Unit 13: Learner characteristics

What are learner characteristics? (Jose)

Learner characteristics include their motivation, learning style, learning strategies,
maturity and past language learning experience. They are factors which influence learners'
attitude to learning a language, how they learn it, how they respond to different teaching
styles and approaches in the classroom (audio-lingual, when the lesson is based on listening
comprehension and speaking, especially when teaching a foreign language, grammar
translation, total physical response (pick up your pencil, open your books), communicative
language teaching (learners may practice introductory conversations, offering
suggestions, making invitations, complaining, or expressing time or location, etc.)), and
how successful they are at learning a language.

Learning styles: Ways in which a learner naturally prefers to take in, process and remember
information and skills. Our learning style influences how we like to learn and how we learn
fast. Some commonly mentioned learning styles are: visual (watching and looking), auditory
(listening and hearing), kinaesthetic (moving or touching things), group (working with
others), individual (working alone), reflective (giving time to consider choices), impulsive
(responding immediately), analytic (having the opportunity to analyse things) and
autonomous (deciding what they learn and how they learn it).

Important aspect: Students learn in different ways and so teachers need to teach them in
different ways. Students may have more than one style. Styles vary from cultures and
learners.

Learning strategies (Agus)

 They are different ways that learners choose and use to learn a new language.

● They help them to identify what they need to learn, remember, and use when learning
a new language.
● They also help them to be independent learners.
● They will depend on the learner's character and learning style.
● There are a number of ways to learn how to use them.
Well, some learning strategies are:

● Repeating new words until they remember them.

Repetition is a great way to learn many aspects of a new language. We know that repetition is
one of the most basic and effective methods of memorizing content. Some suggest repeating
things as many as 50 times! It is used a lot to practice vocabulary; However, learning
vocabulary is easy, but remembering it is hard. What is more, it was argued by many
scientists, that a foreign language is a different aspect, and only memorizing phrases are not
enough, sometimes even useless. This is because languages have patterns and context.

● Experimenting or taking risks by using the language in conversations.

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 assumptions about the
language and take the risk of being wrong. A risk-taking student is typically a student who
actively participates in discussion in the classroom and answers the questions without being
waited to be called by the teacher. This type of student is usually not afraid of speaking in
front of their classmates and not afraid of making mistakes, and they are willing to take part
in class discussions without any fear and they also get involved in language learning activities
very quickly and easily.

● Asking the teacher or classmates for some feedback about their use of the language.

Feedback is information that a learner receives about their language learning and most
commonly refers to information about their language production (speaking and writing),
although it can also concern reading and listening, study skills, attitudes, effort and so on.

The most common form of feedback in language classes is probably error correction
(corrective feedback), where the objective is usually to facilitate improvements in a learner’s
accuracy; but feedback in this paper is understood more broadly.

● Using the language as much as they can (for example, talking to tourists or chatting)

Learners need as much exposure as possible to the target language for acquisition to occur.
Learners need to be actively engaged with the target language. Just like learning to ride a bike
or any other important skill, learning is best achieved by doing.

● Recording themselves speaking so that they can judge and correct pronunciation.
One of the most powerful and effective things learners can do to improve your pronunciation
is record yourself speaking English. Sometimes learners need to be their own teacher and
need to correct their own mistakes. It’s strange and uncomfortable at first but it is the best and
fastest way to improve their pronunciation.

● Deciding what to learn regarding vocabulary.

Vocabulary learning goals help in deciding the kind of language to be learnt and taught.

● Thinking strategies to memorize new words.

It can be achieved by creating a learning environment, putting the words into a context,
learning from real life situations, and focusing on useful words.

● Paraphrasing.

It is like expressing the meaning of (something written or spoken) using different words,
especially to achieve greater clarity. Learners can achieve this when they use synonyms, a
different word form, or when they change from the active to the passive voice or even the
word order.

The strategies that learners use most successfully depend on their personality and learning
style. These aren’t the best strategies, but they make learning more successful.

Differences according to maturity (Mica)

What this title suggests is that we all, people in general, go through the process of maturity
which involves becoming a grown up physically, mentally and emotionally. This is why
children, teenagers and adults learn in different ways according to their levels of maturity.
Nevertheless, it’s important to bear in mind that NOT ALL these descriptions are true, there
are always exceptions.

Children:

They need constant motivation. That is to say someone who tells them how good they are
working, guides them when feeling lost or encourages them to do their best.
They always need to move, e.g. they like dancing out of the blue, creating excuses to go to
the bathroom so as to walk around …..

They concentrate for shorter periods because they get easily distracted either for external
circumstances like noises, a bird or a partner…..

They learn through experience and doing in a sense that they get familiar with a concept or
topic using their body e.g. when learning parts of the body they tend to touch or point with
their fingers each part of the body.

They do not control and plan their behaviour. This means that they mostly act impulsively
without thinking about consequences. e.g. they may laugh at a partner without bearing in
mind the other’s feelings or maybe they go to class in a bad mood and consequently behave
bad even when its no ones fault.

The previous aspect is related to the fact that they do not even care about making mistakes or
taking risks. This is in fact, one the best characteristics they have.

They pay attention to meaning in language. This means _________

They have limited experience of life due to their short age, so it is possible for them to
perceive everything as new.

They are in the process of developing cognitive skills (essential skills that brains use in order
to think, read, learn, remember, reason, and pay attention)
Teenagers:

- They begin to keep still for longer periods but still need to move, either because they
are anxious or interested in interacting with their peers.
- They need to control and plan their own behaviour. As part of growing up and
becoming independent, teens have to try/test out independent ideas and ways of
behaving. Sometimes this involves disagreeing with their family, pushing the
boundaries that are set, and even taking risks.
- They also begin to increase their life experience due to their curiosity to know their
environment and that is why they want to do activities that adults do, and that perhaps
they are not yet ready to do them.
- Another characteristic is that Teens begin to learn in abstract ways, i.e. through
thinking, as well as experiencing, as they develop the abilities to form their own new
ideas or questions and to consider many points of view and compare or debate
opinions, among others abilities.
- Moreover, it is believed that cognitive skills develop around the age of 15, when
adolescents begin to deal with several concepts at the same time and think of
hypothetical situations, that is to say, they use more complex thinking processes.
- Teens may also worry about what others think of them because they want to be
accepted and not rejected and because they are afraid of what others think, causing
them, for example, to try to be or act in a way that is not real in order to feel that sense
of belonging.
- Finally, during this stage, concentration is developing because the adolescent's
attention span is longer than that of children but is still short compared to that of
adults. As for their motivation, it varies considerably and may not be fixed or may be
 absent due to the fact that they have to face certain new and unfamiliar issues that can
cause a conflict in their lives.

- More characteristics: sometimes, they are uncomfortably aware of themselves and

their actions, pay attention to meaning and increasingly to form.

Adults:
- They are able to stay still and concentrate for longer periods of time.
- They can learn in more abstract ways in a sense that if we are talking about a triangle,
we do not need to draw it on the board or make one with our hands because they
picture it in their minds while talking.
- They are able to control and plan their behaviour because they are conscious about
their actions and their possible consequences.
- They may not be willing to make mistakes or take risks since they prefer working
with their strengths or what makes them feel comfortable the most. (HASTA ACÁ
MICA)
- Adults also have more life experiences as well as mature cognitive skills, such as
increased attention, memory, language, social and motor skills, among others.
- Finally, their motivation is often conscious since they generally know their goals,
needs, and values. They are also highly motivated, self-directed and learn best from
experience, and these qualities make them easier to motivate.
- Other characteristics: Aware of themselves and/or their actions (more confidence).
Can pay attention to form and meaning in language.

Past language learning experience (Ori)

● This means that both teens and adults may have learnt English before, either in a
school, a private institute or out of interest, by watching videos or films, listening to
music, among others.
● They may also be used to learning in a particular way and have definite ideas about
how to learn best. e.g. An adult may have learnt English at school through learning
lots of grammar and may have been successful in learning this way. If they then find
themselves in a class where the teaching is done only through communicative
activities (i.e. activities where learners communicate with each other in speaking or
 writing), they may feel they are not learning. But they may prefer it. Another adult or
teen may have learnt by using translation at school and then come to a class in which
this technique (translation) is never used. They may or may not like this change
because they are used to learning in a different way.
● Teachers of adults and teens need to be aware of how their students have learnt
previously and how they want to do it now. Students may welcome a change in
method, but they may want to learn in the same way they did before.
● Other learner characteristics which can vary from student to student are their level of
language, their motivation and their general personality. e.g.: they can be shy,
outgoing, patient, curious, sensitive, etc. All these qualities will affect how and how
much each learner engages in different kinds of activities in the classroom.

Key concepts and the language teaching classroom (Carla)

● Learners are not all the same. They do not learn in the same way. Learner
characteristics are different between students.
● Some learner characteristics, such as past language learning experience and learning
strategies, are more relevant to teaching teenagers and adults than to teaching
children. That is because teachers take into account past language learning experience
and learning strategies (what agus said before) to teach from different activities.
● We can find out what learners’ characteristics (learners’ characteristics: include their
motivation, learning style, learning strategies, maturity and past language learning
experience) are by asking them and giving questionnaires to find those characteristics
by looking the way they answered or they interpret the questions. The most important
aspect is to ask them in what different ways they might like to work.
● Learner characteristics may not be fixed. We must not limit a learner by thinking they
can only learn in a particular way. We, teachers, have to teach by presenting different
activities to solve.
● We can train learners to become aware of and use different learning strategies. We
can do that by giving and presenting them all the learning strategies and then they can
choose any of what they feel more comfortable.
● It is not possible for the teacher of a big class to meet the learner characteristics of
each learner all the time. Across a number of lessons, teachers can try to vary how
they teach so that they can match the learner characteristic of a range of learners.