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Linguistics for EFL teachers

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Title: Linguistics for EFL teachers


1
Linguistics for EFL teachers
  • Dr. Alice Spitz

2
Syllabus
  • This course investigates areas in linguistics
    relevant to teachers of English as a foreign
    language. Students examine key linguistic
    concepts and definitions in phonetics, phonology,
    morphology, syntax, semantics, lexicology,
    pragmatics and discourse analysis and their
    applications to teaching and learning English.
    The course explores ways of using research and
    generalizations derived from linguistics to
    inform teaching practice. To obtain a graded
    certificate or 5 credit points respectively
    students are expected to attend regularly, to
    participate actively, to team-teach a practical
    session, and to hand in a collection of annotated
    classroom materials by the end of the semester.

3
Syllabus
4
Syllabus
5
Presentations
  • In pairs
  • Supervisor provides list of materials, but you
    are most welcome to look for more!
  • Always check current English textbooks in the
    library of the ZFL!

6
Presentations
  • Workshop format
  • Handout (adhere to style sheet for all
    bibliographical references!!) and PPP
  • Reading assignments All students read texts from
    Carter/Nunan and Freeman/Freeman
  • Discussants The following presenters ask
    questions
  • Invite feedback from group

7
Scheine
  • LA old
  • Unbenotet regular attendence, participation, and
    presentation
  • Benotet regular attendence, participation,
    presentation and collection of classroom
    materials
  • LA new
  • 5 credit points regular attendence,
    participation, presentation and collection of
    classroom materials

8
Terminology
  • Natural contexts / classroom settings
  • Product / process
  • SLA (second language acquisition research)
  • LA2 (second language acquisition)
  • TESOL (Teaching English to speakers of other
    languages)
  • TEFL (Teaching English as a foreign language)
  • ESL (English as a second language)
  • First language (L1) / source language (SL)
  • Second language (L2) / target language (TL)

9
Your experiences as a language learner/teacher
  • Find someone who.
  • stems from the same village/town/area as you.
  • has learnt English for the same amount of years
    as you.
  • spent time (year abroad/holiday) in the same
    English-speaking country as you.
  • speaks the same variety of English as you.
  • has encountered the same problems in learning
    English as you.
  • has encountered the same problems in teaching
    English as you.
  • Speak to as many people as you can in 10 minutes!!

10
SLA a brief overview
  • Research on how languages are learned from the
    1940s onwards
  • Recognised as a discipline in its own right in
    the 1970s
  • Heavily influenced by research on first language
    acquisition

11
SLA a brief overview
  • Three major theoretical positions
  • Behaviourist position Say what I say
  • Innatist/mentalist position Its all in your
    mind
  • Interactionist position What do you mean?

12
The behaviourist position Say what I say
  • Burrhus Frederic Skinner (1957) Verbal Behaviour
  • Speech as observable behaviour
  • LA1 acquisition of a set of behaviours in a
    process of imitation and habit formation
  • Stimulus response reinforcement

13
The behaviourist position Say what I say
  • LA2 process of overcoming habits of the SL in
    order to acquire new habits of the TL.
  • Pedagogical implications imitation, dialogue
    memorisation and pattern drill
  • Errors first language habits interfering with
    the acquisition of second language habits
  • ? Contrastive analysis (CA)

14
Contrastive Analysis (CA)
  • Robert Lado
  • Hypothesis Where there are similarities between
    the two languages, the learner will acquire the
    target language structures with ease where there
    are differences, the learner will have
    difficulty.
  • ? positive and negative transfer
  • But over- / underprediction of errors!

15
Challenging the behaviourist position
  • Behaviourist view accounts for some of the
    regular and routine aspects of language learning
    however, it cannot explain more complex
    grammatical structures and creative
    word-formation processes.

16
The innatist/mentalist position Its all in
your mind.
  • 1959 Noam Chomskys review of Skinners Verbal
    Behaviour.
  • Innate abilities biologically programmed for
    language
  • Talking is like walking

17
The innatist/mentalist position Its all in
your mind.
  • Language Acquisition Device / Universal Grammar
  • contains all and only the principles universal
    to all human languages.
  • Samples of the language serve as a trigger to
    activate the LAD / UG
  • Child then matches innate knowledge to the
    structures of the particular language in the
    environment ? acquisition

18
The innatist/mentalist position Its all in
your mind.
  • Eric Lenneberg Critical Period Hypothesis
  • LAD works successfully only if stimulated at the
    right time.

19
The innatist/mentalist position Its all in
your mind.
  • Influence on SLA ? creative construction theory

20
Creative Construction Theory
  • Stephen Krashen
  • Learners construct internal representations of
    the language being learned.
  • 2 separate mental processes conscious learning
    and subconscious acquisition
  • Input hypothesis (i1)

21
Creative Construction Theory
  • Pedagogical implications
  • ...supply comprehensible input in low anxiety
    situations, containing messages that students
    really want to hear. ... do not force early
    production in the second language, but allow
    students to produce when they are 'ready',
    recognizing that improvement comes from supplying
    communicative and comprehensible input, and not
    from forcing and correcting production. (Krashen)
  • Formal grammar instruction of limited utility as
    it fuels conscious learning rather than
    subconscious acquisition.

22
Challenging mentalist and creative construction
theories
  • They do not explain how children and LA2 learners
    figure out how to interact with other speakers
    and how to use language appropriately in certain
    situations.
  • Chomsky and Krashen claim that all you need is
    input to start the LAD or creative construction,
    but not any input works.
  • What is needed is interaction with speakers of
    the language which is being acquired.

23
Interactionist position What do you mean?
  • Michael Long
  • Language develops as a result of the complex
    interplay between the uniquely human
    characteristics of the child and the environment
    in which the child develops.
  • Crucial element is the conversational
    give-and-take between children and adults.
  • Motherese / Caretaker talk

24
Interactionist position What do you mean?
  • In LA2 the crucial element is the modification
    of the native speakers utterances, which is
    negotiated in the interaction.
  • Examples comprehension checks, clarification
    requests, self-repetition or paraphrase

25
Interactionist position What do you mean?
  • Collaborative discourse
  • The formation of linguistic hypotheses springs
    from conversational interaction, insofar as
    learners build their utterances on those of
    native speakers.
  • scaffolding

26
Interactionist position What do you mean?
  • Pedagogical implication
  • Give learners opportunities to negotiate meaning.

27
The study of learner language
  • Error analysis
  • Interlanguage
  • Developmental sequences
  • Communication strategies (CS)

28
The study of learner language
  • Error analysis
  • Representative Stephen Corder
  • Mistakes vs errors
  • Errors as signs of learners hypothesis testing
  • ? normal healthy part of learning process
  • Error classification interlingual and
    intralingual errors

29
The study of learner language
  • Interlanguage
  • Larry Selinker
  • system which has some characteristics of TL,
    some characteristics of SL and some general
    characteristics independent of TL and SL.
  • Continually evolves as learners receive more
    input and revise their hypotheses about the
    target language.
  • Fossilisation

30
The study of learner language
  • Developmental sequences
  • Manfred Pienemann
  • Sequences or stages in the development of
    particular structures, e.g. grammatical morphemes
    or negation
  • Sequences similar across learners from different
    backgrounds (and similar to sequences in LA1)

31
The study of learner language
  • Developmental sequence grammatical morphemes
  • 1) present participle ing plural s
  • 2) definite and indefinite articles
  • 3) irregular past tense
  • 4) regular past tense ed 3rd pers sg s
    possessive s
  • Due to speech processing constraints acquisition
    depends
  • on complexity complexity determined by demands
    on
  • short term memory

32
Research on classroom interaction
  • Teacher learner
  • teacher questions/instructions, learner
    responses, teacher feedback turn-allocation
    behaviour
  • Learner learner
  • communication strategies and the relation
    between task types, learner interaction and
    opportunities for negotiation of meaning

33
Research on classroom interaction
  • General development
  • Shift from teacher fronted, traditional language
  • instruction to communicative, task-based
  • language teaching.

34
Research on classroom interaction
35
Research on classroom interaction
36
Current trends in SLA and language teaching
  • Awareness of complexity of LA2 social and
    interpersonal as well as psychological dimensions
    to acquisition
  • Input and output both important.
  • Acquisition is an organic rather than linear
    process learners do not learn one thing
    perfectly at a time but numerous things
    simultaneously rate and speed dependent on
    complex interplay of factors such as
    speech-processing constraints and pedagogical
    intervention.

37
Current trends in SLA and language teaching
  • Communicative language teaching plus guided,
    form-based instruction and correction in specific
    circumstances.

38
Recomended reading
  • Lightbown, Patsy M. and Nina Spada. 1999. How
    languages are learned, 2nd edition. Oxford
    Oxford University Press.
  • ? Bibliography
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