I really enjoyed reading this chapter of the text. It helped to sort out many of the theories and methods we have learned about SLA. One quote that I identified with personally was “This ‘drip-feed’ approach often leads to frustration as learners feel that they have been studying ‘for years’ without making much progress”. This is what I’ve been saying about my own SLA for years. Every time I fill out a form asking how proficient I am in Spanish and how long I have studied it, I feel as though my proficiency should be increasing with the number of years I have studied. I still cannot bring myself to check the “fluent” box, even though I feel as though after 9 years of study, that I should be able to. I feel that I have largely missed out on the opportunity to have frequent and meaningful interactions with native speakers throughout most of my SLA experience.
A strategy that I have used a lot in my own acquisition is to read only to get basic meaning. Because of this, my vocabulary in Spanish is not very extensive. I was surprised by the fact that “in order to guess the meaning of new words in text the reader usually needs to know 90%or more of the words in that text.” That is a huge percentage. I still don’t know that large of a percent of the words in new Spanish texts I read. I have in the past couple of years been trying to readjust this strategy of mine, as it is not beneficial to me in the long run. Old habits die hard though! The last section that really interested me was about a speaker’s ability to produce the phrasing and stress patterns of a language being more important than being able to produce each individual sound. I took French for a two semesters in college and my teacher always said that even if you had perfect grammar, that a native speaker won’t understand you unless you speak in the “melody” of French. Thus in my class, it was more important to produce the phrasing and stress patterns. I wish that all my Spanish classes had been taught like this as well! There are so many factors, methods and theories that go into SLA, this field will continue to change and be an interesting resource that is necessary to keep up with in order to use it in our classrooms.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Methods
“They argue that allowing learners too much ‘freedom’ without correction and explicit instruction will lead to early fossilization of errors” (Lightbrown, Spada 140). This is part of the “Get it Right from the Beginning” approach. This approach is familiar to me because it is how I was taught to acquire my L2, especially in Jr. High and High school. This quote says that there should not be too much freedom, or in other words room for error. I was constantly corrected as an L2 student, and although I did learn some from that, I now am timid to speak in Spanish to other people. I also have errors that have fossilized in my L2. I do not think that by correction this completely avoids fossilization.
I think one of the methods that I agree with for in the classroom in the method that is commonly used in French-immersion schools in Canada. The “Two for One” method values both the acquisition of content and of the L2. This is the method that is closely related to the methods we have discussed in my bilingual classes. It is possible that a student can learn subject matter and a language all at once. That is the point of bilingual education; that neither one of these goals be lost or become less important. Learning language through content allows this to happen. Canada is a great example of the success of this approach, because as the text reiterates “ French immersion students develop fluency, high levels of listening comprehension and confidence in using their second language” (p 156). This type of acquisition is not evident in most of the schools in America, but if would implement this two-for-one system, I think that it could jumpstart education reform, including SLA and ESL and mainstream, all across America.
I think one of the methods that I agree with for in the classroom in the method that is commonly used in French-immersion schools in Canada. The “Two for One” method values both the acquisition of content and of the L2. This is the method that is closely related to the methods we have discussed in my bilingual classes. It is possible that a student can learn subject matter and a language all at once. That is the point of bilingual education; that neither one of these goals be lost or become less important. Learning language through content allows this to happen. Canada is a great example of the success of this approach, because as the text reiterates “ French immersion students develop fluency, high levels of listening comprehension and confidence in using their second language” (p 156). This type of acquisition is not evident in most of the schools in America, but if would implement this two-for-one system, I think that it could jumpstart education reform, including SLA and ESL and mainstream, all across America.
Monday, April 4, 2011
Firth and Wagner
1. “participation in conversation with NSs [native speakers] . . . is the necessary and sufficient condition for SLA”
2. “In SLA, as Mey (1981, p. 73) sardonically puts it, the NS’s status as “the uncrowned King of linguistics” is upheld.14 NS data are thus viewed as the warranted baseline from which NNS data can be compared, and the benchmark from which judgments of appropriateness, markedness, and so forth, can be made.”
3. “As a logical extension, NNSs are unproblematically viewed as the NSs’ subordinates, with regard to communicative competence”
4. “Given this state of affairs, newcomers to SLA may be surprised to discover that the study of FL use (involving both NS–NNS and NNS–NNS) in naturally occurring, everyday (noneducational) settings constitutes a small fraction of SLA research.”
These are all quotes from the Firth and Wagner article that caught my attention as I read. The first quote reminded me of the comparison between ZPD and i+1 theories we explained last week on the exam. Krashen’s theory is focused on input and believes that because of this, as long as there is input, communication with a native speaker is not necessary. I just thought this was an interesting point. Again, there are so many theories; it is difficult to decide which ones I personally connect with.
The second quote is one that I relate with personally. As an SLL of Spanish, I am constantly comparing my own speech and language capabilities to that of a native speaker’s. If we were to make standards for SLA, the benchmark would absolutely be a native speaker’s speech. What I wonder though, is which dialect, which country etc. would the benchmark come from? Would the standards for each language be different? This would be an interesting topic to discuss with SLA experts, just to see what their arguments and thoughts would be on how to make “standards” for SLA.
The third quote is also one I identified with personally. When I studied in Guatemala, and have been on trips to Honduras, I always feel like I am a subordinate to the native speakers that I am surrounded by. This belief causes me to be more hesitant to speak. I believe this may be skewed. I think that perhaps more so than the NS’s seeing the NNS’s as subordinates, I think the NNS’s give us that name. In my experiences, the NS’s I have been around do not see me as a subordinate, rather they have told me they admire that I am learning their language. Therefore I think that this is also an interesting point to address and I would like to see some different views on it.
Lastly, this quote must be 100% true. For my project I am compiling research focused on EFL in the home environment, so FL in a naturally occurring, everyday (noneducational) setting. It has been very difficult to find research focused solely on this. I hope that this will become a more observed part of the field of SLA because I think it would really contribute to what we know (and don’t know) about the interactions between NS’s and NNS’s and vice-versa.
2. “In SLA, as Mey (1981, p. 73) sardonically puts it, the NS’s status as “the uncrowned King of linguistics” is upheld.14 NS data are thus viewed as the warranted baseline from which NNS data can be compared, and the benchmark from which judgments of appropriateness, markedness, and so forth, can be made.”
3. “As a logical extension, NNSs are unproblematically viewed as the NSs’ subordinates, with regard to communicative competence”
4. “Given this state of affairs, newcomers to SLA may be surprised to discover that the study of FL use (involving both NS–NNS and NNS–NNS) in naturally occurring, everyday (noneducational) settings constitutes a small fraction of SLA research.”
These are all quotes from the Firth and Wagner article that caught my attention as I read. The first quote reminded me of the comparison between ZPD and i+1 theories we explained last week on the exam. Krashen’s theory is focused on input and believes that because of this, as long as there is input, communication with a native speaker is not necessary. I just thought this was an interesting point. Again, there are so many theories; it is difficult to decide which ones I personally connect with.
The second quote is one that I relate with personally. As an SLL of Spanish, I am constantly comparing my own speech and language capabilities to that of a native speaker’s. If we were to make standards for SLA, the benchmark would absolutely be a native speaker’s speech. What I wonder though, is which dialect, which country etc. would the benchmark come from? Would the standards for each language be different? This would be an interesting topic to discuss with SLA experts, just to see what their arguments and thoughts would be on how to make “standards” for SLA.
The third quote is also one I identified with personally. When I studied in Guatemala, and have been on trips to Honduras, I always feel like I am a subordinate to the native speakers that I am surrounded by. This belief causes me to be more hesitant to speak. I believe this may be skewed. I think that perhaps more so than the NS’s seeing the NNS’s as subordinates, I think the NNS’s give us that name. In my experiences, the NS’s I have been around do not see me as a subordinate, rather they have told me they admire that I am learning their language. Therefore I think that this is also an interesting point to address and I would like to see some different views on it.
Lastly, this quote must be 100% true. For my project I am compiling research focused on EFL in the home environment, so FL in a naturally occurring, everyday (noneducational) setting. It has been very difficult to find research focused solely on this. I hope that this will become a more observed part of the field of SLA because I think it would really contribute to what we know (and don’t know) about the interactions between NS’s and NNS’s and vice-versa.
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