on to the next one. This can make listening less stressful, and help students to predict what the next chunk will contain.

Use the audioscript

There are three ways of using the audio script to help students who are having difficulty. In the first place, we can cut the script into bits. The students put the bits in the right order as they listen. Secondly, we can let the students see the first part of the alJdioscript before they listen. They will then know what the listening text is going to be about. Finally, the students can read the audio script before, during and after they listen. The audioscript can also have words or phrases blanked out.

Use vocabulary prediction

We can give students 'key' vocabulary before they listen. They can be asked to predict what the recording will be about and, because they now know some of the words, they will probably understand more.

Have students listen all the time

Encourage students to carry listening extracts in their car or on their MP3 players. Get them to listen to the news in English on the radio or Internet as often as possible and to try to understand just the main points. Remind them that the more you listen, the easier it gets.

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Benjamin Bloom and his colleagues (Krathwohl, Bloom, & Masia 1964) provided a useful extended definition of the affective domain that is still widely used today.

1. At the first and fundamental level, the development of affectivity begins with receiving. Persons must be aware of the environment surrounding them and be conscious of situations, phenomena, people, objects; be willing to receive—to tolerate a stimulus, not avoid it—and give a stimulus their controlled or selected attention.

2. Next, persons must go beyond receiving to responding, commit­ting themselves in at least some small measure to a phenomenon or a person. Such responding in one dimension may be in acqui­escence, but in another, higher, dimension the person is willing to respond voluntarily without coercion, and then to receive satisfac­tion from that response.

3. The third level of affectivity involves valuing: placing worth on a thing, a behavior, or a person. Valuing takes on the characteristics of beliefs or attitudes as values are internalized. Individuals do not merely accept a value to the point of being willing to be identi­fied with it, but commit themselves to the value to pursue it, seek it out, and want it, finally, to the point of conviction.

4. The fourth level of the affective domain is the organization of values into a system of beliefs, determining interrelationships among them, and establishing a hierarchy of values within the system.

5. Finally, individuals become characterized by and understand themselves in terms of their value system. Individuals act consis­tently in accordance with the values they have internalized and integrate beliefs, ideas, and attitudes into a total philosophy or world view. It is at this level that problem solving, for example, is approached on the basis of a total, self-consistent system.

Understanding how human beings feel and respond and believe and value is an exceedingly important aspect of a theory of second language acquisition.

We turn now to a consideration of specific personality factors in human behavior and how they relate to second language acquisition

Self-esteem is probably the most pervasive aspect of any human behavior. It could easily be claimed that no successful cognitive or affective activity can be carried out without some degree of self-esteem, self-confidence, knowledge of yourself, and belief in your own capabilities for that activity.

Inhibition Closely related to and in some cases subsumed under the notion of self-esteem is the concept of inhibition. All human beings, in their under­standing of themselves, build sets of defenses to protect the ego. The human ego encompasses what Guiora (1972a) and Ehrman (1996) refer to as language ego or the very personal, egoistic nature of second language acquisition. Meaningful language acquisition involves some degree of identity conflict as language learners take on a new iden­tity with their newly acquired competence. An adaptive language ego enables learners to lower the inhibitions that may impede success.

Risk – Taking

In the last chapter we saw that one of the prominent characteristics of good language learners, according to Rubin and Thompson (1982), was the ability to make intelligent guesses. Impulsivity was also described as a style that could have positive effects on language success. And we have just seen that inhibitions, or building defenses around our egos, can be a detriment. These factors suggest that risk-taking is an important characteristic of suc­cessful learning of a second language. Learners have to be able to gamble a bit, to be willing to try out hunches about the language and take the risk of being wrong.

Anxiety Intricately intertwined with self-esteem and inhibition and risk-taking construct of anxiety plays an important affective role in second language acquisition. Even though we all know what anxiety is and we all have experienced feelings of anxiousness, anxiety is still not easy to define in a simple sentence. It is associated with feelings of uneasiness, frustration, self-doubt, apprehension, or worry (Scovel 1978: 134).

In common terminology, empathy is the process of "putting yourself into someone else's shoes," of reaching beyond the self to understand what another person is feeling. It is probably the major factor in the harmonious coexistence of individuals in society. Language is one of the primary means of empathizing, but nonverbal communication facilitates the process of empathizing and must not be overlooked

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Before reading

1 Arouse interest and help prediction

Encourage the students to think about and discuss what they are going to read. Or create a 'need to know' by telling them how the reading fits in with a later activity they are going to do.

Don't worry about grammar 'mistakes' during these lead-in activities - the aim here is not to focus on grammatical accuracy but rather to interest and motivate the students to read.

Use such prompts as realia, visuals, references to your or the students' experiences, and questions to arouse the students' interest, to activate any knowledge they have about the topic and to help them predict what they are going to read.

Use any clues afforded by the text layout and format. Is it a magazine article, a letter, a theatre programme, etc? Are there any photographs or pictures accompanying the text that can help the students predict what the text is about?

2 Teach any key words

Consider whether there are any key words which you want to teach before the students read the text. As in a listening text the context makes the task of understanding individual words and expressions easier. However, unlike a listening text, the students can see the words so it is not as difficult for them to identify proper names or to take the time to puzzle out the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary.

First reading

1 Set a task to assist overall understanding

This can be in the form of two or three gist questions, or a task.

Example

Choose a headline from a choice of three logo with the article.

Don't make the completion of the task dependent on the students reading in too much detail.

Give advice about the type of strategies the students might employ.

Example

Don't try to read everything. Just read the first sentence in each paragraph and try to get a general idea of what it's about so that you can answer the questions on the board/choose an appropriate headline. You have two minutes.

Chapter 5 Developing skills and strategies

2 The students read the text

You may want to give a time limit - this may discourage students from reading for detail when they should be skimming. On the other hand you may want to give them as much time as they feel they need.

3 Feedback

Ask the students to discuss their answers and opinions in pairs or groups before you elicit them.

Second reading

1 Set a task to focus on more detailed understanding

Whether you are using material from published materials or devising your own activities, try to vary the tasks - including tasks which require the students to 'read between the lines' as well as answer questions which call for factual answers.

2 The students read the text for the second time

Again, give them some idea of how long they have to do this and how they should set about the task.

Example

You have three minutes; don't forget to look carefully at the linking words - they'll help you work out the order of events in the story. You can use your dictionaries if you wish.

3 Feedback

Again, encourage the students to work together before eliciting their responses.

Follow-up

You will probably want to encourage a personal response to the text from your students.

Example

What did you think of the man's idea? Would you have done that?

In this way reading can be naturally integrated with speaking practice.

It may be appropriate for you to read, or to play a recording of all or part of the text so the students read and listen simultaneously. By doing so the sounds and spelling of the language are linked. If the resources are available students often enjoy doing this as a self-access activity. Or you could use part of the text as a dictation activity, perhaps as a revision activity in a later lesson.

As with a listening text, you may want to go on to use a reading text as a context for the introduction or practice of specific language; a point of grammar or pronunciation, a functional or vocabulary focus. (See Chapter 6: Presenting and practising language.)

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What if students are all at different levels?

One of the biggest problems teachers face is classes where the students are at different levels - some with quite competent English, some whose English isn't very good, and some whose English is only just getting started. Even if things are not quite so extreme, teachers of English - along with teachers of other curriculum subjects - regularly face mixed-ability groups where different individuals are at different levels and have different abilities. What then are the possible ways of dealing with the situation?

Use different materials/technology

When teachers know who the good and less good students are, they can form different groups. While one group is working on a piece oflanguage study (e.g. the past continuous) the other group might be reading a story or doing Internet-based research. Later, while the better group or groups are discussing a topic, the weaker group or groups might be doing a parallel writing exercise, or sitting round a CD player listening to an audio track. This is an example of differentiation - in other words, treating some students differently from others.

In schools where there are self-study facilities (a study centre or separate rooms), the teacher can send one group of students off to work there in order to concentrate on another. Provided the self-study task is purposeful, the students who go out of the classroom will not feel cheated.

If the self-study area is big enough, of course, it is an ideal place for different-level learning. While one group is working on a grammar activity in one corner, two other students can be watching a DVD; another group again can be consulting an encyclopedia while a different set of students is working at a computer screen.

Do different tasks with the same material/technology

Where teachers use the same material with the whole class, differentiation can still take place. We can encourage students to do different tasks depending on their abilities. A reading text can have sets of questions at three different levels, for example. The teacher tells the students to see how far they can get: the better ones will quickly finish the first two sets and have to work hard on the third. The weakest students may not get past the first set.

In a language study exercise, the teacher can ask for simple repetition from some students, but ask others to use the new language in more complex sentences. If the teacher is getting students to give answers or opinions, she can make it clear that one word will do for some students whereas longer and more complex contributions are expected from others. In role-plays and other speaking or group activities, she can ensure that students have roles or functions which are appropriate to their level.

Ignore the problem

It is perfectly feasible to hold the belief that, within a heterogeneous group, students will find their own level. In speaking and writing activities, for example, the better students will probably be more daring; in reading and listening, they will understand more completely and more quickly. However, the danger of this position is that students may either be bored by the slowness of their colleagues or frustrated by their inability to keep up.

Use the students

Some teachers adopt a strategy of peer help and teaching so that better students can help weaker ones. They can work with them in pairs or groups, explaining things or providing good models of language performance in speaking and writing. Thus, when teachers put students in groups, they can ensure that weak and strong students are put together. However, this has to be done with great sensitivity so that students don't feel alienated by their over-knowledgeable peers or oppressed by their obligatory teaching role.

Many teachers, faced with students at different levels, adopt a mixture of solutions such as the ones we have suggested here. However, it is vitally important that this is done in a supportive and non-judgmental manner. Students should not be made to feel in any way inferior, but rather should have the benefits of different treatment explained to them. Furthermore, we should be sensitive to their wishes so that if they do not want to be treated differently, we should work either to persuade them of its benefits or, perhaps, accede to their wishes.

What if the class is very big?

In big classes, it is difficult for the teacher to make contact with the students at the back and it is difficult for the students to ask for and receive individual attention. It may seem impossible to organise dynamic and creative teaching and learning sessions. Frequently, big classes mean that it is not easy to have students walking around or changing pairs, etc. Most importantly, big classes can be quite intimidating for inexperienced teachers.

Despite the problems of big classes, there are things which teachers can do.

Use worksheets

One solution is for teachers to hand out worksheets for many of the tasks which they would normally do with the whole class, if the class was smaller. When the feedback stage is reached, teachers can go through the worksheets with the whole group - and all students will get the benefit.

Use pairwork and groupwork

In large classes, pairwork and groupwork play an important part since they maximise student participation. Even where chairs and desks cannot be moved, there are ways of doing this: first rows turn to face second rows, third rows to face fourth rows, etc. In more technologically equipped rooms, students can work round computer screens.

When using pairwork and groupwork with large groups, it is important to make instructions especially clear, to agree how to stop the activity (many teachers just raise their hands until students notice them and gradually quieten down) and to give good feedback.

Use chorus reaction

Since it becomes difficult to use a lot of individual repetition and controlled practice in a bi", group, it may be more appropriate to use students in chorus. The class can be divided into two halves - the front five rows and the back five rows, for example, or the left-hand and right-hand sides of the classroom. Each row/half can then speak a part in a dialogue, ask or answer a question, repeat sentences or words. This is especially useful at lower levels.

Use group leaders

Teachers can enlist the help of a few group leaders. They can be used to hand out copies check that everyone in their group (or row or half) has understood a task, collect work and give feedback.

Think about vision and acoustics

Big classes are often (but not always) in big rooms. Teachers should ensure that what the show or write can be seen and that what they say or play to the whole group can be heard.

Use the size of the group to your advantage

Big groups have disadvantages of course, but they also have one main advantage - they are bigger, so that humour, for example, is funnier, drama is more dramatic, a good class feeling is warmer and more enveloping. Experienced teachers use this potential to organise exciting and involving classes.

No one chooses to have a large group: it makes the job of teaching even more challenging than it already is. However, some of the suggestions above will help to turn a potential disaster into some kind of a success.

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In the Classroom: The Grammar Translation Method

We begin a series of end-of-chapter vignettes on classroom applica­tions with a language teaching "tradition" that, in various manifes­tations and adaptations, has been practiced in language classrooms worldwide for centuries. A glance back in history reveals few if any research-based language teaching methods prior to the twentieth century. In the Western world, "foreign" language learning in schools was synonymous with the learning of Latin or Greek. Latin, thought to promote intellectuality through "mental gymnastics," was until relatively recently held to be indispensable to an adequate higher education. Latin was taught by means of what has been called the Classical Method: focus on grammatical rules, memorization of vocabulary and of various declensions and conjugations, translation of texts, doing written exercises. As other languages began to be taught in educational institutions in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the Classical Method was adopted as the chief means for teaching foreign languages. Little thought was given at the time to teaching oral use of languages; after all, languages were not being taught primarily to learn oral/aural communication, but to learn for the sake of being "scholarly" or, in some instances, for gaining a reading proficiency in a foreign language. Since there was little if any theoretical research on second language acquisition in general, or on the acquisition of reading proficiency, foreign languages were taught as any other skill was taught.

Late in the nineteenth century, the Classical Method came to be known as the Grammar Translation Method. There was little to dis­tinguish Grammar Translation from what had gone on in foreign lan­guage classrooms for centuries, beyond a focus on grammatical rules as the basis for translating from the second to the native lan­guage. But the Grammar Translation Method remarkably withstood attempts at the outset of the twentieth century to "reform" language teaching methodology, and to this day it remains a standard methodology for language teaching in educational institutions. Prator and Celce-Murcia (1979: 3) list the major characteristics of Grammar Translation:

1. Classes are taught in the mother tongue, with little active use of the target language.

2. Much vocabulary is taught in the form of lists of isolated words.

3. Long elaborate explanations of the intricacies of grammar are given.

4. Grammar provides the rules for putting words together, and instruction often focuses on the form and inflection of words.

5. Reading of difficult classical texts is begun early.

6. Little attention is paid to the content of texts, which are treated as exercises in grammatical analysis.

7. Often the only drills are exercises in translating discon­nected sentences from the target language into the mother tongue.

8. Little or no attention is given to pronunciation.

It is remarkable, in one sense, that this method has been so stal­wart among many competing models. It does virtually nothing to enhance a student's communicative ability in the language. It is "remembered with distaste by thousands of school learners, for whom foreign language learning meant a tedious experience of memorizing endless lists of unusable grammar rules and vocabulary and attempting to produce perfect translations of stilted or literary prose" (Richards & Rodgers 1986: 4). In another sense, however, one can understand why Grammar Translation is so popular. It requires few specialized skills on the part of teachers. Tests of grammar rules and of translations are easy to construct and can be objectively scored. Many standardized tests of foreign languages still do not attempt to tap into communicative abilities, so students have little motivation to go beyond grammar analogies, translations, and rote exercises. And it is sometimes successful in leading a student toward a reading knowledge of a second language. But, as Richards and Rodgers (1986: 5) pointed out, "it has no advocates. It is a method for which there is no theory. There is no literature that offers a rationale or justification for it or that attempts to relate it to issues in linguistics, psychology, or educational theory." As we continue to examine theoretical principles in this book, I think we will under­stand more fully the "theorylessness" of the Grammar Translation Method

Some FLT methodology experts say that there are not only 4 skills in the process of learning the language (reading, writing, listening and speaking) but 5, and the fifth is translation. I agree with this.
What Heinrich mentioned is a very useful tool in class, a lot of teachers use it, but it is also very old, and quite boring.

I once did a survey among English teachers in Hungary. Most of them use translation in their Enlgish classes according to the old Grammar-Translation method. Others, mostly young teachers, use more or less the Communicative approach, so they try not to use L1 in the class, and that also means they do not translate in class.

I think these two are extremes, and the solution should be somewhere in the middle.

As far as I can see, many students finish secondary school with a medium level English, some even pass an exam. After school, whether studying at a college or working somewhere, if they use their English at all, most of the time it is NOT communicating with native speakers, but reading something for their studies/work, and translating it for themselves or for the others.

By translation here I do not mean producing a proper, final text to be published that most of us do here on this site. But they still translate for themselves, for their colleagues etc.

However, if we do not teach them the basic skills of translation, they will not be able to do this. Let me give you an example. I teach in a technical secondary school. Our students, when they graduate, became "technicians", some kind of middle-level experts in electronics. And they have to understand/translate Enlgish texts, e.g. description of different devices. But when they open a dictionary, they don't know that they should check all the meanings of a word, and choose the best one according to the context, they simply use the very first meaning given. This is something we should teach them in school. And there are a lot of other, important sub-skills like this that are lost in the fashionable new methods today. Since most of the coursebooks are published in Britain, for world-wide use, they cannot be language-specific.

If the teachers are aware of the linguistic differences between L1 and L2, they can avoid these problems. But I am not sure they are. I

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Speaking has many different aspects. It is useful to look at them under these headings:

1 Accuracy

Accuracy involves the correct use of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. In controlled and guided activities the focus is usually on accuracy and the teacher makes it clear from feedback that accuracy is important. Ongoing correction is often appropriate during accuracy activities. In freer activities the teacher is hoping for the correct use of language but is also keen to encourage the students' attempts to use the language they have in order to communicate. (See below.)

Chapter 5 Developing skills and strategies

In feedback the teacher will probably comment on correct use of language but also on how successfully the students communicated. (See also Chapter 6: Presenting and practising language.) Even in free activities students can be encouraged to be as accurate as possible so long as their anxiety to 'get it right' doesn't interfere too much with their fluency and ability to communicate. In any particular activity the teacher can make it clear to students in which areas accuracy is expected, and to what extent. (See also Chapter 7 Section 2: Correction techniques.)

2 Fluency

Fluency can be thought of as 'the ability to keep going when speaking spontaneously'. When speaking fluently students should be able to get the message across with whatever resources and abilities they've got, regardless of grammatical and other mistakes.

Normally, students should not be corrected during fluency activities. However, in feedback afterwards you can comment favourably on any strategies the students used to increase their fluency. For example:

• the use of natural-sounding 'incomplete' sentences: When did you go? On Tuesday (not I went on Tuesday);

• the use of common expressions like I see what you mean, Never mind, What's the matter?

• the use of 'fillers' and hesitation devices: Well, Let me think, Let's see;

• the use of communication strategies, such as asking for clarification: I don't understand. Do you mean...?

• the ability to paraphrase - 'put it another way' or explain/describe what they want to say if they haven't got the right language. This can involve using gesture or even mime;

• the use of useful expressions such as That reminds me... /By the way... /Talking of... etc when introducing a topic; Still... /Anyway... /Strange, really... etc when finishing with a topic; and Well, I must go/Nice talking to you, etc when finishing a conversation:

Some of these aspects are more difficult to focus on than others. Students obviously transfer many of the speaking skills they have in their own language when they are speaking English. However, don't forget that some conventions of conversation are not universal and it can be very useful to focus on particular aspects in class. For example, Japanese people consider it impolite to interrupt -especially someone older or of a higher status. With more advanced students who have to take part in discussions and meetings with native speakers of English, it can be helpful to teach Japanese students how to interrupt in English in a way which is considered acceptable by native speakers.

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In the Classroom: Putting Methods into Perspective

Throughout the twentieth century, the language teaching profession was involved in a search. That search was for what has popularly been called "methods," or ideally, a single method, generalizable across widely varying audiences, that would successfully teach stu­dents a foreign language in the classroom. Historical accounts of the profession tend therefore to describe a succession of methods, each of which is more or less discarded in due course as a new method takes its place.

The first four of these end-of-chapter vignettes on classroom practice provided a brief sketch of that hundred-year "methodical" history. From the revolutionary turn-of-the-century methods espoused by Frangois Gouin and Charles Berlitz, through yet another revolution—the Audiolingual Method—in the middle of the twentieth century, and through the spirited "designer" methods of the seven­ties, we are now embarking on a new century. But now methods, as distinct, theoretically unified clusters of teaching practices presum­ably appropriate for a wide variety of audiences, are no longer the object of our search. Instead, the last few years of the twentieth cen­tury were characterized by an enlightened, dynamic approach to lan­guage teaching in which teachers and curriculum developers were searching for valid communicative, interactive techniques suitable for specified learners pursuing specific goals in specific contexts.

In order to understand the current paradigm shift in language teaching, it will be useful to examine what is meant by some com­monly used terms—words like method, approach, technique, proce­dure, etc. What is a method? Four decades ago Edward Anthony (1963) gave us a definition that has withstood the test of time. His concept of method was the second of three hierarchical elements, namely, approach, method, and technique. An approach, according to Anthony, is a set of assumptions dealing with the nature of lan­guage, learning, and teaching. Method is an overall plan for sys­tematic presentation of language based upon a selected approach. Techniques are the specific activities manifested in the classroom, which are consistent with a method and therefore in harmony with an approach as well.

To this day, Anthony's terms are still in common use among lan­guage teachers. A teacher may, for example, at the approach level, affirm the ultimate importance of learning in a relaxed state of mental awareness just above the threshold of consciousness. The method that follows might resemble, say, Suggestopedia. Techniques could include playing Baroque music while reading a pas­sage in the foreign language, getting students to sit in the yoga position while listening to a list of words, learners adopting a new name in the classroom, or role-playing that new person.

A couple of decades later, Jack Richards and Theodore Rodgers (1982, 1986) proposed a reformulation of the concept of method. Anthony's approach, method, and technique were renamed, respec­tively, approach, design, and procedure, with a superordinate term to describe this three-step process now called method. A method, according to Richards and Rodgers, "is an umbrella term for the specification and interrelation of theory and practice" (1982: 154). An approach defines assumptions, beliefs, and theories about the nature of language and language learning. Designs specify the rela­tionship of those theories to classroom materials and activities. Procedures are the techniques and practices that are derived from one's approach and design.

Through their reformulation, Richards and Rodgers made two prin­cipal contributions to our understanding of the concept of method:

1. They specified the necessary elements of language teaching "designs" that had heretofore been left somewhat vague. They named six important features of "designs": objectives, syllabus (criteria for selection and organization of linguistic and subject-matter content), activities, learner roles, teacher roles, and the role of instructional materials.

2. Richards and Rodgers nudged us into at last relinquishing the notion that separate, definable, discrete methods are the essential building blocks of methodology. By helping us think in terms of an approach that undergirds our language designs (or, we could say, curricula), which are realized by
various procedures (or techniques), we could see that methods, as we still use and understand the term, are too restrictive, too pre-programmed, and too "pre-packaged." Virtually all language teaching methods make the oversim­plified assumption that what teachers "do" in the classroom can be conventionalized into a set of procedures that fits all contexts. We are now well aware that such is clearly not the case.

Richards and Rodgers's reformulation of the concept of method was soundly conceived; however, their attempt to give new meaning to an old term did not catch on in the pedagogical literature. What they would like us to call "method" is more comfortably referred to, I think, as "methodology," in order to avoid confusion with what we will no doubt always think of as those separate entities (like Audiolingual or Suggestopedia) that are no longer at the center of our teaching philosophy.

Another terminological problem lies in the use of the term "designs"; instead, we now more comfortably refer to "curricula" or "syllabuses" when we discuss design features of a language pro­gram.

What are we left with in this lexicographic confusion? It is inter­esting that the terminology of the pedagogical literature in the field appears to be more in line with Anthony's original terms, but with some important additions and refinements. Following is a set of def­initions that reflect the current usage.

Methodology: The study of pedagogical practices in general (including theoretical underpinnings and related research). Whatever considerations are involved in "how to teach" are methodological.

Approach: Theoretical positions and beliefs about the nature of language, the nature of language learning, and the applicability of both to pedagogical settings.

Method: A generalized, prescribed set of classroom specifica­tions for accomplishing linguistic objectives. Methods tend to be primarily concerned with teacher and student roles and behav­iors, and secondarily with such features as linguistic and sub­ject-matter objectives, sequencing, and materials. They are almost always thought of as being broadly applicable to a variety of audiences in a variety of contexts.

Curriculum/syllabus: Designs for carrying out a particular language program. Features include a primary concern with the specification of linguistic and subject-matter objectives, sequencing, and materials to meet the needs of a designated group of learners in a defined context. (The term "syllabus" is used more customarily in the United Kingdom to refer to what is referred to as a "curriculum" in the United States.)

Technique (also commonly referred to by other terms)¹: Any of a wide variety of exercises, activities, or devices used in the lan­guage classroom for realizing lesson objectives.

And so, ironically, the methods that were such strong signposts of a century of language teaching are no longer of great conse­quence in marking our progress. How did that happen?

In the 1970s and early 1980s, there was a good deal of hoopla about the "designer" methods described in the earlier vignettes. Even though they weren't widely adopted as standard methods, they were symbolic of a profession at least partially caught up in a mad scramble to invent a new method when the very concept of "method" was eroding under our feet. We didn't need a new method. We needed, instead, to get on with the business of unifying our approach to language teaching and of designing effective tasks and techniques that are informed by that approach.

Today, those clearly identifiable and enterprising methods are an interesting, if not insightful, contribution to our professional repertoire, but few practitioners look to any one of them, or their predecessors, for a final answer on how to teach a foreign language. Method, as a unified, cohesive, finite set of design features, is now given only minor attention.² The profession has at last reached the point of maturity where we recognize that the complexity of lan­guage learners in multiple worldwide contexts demands an eclectic blend of tasks, each tailored for a particular group of learners studying for particular purposes in a given amount of time. David Nunan (1991b: 228) summed it up nicely: "It has been realized that there never was and probably never will be a method for all, and the focus in recent years has been on the development of classroom tasks and activities which are consonant with what we know about second language acquisition, and which are also in keeping with the dynamics of the classroom itself."

1. There is currently quite an intermingling of such terms as technique, task, procedure, activity, and exercise, often used in somewhat careless free vari­ation across the profession. Of these terms, task has received the most con­certed attention recently, viewed by such scholars as Peter Skehan (1998) as incorporating specific communicative and pedagogical principles. Tasks, according to Skehan and others, should be thought of as a special kind of technique, and in fact, may actually include more than one technique

2 While we may have outgrown our need to search for such definable methods, the term "methodology" continues to be used, as it would in any other behavioral science, to refer to the systematic application of validated principles to practical contexts. It follows that you need not subscribe to a particular Method (with a capital M) in order to engage in a "methodology”.

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