Language, Learning, and Teaching

Source: Brown, D. Principles of Language

Learning and Teaching.
 Learning a Second Language

• Learning a new language

• Learning a new culture (the way how people in the target
language learner learns will contribute to learner language acquisition)

• A new way of thinking (Asian languages, for example, have more

precise words for relatives than English, so your mother’s older sister’s children have a
more precise name than “cousin” in English. But that’s just convenience.) Or The way how
thought is presented – linear or circular)

• A new way of feeling (expressing certain situation with proper

diction)

• A new way of acting (situating contextually)

Sucess Sending & Receiving
Messages in a L2
 L2 LEARNING COURSES
• Inadequate on their own
• Facilitate learning a L2
• Success is possible:
Teachers know what/how/ why
variables affect learning a L2.
 Questions to Answer
(Students)

• How does one fail to learn L2/Foreign Language?

• Why does one fail to learn L2/Foreign Language?
Questions to Answer
(Teacher)
1. Read and study the PPT I uploaded few minutes ago via WA
Group of Teaching Principles as SPADA has not been set this
course yet.
2. Please address 2 questions for each of you based on the PPT.
3. Send your questions to my email: asari70@umg.ac.id
4. We will have a discussion for these two types of questions
next meeting.
 Group Discussion
• At the beginning of this chapter, a
Number of categories of questions
About L2 acquisition are described, with
numerous specific questions in each
category.
• In small groups, try to generate some
possible answers to selected questions.
• To personalize your responses, include
examples from the learning experiences of
members of your group.
 Questions on L2 Acquisition
1. Characteristics of Learners (Who does the learning & Teaching?)
•Who are these learners? Where do they come from? What are their native
languages? Levels of education? Social economic? What is the teacher’s native
language? Experience or training? Knowledge of L2 and its culture? How do teacher &
learner interact with each other.
2. Linguistic Factor
•What is it that the learner must learn and the teacher teaches? What is
communication? What is language? What does it mean when we say someone knows
how to use a language?
3. Learning Process
•How does learning take a place? How can a person ensure success in
language learning? What kind of strategies do the learner use? What
cognitive process is utilized in L2 learning?
4. Age and Acquisition
•When does L2 learning take a place? How much time do learner spend for
learning? Why does the age of learning make a difference?
5. Instructional Variable & Context
•Do the learners learn L2 language in the artificial environment created
purposively such as international class, modern language teaching class? How
is a nation policy regarding L2 learning and acquisition?
6. Goal
•Why are learners attempting to acquire L2? What are their purposes? Are
they motivated by the achievement of successful career? By passing a foreign
language requirement? Or by wishing to identify closely with the culture and
the people of the target language?
 LANGUAGE
What is LANGUAGE? (P.6)
1. Language is systematic
2. Language is a set of arbitrary symbols.
3. Those symbols are primarily vocal, but may also
be visual.
4. The symbols have conventionalized meaning to
which they refer.
5. Language is used for communication.
6. Language operates in a speech community or
culture.
7. Language is essentially human, although possibly
not limited to humans.
8. Language is acquired by all people in much the
same way; language and language learning both
have universal characteristics.
 LEARNING
What is LEARNING?
1. Learning is acquisition or ¨getting¨.
2. Learning is retention of information or skill.
3. Retention implies storage systems, memory,
cognitive organization.
4. Learning involves active, conscious focus on
and acting upon events outside or inside the
organism.
5. Learning is relatively permanent but subject to
forgetting.
6. Learning involves some form of practice,
perhaps reinforced practice.
7. Learning is a change in behavior.
 TEACHING
What is TEACHING?

• Guides learning
• Facilitates learning
• Enables the learner to learn
• Sets the conditions for learning
 The L2 Teacher

• Needs to understand the principles of language learning and t

eaching.

• Needs to understand the many aspects of the process of L2

learning.

• Understanding of how learners learn, determines:

1. Teaching style
2. Approach
3. Methods
4. Classroom techniques
 DEFINITIONS
Teaching style
• Individual teachers' distinctive or
characteristic manners of teaching.
 DEFINITIONS

Approach

• Theoretical positions and beliefs

about the nature of language, the
nature of language learning, and the
applicability of both to pedagogical
settings.
• Describes how people acquire their
knowledge of the language and
makes statements about the
conditions which will promote
successful language learning.
 DEFINITIONS
Methods

• A generalized set of classroom

specifications for accomplishing linguistic
objectives.

• Method is an overall plan for the orderly

presentation of language material.
 DEFINITIONS

Classroom techniques

• Any of a wide variety of exercises,

activities, or devices used in the
language classroom for realizing lesson
objectives.

• Techniques must be consistent with a

method, and therefore in harmony with
an approach as well
 Their Relationship
For approach, method, and technique,
which determines which?

•‡Approach determines method

•Method determines technique

•The organizational key is that

techniques carry out a method which is
consistent with an
approach
 L2 TEACHER
• Understanding of the components of language
determine how you will teach a language
1.Language and cognition
2.Writing systems
3.Nonverbal communication
4.Sociolinguistics
5.First language acquisition
 THEORY OF TEACHING

• Integrated with your understanding of the

learner and the subject will allow you to
choose the best procedure for the learners
and context.
Schools of Thought in Second
Language Learning

Source: Brown, D. Principles of Language Learning and

Teaching. (p.p.9-15)
 Trends in Linguistics and
Psychology
• Psychology • Linguistics
– 1940’s-1950’s: – 1940’s-1950’s:
• Behaviorism/ • Structural Linguistics
Neobehaviorism

-1960’s: -1960’s:

Cognitive Psychology Transformational-

Generative School
 1940’s-1950’s
• Behaviorism • Structural Linguistics
-It focused only on -Only observable linguistic
publicly observable behaviors can be
behaviors studied.
-Language could be
dismantled into small
pieces or units,
described scientifically,
contrasted, then added
up again to form the
whole.
 Cont’d
Behaviorism Structural Linguistics
• -Notions such as -Notions such as
intuition, memory, meaning or thought
thinking, or any were completely
mental processes ignored.
were ignored.
 Cont’d
Behaviorism Structural Ling.
-Learning a behavior: -Learning language:
through conditioning conditioning learners to
‘organisms’ to respond make the right
in desired ways to connection between
stimuli --} Practice/ stimuli and the desired
drilling is important. responses
Drilling in the language
classroom was a
dominant method.
 Cont’d
Behaviorism Structural Ling.
-Reinforcement -Positive/ negative
(Positive or negative) reinforcement play a
plays an important significant role in
role in learning. language learning.
 The 1960’s - 1980’s
• Cognitive Psychology • Transformational-
Generative Linguistics
-Meaning,
-They broke away from
understanding, and
the structuralists’
knowing are
important insistence on only
psychological data. studying observable
language (performance)
 Cont’d
Cognitive Psychology Transformational-
Generative Linguistics
-Cognitivists sought to -Linguistics goes beyond
discover underlying mere description of the
motivation and deeper surface structure of
structures of human language.
behavior.
 Cont’d
Cognitive Psychology Transformational-Generative
Linguistics
-Instead of focusing on the -Studying competence reveals
mechanical stimulus- the hidden level of meaning
and thought (deep
response connections, structure) that generates
cognitivists tried to the observable
focus on psychological performance.
principles of -learning language: language is
organization and species-specific; it is innate:
functioning. human beings are born with
the ability to learn
language.
 The 1980’s – 2000’s
Constructivism
• It involves the integration of linguistic,
psychological, and sociological paradigms.
• The active role of the learner is emphasized.

A. Cognitive constructivism: emphasizes the role

of the learner in constructing his/her own
representation of reality:
 Constructivism

-Learners must transform complex information

to make it their own.
• A more active role for students in their
learning.
Piaget argues that, “learning is a developmental
process that involves change, self-generation,
and construction, each building on prior
experiences.” (in Kaufman, 2004).
 Constructivism
• Social Constructivism: emphasizes the
importance of social interaction and
cooperative learning in constructing cognitive
and emotional images of reality.
• Language learning is a result of thinking and
meaning-making that is “socially constructed
and emerges out of [learners’] social
interactions with the environment.” (Brown,
p. 13)
 What is the Best Theory?
• No single theory is right or wrong all the way!
 GROUP DISCUSSION
• Looking back at the three schools of thought
described in this chapter, in a small group,
suggest some examples of activities in the
language classroom that would be derived
from each of the perspectives.
 Language Teaching
Before the 20th century
• Goal: Reading in a foreign language
• Classical Method was adopted for teaching
foreign languages (Grammar Translation
Method)
• Focus on grammar rules, memorization of
vocabulary, conjugations, translation and
written exercises.
 GRAMMAR TRANSLATION
METHOD
CHARACTERISTICS
1. Classes taught in L1; little use of L2
2. Vocabulary taught in lists and isolated
3. Grammar explanation, memorization
4. Reading classical text early
5. Grammar analysis of text
6. Translation
7. 0 attention to pronunciation
 20th CENTURY
Methods
• Grammar Translation Method
• Direct Method
• The Audiolingual Method
• Community Language Teaching
• The Silent Way
• Suggestopedia
• Total Physical Response
• The Natural Approach
http://www.englishraven.com/methodology.html
 21 Century
• Method –Approach
• Communicative Language Teaching (approach)
• Eclectical blend of previous methods
• Teaching students to communicate genuinely,
spontaneously, and meaningfully in the L2

http://www.englishraven.com/
method_communicative.html
 GROUP DISCUSSION

• At the end of the chapter, twentieth-century

language teaching methodology is described
as one that evolved into an approach rather
than a specific accepted method, with the
Direct Method and Audiolingual Method cited
as examples of the latter.
• What is the difference between approach and
method?