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Whole Language, Whole Person: A Handbook of Language Teaching Methodology 1
Maya Pentcheva
Todor Shopov
Whole Language, Whole Person
A Handbook of Language Teaching Methodology
Viseu, 2003
Passagem EditoresISBN 972-98770-0-9
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Contents
Foreword 3
Chapter 1: Principles of Teaching 61.1.
Cognitive Principles 7
1.2. Social Principles 201.3.
Linguistic Principles 25
Chapter 2: Exploring Language Teaching Methods 35
2.1. Period I: Direct Language Teaching 352.2.
Period II: Audio-lingual Teaching and the Innovative Methods of
the 1970s 372.3.
Period III: Communicative Language Teaching 41
Chapter 3: Paradigm Shift in Education 47
3.1. Changing the Focus of Education 473.2.
A Teaching Paradigm to Meet Psychosocial Needs 50
3.3. Factors of Cooperative Learning 53
3.4.
Cooperative Language Learning 56
Chapter 4: The Language Curriculum 59
4.1.
Constructivism 604.2.
The General versus Specific Course Conjecture 63
4.3. Random Access Instruction in Complex and Ill-structured
Domains 65
4.4. Language Curriculum as a Knowledge Strategic Hypertext 664.5.
Instead of a Conclusion 70
References 71
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Foreword
This book is written within the framework of the Exchange to Change
Project . We have been trying the find out what the methodological
implications of the awareness resulting from reflective mobility are. Is thereany “methodological value” added in result of the visiting and welcomingexperiences of language teachers and learners in mobility? Our aim is to
offer some orientation into the general educational concerns of the Project.The task is formidable. It is the focus of many different lines of exploration.
In his poem “Little Gidding”, No. 4 of Four Quarters, T. S. Eliot puts it inthis way:
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploringWill be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Yet, this is an optimistic book. At some moments in history, professionalspheres are susceptible to important change. We believe that we want and
can cross the threshold of “exchange to change” and step into the realm of
educational promises fulfilled.
The title indicates our holistic approach to the analysis and synthesis of the
concepts of language, personality, methodology, communication and inter-comprehension, etc. This approach emphasizes the priority of the whole over
its parts. We hold that language teaching and learning is a complex
knowledge domain, characterized by network of relationships in a social and
cultural context. In addition, we believe that methodology is aninterdisciplinary field, which cannot be understood in isolation. Our
perspective sees it in terms of its relations to other knowledge domains.
We shall look into a range of issues, which are not only interestingthemselves, but also relevant to the objectives of the Project and, hopefully,
to the Reader. The nature and extent of the relevance is difficult, if notimpossible, to determine a priori. However, the book supplements the
Project Modules and serves as a concise reference material on the theory ofthe teaching and learning of modern foreign languages. Methodological
literature is of course extensive, so we shall be pointing out some of thegood books on the topics presented.
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We have just mentioned the term “foreign language”; throughout the bookwe shall use it interchangeably with the term “second language”. Here, we
shall consider them synonymous albeit we realize that they can be easily
distinguished. In the literature, “second language” usually refers to a targetlanguage that is being taught in the country where it is the dominant
language, whereas “foreign language” usually refers to a target language thatis being taught in the country where it is not the dominant language.
However, we do not find this distinction quite relevant for the focus of this
book.
A decade ago, N. S. Prabhu, the famous Indian methodologist, pointed outthat language teaching faced three major problems, “(1) the measurement of
language competence involves elicitation (in some form) of specific
language behaviour but the relationship between such elicited behaviour andlanguage competence which manifests itself in natural use is unclear, (2)given the view that the development of linguistic competence is a holistic
process, there is not enough knowledge available either to identify and
assess different intermediate stages of that development or to relate those
stages to some table of norms which can be said to represent expectations,and (3) there is, ultimately, no way of attributing with any certainty any
specific piece of learning to any specific teaching: language learning cantake place independently of teaching intentions and it is impossible to tell
what has been learnt because of some teaching, and what in spite of it”
(Prabhu 1987, 8). Many things have happened in the field of languageteaching methodology since then. For example, the Common European
Framework of Reference (Council of Europe 1996 and 1998) was published, European Language Council (http://www.fu-berlin.de/elc) was founded,
European Language Portfolio (Scharer 1999) was launched and so on.
Nonetheless, Prabhu‟s claims are still valid. We shall focus on a range ofquestions in the light of modern methodological developments trying to state
the scientific facts. Our own opinion emerges in the discussion now andthen, though. We hope our fortuitous academic bias will be understood.
The book is written in English and our examples come from English but we
do not intend to promote a lingua Adamica restituta. We believe in
plurilingualism and pluriculturalism and our inadequacy is only because of
our teleological prudence. The book is a collaborative effort but theresponsibility of the authors is individual. Maya Pencheva wrote Chapter 1
and Todor Shopov prepared Chapters 2, 3 and 4.
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Chapter 1 offers a theoretical orientation into the philosophical foundationsof methodology. Cognitive and other principles of language teaching and
learning are discussed. It is claimed that the Picture of the World, which we
all keep in our minds, determines the way we speak. This relativistic perspective and other ideas have found different applications in teaching.
They are explored in Chapter 2. It is a brief historical overview of teachingmethods. The three major periods of the development of methodology in the
twentieth century are presented. Chapter 3 discusses the more specific theme
of the approach level of teaching methods. The authors argue that
educational paradigm shift has had a pronounced impact on language
methodology. Particular plans for a language curriculum, which constitutesthe relatively concrete design level of teaching methods, are made in
Chapter 4. The question of modern curriculum design and development is
examined in it. The book functions as a whole text. We recommend that thereader speed-read the book first. Then, the appropriate readings can beselected easily. However, the reader can approach it as a compendium,
browsing only through the relevant sections.
We want to acknowledge the encouragement and support extended to us bymany people. We have had the good fortune to work with Filomena
Capucho of Universidade Catolica Portuguesa – Centro Regional das BeirasPolo de Viseu, PT, Project General Coordinator, and our Partners from
Hogskolan Kalmar, SE, Centro de Professores y Recursos de Salamanca,
ES, Centro de Professores y Recursos de Vitigudino, ES, Institut Universairede Formation des Maitres d‟Auvergne, FR, Skarup Statsseminarium, DK
and Universitat Salzburg, AT. We also wish to acknowledge our deep senseof indebtedness to our colleagues at the Faculty of Classical and Modern
Philology, Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski, BG. Our work would have
hardly been possible without the order introduced in the system by AlexFedotoff. We are especially grateful to Peter Hanenberg of Universidade
Catolica Portuguesa – Centro Regional das Beiras Polo de Viseu, PT, whohad the idea of this book first, for his example and help.
To all these people, many thanks.
Sofia, December 1999
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Chapter 1: Principles of Teaching
In his Principles of Language Learning and Teaching , H. Douglas Brown
notes that there are “…best of times and worst of times” in the languageteaching profession (Brown 1994a). We can safely say that this is the best oftimes for the foreign language teacher. Today, we know much about foreign
language acquisition, about child acquisition of language, about cognitive processes, etc. It is also very important that we have come to an appreciation
of the extreme complexity of this field. This gives us cautious optimism to plunge even deeper into the problems.
Foreign language teachers and educators are often confronted with the
question "What method or what system do you use in teaching a foreignlanguage?" Most often the answer does not come easily or if one gives a
straightforward answer, he risks to be subjected to criticism. Teachersalways have to make choices. These choices are motivated by the fact that
they rest on certain principles of language learning and teaching. Now thatwe know much more about human language and its various aspects, we can
make the next step and formulate at least some of these principles, which are
based on what we know about language itself. Often, swept by fashionable
theories or a desire to sound “scholarly”, we forget a simple truth – we, ashuman beings, teach a human language to human beings. “Students and
teachers of language”, says Osgood, “will discover the principles of theirscience in the universalities of humanness” (Osgood et al. 1957, 301). A
concise but true definition of man will probably include three major
characteristics: (i) one who can reflect and interpret the world around him;
(ii) one who can express feelings; and (iii) one who can use language. Thesecharacteristics underlie three major principles of language teaching and
learning. Well known and novice teaching techniques can be subsumedunder these three headings. Multiplicity of techniques can be brought down
to a number of methods and the methods reduced to a number of principles.Mastering a great number of teaching techniques will not save you in new
situations, “not predicted” by the theory but predictable. It will not give youthe all-important ability to rationalize what you are doing and why are you
doing it. To do that one must be aware of deeper principles of languageacquisition and use, stemming from the foundations of human language as
such.
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1.1. Cognitive Principles
We shall call the first set of principles “cognitive” because they relate to
mental, intellectual and psychological faculties in operating with language. Itshould be made clear, however, that the three types of principles described
in this chapter, cognitive, social and linguistic principles, do not exist as if inthree watertight compartments but rather spill across each other to make up
the most remarkable ability of man – the linguistic ability.
It is no wonder that the achievements of modern cognitive science have
found such a warm and fast response in linguistics. Some of the postulates ofcognitive science today are crucial to our understanding of how language
operates and how we acquire this ability, respectively. Because one of the
most difficult questions in foreign language acquisition and child acquisitionof language is, How is it possible that children at an early age and adults,late in their life, can master a system of such immense complexity? Is it only
a matter of memory capacity and automatic reproduction or is there
something else that helps us acquire a language?
Let us begin with some long established postulates of foreign language
acquisition and see what cognitive theory has to say about them.
(1)
Automaticity of Acquisition
No one can dispute the fact that children acquire a foreign language quickly
and successfully. This ease is commonly attributed to children‟s ability toacquire language structures automatically and subconsciously, that is,
without actually analyzing the forms of language themselves. They appear to
learn languages without “thinking” about them. This has been called by B.McLaughlin “automatic processing” (McLaughlin 1990). In order to operate
with the incredible complexity of language both children and adult learnersdo not process language “unit by unit” but employ operations in which
language structures and forms (words, affixes, endings, word order,grammatical rules, etc.) are peripheral. The Principle of Automaticity, as
stated above, aims at an “automatic processing of a relatively unlimited
number of language forms”. Overanalyzing language, thinking too much
about its forms tend to impede the acquisition process. This leads to therecommendation to teachers to focus on the use of language and its
functional aspects. But focus on use and functionality presupposes
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meaningful learning, which is in strong contradiction with automaticity.
What is more, one major characteristic both of child acquisition and adultlearning of foreign languages is the phenomenon called hypercorrection.
Again hypercorrection cannot exist without meaningful analysis of language
structures and their “classification” into “regular patterns” and “exceptions”with respect to a language function.
(2)
Meaningful Learning
Meaningful learning “subsumes” new information into existing structures
and memory systems. The resulting associative links create stronger
retention. “Children are good meaningful acquirers of language because theyassociate…words, structures and discourse elements with that which is
relevant and important in their daily quest for knowledge and survival ”
(Brown 1994b, 18). We must pay special attention to this sentence of H. D.Brown, especially the last words, underlined here. It will be relevant in ourargument in favor of the cognitive principles of language acquisition. One of
the recommendations for classroom application of Meaningful Learning is
also of relevance to our further argument in this direction. It states
“Whenever a new topic or concept is introduced, attempt to anchor it instudents‟ existing knowledge and background so that it gets associated with
something they already know”.
Some thirty-five years ago, a new science was born. Now called “Cognitive
Science”, it combines tools from psychology, computer science, linguistics, philosophy, child psychology, and neurobiology to explain the workings of
human intelligence. Linguistics, in particular, has seen spectacular advancesin the years since. There are many phenomena of language that we are
coming to understand.
Language is not a cultural artifact that we learn the way we learn to tell the
time. Instead, it is a distinct characteristic of our brains. Language is acomplex, specialized skill, which develops in the child. For that reason
cognitive scientists have described language as a psychological and mental faculty. The idea that thought is the same thing as language is an example of
what can be called a conventional absurdity. Now that cognitive scientists
know how to think about thinking, there is less of a temptation to equate it
with language and we are in a better position to understand how languageworks.
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In essence, to reason is to deduce new pieces of knowledge from old ones.
But “knowledge” is something complex, the product of social and culturalexperience from living in a particular “world”. In his Philosophy of
Language, Wilhelm von Humboldt claims that speaking a language means
living in a specific conceptual domain. Acquiring a foreign language meansentering a new conceptual domain. This statement poses a major problem or
perhaps the major problem of acquiring a foreign language – are theseconceptual domains so different that they are incompatible? Or there are
certain mechanisms by which we can make transitions from the one into the
other?
We shall present arguments in support of the second decision. The pivotalquestion is how we interpret Humboldt‟s conceptual domains. We will refer
to them by the term Picture of the World, initially used in analyzing
mythology and today employed by cognitive science. The word “picture”,though usually used metaphorically, expresses truly the essence of the phenomenon – it is a picture, not a mirror reflection, or a snapshot of the
world around us. Like any other picture, it presupposes a definite point of
view or the attitude of its creator. It involves interpretation, representations
of the world from various angles (the so- called “facet viewing”). This ofcourse implies the possibility to have a number of different pictures of one
object. What is important here is that our conceptualization of the world isnot “an objective reflection of reality”, but a subjective picture, which
reflects our views, beliefs, and attitudes. “Subjective” in the sense of the
collective interpretation or point of view of a society or cultural andlinguistic community. This picture explicates the relativity of human
cognition. In semiotics it goes under the name of “passive” culturalmemory. Cognitive science, however, rejects the qualification “passive” and
claims that Pictures of the World are actively and currently structured by
common cognitive models. In connection with Humboldt‟s statement, it is possible to pass from one picture of the world into another by means of a set
of universal cognitive mechanisms. This is crucial for explaining foreignlanguage acquisition. But what are those mechanisms? And what is the
nature of the evidence?
Our conceptual system or Picture of the World is not something that we are
normally aware of. But human language is an important source of evidence
for what a picture of the world is like. On the basis of linguistic evidence wecan say that most of our everyday conceptual system is metaphorical in
nature. Cognitive science explains the essence of metaphor as understanding
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and experiencing one thing in terms of another. The first thing is called
Target Domain (what we want to express) and the second one is calledSource Domain (by means of which we express the first). We can use, as an
example, the way we conceive of time in our everyday life. Let us have the
following linguistic expressions:
You are wasting my time.
This gadget will save you hours. How do you spend your time?
That flat tyre will cost me an hour.
I’m running out of time.
The central postulate of cognitive science is that metaphorical transfer is not
just a matter of language, of mere words. Human thought processes are
largely metaphorical. Metaphor means metaphorical concepts. And these arespecifically structured. If we generalize the examples above, we come upwith the metaphor /TIME IS MONEY/. This metaphor entails the treatment
of time as a limited resource and a valuable commodity. The examples
demonstrate one type of metaphorical transfer – structural metaphor .
On the more linguistic side of the problem, when metaphorical concepts
become lexicalized, they help a variety of people understand what theconcepts mean. In other words, they have a certain didactic role. Metaphors
in computer terminology, for example, aid users speaking different
languages but using English to understand and remember new concepts. Atthe same time they allow users to associate unfamiliar concepts with old
ones, thereby helping to palliate technostress. “User friendliness” ofcomputer metaphorical terms can be illustrated by the numerous examples
found in the vocabulary of user interfaces – e.g. desktop, wallpaper, and
menu, to mention just a few. It appears that conceptual domains are shaped by several themes. The domain of the Internet features several conceptual
themes. Most of these are based on the functions that the Internet is perceived to have: (1) helping people “move” across vast distances; (2)
facilitate communication; and (3) send and store data. The followingmetaphorical domains can present these themes:
1. Transportation
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The theme of transportation dominates Internet terminology, specified
sometimes as marine navigation, highway transportation:
to navigate/cruise/surf the Internet (or the Web)
internaut
cybersurfer
anchor
information highway, data highway
to ride/get on the Internet
router
ramp/on-ramp, access ramp
infobahn
cyberspace
2. Mail and Postal Services
e-mailsnailmail
mailbox
virtual postcard
envelope
3. Architecture
site
gateway
bridge
frame
4. The Printed Medium
Web page
bookmark
White pages
to browse
e-magazine
carbon copy
Some metaphorical terms have spawned numerous conceptually related ones
by metaphorical extension. Gopher , for example, has given rise to
Gopherspace, Gopher hole. The famous desktop metaphor has given rise to
files, folders, trash cans. The mouse metaphor has generated mouse trails and so on.
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A different type of metaphorical model is the second one, which organizes a
whole system of concepts with respect to one another – the so-calledorientation metaphor . They rely on bodily experience: up-down, in-out,
front-back, deep-shallow, center-periphery, etc. Such orientation metaphors
are grounded in physical perception and hence universal. For example:
Up vs. Down
happy sad
I’m feeling up. I’m down today.
I’m in high spirits. My spirits sank.
Thinking about her gives me a lift. I’m depressed.
good health sickness
He is in top shape. He fell ill. He is at the peak of health. He came down with a
flue.
have control over be subject to control
He is in a superior position. He is my social inferior. I have control over the situation. He is under my control.
high status low status
He’s climbing the social ladder fast. He is at the bottom of the
social hierarchy.
virtue depravity He is an upstanding citizen. I wouldn’t stoop to that.
She is high-minded. That’s beneath me.
rational emotional
His arguments rose above emotions. Discussion fell to theemotional level.
The third type of metaphor is called ontological . Cognitive science has it
that we understand our experience in terms of objects and substances. This
allows us to pick fragments of our experience and treat them as discrete
entities or substances. Thus, we interpret the human mind as a materialobject with specific properties - the /MIND IS A MACHINE/ metaphor:
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My mind just isn’t operating today.
I’m a little rusty today. The experience shattered her.
He is easily crushed.
He broke under cross-examination.
The conception of /MIND IS A MACHINE/ also enables us to view mindas having an off-state, a level of efficiency, productive capacity, internal
mechanisms, etc. What is more, and it is very important, we view both
conceptual domains (The Mind and The Machine) as internally structured,
so that we can make transfers not only between the domains as a whole but
also between parts of these domains. This process is known as “metaphoricalmapping”. In this way, when we use a metaphorical model, we can also use
elements of that model with the same effect. Let‟s illustrate this with an
example:
/LIFE IS A JOURNEY/.
The mapping between the two domains is not simple. The structure of
Journey includes, for example, point of departure, path to destination, meansof transportation, co-travelers, obstacles along the way to destination,
crossroads, etc. It is amazing how our concept of life repeats all the detailsof our concept of journeys. What is much more amazing, however, is not
that we have many metaphors for life, but that we have just a few. They are
among the basic metaphors we live by.
Basic metaphors are limited in number. Among them are:
/STATES ARE LOCATIONS/
/EVENTS ARE ACTIONS/
/PEOPLE ARE PLANTS/
/PEOPLE ARE CONTAINERS/
/LIFE IS A JOURNEY/
By means of them we can interpret all existing metaphorical models:
/LIFE IS A JOURNEY/
< /EVENTS ARE ACTIONS/
/LIFE IS A PLAY/
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/LIFE IS A PRECIOUS POSSESSION/
/LIFE IS A SUBSTANCE/
< /PEOPLE ARE CONTAINERS/
/LIFE IS A FLUID/
/LIFE IS LIGHT/
< /PEOPLE ARE PLANTS/
/DEATH IS DARKNESS/
/DEATH IS DEPARTURE/ < /LIFE IS A JOURNEY/
/DEATH IS SLEEP/REST/ < /STATES ARE LOCATIONS/.
We understand the Source Domains of basic metaphors relying on oureveryday experience – bodily experience and social experience. This meansthat they are not independent of thinking and cognition.
What motivates our ability to create and understand metaphorical structures?
According to cognitive science, these are cognitive and psychologicalcharacteristics, which are elements of our species specific as human beings.
They are:
(1)
Our ability to create structures in concepts that do not exist
independent of the metaphor, i.e. our ability for modeling,(2)
Our ability to choose and explicate optional elements from
conceptual structures,(3)
Our ability to make conclusions and inferences,
(4)
Our ability to evaluate and transfer evaluations of elements of the
Source Domain onto the Target Domain.
Our mental ability for modeling enables us to operate easily with extremelycomplex conceptual structures. A very good example is the notion of
„mother‟. It comprises six sub-models:
(i)Birth
Mother is the one who gives birth to a child. (ii)Genetic
Mother is the one who carries the embryo.
(iii)Breeding
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Mother is the one who feeds and cares for the baby.
(iv)Marriage
Mother is the one who is married to the child’s father.
(v)Genealogical
Mother is the closest female relative.
(vi) Housewife
Mothers stay at home and care for the family.
Sub-models (i), (iii), and (iv) form the core of the concept. They build the
stereotype image of a mother. Sub-models (i), (ii), and (v) describe what a
mother is “objectively” (biologically). And (i), (ii), (iii), and (iv) describe
what a mother normally is, i.e. the prototypical mother. This prototyperemains stable cross-culturally. All six sub-models describe the ideal
mother. This ideal changes historically and across cultures.
Thus, we operate with several images. The most important are the stereotypeand the ideal. Very often they have separate linguistic expressions. Thus in
English we distinguish between the biological and the ideal father. We can
normally ask
Who is the child’s fat her? but not
*Who is the child’s daddy? because the ideal implies caring for the family and being married to the
child‟s mother. In the „mother‟ concept the biological and the social are
inseparable. All deviations from the model are interpreted as highly marked,i.e. exceptions from the ideal. For that reason they are consistently marked
linguistically:
stepmother
surrogate mother foster mother
adoptive motherdonor mother
biological mother
We can summarize all metaphorical models into a small number of Basic
Models:
/GENERAL IS SPECIFIC/
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/ABSTRACT IS CONCRETE/
/TIME IS SPACE/
/SOCIAL IS NATURAL/
/MENTAL IS PHYSICAL/
How can we apply these principles, mechanisms and models in teaching a
language and teaching about language? We can do that in a number of ways:
I. On the diachronic level
There is a marked parallelism between current English metaphors and
models of semantic change. Living metaphors and semantic change arerelated and mutually reinforcing. This explains the commonality of such
metaphors in the Indo-European languages through time. By using cognitive
models we can explain but also teach the established one-way directions ofsemantic change. For example, Indo-European languages follow consistentlycertain metaphorical transfers:
1. /MENTAL ACTIVITY IS MOTION IN PHYSICAL SPACE/,
e.g. report < Latin „carry back‟
refer
This direction of semantic change is paralleled by the existence of
synchronic metaphorical schemes in which physical motion is used as theSource Domain for more abstract notions like „time‟ or „mental activity‟.
Shifts in the opposite direction are unknown.
2. /MENTAL STATES ARE PHYSICAL PERCEPTION/, e.g. know < „see‟
remark < observe < „look closely at‟
3. /MENTAL STATES ARE PHYSICAL MOTION/,
e.g. suppose „understand‟ < Latin sub + ponere „put under‟
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4. /MENTAL STATES ARE MANIPULATION OF OBJECTSIN SPACE/,
e.g. comprehend < Latin „seize‟
grasp2 „understand‟ verbs of „Speech acts‟, but never in the opposite direction. Ther eforesemantic change tends to move towards more personal meanings, meanings
closer to the Self.
6.
/SPEECH ACTS ARE MANIPULATION OF OBJECTS IN
SPACE/,
e.g. admit < Latin ad + mittere „send to‟
assert < Latin ad + serere „connect to‟
ad - expressing „direction from speaker to hearer‟ reply < Latin re + plicare „feed back‟
refuse < Latin re + futare „beat back‟ re- expressing „direction from hearer to speaker‟
7. /MENTAL ACTIVITY/SPEECH ACT IS TRAVEL INSPACE/,
e.g. We haven’t got anywhere in this conversation.
Now we must go back to the main issue.
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Notice also the use of spatial prepositions both with „Speech act‟ and
„Mental activity‟ verbs: e.g. talk think
about over
walk go
This shows that we conceive of a speech act as a distance between the twocommunicating parties, a route along which ideas=objects can travel or be
exchanged. This is a replica of the model of „Physical action‟ verbs, with
their regular contrast between to and at prepositions:
e.g. throw to talk to shout to at at at
to, expressing active participation on the part of the receiver=hearer, asuccessful completion of the trajectory of the action, and at , expressing aninactive receiver=hearer.
Since „Speech act‟ verbs involve exchange between two parties, i.e. action,
they can also have a metaphorical variant like /SPEECH ACTS ARE
WARFARE/,
e.g. concede < Latin con + cedere „give up‟ insist < Latin in + sistere „stand in‟
convince < Latin con + vincere „conquer together‟.
II. On the synchronic level
Synchronically, we can employ metaphorical transfer models to teachsemantic fields and explain semantic extension. Thus, „Human emotions‟
can be explained through „Temperature‟, „Cooking activities‟, or „Colours‟,
e.g. hot temper cold personwarm friendship our friendship has cooled
boil with indignation take it cool
burn with emotion
simmer with angerbe in a stew.
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Other spheres of language teaching or linguistic analysis where we can apply
the same mechanism of explanation are synonymy, phraseology,development of grammatical categories and forms of their expression,
predominant word order, etc. We shall demonstrate the validity of this
approach in teaching grammar, using auxiliary verbs as an example.
There is a stable tendency for a limited set of notional verbs, with specificmeaning, to turn, over time, into auxiliary verbs of analytical constructions
(the perfect tenses, the progressive tenses, and the future tense). The lexical
sources for auxiliaries in such constructions usually include notions like:
PHYSICAL LOCATION: be + on/at/in + nominal form MOVEMENT TO A GOAL: go(to)/come(to) + nominal formDEVELOPMENT OF ACTION IN TIME: begin/become/finish +
nominal form
VOLITION: want/will + nominal formOBLIGATION: must + verbal formPERMISSION: let + verbal form.
In other words, there is a “selectivity” with respect to the initial lexical
meaning of verbs that are likely to evolve into auxiliaries of analyticalconstructions across languages. Thus the initial meaning of 117 auxiliaries
from 15 languages involve 20 lexical sources:be at/on
be + adjective/participle
havecome
go(to)walk
sit
standlie
beginbecome
remain finish
do
want
must permit
take care, put
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give.
There are a number of immediate questions that arise. Is this “rule of
auxiliation” due to pure coincidence; does it result from geographic or
genetic closeness of languages; or could this be the reflection of somefundamental cognitive principle that gets actualized in linguistic structure?
We can postulate that this process of auxiliation is the reflection of a basic principle in human conceptualization, namely that abstract notions are
conceptualized by means of a limited number of concrete basic concepts.
We can make an even stronger claim that lexical sources for grammatization
in general involve notions basic to human experience (bodily and social) that
provide central reference points.
1.2. Social Principles
We now turn our attention to those principles of language acquisition that
are central to human beings as social entities. We shall look at the concept ofself and self-awareness, at relationships in a community (of speakers and
learners), at the relationships between language and culture.
In speaking, learning and teaching a language we are taking part in one of
the wonders of the world. For we all belong to a species with a remarkableability: we can shape events and ideas in each other‟s brains. The ability is
language. Language is not just any cultural invention but the product ofsociety and culture, and the ability of man to cope with them and to create
them. But it is much more than that. There must be something, then, that
makes language accessible to all, manageable and flexible enough toaccommodate various cultures and societies, and to be the most widely used
instrument in interpersonal relations.
(1) The Self and Self-awareness
One of the products of social development is the formation of the concept
of self and awareness of the ego, which model a specific pattern of linguistic
behaviour and structure of linguistic categories. In the context of the problems discussed here, this touches onto the old and widely disputed idea
of language relativity, i.e. the idea that the structure of our mother tongue
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and its categories, which are a reflection of our way of life and the
environment, give particular shape to our way of thinking. That is, speakinga particular language, you are also a particular linguistic self . As human
beings learn a foreign language, they also develop a new mode of thinking
and acting – they enter a new identity. But this new “language ego”,intertwined with the new language itself, can create a sense of uncertainty,
defensiveness, even humiliation, and raise inhibitions. Learners can feel this because the arsenals of their native-language egos may be suddenly useless
in developing a “second self”.
The foreign language teacher is the major factor in the formation of this
“second self”. His choice of techniques needs to be cognitively challengingto achieve the accommodation of the learner to his “new world”. If the
student is learning the foreign language in the milieu of the country where it
is spoken, then he is likely to experience an “identity crisis”. To avoid thisthe teacher must “create” appropriate “natural” situations for the learner sothat he can practice his new identity.
Let us take one ordinary example – learning to write compositions in
English. Students whose teachers urge them to reduce the number of timesthey use the pronoun “I” in their essays (or, conversely, encourage the use of
“I”) may be surprised to discover that in some cultures this grammaticalchoice has profound cultural and even political connotations. A Chinese
student is taught to use always “we” instead of “I” lest he give the
impression of being selfish and individualistic. Starting to study English herequired to “imagine looking at the world with his head upside down” and to
invent a new “English self” that could use the pronoun “I”. Learning to writean essay in English is not an isolated classroom activity, but a social and
cultural experience. Learning the rules of English essay writing is, to a
certain extent, learning the values of Anglo-American society. Writingessays in English, a Chinese student has to “reprogram” his mind, to
redefine some of the basic concepts and values that he had about himself,about society.
Rule number one in English composition writing is: “Be yourself”. But
writing many “I‟s” is only the beginning of the process of redefining oneself.
By such a redefinition is meant not only the change of how one envisioned
oneself, but also a change in how he perceived the world. The Chinesestudent gradually creates his new “English Self”.
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(2) The Language-Culture Connection
Everyone knows what is supposed to happen when two Englishmen who
have never met before come face to face in a railway compartment – they
start talking about the weather. By talking to the other person about someneutral topic like the weather, it is possible to strike up a relationship with
him without actually having to say very much. Conversations of this kind area good example of the sort of important social function that is often fulfilled
by language. By trying to master this function of language, the learner is
building part of his new language identity.
It is well known, and often humorously exaggerated, that the British alwaystalk about the weather. In his famous book, How To Be an Alien, George
Mikes (1970) discusses the weather as the first and most important topic for
a person who wants to learn English. Here is his comment:
“This is the most important topic in the land. Do not be misled by memories
of your youth when, on the Continent, wanting to describe someone as
exceptionally dull, you remarked: „He is the type who would discuss the
weather with you.‟ In England, this is an ever-interesting, even thrillingtopic, and you must be good at discussing the weather.
EXAMPLES FOR CONVERSATION
For Good Weather
„Lovely day, isn‟t it?‟ „Isn‟t it beautiful?‟
„The sun…‟
„Isn‟t it gorgeous?‟ „Wonderful, isn‟t it?‟
„It‟s so nice and hot…‟ „Personally, I think it‟s so nice when it‟s hot – isn‟t it?‟
„I adore it – don‟t you?‟
For Bad Weather
„Nasty day, isn‟t it?‟ „Isn‟t it dreadful?‟
„The rain…I hate rain…‟
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„I don‟t like it at all. Do you?‟
„Fancy such a day in July. Rain in the morning, then a bit of sunshine, andthen rain, rain, rain, all day long.‟
„I remember exactly the same July in 1936.‟
„Yes, I remember too.‟ „Or was it in 1928?‟
„Yes, it was.‟ „Or in 1939?‟
„Yes, that‟s right.‟
Now, observe the last few sentences of this conversation. A very important
rule emerges from it. You must never contradict anybody when discussingthe weather in England. Should it hail and snow, should hurricanes uproot
trees, and should someone remark to you: „Nice day, isn‟t it?‟ – answer
without hesitation: „Isn‟t it lovely?‟”
And here is Mikes‟ advice to the learner of English:
“Learn the above conversations by heart. If you are a bit slow in picking
things up, learn at least one conversation, it would do wonderfully for anyoccasion.”
All this is of course a very good joke but it says much about the British and
their social behaviour. Whenever you teach a language, you also teach a
complex system of cultural customs, values, and ways of thinking, feelingand acting. A teacher must necessarily attract his students‟ attention to the
cultural connotations, especially of socio-linguistic aspects of language. Aneasy way to do this is to discuss cross-cultural differences with the students,
emphasising that no culture is “better” than another. What is important in
such a discussion is to make them aware that they will never master theforeign language without “entering a new world” or “acquiring a new self”.
A second aspect of the language – culture connection is the extent to whichthe students will be affected by the process of acculturation, which will vary
with the context and the goals of learning. In many language-learningcontexts such as ESL, students are faced with the full-blown realities of
adapting to life in a foreign country, complete with varying stages of
acculturation. Then, cultural adaptation, social distance, and psychological
adjustment are also factors to deal with. The success with which learnersadapt to a new cultural milieu will affect their language acquisition success,
and vice versa, in some significant ways.
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We cannot be certain that all the functions of language described inlinguistic literature are to be found in all cultures. The relative importance of
these different functions may vary from culture to culture, their distribution
may vary. For anyone to participate in the life of a community he has to beable to communicate and be communicated to. That is why the learner is
learning a language. This does not mean that the range of functions aimed at by a foreign language learner will be that at the command of the native
speaker. A language learner may know exactly what he wants the foreign
language for, or he may have no clear idea at all. But for many teaching
operations we need to specify the aims.
Our ability to participate as members of social and language communities
depends upon our control of linguistic and other behaviour considered
appropriate. The learner of a foreign language is preparing to use thatlanguage for certain purposes, in certain roles and in certain situations. Manywriters speak of the linguistic needs of the learner in terms of roles he may
assume. The primary role ascribed to him will be that of foreigner, in which
his communicative needs are normally going to be more restricted than those
of the native speaker. In preparing a teaching programme or choosing ateaching strategy, we have to take into account what the learner‟s needs may
be and we must do so in terms of the social situations she is going to have to participate in, perhaps not as a “full member” but as a “foreign associate”. In
this connection, it is appropriate to remind again of the wonderful book of
George Mikes containing valuable advice to foreigners not to pretend to benative speakers. Here is what Mikes says about foreigners, trying to acquire
“perfect” English and sound like native speakers.
“In the first week after my coming to England I picked up a tolerable
working knowledge of the language and the next seven years convinced megradually but thoroughly that I would never know it really well, let alone
perfectly. This is sad. My only consolation being that nobody speaks English perfectly.
If you live here long enough you will find out to your greatestamazement that the adjective nice is not the only adjective the language
possesses, in spite of the fact that in the first three years you do not need to
learn or use any other adjective.
Then you have to decide on your accent. You will have your foreignaccent all right, but many people like to mix it with something else. The
easiest way to give the impression of having a good accent or no foreign
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accent at all is to hold an unlit pipe in your mouth, to mutter between your
teeth and finish your sentences with the question: „isn’t it?‟ People will notunderstand much, but they are accustomed to that and they will get the most
excellent impression.
The most successful attempts to put on a highly cultured air have beenon the polysyllabic line. Many foreigners, who have learned Latin and Greek
in school, discover with amazement and satisfaction that the Englishlanguage has absorbed a huge amount of ancient Greek and Latin
expressions, and they realize that (a) it is much easier to learn these
expressions than the much simpler English words; (b) that these words are as
a rule interminably long and make a simply superb impression when talking
to the greengrocer…”
1.3. Linguistic Principles
The last category of principles of language learning and teaching centres on
language itself and on how learners deal with this complex and ill-formedsystem (see Chapter 4).
Earlier in this century, Edward Sapir wrote: “When it comes to linguistic
form, Plato walks with the Macedonian swineherd, Confucius with the head-
hunting savage of Assam.” There is a considerable knowledge availableabout the nature of human language. Linguistics provides a growing body of
scientific knowledge about language, which can guide the activity of thelanguage teacher. Linguists can make and have made great contributions to
the solution of some of the problems.
Language is such a complex phenomenon that it cannot be fully accounted
for within one consistent and comprehensive theory. For this reason, whenasked the question "What is language?" the linguist is likely to reply by
asking another question "Why do you want to know?" If we teach language,the way we approach the task will be influenced, or even determined, by
what we believe language to be. There is generally a close connection
between the way we talk about something and the way we regard it.
Linguists, especially, often talk about how language “works”. The linguisticapproach to language is the most “objectivising” approach: it is concerned
with language as a system; it aims to elucidate the structure of language. To
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do this it has set up various “levels of description”. These levels bear such
familiar names as syntax, morphology, phonology and phonetics, lexis andsemantics, pragmatics, etc.
The study of language is beset by the difficulty that it deals with somethingutterly familiar. Everybody “knows” about language, because they use it all
the time. The problem of studying phenomena like language is to separate itfrom ourselves, to achieve a “psychic distance” (Chomsky 1968).
Perhaps the most cogent criticism of traditional language teaching with its
insistence on correctness, the rules of grammar, and its limited objectives, is
that it lacked the socio-cultural dimension. Little thought seems to have beengiven to the notion of appropriateness, to the way that language behaviour is
responsive to differing social situations. It is one of the great values of
modern language teaching that it adopts a more social approach to language,and it is concerned with the problems of its communicative function.
The relevance of the linguistic approach to language teaching is too obvious
to need much discussion here. One point must be mentioned, however.
Modern teachers of language are actually teaching their students not only thelanguage but also about language. Modern linguistics requires that a
grammar should accord with a native speaker‟s intuitions about language.This formulates a new goal for linguistic theory. Now linguists describe
what native speakers conceive to be the nature of their language. The
emphasis has shifted from the nature of language data to the nature of thehuman capacity, which makes it possible to produce the language data.
Some linguists, Chomsky among them, would claim that the objectives ofthe linguistic study of language have always implicitly been the
characterization of the internalized set of rules by a speaker-hearer (and
learner) when he uses language. Such linguists do not study what people dowhen they speak and understand language, but seek to discover the rules
underlying this performance. This is what Chomsky calls competence (1966a, 9): "A distinction must be made between what the speaker of a
language knows implicitly (what we may call his competence) and what hedoes (his performance). A grammar, in the traditional view, is an account of
competence".
The s peaker‟s competence, then, can be characterized as a set of rules for producing and understanding sentences in a language. The grammar of a
language, thus, in its linguistic sense, is a characterization of the native
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speaker‟s competence. All speakers of a language vary slightly in the rules
they follow, as well, of course, as in their performance. When we areteaching a foreign language, we are trying to develop in the learner not just
grammatical competence, in the Chomskyan sense, but communicative
competence. We are teaching him or her not only what we call “theformation rules” of the language, but also in addition, what Hymes has
called “the speaking rules”. The learner must develop the ability todistinguish grammatical from ungrammatical sequences, but he must also
know when to select a particular grammatical sequence, appropriate to the
context, both linguistic and situational.
Different functions of language can be associated with the factors involvedin a speech act – the speaker, the hearer, contact between them, the linguistic
code used, the topic and the form of the message. If the orientation is
towards the speaker, then we have the personal function of language. It isthrough this function that the speaker reveals his attitude towards what he isspeaking about. It is not just that he expresses his thoughts and emotions
through language, but his emotions and attitudes at what he is talking about.
Hearer-oriented speech acts involve the directive function of language. It isthe function of controlling the behaviour of a participant. This can be done
by command, request or warning, or by some general admonitory statement, by invoking legal, moral or customary rules of society.
Where the focus is on the contact between the participants, speech functionsto establish relations, maintain them, or promote social solidarity. These are
typically ritual, or formulaic speech acts: leave-taking, greetings, remarksabout the weather, inquiries about health, etc. This function, sometimes
called phatic, is also performed or supported by gestures, facial expression.
The topic-oriented function of speech, often called the referential function,
is that which usually stands first in people‟s minds. It is the function thatgave rise to the traditional notion that language was created solely for the
communication of thought, for making statements about how the speaker perceives the way things in the world are.
There are two more functions, associated with the code used and the
message. They are the most difficult to formulate. We usually test them byasking the questions "Do you hear me?" and "Do you follow?"
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(1) The Native Language Effect
S. Pit Corder claims that when people learn a second language they are not
acquiring language, they already possess it. The learning of a second
language is rather a question of increasing a repertoire, or learning a set ofalternatives for something they already know. The assumption then is that
some of the rules they already know are also used in the production andunderstanding of the second language. This is what is meant by “transfer”.
Learners transfer what they already know. Making errors in the second
language can, in part, be explained by the notion of transfer. It is also called
“negative transfer” or interference. But this tendency of transfer can be also
positive ( facilitation). It is just as well that different languages do, in fact,have resemblances to each other. On this account, it has to be established
what is different between the mother tongue and the foreign language.
Describing language, or part of language, is part of the process ofdeveloping linguistic theory itself. But we must now outline the hierarchy of
applications of linguistics to language teaching. There are a number of
stages in the application of linguistics to language teaching. The first has
already been identified as that of linguistic description. The second isconcerned with operations performed on the descriptions of language. Each
stage has the function of answering some questions or solving some problems relevant to language teaching. Thus, the application of first order
answers the very general question: what is the nature of the language, which
is to be taught? The next stage answers the question: what is to be taught andhow is it to be taught? The criteria for selecting material for language
teaching are various: utility to the learner, that is, selecting what he needs toknow, his proposed repertoire – those varieties of the language which will
be useful to him, those speech functions which he will need to command. Or
we can invoke the criterion of difference. In a sense, all parts of the foreignlanguage are different from the mother tongue. But difference is relative
Some parts will be more different than others. For example, if the learner‟smother tongue has no grammatical system of aspect, the learning of such a
system presents a serious learning task. Where the learner‟s mother tongue,however, has such a system, the size of the learning problem will depend on
the nature and degree of difference. A third criterion might be difficulty.
What is different in the foreign language does not necessarily in all cases
represent a difficulty. For example, at the phonological level, what is sototally different from anything encountered in the mother tongue does not
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seem to be so difficult to learn as something, which is liable to confusion
with some similar feature in the mother tongue.
The procedures and techniques involved in all these cases of application of
linguistics to foreign language teaching are comparative. This is called
interlingual comparison, or “contrastive” comparison (Contrastive Analysis). The other type of comparison is often called Error Analysis. Theerrors performed by the learners may be an important part of the data on
which the comparison is made. But what is being compared in this case is
not two existing and already known languages, but the language of the
learner at some particular point in the process of learning, with the target
language. A learner‟s so called errors are systematic, and it is precisely thisregularity which shows that the learner is following a set of rules. These
rules are not those of the target language but a “transitional” from of
language, similar to the target language, but also similar to the learner‟smother tongue (what Larry Selinker calls “interlanguage”).
(2) Language Universals
In the context of discussing similarities and differences between languages,we must touch upon the theme of language universals and their place in
foreign language teaching. The 4,000 to 6,000 languages of the world dolook impressively different from English and from one another. On the other
hand, one can also find striking uniformities. In 1963 the linguist Joseph
Greenberg examined a sample of 30 far-flung languages from fivecontinents. Greenberg wanted to see if any properties of grammar could be
found in all these languages. In the first investigation, which focused on theorder of words and morphemes, he found no fewer than forty-five universal
features.
Since then, many other surveys have been conducted, involving scores of
languages from every part of the world, and literally hundreds of universal patterns have been documented. Some hold absolutely. For example, no
language forms questions by reversing the order within a sentence, like* Built Jack that house the this is? Some universals are statistical: subjects
normally precede objects in almost all languages, and verbs and their objects
tend to be adjacent. Thus most languages have SVO or SOV word order;
fewer have VSO; VOS and OVS are rare (less than 1%); and OSV may benon-existent. The largest number of universals involve implications: if a
language has X, it will also have Y. Universal implications are found in all
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aspects of language, from phonology (if a language has nasal vowels, it will
have non-nasal vowels) to word meanings (if a language has a word for„purple‟, it will also have a word for „red‟; if a language has a word for „leg‟,
it will also have a word for „arm‟).
The knowledge of the existence of language universals may save some
procedures of comparison between the mother tongue and the foreignlanguage taught. In the second place, it can be part of the teaching material
(mostly implicitly) and the methods of explanation.
(3) Linguistics in Structuring the Syllabus
A finished syllabus (cf. Chapter 4) is the overall plan for the learning
process. It must specify what components must be available, or learned by a
certain time line; what is the most efficient sequence in which they arelearned; what items can be learned “simultaneously”; what items are alreadyknown.
The structure of language is a “system of systems”, or a “network” of
interrelated categories, no part of which is wholly independent or whollydependent upon another. In language, nothing is learned completely until
everything is learned. If this is so, then no simple linear sequence for asyllabus is appropriate. A logical solution to this problem seems to be a
cyclic, or spiral, structure, which requires the learner to return time and
again to some aspects of language structure, language process, or domain oflanguage use. Language learning is not just cumulative, it is an integrative
process. In Chapter 4, we shall offer a new approach to syllabus/curriculumdesign.
The major problem that faces us in syllabus organisation is whether to takethe formal criteria as dominant, leaving alternative ways of expressing the
same idea to some other part of the syllabus, or to base our grouping onsemantic criteria. The teaching of modal verbs is a perfect example of the
dilemma. Should we bring all alternative ways of expressing necessity,obligation, possibility and probability, etc. together into separate single
units? In other words, are we going to regard „modal verbs‟, or alternatively
„the expression of obligation‟, as a syllabus item?
There is no simple answer to this problem. The more we take account of
semantic considerations, the more evident it becomes that the relationship
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between meaning and surface form is a complex and indirect one. At the
time when less attention was paid to the whole problem of meaning, andlanguage learning was thought of as a matter of acquiring the ability to
produce automatically „sentence patterns‟, it was logical (or was it?) to
group materials in a syllabus on the basis of superficial formal criteria. Butwith the increasing emphasis on language learning as training the learner in
communication, the relevance of semantic criteria in organising thelinguistic material increases. We are now trying to classify the linguistic
material in terms of more abstract semantic categories as time, deixis,
modality, aspectuality, futurity, possession, quantification, causation, etc.
We have seen that the systematic interconnectedness of language makes itunrealistic to think of any item as teachable or learnable in isolation. We
should consider an item in a more general way, i.e. as a process, or as some
grammatical category, such as tense or number .
(a) The syntactic syllabus
Nowadays, descriptions of language give us a relatively satisfactory account
of the structure of the system to be learned, that is, a characterisation of the„formation rules‟ of the language. But we are concerned with more than this
in language teaching – we are concerned with performance ability. There aresome general types of syntactic processes, such as nominalisation,
relativisation or thematisation, passivisation, interrogativisation, negation,
which could be regarded as „items‟ of performance ability in a syllabus.Linguistically speaking, all these involve performing certain operations.
(b) The morphological syllabus
The most frequent claim for the appropriate application of sequencing,otherwise denied in principle, is made at the level of morphology. For
example, the verb "to have" and "to be" are used as auxiliaries in theformation of perfect or progressive aspect. Most logically, we must present
and teach these verbs before introducing the formation of these aspectualforms. This seems a good argument until we specify what we mean by
'„teaching'‟ the verbs to have and to be. Learning a verb involves not only
discovering the relations in enters into with nominals, whether it is transitive
or copulative, but also learning the morphological system together with theirassociated meanings: time, duration, completion, frequency, etc. The
learning of something must surely involve the ability to use it acceptably, i.e.
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discover its functions. The function of the auxiliary to be in the progressive
aspect, or passive voice, is different from that of the verb to be in copulativestructures. To say that in teaching copulative sentences one is teaching the
verb "to be" so that it can be available for later auxiliary use is a categorial
error.
(c) The lexical syllabus
In order to present and exemplify grammatical categories and syntactic
structures, we have to use lexical words. This does not mean that the
teaching of vocabulary is logically dependent on the teaching of grammar.
The teaching of vocabulary provides us with another concept of syllabus
grouping – lexico-semantic. An example of this could be the co-occurrence
of adverbs of past time, yesterday, last week, three years ago, etc., withtense verbs; or co-occurrence of verbs of speaking and believing, say, tell,cry, believe, hope, expect , etc., with nominalised sentences of different
types.
We must outline „the network of relations‟ which bind the vocabulary of alanguage into a structure. It is possible to isolate „sub-fields‟ within the
lexical structure of a language. Such groupings of lexical items bearing moreor less close semantic relations to each other are usually called „semantic
fields‟. Semantic fields provide groupings of the vocabulary, which could
serve as „items in a syllabus‟. The field of cooking will be used as anexample. Cooking words provide a good source of examples because there
are clear reference relations that one can appeal to; the words do notnormally carry strong connotations, so we can concentrate on the cognitive
meaning.
The basic words in the culinary field in English are cook , bake, boil , roast ,
fry, and broil (or grill for British English). The set also includes steam, simmer , stew, poach, braise, sauté, French-fry, deep-fry, barbecue, grill and
charcoal . There are, in addition, a number of peripheral words: parboil , plank , shirr , scallop, flambere, rissoler and several compounds: steam-bake,
pot-roast , oven-poach, pan-broil , pan-fry, oven-fry.
It is more than obvious that not all of the words are widely used and need to be included in the syllabus. Some are even unknown to ordinary native
speakers of English. Cook can be used in two ways – once as the
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superordinate term of the field, naming the activity expressed („preparing
food‟), and second, as a more specific word opposed to bake. Cook and bake are the most general terms, they appear freely intransitively with human
subjects. Boil and its subordinate terms ( simmer , poach, stew, braise) differ
from the others in the field in that water or liquid must be used, whereas theabsence of liquid is necessary for fry, broil , roast and bake.
It is easy to demonstrate the set of words of this kind as they pattern in
semantic fields. But we must also add, and it is very important for language
teaching, that this approach has a strong explanatory value – it enables us to
predict and explain some semantic and cognitive processes in language.
First, it enables us to explain how is it that words come to have newmeanings in certain contexts. Secondly, we can predict what semantic and
syntactic features a totally new word will have when added to a lexical field.
And thirdly, we can offer an explanation as to how we are able to understandand even offer explanations of our understanding of the meanings of totallyunknown words and expressions.
The first question – the semantic extension of words – can be illustrated by
looking at the items hot-warm-cool-cold . These exhibit more or less thesame relationships to one another: Hot and cold are gradable antonyms at
end points of a scale, and warm and cool are antonyms which are closer tosome centre point that separates hot and cold . All four words are used and
have standard meanings when talking about the weather, psycho-physical
features ( I feel cold; This water feels cold to me), emotions ( John has a hottemper; My brother is a cold person; Our former warm friendship has
cooled ), guessing games like „I spy‟, colours (You should paint this room awarm colour, like orange), etc. Other fields of discourse use only one or two
words from the field: We speak of hot news items but not of a *cold or a
*cool news item, a cold war or a hot war , but not a *cool war or a *warmwar . There is hot jazz and cool jazz but not *warm jazz . One can get a hot tip
on a horse, but not a *cool tip.
Since hot , warm, cool , and cold bear a certain relationship to one another,even when a word does not possess a certain meaning, it can acquire a new
one in a context by virtue of that relationship. Hence, these new coinages are
so easily understood.
Such extensions of meaning related to semantic fields are usually performed
by means of metaphorical transfer. Cognitive psychologists claim that
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metaphors are strongly memorable. This is due to the fact that they furnish
conceptually rich, image-evoking conceptualisations. Metaphorical vehiclesfacilitate memory to the extent that they evoke vivid mental images. One
question that is central to language learning is whether the occurrence of
imagery with metaphor is simply epiphenomenal to its comprehension or akey element in understanding and memorising the meaning. Various
empirical studies on the communicative function of metaphor suggest anumber of possibilities about the positive influence of metaphor on learning.
In the next chapter, we shall look at the development of language teaching
methods in the twentieth century.
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Chapter 2: Exploring Language Teaching
Methods
In the twentieth century, the teaching of modern foreign languages has
progressed through three major periods. In this chapter, we shall brieflysketch the facts and indicate the salient features of the teaching methods,
which have been designed and implemented by several generations ofmethodologists and teachers. Our historical perspective is limited although
we realize that there have been many interesting theories and practicesthrough the ages. For example, this is what Joseph Aickin wrote in the year
1693: “for no Tongue can be acquired without Grammatical rules; since then
all other Tongues, and Languages are taught by Grammar, why ought not theEnglish Tongue to be taught so too. Imitation will never do it, under twentyyears; I have known some Foreigners who have been longer in learning to
speak English and yet are far from it: the not learning by Grammar, is the
true cause” (quoted in Yule 1985, 150). Louis Kelly (1969) in his book 25
Centuries of Language Teaching provides an extensive historical analysis ofthe development of methodology from the time of Ancient Greece to the
present.
Many scholars have explored the development of language teaching in this
century. Here, we shall mention but a few, whose work we have been using
successfully with our students, William Francis Mackey (1965), H. H. Stern(1983), Anthony Howatt (1984), Jack T. Richards and Theodore S. Rogers
(1986), Diane Larsen-Freeman (1986), H. Douglas Brown (1987, 1994).They, and many other colleagues, have inspired the discussion in this
chapter.
2.1. Period I: Direct Language Teaching
The first half of the century was dominated by the teaching method, which is
known as Direct Language Teaching or Direct Method (DM). It emerged asa result of the language education reform movement at the end of the
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nineteenth century and was prominent until the middle of the twentieth
century.
At the beginning of the century, the DM became the only officially approved
method for the teaching of modern foreign languages in France through adecree of the French Minister of Public Instruction (1902). The term, which
was used in the decree, was "methode directe". The method was soonestablished in many European countries and was used with enthusiasm by its
proponents. Some of the commercial ventures in the area were very
successful and became quite popular. For example, in 1878, the German
born Maximilian Delphinus Berlitz opened his first language school in
Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.A. Today, Berlitz Languages Inc. (www.berlitz.com/free) is still thriving.
Direct Method is of course only a general term, which covers a range ofdifferent teaching methods. We shall mention two of them, which have beeninfluencing language methodology to present. In 1923, Harold Palmer
developed his Oral Method to be adapted some fifty years later in the
innovative approaches of the 1970s as the Total Physical Response Method
(Asher 1977, 1982). The second one, Michael West‟s Reading Method , wasdesigned in 1926. And only two years ago, Stephen Krashen revived it in the
method, which he named the Easy Way (1997).
The basic premise of the DM is that a second language should be taught by
making a direct connection in the mind of the learner between what hethinks and what he says. In other words, no use is made of the learner's own
language. Thus, the target language becomes both the aim and the means ofthe teaching and learning process. The following list sums up eight salient
features of direct language teaching:
Teaching is executed orally through the medium of the target language.
Teachers should be either native speakers or extremely fluent in the target
language.
Grammar is taught inductively by situation. Concrete vocabulary is taught in context through ostensive definition and
pictures.
Abstract vocabulary is taught through association of ideas.
Language skills are ordered in a “natural way”: listening, speaking,reading and writing.
http://www.berlitz.com/freehttp://www.berlitz.com/freehttp://www.berlitz.com/freehttp://www.berlitz.com/free
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Pronunciation is emphasized; the first few weeks are devoted to
pronunciation.
All reading matter is first presented orally.
However, in the second quarter of the century, the method began to decline.Its principles were questioned. A group of prominent American experts
stated that "the ability to converse should not be regarded as a thing of primary importance for its own sake but as an auxiliary to the higher ends of
linguistic scholarship and literary culture" ( Report of the Committee of
Twelve, Modern Language Association of America 1892). Moreover, theDM demanded highly competent teachers who have always been difficult to
recruit. So by the middle of the twentieth century modern languages were
being taught by the methods, most of which had been developed before the
turn of the century. The era of the Direct Method had ended.
2.2. Period II: Audio-lingual Teaching and the Innovative Methods of
the 1970s
The next stage of development started with the decade of 1940 to 1950 andcontinued until the mid-seventies. Language teachers and the general public
were dissatisfied with the methodological theory and practice of the previousera. For example, Leonard Bloomfield (1942) stated, “Often enough the
student, after two, three, or four years of instruction, cannot really use the
language he has been studying.” In 1943, The American Army initiated the
Army Specialized Training Program (hence, "Army Method") to teachintensive language courses that focused on aural/oral skills. The “revolution”
in language teaching of that period created a new methodological ideology,which came to be known in the late fifties as the Audio-lingual Method
(ALM). According to the U.S. Army Language School in California, 1300hours are sufficient for an adult to attain near-native competence in
Vietnamese (Burke, quoted in Reich 1986).
Two major scientific theories were applied as methodological principles:linguistic structuralism (e.g. Bloomfield 1933) and psychological neo-
behaviorism (e.g. Skinner 1957). The proponents of the ALM believed that
language learning was a process of habit formation in which the student
over-learned carefully sequenced lists of set phrases or "base sentences".
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The method was extremely successful and enjoyed considerable popularity.
Courses like English 901 (Strevens 1964), the British edition of the originaltextbook in American English, English 900, and Realistic English (Abbs,
Cook & Underwood 1968) became widely accepted in Europe in the 1960s.
In 1961, the American linguist William Moulton proclaimed the linguistic
principles of ALM: “language is speech, not writing… a language is a set ofhabits… teach the language, not about the language… a language is what
native speakers say, not what someone thinks they ought to say… languages
are different” (quoted in Richards & Rogers 1986). The following list sums
up eight salient features of audio-lingual teaching:
Language input is provided in dialog form.
Learning activities are based on mimicry and memorization and pattern
practice. Successful responses are immediately rewarded.
Mistakes are not tolerated.
Language structure is taught using pattern drills.
Vocabulary is strictly controlled and learnt in context.
Pronunciation is emphasized.
Audio-visual technology is used extensively, e.g. slide projectors, tape
recorders, language laboratories.
Robert Ian Scott invented a “sentence generator” (1969, quoted in Roberts1973, 99) as an aid to be used in the teaching of reading. The machine could
be programmed to generate 4-word sentences of the simple, activedeclarative type. Words of each syntactic function could be entered on a
separate wheel, the machine consisting of 4 wheels mounted side by side ona cranking device. The wheels could be turned independently of each other
to make a new sentence at each spin. With 60 words on each wheel, it would
be possible to generate 12960000 sentences, which, assuming that it were
possible to speak one sentence per second, would take about half a year oftalking to get through. The machine did not gain popularity though.
The comparative merits of the ALM and the traditional grammar-translation
instruction were evaluated in a two-year study of beginning students of
German in America (Scherer & Wertheimer 1964, quoted in Reich 1986). At
the end of the two years, the results were that ALM and traditionalinstruction were equal on listening, reading and English-to-German
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translation; ALM was far superior to traditional instruction in speaking but
traditional instruction was superior to ALM in writing and far superior toALM in German-to-English translation. Thus neither method is clearly
superior. Which you prefer depends on what you deem most important.
In the late sixties, the ALM was subjected to criticism and its popularity
waned. Controlled studies of the effectiveness of the language laboratoriesas actually used in schools in the 1960s found that they were either a not
particularly effective teaching aid or they were actually detrimental to
language learning (Keating 1963, quoted in Reich 1986). Noam Chomsky
openly criticized audio-lingual theory and practice in his address to language
teachers at the Northeast Conference, U.S.A., in 1966, “I am, frankly, ratherskeptical about the significance, for the teaching of languages, of such
insights and understanding as have been attained in linguistics and
psychology”. The pattern practice procedure was rejected together with thedisillusionment over neo-behaviorism as a psychological theory. Structurallinguistics was also denounced and with it the ALM gave way to fresher
teaching methods.
The innovative approaches of the seventies were an attempt to bringmethodology in line with modern scientific developments in the related
areas and to discover the new orientations in the teaching of modern foreignlanguages.
The theoretical basis of Caleb Gattegno‟s method (1972), The Silent Way, isthe idea that teaching must be subordinated to learning and thus students
must develop their own inner criteria for correctness. Learning is facilitatedif the learner discovers and creates in a problem-solving process involving
the material to be learnt. All four skills are taught from the beginning.
Students‟ errors are expected as a normal part of learning. The teacher‟ssilence helps foster students‟ self -reliance and initiative. The teacher is
active in setting up situations using special teaching aids, Fidel charts andCuisenaire rods, while the students do most of the talking and interacting.
Georgi Lozanov‟s Suggestopedia (1972) seeks to help learners eliminate
psychological barriers to learning. The learning environment is comfortable
and subdued, with low lighting and soft slow music in the background.
Students choose a name and character in the target language and culture andimagine being that person. Dialogues are presented to the accompaniment of
Baroque concertos. Students are in a relaxed but focused state of “pseudo-
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passiveness”. They listen to the dialogues being read aloud with varying
intonations and a coordination of sound and printed word or illustration. Thestudents are expected to read the texts at home “cursorily once before going
to bed and again befor