"It has occurred to the linguist as well a s to the psychologist that the foreign language classroom should be an excellent laboratory in which to test new theories of language acquisition."
Methods of foreign language teaching like any other science, has definite ways of investigating the problems which may arise. They are:
1. a critical study of the ways foreign languages were taught in our country and abroad;
2. a thorough study and summing up of the experience of the best foreign language teachers in different types of schools;
3. experimenting with the aim of confirming or refuting the working hypotheses that may arise during investigation. Experimenting becomes more and more popular with methodologists. In experimenting methodologists have to deal with different data, that is why in arranging research work they use mathematics, statistics, and probability theory to interpret experimental results.
In recent years there has been a great increase of interest in Methods since foreign language "teaching has many attractions as an area for research. A great deal of useful research work has been carried out. New ideas and new data produced as the result of research are usually developed into new teaching materials and teaching techniques.
It should be said that we need research activities of the following types: descriptive research which deals with "what to teach"; experimental and instrumental research dealing with "how to teach". More research is now needed which compares different combination of devices, various teaching aids.
Supplement 2. Methods of Foreign Language Teaching
At the term of the 17th century Volfgang Ratichius (1571-1635) complained about contemporary methods of LT stressed rote learning and grammar at the expense of reading and spearing. He initiated the principle of cognitive leaning of Latin translation as a basic means of semantization and emphasized on repetition as a favored technique. But it remained for his successor, the famous Czech educator Ian Comenius (1592-1670) to devise new methods of LT based on new principles. Instead of rules, I. Comenius used imitation, repetition and plently of practice in both reading and speaking.
In 1631 Ian Comenius published his book “Ianua linguarum reserata” – “The Gates of Languages Unlocked” in which he described new methods of language teaching based on his principles. The book included a limited vocabulary of a few thousand word; each used in a sentence which gave some indication of meaning.
“Orbis Pictus” (1658) is another book by Ian Comenius in which a Latin text is accompanied by illustrations and translations into the mother tongue. Great attention is paid to direct associations between the word in a FL and an object it denotes. In this way the role of the mother tongue was limited. Ian Comenius recommended the following principles:
– from easy to difficult;
– from simple to complex;
– from know to unknown.
Language teaching remained the chief concern of Ian Comenius. His “Linguarum methodus novissima” (Contemporary/modern methods revised) contains one of the first attempts to teach grammar inductively. “Didactica Magna” was a more ambitious work that went beyong language teaching and laid the foundations for modern pedagogy.
Grammar-Translation Method
This method has been with us through the centuries and is still with us. It has had different names; at one time it was called Classical Method since it was used in the teaching of the classical language, Latin and Greek. The method involves many written exercises, much translation and lengthy vocabulary lists. The teacher describes in detail the grammar of the language, focusing on the form and infection of words. This method aims at providing an understanding of the grammar of the language in question expressed in traditional terms, and at training the students to read and write the target language, rather than mastering the oral and aural skills. To do this the students need to learn the grammar rules and vocabulary of the target language. It was hoped that, by doing this students would become more familiar with the grammar of the native language and that this familiarity would help them speak and write their native language better. It was also thought that foreign language learning would help students grow intellectually; it was recognized that students would probably never use the target language, but the mental exercise of learning it would be beneficial anyway.
Students study grammar deductively: that is, they are given rules and examples, they are told to memorise then, and then are asked to apply rules to other examples. They also learn grammatical paradigms such as the plural of nouns, degrees of comparison of adjectives and adverbs, verb conjugations. They memories native language equivalents for foreign language vocabulary lists.
The techniques of G-TM imply bilingual vocabulary lists, written exercises, elaborate grammatical explanations, translation, and total involvement in reading and writing.
The objectives of G-TM are non-utilitarian – confined to understanding of literature which gives keys to great classical culture.
The advantages of this method lie in its limited objectives: understanding of written language and some basic writing and translation. The method is not demanding for the teacher (simple preparation from a textbook and little physical endeavour).
The disadvantages of this method include a total neglect of spoken language, communication skills, use of esoteric vocabulary, and monotonous procedure in class.
Thus the Grammar-Translation Method is simply a combination of the activities of grammar and translation. The teacher begins with rules isolated vocabulary items, paradigms and translation. Pronunciation either is not taught or is limited to a few introductory notes. Grammar rules are memorized as units, which sometimes include illustrative sentences.
Harold Palmer’s Method
Harold Palmer the great English authority and teacher, experimented extensively with the question-answer method. He considered question-answer work to be “the most effective of all language learning exercise ever devised”.
Palmer insisted, however, that if this technique was to be carried out successfully, all questions asked by the teacher must be carefully planned and thought out beforehand. Questions should never be haphazard, either in form or content. Specifically, H. Palmer thought that any question asked by the teacher should be of a nature that admits the following:
a) an obvious answer, not an answer that requires one or more complicated acts of judgement on the part of the student;
b) an easy answer, not one that requires the use of word, facts, or constructions unknown to the student;
c) a relevant answer, direct answer involving only a moderate change through the process of conversion, substitution, or completion of the material contained in the teacher’s question.
In H. Palmer’s view, there are three stages of learning:
1. Receiving knowledge.
2. Fixing it in the memory by repetition.
3. Using the knowledge by real practice.
H. Palmer was the author of some 50 theoretical works, textbooks and manuals. Of great interest are H. Palmer’s “100 Substitution Tables”, in which sentence patterns are arranged in tables for pupils to make up their sentences, following the pattern. His main findings can be conveniently summarized as the following objectives:
1. Phonetic, semantic and syntactic aspects.
2. Oral speech by way of speaking and understanding.
3. Accumulation of passive material with subsequent active reproduction.
4. Techniques used for translation include visuality, interpretation and verbal context.
5. Speech patterns to be learn by heart.
6. Rational selection of vocabulary based on frequency counts and utility.
7. Topical selection: minimum vocabulary list of 3000 words.
H. Palmer paid great attention to a system of exercises, which in his should include:
1. receptive –question and short answers to them;
2. receptive-imitative –words and word-combinations repeated after the teacher;
3. conversational –questions, answers, commands and completion of sentences.
Thus H. Palmer method is based on rationalization of teaching/learning process and systematic selection of material. Teaching speaking features prominelity in H. Palmer’s method, hence its name “oral method”.
Direct Method
The Direct Method appeared as a reaction to the GTM and the failure to procedure learns who could use the foreign language they had been studying.
The Direct Method was based on the belief that students could learn a language through listening to it and that they learn to speak by speaking it – associating speech with appropriate action, like the way the children learn native tongue. The Direct Method received its name from the fact that meaning is to be related to the target language directly, without going through the process of translating into the student’s native language.
The various “oral” and “natural” methods which developed at the turn of the century may be grouped under DM. The students learn new words and phrases from objects. Actions and mime. When the meaning of words could not be made clear, the teacher would resort to semantization but never to native language translations. From the beginning, students are accustomed to hearing complete meaningful sentences in the target language. Grammar is taught at a later stage inductively, numerous examples of a certain principle are presented and the rule is then inferred from these examples. An explicit grammar rule may never be given.
Students learn to think in the target language as soon as possible. Vocabulary is acquired more naturally if students use in full sentences, rather than memorizing long lists of words. Vocabulary is emphasized over grammar. Although work on all four skills occurs from the start, oral communication is seen as basic. Thus the reading and writing exercises are based upon what the students have orally practiced first. Pronunciation also receives due attention from the beginning of the course. Desides studying every speech the learns also do history, geography and culture of the country or countries where the language spoken.
The teacher who employs DM asks the students to self-correct their answers by asking them to make a choice between what they said and alternate answer he supplies. There are, of course, other ways of getting students to self-correct. For example, a teacher might simply repeat what a student has just said using a questioning voice to signal to the student that something was wrong with it. Another possibility is for teacher to repeat what the student said, stopping just before the error. The student then knows that the next word was wrong. There are also other options of remedial work.
The main principles of DM can be summarized under the following headings:
Techniques
1. FL used throughout.
2. Audio-visual approach.
3. Speech before reading.
4. No translation-meaning conveyed through visual/mime.
Objectives
1. Fluency in speech.
2. Capacity to think in target language.
3. Meaningful everyday language.
4. Grammar to be include from practice.
5. Explanations in foreign language.
Pros
1. Lively procedure in classroom.
2. Correct pronunciation.
3. Absence of rule-giving.
4. Learning through doing
Cons
1. Plunges learners too soon into unstructured situations.
2. Foreign-Language learner not like infant native-language learner.
3. Dangers of including wrong rule.
4. Tremendous energy needed be teacher.
Audio-Lingual Method
The Audio-Lingual Method like the Direct Method we have just examined, has a goal very different from that of the Grammar-Translation Method. The Audio-Lingual Method was developed in the United States during the Second World War. At that time there was a need for people to learn foreign languages rapidly for military purposes. As we have seen G-TM did not prepare people to use the target language. While the communication in the target language was the goal of DM, there were at the time exciting new ideas about language and learning emanating from the disciplines of descriptive linguistics and behavioural psychology.
We can trace the Audio-Lingual Method rather directly to the “scientific” linguistics of Leonard Bloomfield and his followers. Both behaviouristic psychology and structural linguistics constituted a reaction against a vague and unscientific approach to the questions of human behaviour. Including the acquisition of knowledge.
Every language, as it is viewed here, has its own unique system. This system is comprised of several different levels: phonological, lexical, and syntactical. Each level has its own distinctive features.
Everyday speech is emphasized in the Audio-Lingual Method. The level of complexity of the speech is graded so that beginning students are presented with only simple forms.
The structures of the language are emphasised over all other areas. The syllabus is typically a structural one, with the structure for any particular unit include in the new dialogue. Vocabulary is also contextualized within the dialogue. It is however, limited since the emphasis is placed on the acquisition of the patterns of the language.
The underlying provision of this method include five maxims to guide teachers in applying the result of linguistic research to the preparation of teaching materials and to classroom techniques:
8. Language is speech, not writing.
a) Emphasis on correct pronunciation from the beginning;
b) Listening and speaking before reading and writing;
c) Realistic, situation utterances from start;
d) Oral mastery first; reading/writing as reinforcers; time lag will depend on sitution.
9. Language is a set of habits.
a) Based on the assumption that language learning is a habit formation process, pattern drilling and dialogue memorization are extensively used;
10.Teach the language, not about language;
a) Revolt against the grammar-translation method;
b) Grammar for the teacher not the learner;
c) Learn through doing, through active practice
d) Practice first, rules induced later.
11.A language is what its native speakers say, not what someone thinks they ought to say:
a) Emphasis on colloquial wealth of language;
b) Literary language at much later stage;
c) Traditional grammar mistrusted: functional styles (occupational, emotive, informative) studied as well as language of attitude.
12.Languages are different:
a) Universal rules of transformational grammar mistrusted;
b) Contrastive studies of language encouraged;
c) Translation accepted when necessary or possible;
d) Translation a later skill with its own techniques
Techniques:
1. Situational dialogues.
2. Everyday language.
3. Emphasis on speaking – aural – oral active participation.
4. Mimicry-memorisation.
5. Pattern-drilling-choral/individual – Role playing/Dialogue building.
6. Reading and writing to reinforce.
7. Awareness of graphic interference.
8. Rules to be induced from practice.
A-LM enables the students to use the target language communicatively. In order to do this the students are believed to overlearn the target language. To learn to use it automatically without stopping to think. The students achieve this by forming new habits in the target language and overcoming the old habits of their native language.
The teacher is like an orchestral leader, directing and controlling the language behaviour of the students. He is also responsible for providing his students with a good model of imitation. The students are imitators of the teacher’s model or the tapes he supplies of model speakers. They follow the teacher’s directions and respond as accurately and as rapidly as they can.
New vocabulary and structures are presented through dialogues and texts. These are learnt through imitation and repetition, transposition are based upon the patterns in the dialogue or texts. Students successful responses are positively reinforced. Grammar is induced from the example given; explict grammar rules are not provided. Cultural information is contextualized in the dialogues and texts or presented by the teacher. Students’ reading and writing work is based upon the oral work they did earlier.
Thus the main provisions of this method can be conveniently summarized in the following way:
Pros:
1. Useful language learnt from outset.
2. Good pronunciation achieved through sound discrimination and auditory practice.
3. Materials especially devised on contrastive analysis rather than total structures –presentation based on frequency counts and utility.