domingo, 4 de diciembre de 2011
Final Reflection
What was useful, what wasn’t so useful in terms of your classroom practice?
For me were very useful the presentations because it helped you to organize yourself the same as to analyze the ideas. Because sometimes you have so much information and you don´t know what is relevant, what is not, how can you express it ext… Also the presentations allowed us to see deeper in our teaching practice and how we can improve it taking on account the different approaches we saw during the course.
What things you enjoyed/didn’t enjoy about the sessions?
I think that what I enjoyed the most were the lectures, they were very interesting, good and also complementary to the course. About what I didn´t enjoy too much was to write in our blog every week because sometimes you don´t have too much to say or is very similar to what you said in the last blog.
What you think would improve this module and why?
I think that maybe what would improve this module would be giving some more examples of activities of the different approaches. I don’t know maybe watching videos of examples of activities, or doing them in the class, etc.. . I know that this course is very theoretical buy maybe showing some activities would make it more practical and at the same time we would have a better knowledge of the different approaches
domingo, 20 de noviembre de 2011
Developing Our Professional Competence
What type of "New Year resolutions" do you tend to make each new school year?
When I was working as a teacher (the last 2 years) at the beginning of every year I used to make “New Year Resolutions” where it include plans, projects also I would propose to do creative activities and research about the methodology, new strategies to motivate the students.
Is it easy to keep them?
It wasn’t easy because there was so much contents that you have to teach to the students that you didn’t have time to do projects and to plan different activities. You just had to cope with all the materials that you were given, worships, test ext…
What practices would you like to see your institution adopt?
Give you more freedom when you are planning your syllabus and maybe left aside some contents so then you can see deeply the ones that you feel that are more important.
Why do you think this article appears in a book on methodology?
Because the author, Joanne Petits, talks about how we as educators must make a personal commitment to our ongoing professional growth and that necessary leads that we have to integrate principles, knowledge and skills in our practice.
When I was working as a teacher (the last 2 years) at the beginning of every year I used to make “New Year Resolutions” where it include plans, projects also I would propose to do creative activities and research about the methodology, new strategies to motivate the students.
Is it easy to keep them?
It wasn’t easy because there was so much contents that you have to teach to the students that you didn’t have time to do projects and to plan different activities. You just had to cope with all the materials that you were given, worships, test ext…
What practices would you like to see your institution adopt?
Give you more freedom when you are planning your syllabus and maybe left aside some contents so then you can see deeply the ones that you feel that are more important.
Why do you think this article appears in a book on methodology?
Because the author, Joanne Petits, talks about how we as educators must make a personal commitment to our ongoing professional growth and that necessary leads that we have to integrate principles, knowledge and skills in our practice.
lunes, 31 de octubre de 2011
Noticing
About the concept of “Noticing”, I never had heard it before but it is a complex process where involves the intakes of meaning and form. When I was in school I think that teacher used to focus more in form that in meaning, for example the structures of grammar the verb tenses but they left apart the meaning so what did happened is that at the end most of the us forgot easily what we learnt.
Do adults and children learn 2 in the same way?
I think they don’t, because the level of anxiety is different, the same as the motivation, the needs ext… For example when a child learns L2 most of the time it is imposed by the school but at the same time they are willing to try, to make mistakes. On the other hand when adults learn L2 is because they want, some of the structures they will known them well but the anxiety it is a issue.
Can we teach a language or can we learn language?
I think that both of them are needed. We need someone to teach us the language, to guide us but at the same time we must be willing to learn the language if not the work is useless.
How is your language to be learned sequenced in your current teaching context or place of work.
It is followed step by step and it depends on the age of the learner and also their needs.
What if anything can we learn from looking at past methodologies.
I think that we have to analyze the strength and weakness of each of the methodologies already seen and take the best of each one of them.
Do adults and children learn 2 in the same way?
I think they don’t, because the level of anxiety is different, the same as the motivation, the needs ext… For example when a child learns L2 most of the time it is imposed by the school but at the same time they are willing to try, to make mistakes. On the other hand when adults learn L2 is because they want, some of the structures they will known them well but the anxiety it is a issue.
Can we teach a language or can we learn language?
I think that both of them are needed. We need someone to teach us the language, to guide us but at the same time we must be willing to learn the language if not the work is useless.
How is your language to be learned sequenced in your current teaching context or place of work.
It is followed step by step and it depends on the age of the learner and also their needs.
What if anything can we learn from looking at past methodologies.
I think that we have to analyze the strength and weakness of each of the methodologies already seen and take the best of each one of them.
Medyes´ Communicative Teacher
Medgyes in his article talks about the communicative approach and the role of the teacher not only what they are but also what they should do in a classroom. First he expresses the idea that CA is too demanding for the teacher but he doesn’t criticized the method he only points out the difficulties it presents to the language teachers to apply this method. Secondly he refers of some characteristic that teachers should have to be, for example that they should be extremely erudite and versatile people, be an instrument not the authority, learner centered, multidimensional, technically skilled, all what makes a super person. Also he refers of what teacher have to do, they have to produce real interaction, see that learning takes place, pay attention to form and meaning, create favorable conditions, keep control but let students exercise initiative and a lot more.
lunes, 10 de octubre de 2011
Queries from a Communicative Teacher (Peter Medgyes)
I found the article very interesting and I agree with the author. The theory of the Communicative Approach sounds great; it talks of how a communicative teacher should be, about the importance of considering the needs of the group but also the learner itself. Also how teachers should pay attention to meaning and form simultaneously, how should be their role in relation to their students and the use of text book. But there is a big difference between the theory and the practice because the reality on a classroom is completely different. Even the author makes allusion of that when he is describing a communicative teacher as “Wizard of Oz like superperson”.
I think that teachers should aspire to be a Communicative Teacher and maybe they can take out some ideas but that’s it!
Creativity in Education
I found the video very interesting and at the same time so true. It is so important to develop on children creativeness, innovation but for that there must be a change in the way how people think, there has to be spaces where students can create. For instance, and how the author said, in school the subjects that are more important are those where there isn’t much imagination like Math, Language, Science but what happen to the other ones like art, dance or music, what happen to those students that are good at those ones and that will like to make a living for that, well most of the times they can’t.
Another thing that I found amazing is when he said that kids aren’t frightened to be wrong but when they get older they lose their capacity they are afraid because people that are incorrect are stigmatized. So as teachers we have to try to make students not to be afraid of being wrong and also we need to give students a space to use their imagination, to be innovators.
Another thing that I found amazing is when he said that kids aren’t frightened to be wrong but when they get older they lose their capacity they are afraid because people that are incorrect are stigmatized. So as teachers we have to try to make students not to be afraid of being wrong and also we need to give students a space to use their imagination, to be innovators.
martes, 27 de septiembre de 2011
Vale Howard: "Communicative Competence" Canale and Swain
1 Background
1.1 Grammatical and communicative approaches
Page 2- Paragraph 1: Distinction between grammatical and communicative approaches.
Paragraph 2: Reference of situational syllabus.
Page 3- Paragraph 1: Approach refer to principles of syllabus construction.
1.2 Competence and performance
Page 3- Paragraph 2: Terms performance and competence.
Paragraph 3: Competence refers to knowledge of grammar and performance to actual use.
Paragraph 4: Theory of competence and performance (Chomsky).
Page 4 –Paragraph 1 : appropriateness.
Paragraph 2: Distinction between communicative competence and performance.
Page 5- Paragraph 1: Reference of communicative and grammatical competence.
Paragraph 2: Reference of communicative performance.
Page 6- Paragraph 1: Sociolinguistic competence.
Paragraph 2: Summarize/ CC refer to the interaction between grammatical competence and sociolinguistic competence.
Page 6- Paragraph 3: Teaching methodology must be designed not only for CC also CP.
Page 7- Paragraph 1: CC includes grammatical competence and sociolinguistic competence.
Page 7- Paragraph 2: Don’t incorporate the notion of ability into CC.
Page 8- Paragraph 1: CC and CP concerns aspect s of general psycholinguistic.
2. Some theories of Communicative Competence
Page 8- Paragraph 2: Theories of CC
2.1 Theories of basic communication skills
Page 9-Paragraph 1: Theory of basic communication skills can emphasizes minimum level of
communications skills pr cope with the most common situation the learner is likely to face. They don’t emphasize grammatical accuracy.
Page 9- Paragraph 2: Some examples of the skills include in theories.
Page 9- Paragraph 3: Language functions and notions.
Page 10-Paragraph 1:Principles of the theories of basic communication skills.
Page 10-Paragraph 2: Minimum level of skills is necessary to communicate.
Page 10-Paragraph 3: The view that is more effective when it emphasizes one meaning rather than grammatical.
Page 11-Paragraph 1: Grammatical accuracy in beginners and adults learners.
Page 12-Paragraph 1: Tolerance of sociocultural failure.
Page 12-Paragraph 2: Cases of GC as not a good predictor of CC.
Page 13-Paragraph 3: Conclusion is that GC is not a sufficient condition for the development of CC.
Page 14-Paragraph 2: There should be some combination of emphasis on grammatical accuracy and emphasis on meaningful communication from the beginners.
Page 15-Paragraph 2: Basic communicative approaches can be as effective as grammatical approaches in developing grammatical competence and more effective in approaches in developing communicative competence.
2.2 Sociolinguistic perspectives on communicative competence
Page 15 – Paragraph 3: Research on communicative competence from sociolinguistic perspective has been of a more theoretical and analytic nature than work on basic communication skills.
Paragraph 4: Theory cf communicative competence and analysis of the ethnography of speaking (Hymes).
Page 16- Paragraph 2: CC is viewed by Hymes as the interaction of grammatical (what is formally possible), psycholinguistic (what is feasible in terms of human information processing),sociocultural (what is the social meaning of value of a given utterance) and probabilistic (what actually occurs) systems of competence.
Paragraph 3: Notion of ethnography of speaking.
Page 17- Paragraph 1: Notion of speech event (aspects that are governed directly by rules of language) and components of speech events.
Paragraph 2: Analysis of components of speech event.
Page 18 Paragraph 1: Sociosemantic aspects of language and language use. Social system determines set of behavioral, semantic and grammar.
Paragraph 2: Analysis this sets in second language learners.
Page 19-Paragraph 1: Reason against about semantic options are only the realization of social behaviorism.
Paragraph 2: Theory of natural language semantics must make reference to social behaviorism.
Paragraph 3: Summary/ the theory of sociolinguistic is important to the development of a communicative approach in that they have been concerned with the interaction of a
communicative approach in that they have been concerned with the interaction of social
context, grammar and meaning.
2.3 Integrative theories of communicative competencePage 19 - Paragraph 3: Introducing idea of an integrative theory of competence.
Page 20- Paragraph 1: Integrative theory of communicative competence: synthesis of knowledge of basic grammatical principles, of how language is used in social context to perform communicative functions and of how utterances and communicative functions can be combined.
Paragraph 2: Munby's model of communicative competence: sociocultural orientation,
sociosemantic view of linguistic knowledge and rules of discourse.
Paragraph 3: Distinction between cohesion and coherence.
Page 21:Paragraph 1: Analysis of discourse in the literature.
Paragraph 2: Analysis of Munby's model/ grammatical complexity.
Page 22-Paragraph 2: Combining grammatical and communication skills.
Paragraph 3: There is an overemphasis in many integrative theories on the role of
communicative functions and social behavior options in the selection of grammar forms.
Page 23-Paragraph 2: Introducing the 3 basic assumptions that are responsible for an overemphasis on communicative functions in communicative syllabus organization.
Paragraph 3: The assumption that the essential purpose of language is communication.
Paragraph 4: The assumption that grammatical forms follows the communicative purpose.
Page 24-Paragraph 2: The assumption that in normal communication one is concerned with aspects of language use and not with aspects of grammatical usage.
Paragraph 3: Summarize/ little theoretical motivation for the overemphasis on language function and lack of emphasis on grammatical complexity.
2.4 General Comments
Page 25: Paragraph 1: The first conclusion is that not many theorist have devoted any detailed attention to communication strategies that learner employ to handle breakdown in communication.
Paragraph 2: The second conclusion most of the theories don't deal rigorous with a range of criteria sufficiently for establishing the sequencing of semantic concepts, grammatical forms and communicative functions in a communicative approach.
Paragraph 3: The third conclusion is that there hasn't been paid to much attention to the criteria for evaluation and levels of achievement with respect to a given theory of CC.
Page 26- Paragraph 1: Discrete point test of communicative competence.
Paragraph 2: Analysis of a integrative test of CC.
3 Toward an adequate Theory of Communicative Competence
3.1 Guiding principles for a communicative approach
Page 27- Paragraph 1: 5 principles that must guide the development of communicative approach for a second language programme.
Paragraph 2: CC is composed minimally of grammatical competence, sociolinguistic
competence and communication strategies (strategic competence).
Paragraph 3: A communicative approach must be based on and respond to the learner's communication needs.
Paragraph 4: Second language learner must interact with highly competent speakers.
Page 28 -Paragraph 2: Exposure to realistic communication situations is very important.
Paragraph 3: That the more arbitrary and less universal aspects of communication in the second language be presented and practices in the context of less arbitrary and more universal aspects.
Paragraph 4: The primary objective of a communication -oriented second language programme must be to provide the learners with the information and the practice.
3.2 A proposed theoretical framework fro communicative competence
Page 28 – Paragraph 5: Introducing the tentative theory that includes 3 main competencies (GC, SoC, SC)
Page 29- Paragraph 1: General assumptions about the nature of communication.
Paragraph 2: Assumption that a theory of CC interacts with a theory of human action and with other systems of human knowledge.
Paragraph 3: The communicative approach that author propose is an integrative one in which emphasis is on preparing second language learners to exploit through aspect of sociolinguistic competence and strategic competence grammatical features.
Paragraph 4: GC understood where includes knowledge of lexical items and rules of morphology,syntax, sentence-grammar semantics and phonology.
Page 30- Paragraph 1: GC will be an important concern fro any communicative approach.
Paragraph 2: Introducing the idea that SocC is made up of 2 sets of rules (sociocultural rules of use and rules of discourse) .
Paragraph 3: Analysis of Sociocultural rules of use were will specify in which utterances are produced and understood appropriately.
Paragraph 4: Rules of discourse understood in terms of cohesion and coherence.
Paragraph 5: Analysis of Strategic Competence where is made up of verbal and nonverbal communication strategies that can compensate for breakdowns. There are 2 SC those relate to GC and those to SocC.
Page 31- Paragraph 2: Assumption of a subcomponent of probability rules of occurrence.
3.3 Implications for a communicative approach to teaching
Page 31- Paragraph 4: Introducing the idea that the theoretical framework will have implications in: syllabus design, teaching methodology, teacher training and material development.
Page 32- Paragraph 1: Implication in syllabus designed.
Page 33- Paragraph 3: Implication in teaching methodology (classroom activities where students are engaged).
Paragraph 4: Implication in teachers training.
Page 34- Paragraph 1: Implication in material development (current books will not be appropriate).
3.4 Implications for a communicative testing programme
Page 34 – Paragraph 2: 2 important general implications fro testing. First; testing must be devoted not only to what learners know and about how to use it but also to what excent the learner is able to actually demonstrate this knowledge in a meaningful communicative situation.
Paragraph 3: Integrative type test and discrete point test can be useful in the proposed communicative approach.
4 Directions for Research
Page 35- Paragraph 4: Reflecting the idea that many aspects of CC must be investigated in a more rigorous manner before a communicative approach can be fully implemented.
Page 36- Paragraph 1: There has to be a description of the communication needs of a given group based on factors particular to the learner and to the speech community.
Paragraph 2: There has to be a explicit statement of grammatical rules, sociocultural rules,discourse rules and communication strategies.
Paragraph 3: There has to be an analysis of the similarities and differences between rules in sociolinguistic components.
Paragraph 4: There has to be an investigation of the optimum balance of factors like grammatical, cognitive-semantic and perceptual complexity.
Paragraph 5 and 6: There has to be a study of the relation between a minimum level of communication skills needed for students and for teachers.
Paragraph 7: There has to be a development of classroom activities that encourage meaningfulcommunication.
Paragraph 8: There has to be an identification of the advantages and disadvantages of the use of authentic texts in addition to or place of contrived texts.
Paragraph 9: There has to be a development of test formats and evaluation criteria.
Page 37- Paragraph 1: There still has to be a more deep research of whether or not adopting a communicative approach.
Paragraph 2: There has to be a description of the manner in which communication is focused on in different classes.
Paragraph 3: There has to be an investigation that see the suitable of the different aspects of a communicative approach.
Paragraph 4: Investigate about the evidence .
Paragraph 5: It is not clear that a communicative approach is more or less effective than a grammatical approach in developing learners flexibility in being able to communicate.
Page 38- Finally, it must be determined whether or not a communicative approach increases learners motivation to learn and teacher motivation to teach.
1.1 Grammatical and communicative approaches
Page 2- Paragraph 1: Distinction between grammatical and communicative approaches.
Paragraph 2: Reference of situational syllabus.
Page 3- Paragraph 1: Approach refer to principles of syllabus construction.
1.2 Competence and performance
Page 3- Paragraph 2: Terms performance and competence.
Paragraph 3: Competence refers to knowledge of grammar and performance to actual use.
Paragraph 4: Theory of competence and performance (Chomsky).
Page 4 –Paragraph 1 : appropriateness.
Paragraph 2: Distinction between communicative competence and performance.
Page 5- Paragraph 1: Reference of communicative and grammatical competence.
Paragraph 2: Reference of communicative performance.
Page 6- Paragraph 1: Sociolinguistic competence.
Paragraph 2: Summarize/ CC refer to the interaction between grammatical competence and sociolinguistic competence.
Page 6- Paragraph 3: Teaching methodology must be designed not only for CC also CP.
Page 7- Paragraph 1: CC includes grammatical competence and sociolinguistic competence.
Page 7- Paragraph 2: Don’t incorporate the notion of ability into CC.
Page 8- Paragraph 1: CC and CP concerns aspect s of general psycholinguistic.
2. Some theories of Communicative Competence
Page 8- Paragraph 2: Theories of CC
2.1 Theories of basic communication skills
Page 9-Paragraph 1: Theory of basic communication skills can emphasizes minimum level of
communications skills pr cope with the most common situation the learner is likely to face. They don’t emphasize grammatical accuracy.
Page 9- Paragraph 2: Some examples of the skills include in theories.
Page 9- Paragraph 3: Language functions and notions.
Page 10-Paragraph 1:Principles of the theories of basic communication skills.
Page 10-Paragraph 2: Minimum level of skills is necessary to communicate.
Page 10-Paragraph 3: The view that is more effective when it emphasizes one meaning rather than grammatical.
Page 11-Paragraph 1: Grammatical accuracy in beginners and adults learners.
Page 12-Paragraph 1: Tolerance of sociocultural failure.
Page 12-Paragraph 2: Cases of GC as not a good predictor of CC.
Page 13-Paragraph 3: Conclusion is that GC is not a sufficient condition for the development of CC.
Page 14-Paragraph 2: There should be some combination of emphasis on grammatical accuracy and emphasis on meaningful communication from the beginners.
Page 15-Paragraph 2: Basic communicative approaches can be as effective as grammatical approaches in developing grammatical competence and more effective in approaches in developing communicative competence.
2.2 Sociolinguistic perspectives on communicative competence
Page 15 – Paragraph 3: Research on communicative competence from sociolinguistic perspective has been of a more theoretical and analytic nature than work on basic communication skills.
Paragraph 4: Theory cf communicative competence and analysis of the ethnography of speaking (Hymes).
Page 16- Paragraph 2: CC is viewed by Hymes as the interaction of grammatical (what is formally possible), psycholinguistic (what is feasible in terms of human information processing),sociocultural (what is the social meaning of value of a given utterance) and probabilistic (what actually occurs) systems of competence.
Paragraph 3: Notion of ethnography of speaking.
Page 17- Paragraph 1: Notion of speech event (aspects that are governed directly by rules of language) and components of speech events.
Paragraph 2: Analysis of components of speech event.
Page 18 Paragraph 1: Sociosemantic aspects of language and language use. Social system determines set of behavioral, semantic and grammar.
Paragraph 2: Analysis this sets in second language learners.
Page 19-Paragraph 1: Reason against about semantic options are only the realization of social behaviorism.
Paragraph 2: Theory of natural language semantics must make reference to social behaviorism.
Paragraph 3: Summary/ the theory of sociolinguistic is important to the development of a communicative approach in that they have been concerned with the interaction of a
communicative approach in that they have been concerned with the interaction of social
context, grammar and meaning.
2.3 Integrative theories of communicative competencePage 19 - Paragraph 3: Introducing idea of an integrative theory of competence.
Page 20- Paragraph 1: Integrative theory of communicative competence: synthesis of knowledge of basic grammatical principles, of how language is used in social context to perform communicative functions and of how utterances and communicative functions can be combined.
Paragraph 2: Munby's model of communicative competence: sociocultural orientation,
sociosemantic view of linguistic knowledge and rules of discourse.
Paragraph 3: Distinction between cohesion and coherence.
Page 21:Paragraph 1: Analysis of discourse in the literature.
Paragraph 2: Analysis of Munby's model/ grammatical complexity.
Page 22-Paragraph 2: Combining grammatical and communication skills.
Paragraph 3: There is an overemphasis in many integrative theories on the role of
communicative functions and social behavior options in the selection of grammar forms.
Page 23-Paragraph 2: Introducing the 3 basic assumptions that are responsible for an overemphasis on communicative functions in communicative syllabus organization.
Paragraph 3: The assumption that the essential purpose of language is communication.
Paragraph 4: The assumption that grammatical forms follows the communicative purpose.
Page 24-Paragraph 2: The assumption that in normal communication one is concerned with aspects of language use and not with aspects of grammatical usage.
Paragraph 3: Summarize/ little theoretical motivation for the overemphasis on language function and lack of emphasis on grammatical complexity.
2.4 General Comments
Page 25: Paragraph 1: The first conclusion is that not many theorist have devoted any detailed attention to communication strategies that learner employ to handle breakdown in communication.
Paragraph 2: The second conclusion most of the theories don't deal rigorous with a range of criteria sufficiently for establishing the sequencing of semantic concepts, grammatical forms and communicative functions in a communicative approach.
Paragraph 3: The third conclusion is that there hasn't been paid to much attention to the criteria for evaluation and levels of achievement with respect to a given theory of CC.
Page 26- Paragraph 1: Discrete point test of communicative competence.
Paragraph 2: Analysis of a integrative test of CC.
3 Toward an adequate Theory of Communicative Competence
3.1 Guiding principles for a communicative approach
Page 27- Paragraph 1: 5 principles that must guide the development of communicative approach for a second language programme.
Paragraph 2: CC is composed minimally of grammatical competence, sociolinguistic
competence and communication strategies (strategic competence).
Paragraph 3: A communicative approach must be based on and respond to the learner's communication needs.
Paragraph 4: Second language learner must interact with highly competent speakers.
Page 28 -Paragraph 2: Exposure to realistic communication situations is very important.
Paragraph 3: That the more arbitrary and less universal aspects of communication in the second language be presented and practices in the context of less arbitrary and more universal aspects.
Paragraph 4: The primary objective of a communication -oriented second language programme must be to provide the learners with the information and the practice.
3.2 A proposed theoretical framework fro communicative competence
Page 28 – Paragraph 5: Introducing the tentative theory that includes 3 main competencies (GC, SoC, SC)
Page 29- Paragraph 1: General assumptions about the nature of communication.
Paragraph 2: Assumption that a theory of CC interacts with a theory of human action and with other systems of human knowledge.
Paragraph 3: The communicative approach that author propose is an integrative one in which emphasis is on preparing second language learners to exploit through aspect of sociolinguistic competence and strategic competence grammatical features.
Paragraph 4: GC understood where includes knowledge of lexical items and rules of morphology,syntax, sentence-grammar semantics and phonology.
Page 30- Paragraph 1: GC will be an important concern fro any communicative approach.
Paragraph 2: Introducing the idea that SocC is made up of 2 sets of rules (sociocultural rules of use and rules of discourse) .
Paragraph 3: Analysis of Sociocultural rules of use were will specify in which utterances are produced and understood appropriately.
Paragraph 4: Rules of discourse understood in terms of cohesion and coherence.
Paragraph 5: Analysis of Strategic Competence where is made up of verbal and nonverbal communication strategies that can compensate for breakdowns. There are 2 SC those relate to GC and those to SocC.
Page 31- Paragraph 2: Assumption of a subcomponent of probability rules of occurrence.
3.3 Implications for a communicative approach to teaching
Page 31- Paragraph 4: Introducing the idea that the theoretical framework will have implications in: syllabus design, teaching methodology, teacher training and material development.
Page 32- Paragraph 1: Implication in syllabus designed.
Page 33- Paragraph 3: Implication in teaching methodology (classroom activities where students are engaged).
Paragraph 4: Implication in teachers training.
Page 34- Paragraph 1: Implication in material development (current books will not be appropriate).
3.4 Implications for a communicative testing programme
Page 34 – Paragraph 2: 2 important general implications fro testing. First; testing must be devoted not only to what learners know and about how to use it but also to what excent the learner is able to actually demonstrate this knowledge in a meaningful communicative situation.
Paragraph 3: Integrative type test and discrete point test can be useful in the proposed communicative approach.
4 Directions for Research
Page 35- Paragraph 4: Reflecting the idea that many aspects of CC must be investigated in a more rigorous manner before a communicative approach can be fully implemented.
Page 36- Paragraph 1: There has to be a description of the communication needs of a given group based on factors particular to the learner and to the speech community.
Paragraph 2: There has to be a explicit statement of grammatical rules, sociocultural rules,discourse rules and communication strategies.
Paragraph 3: There has to be an analysis of the similarities and differences between rules in sociolinguistic components.
Paragraph 4: There has to be an investigation of the optimum balance of factors like grammatical, cognitive-semantic and perceptual complexity.
Paragraph 5 and 6: There has to be a study of the relation between a minimum level of communication skills needed for students and for teachers.
Paragraph 7: There has to be a development of classroom activities that encourage meaningfulcommunication.
Paragraph 8: There has to be an identification of the advantages and disadvantages of the use of authentic texts in addition to or place of contrived texts.
Paragraph 9: There has to be a development of test formats and evaluation criteria.
Page 37- Paragraph 1: There still has to be a more deep research of whether or not adopting a communicative approach.
Paragraph 2: There has to be a description of the manner in which communication is focused on in different classes.
Paragraph 3: There has to be an investigation that see the suitable of the different aspects of a communicative approach.
Paragraph 4: Investigate about the evidence .
Paragraph 5: It is not clear that a communicative approach is more or less effective than a grammatical approach in developing learners flexibility in being able to communicate.
Page 38- Finally, it must be determined whether or not a communicative approach increases learners motivation to learn and teacher motivation to teach.
sábado, 17 de septiembre de 2011
Your Approach Indicator
About the questionnaire I choose the following questions.
First I think that the main focus in a language class should be on the meaning especially when you are teaching beginners. Because is the meaning what is going to be remembered. Of course this doesn’t mean we should left out the grammar but this could be introduce afterwards or slowly. And that is why, in every language we first learn the meaning of the words and afterwards the grammar rules in a way because is more practical.
Classes operate more successfully by encouraging intrinsic motivation and I think that in English can be easier to find classes where students want to earn the language. Why? Because is a different one, is the main way to communicate with others. But if we not, we as teachers have to appeal to the students to a find a motivation.
I think that now days in Chile we don’t have too many cultures, is true that are arriving a lot of immigrants, but still I don’t think that are many teachers that have to handle with students that have different cultures. However, teachers should respect difference on their students no matter their beliefs or where they are from.
Finally about the rewards I am not very sure which one is the best way. Maybe immediate rewards could be good to have their attention or to motivate them buy then definitely long-term reward is much better because what you are going to gain afterwards is going to be more valuable than what you can have immediate. For example learning the language and being able to make yourself understand by others and communicate.
First I think that the main focus in a language class should be on the meaning especially when you are teaching beginners. Because is the meaning what is going to be remembered. Of course this doesn’t mean we should left out the grammar but this could be introduce afterwards or slowly. And that is why, in every language we first learn the meaning of the words and afterwards the grammar rules in a way because is more practical.
Classes operate more successfully by encouraging intrinsic motivation and I think that in English can be easier to find classes where students want to earn the language. Why? Because is a different one, is the main way to communicate with others. But if we not, we as teachers have to appeal to the students to a find a motivation.
I think that now days in Chile we don’t have too many cultures, is true that are arriving a lot of immigrants, but still I don’t think that are many teachers that have to handle with students that have different cultures. However, teachers should respect difference on their students no matter their beliefs or where they are from.
Finally about the rewards I am not very sure which one is the best way. Maybe immediate rewards could be good to have their attention or to motivate them buy then definitely long-term reward is much better because what you are going to gain afterwards is going to be more valuable than what you can have immediate. For example learning the language and being able to make yourself understand by others and communicate.
lunes, 5 de septiembre de 2011
Designer Methods of the spirited 1970´s
It is going to be during the 1970’s where appeared some innovative methods for second language learning. Despite that these methods weren’t perfect it was a beginning.
The first of the methods is Community Language Learning, where it took on a distinctly affective nature. In this case it was important for the learners to interact in an interpersonal relationship where students and teachers worked together to facilitate learning. Also the teacher was sort of a counselor where centers all the attention in the learner needs. The main disadvantages where that the teachers can become too nondirective and the students need instructions especially the ones that are begging to learn. Also it can be too inductive for example were the learners determining the type of conversation and analyze it inductively. The Suggestopedia was based in that the brain could process a big amount of material if given the right condition for learning. In this method the aim was to relax the states of mind therefore there could be a more retention and for this the music was essential as well as having a comfortable environment. Having these two elements is difficult and this method was more attempted to teach memorization techniques instead of making the learners comprehend. The third is Silent Way, it was also more cognitive. In this case students constructed conceptual hierarchies; also they develop independence, autonomy and responsibility. The main issue was that teachers where too distant and sometimes students needed more guidance and overt correction. The Total Physical Response, this method focus on that memory is increased if it is stimulated through association with motor activity. They used imperative mood, for example commands, “Open the door”. This helped avoid anxiety. The problem is that despite it was very useful on beginning levels it wasn’t that much on advance. The last method was Natural Approach, where the most important thing was that teachers had to provide comprehensible input, in other words understandable language. Also at the beginning was focus more in the meaning than in the form and in listening skills. The objections were that these strategies worked with kind of “timetables”, but what happened when a learner had different times, when their language emerged after?
Now I think that all this methods where revolutionary and that you can take out very good things from each one of them to improve your class.
The first of the methods is Community Language Learning, where it took on a distinctly affective nature. In this case it was important for the learners to interact in an interpersonal relationship where students and teachers worked together to facilitate learning. Also the teacher was sort of a counselor where centers all the attention in the learner needs. The main disadvantages where that the teachers can become too nondirective and the students need instructions especially the ones that are begging to learn. Also it can be too inductive for example were the learners determining the type of conversation and analyze it inductively. The Suggestopedia was based in that the brain could process a big amount of material if given the right condition for learning. In this method the aim was to relax the states of mind therefore there could be a more retention and for this the music was essential as well as having a comfortable environment. Having these two elements is difficult and this method was more attempted to teach memorization techniques instead of making the learners comprehend. The third is Silent Way, it was also more cognitive. In this case students constructed conceptual hierarchies; also they develop independence, autonomy and responsibility. The main issue was that teachers where too distant and sometimes students needed more guidance and overt correction. The Total Physical Response, this method focus on that memory is increased if it is stimulated through association with motor activity. They used imperative mood, for example commands, “Open the door”. This helped avoid anxiety. The problem is that despite it was very useful on beginning levels it wasn’t that much on advance. The last method was Natural Approach, where the most important thing was that teachers had to provide comprehensible input, in other words understandable language. Also at the beginning was focus more in the meaning than in the form and in listening skills. The objections were that these strategies worked with kind of “timetables”, but what happened when a learner had different times, when their language emerged after?
Now I think that all this methods where revolutionary and that you can take out very good things from each one of them to improve your class.
domingo, 28 de agosto de 2011
The Second Language Acquisition Tradition
This methodological tradition suggests that there are two distinct mental processes operating in second language development:
1-acquisition process: Similar to the process a child uses in acquiring its first language. It is necessary a meaningful interaction in the target language and this procedure is subconscious.
2-learning process: Is conscious “…our formal knowledge of the second language, our conscious learning may be used to alter the output of the acquired system...” (Krashen 1981:1)
If second language acquisition works similar as first language acquisition, then all second language learners should develop, have the same results. But this doesn’t occur because of “affective filter”. Examples anxious were the acquisition process could be blocked.
There are two models based in Second Language Acquisition (SLA):
1-The Natural Approach: The most important element is to provide comprehensible input. The activities are related to affective-humanistic where it concentrates on the meanings and not in the forms and also attempts to lower the affective filter.
2- The Total Physical Response: It focuses on two characteristics of first language acquisition. First is that a child gets a huge amount of comprehensible input before he starts to speak and second that there is a lot of physical manipulation and action language with early input, example “throw the ball to Daddy”. Teachers should provide input to the learners through imperatives (Simon says), also we should follow the “here and now” principle and finally at the beginning of second language instruction we should emphasis more in the comprehension than in the production.
1-acquisition process: Similar to the process a child uses in acquiring its first language. It is necessary a meaningful interaction in the target language and this procedure is subconscious.
2-learning process: Is conscious “…our formal knowledge of the second language, our conscious learning may be used to alter the output of the acquired system...” (Krashen 1981:1)
If second language acquisition works similar as first language acquisition, then all second language learners should develop, have the same results. But this doesn’t occur because of “affective filter”. Examples anxious were the acquisition process could be blocked.
There are two models based in Second Language Acquisition (SLA):
1-The Natural Approach: The most important element is to provide comprehensible input. The activities are related to affective-humanistic where it concentrates on the meanings and not in the forms and also attempts to lower the affective filter.
2- The Total Physical Response: It focuses on two characteristics of first language acquisition. First is that a child gets a huge amount of comprehensible input before he starts to speak and second that there is a lot of physical manipulation and action language with early input, example “throw the ball to Daddy”. Teachers should provide input to the learners through imperatives (Simon says), also we should follow the “here and now” principle and finally at the beginning of second language instruction we should emphasis more in the comprehension than in the production.
sábado, 20 de agosto de 2011
Language Skills Reflection
I think that listening is my most developed skill in English, I can understand it well and of course there are times that is more difficult but you always can manage it, at least know what they are talking about, although you can miss some words. The fact that most of the movies or TV programs are in English gives you the chance to practice your hearing. That is why I try not to put subtitles when I am watching a movie because you usually read instead of listening.
My writing skill is definitely my weakest one, is the hardest one for me. I think that in school they didn’t taught me enough grammar or maybe when I finished school I didn’t practice it again so I forgot everything, I don’t know. I used to practice reading skills by reading a book, speaking when I was travelling, listening as I said before by watching TV but writing never, I wish I had. The best way improving this skill is writing and a lot, in a computer or a notebook and also reviewing grammar. Reading books in English can help you as well because you are learning new vocabulary and you are getting familiar with when to use some words,verbs ext...
My writing skill is definitely my weakest one, is the hardest one for me. I think that in school they didn’t taught me enough grammar or maybe when I finished school I didn’t practice it again so I forgot everything, I don’t know. I used to practice reading skills by reading a book, speaking when I was travelling, listening as I said before by watching TV but writing never, I wish I had. The best way improving this skill is writing and a lot, in a computer or a notebook and also reviewing grammar. Reading books in English can help you as well because you are learning new vocabulary and you are getting familiar with when to use some words,verbs ext...
viernes, 12 de agosto de 2011
My experience with English
My first contact with English was when I was 4 years old and it was because of my Dad’s job we had to move to Virginia Beach, United States. We lived there for about 2 years. It was very strange, because my big brothers used to speak in Spanish, my sister half English half Spanish, my parents also, it was that confusing that my little brother (he was 2 months old) he didn’t say a word for 2 years! Then I studied in a British school in Vina del Mar until I was 14 years old, my Dad was transfer now to London, we stood there 1 year. I for got to say, he used to work in the Navy. Also when I was in the University I worked in a ski resort in Colorado for 4 months and a few years ago I travel to New Zealand and Australia for 5 months. What else, last year I had to teach 3 grade students English (a couple of months) and... here I am.
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