Language learning and teaching – theory and practice · Language learning and teaching-theory and practice Theory and principles 90-401 Berns, Margie. Why language teaching needs

Language learning and teaching-theoryand practice

Theory and principles90-401 Berns, Margie. Why language teaching needs the sociolinguist. CanadianModern Language Review (Toronto). 46, 2 (1990), 339-53.

Sociolinguistics has informed language teachingtheory and practice over the past 15 years or so,largely through a change of emphasis in languageteaching content and innovations in materials andclassroom activities. While these changes are fairlywidespread and the value of insights from soc-iolinguistics generally is recognised, understandingof the relationship between sociolinguistics andlanguage teaching among language teaching pro-fessionals is all too often limited to concern withlanguage functions and ways to teach rules for use ofpolite forms. This paper attempts to provide a basisfor a broader understanding of the potential of

sociolinguistics as a resource for the languageteacher, an understanding that would contribute toa language teaching theory and practice that is moreresponsive to the needs of learners who want todevelop their ability to express, interpret, andnegotiate meaning in a second language. A means ofachieving this goal is offered in a consideration of anumber of areas, including: the nature of language;the goals and concerns of language teaching; asociolinguistic perspective on curriculum syllabusand materials design; the identification of app-ropriate goals; and the evaluation of learners' abilityto use a second/foreign language.

90-402 Vivian Cook (U. of Essex). Universal Grammar theory and the classroom.System (Oxford). 17, 2 (1989), 169-81.

This paper explores the implications of the principlesand parameters theory of Universal Grammar forlanguage teaching. Learning the core aspects of asecond language means re-setting values for par-ameters according to the evidence the learner re-ceives, perhaps starting from the LI setting. Implica-tions for the classroom can only be drawn for coreareas of grammatical competence. Classroom acqui-sition depends crucially on the provision of appropri-ate syntactic evidence to trigger parameter-setting;

certain aspects of vocabulary are also crucial.Variability, interaction, active production or com-prehension, consciousness-raising and hypothesis-testing are irrelevant. Existing textbooks alreadysupply appropriate evidence for parameter-setting;the grammatical component of syllabuses may beimproved by use of principles and parameters, evenif this reveals what does not need to be taught, asmay the teacher's awareness of language.

90-403 Ellis, Rod. Second language learning and second language learners:growth and diversity. TESL Canada Journal (Montreal), 7, 1 (1989), 74-94.

Two different traditions have grown up in the fieldof second language acquisition (SLA) studies. Onetradition is linguistic and focuses on the process bywhich learners build up their linguistic knowledgeof the L2, the focus being on learning. The othertradition is psychological and focuses on the differ-ent ways in which learners cope with the task oflearning and using an L2. Here the focus is on theindividual learner. Teachers need to take account ofboth these traditions; though they may appear to bein conflict, they are not, and a ' whole' approach tolanguage teaching must consider both the structuralnature of learning and the learner as an individual.Two general models of SLA which characterise muchof the current research are outlined: 'develop-ment-as-sequence' and 'development-as-growth'.The development-as-sequence model claims thatlearners follow some kind of 'natural' route as a

214

result of the processing complexity of differentstructures. It emphasises the significance of linguisticfactors as determinants of acquisition. The develop-ment-as-growth model sees language developmentas part of the process of learning how to com-municate. It attaches importance, therefore, to thechanging patterns of inter-relationship of form andfunction. Both models are valid; they both captureimportant structural facts about the process of SLA.

How do learners differ in their approaches?Learning style is discussed in terms of the learner'scognitive and affective orientations to the task oflearning an L2. Learners vary according to whatextent they are experiential or studial on the onehand, and active or passive on the other. Do someapproaches work better than others? Studies of the'good language learner' provide a remarkablyconsistent picture and point to four key aspects: a

https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444800005917Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 54.39.106.173, on 01 Jul 2021 at 20:47:50, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at

https://www.cambridge.org/core/termshttps://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444800005917https://www.cambridge.org/core

Theory and principlesconcern for language form, a concern for com-munication, an active task approach, and awarenessof the learning process.

The process of SLA is controlled by the learner.It may be possible to organise instruction tocorrespond to the natural sequence, but the teachercannot tell when each learner is ready to move on.Grammar teaching should not be abandoned butteachers should be able to distinguish whether

instruction is aimed at direct or indirect intervention.Indirect grammar teaching aims to raise the learner'sconsciousness about certain forms in the inputbefore such forms are acquired, thereby facilitatingsubsequent learning. Guidelines to help teachers toencourage communication are suggested, also waysof catering for diversity in learning style (negotiatinglearning tasks and adapting communication to suitindividual learners).

90-404 Pennycook, Alastair (Ontario Inst. for Studies in Ed.). The concept ofmethod, interested knowledge, and the politics of language teaching. TESOLQuarterly (Washington. DC). 23, 4 (1989), 589-618.

Examining the concept of Method in secondlanguage education, this paper argues that both ahistorical analysis and an investigation of its currentuse reveal little conceptual coherence. Ultimately,the term seems to obfuscate more than to clarify ourunderstanding of language teaching. While this mayseem at first a minor quibble over terminology,there are in fact far more serious implications. Byrelating the role of teaching theory to more general

concerns about the production of interested know-ledge and the politics of language teaching, thispaper argues that Method is a prescriptive conceptthat articulates a positivist, progressivist, and pat-riarchal understanding of teaching and plays animportant role in maintaining inequities between,on the one hand, predominantly male academicsand, on the other, female teachers and languageclassrooms on the international power periphery.

90-405 Py, Bernard (U. of Neuchatel, Switzerland). Les strategies d'acquisition ensituation d'interaction. [Acquisition strategies in an interactive situation.] Frangaisdans le Monde (Paris), special no. Feb/Mar (1990), 81-8.

Language acquisition in a natural environment doesnot come about by a magical symbiosis between thelearner and the target language, but rather by hardwork on the part of both the learner and the nativespeaker. This work runs along parallel paths: thecommunicative (the formulation, transmission andinterpretation of the message) and the metalinguistic(the resolution of communicative problems im-

plies the organisation of fragments of the targetlanguage). Two important characteristics of asym-metrical interaction (i.e. between a learner and anative speaker) are illustrated: the desire to col-laborate and the adoption of' teacher' and ' student'roles by the native speaker and the learner re-spectively.

90-406 Rampton, M. B. H. Displacing the 'native speaker': expertise, affiliation,and inheritance. ELT Journal (Oxford), 44, 2 (1990), 97-101.

The terms' native speaker' and ' mother tongue' arecriticised as being inaccurate and misleading. Theyemphasise the biological at the expense of the social,and confuse language as an instrument of com-munication with its function as a symbol of socialidentity. The fact that these weaknesses are exploitedfor political ends makes a reassessment of theseassumptions particualrly important. It is thus pro-posed that the notion of the native speaker should bereplaced by that of the 'language expert'. In thatexpertise is acquired, relative, and accountable, itallows for a shift of emphasis from ' who you are' to'what you know'. The importance of language as a

symbol of group identification may be expressed inthe notion of language 'loyalty', of which twoaspects may be distinguished: 'affiliation' and'inheritance'. Both involve a degree of negotiationin so far as allegiance to social groups may change,as may the groups themselves; however, inheritanceexpresses language loyalty within social boundaries,whereas affiliation takes place across them. It isargued that the concepts introduced encourage usto consider individual cases in their wider socialcontext, for they insist that we do not equatenationality and ethnicity with language ability andallegiance.

215



Language learning and teaching

90-407 Savignon, Sandra J. (U. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign). Les recherchesen didactique des langues etrangeres et I'approche communicative. [Research inforeign language teaching and the communicative approach.] Etudes de LinguistiqueAppliquee (Paris), 77 (1990), 29-46.

A brief review of the linguistic theories and secondlanguage acquisition research that have led to thecommunicative approach is followed by a discussionof the inadequacies of the concept of ' functionalcompetence' [as exemplified in the American'Proficiency Guidelines'] as a tool for evaluatinglearners' competence and communicative pro-

grammes. The second half of the paper is devoted tothe suggestion that a communicative course shouldbe developed on the basis of five components:language study, the functional use of the foreignlanguage, the language as self-expression, thelanguage as creative expression, and the use of thelanguage outside the classroom.

90-408 Trim, John. New European programmes in support of foreign languageteaching. BAAL Newsletter, 34 (1989), 48-64.

The European Community (EC) and the Council ofEurope have seen language learning as an essentialaspect of closer European co-operation. The ECadopted an action programme to support foreignlanguage teaching in 1976, but legal and politicalobstacles blocked its implementation. Events in themid-1980s resuscitated interest in this area, and in1989 the 'Lingua' programme was announced,receiving general support from member states. Itsfive-year budget is modest and is likely to be largelydevoted to periods of residence abroad for practisingteachers and university students of FLs (especiallyfuture teachers where these can be identified). Thescheme is unlikely to be able to cope with the largenumbers of EC English teachers eligible to study inthe United Kingdom. The stimulation of the mutualstudy of each other's languages by smaller ECcountries should, however, be considerable. Onevaluable result of the programme may be thedevelopment of a European unit-credit scheme, asuniversities become accustomed to international co-operation and mobility.

The Council of Europe works in the fields ofeducation and culture through its Council forCultural Co-operation (CDCC), in which 26countries are now involved. The basic principles of

the 'Council of Europe approach' to languagelearning/teaching, exemplified in the ThresholdLevel and Un Niveau-Seuil, gave priority to thecommunicative needs of learners and the definitionof feasible objectives and were laid down in theearly 1970s. In the early 1980s the CDCC suc-cessfully promoted the more general introductionof communicative objectives and methods inmember states. Later a series of well-attendedand enthusiastically received workshops for teachertrainers was held to encourage international co-operation in the implementation of these new ideas.

A new programme, Modern language learning andteaching for European citizenship, will extend theapplication of the earlier projects' findings toprimary education, upper secondary education,vocational education and advanced adult education.Target themes will include the use of new technol-ogies, bilingual education, and development ofstudy skills. Teacher training will remain a centralconcern, and a series of'new-style' workshops withorganised programme of dissemination and follow-up action will be held. Co-operation with the EC inareas of common concern will be highly desirable,not least because of the CDCC's very limitedfunding.

Psychology of language learning90-409 Cameron, Lynne J. (Coll. of Ripon and York St John, North Yorkshire).Staying within the script: personality and self-directed learning. System (Oxford),18, 1 (1990), 65-75.

A collection of case studies illustrates the reactions ofoverseas and British bilingual students in highereducation in Britain to a procedure used to initiatea self-directed learning programme in Study Skills.This paper describes the self-assessment procedurebriefly and then focuses on insights into students'

216

feelings about learning that emerged from thetrialling. Expectations and insecurity often seem tolead to the adoption, by tutors as well as by students,of particular types of roles and the playing out of'scripts' associated with these roles. This can affectmotivation and the possibility of real, effective



Psychology of language learninglearning taking place. In the light of this, the towards increasing the degree of self-directedimplications for tutors and for students of moves learning in higher education are discussed.

90-410 Carroll, Susanne (Ontario Inst. for Studies in Ed.). Second-languageacquisition and the computational paradigm. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich),39, 4 (1989). 535-94.

The central claim of the cognitive science paradigmis that the mind/brain can be thought of as aninformation-processing device. Classical theoriesrequire explicitness about the representations inwhich knowledge is encoded because processes aredefined as algorithms computing over them. Inmuch current second-language acquisition (SLA)research, there is talk of'process' and 'processing'without talk of representation or, conversely,

proposals about representation with no clarity abouthow structures are exploited during parsing orproduction. To accept this state of affairs is not totake the paradigm seriously. An analysis of genderattribution in French LI and French L2 acquisitionis presented here to show how explicit models ofacqusition can be developed, blending together thefindings of linguistics and experimental psycho-linguistics.

90-411 Ellis, Rod (Ealing Coll. of Higher Ed.). Classroom learning styles and theireffect on second language acquisition: a study of two learners. System (Oxford), 17,2 (1989), 249-62.

This article reports on a study of the learning stylesof two adult classroom learners of L2 German.Using data collected in a variety of ways it aims toexplore to what extent and in what ways thelearners' learning style varies, whether one learner'slearning style results in more effective learning thanthe other's and the effect of the instructional style onthe subjects' learning outcomes. A key distinction is

made between a studial and experiential learningstyle. The results indicate that the two learnersdiffered in their cognitive orientation to the learningtask, that one learner might have abandoned herown preferred learning style in order to cope withthe type of instruction provided and that the learn-ing outcomes reflected what the learners set out tolearn.

90-412 Gass, Susan M. (Michigan State U.). Language universals and second-language acquisition. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 39, 4 (1989), 497-534.

This paper examines the goals and assumptions ofsecond-language acquisition (SLA) research, in par-ticular relating these goals and assumptions to thoseof linguistics. It is argued that SLA is linguisticsand that second-language data are of import inunderstanding the nature of language. The mainfocus is language universals of which three ap-proaches (Universal Grammar, typological univer-sals, and processing universals) are considered. Boththeoretical underpinnings and empirical evidenceare brought to bear in presenting supporting anddisconfirming arguments for each of these threeapproaches. It is argued that we must take intoaccount an understanding of how apparently dis-

parate facts of language - which are universallyrelated — are conceptually related before we canpredict their effect on second-language acquisition.It is further pointed out that because an under-standing of second-language learning necessitates aninterdisciplinary approach, we must be able tospecify where any single approach fits into the totalpicture. Finally, the author presents a view of thepossible ways in which SLA and linguistics aretheoretically related and points out that it isincumbent upon SLA researchers to make it knownthat the data they work with are of relevance andinterest to the formulation of theories of language.

90-413 Giacobbe, Jorge (U. of Paris VIM, GRAL). Le recours a la languepremiere: une approche cognitive. [Recourse to the first language: a cognitiveapproach.] Frangais dans le Monde (Paris), special no. Feb/Mar (1990), 115-23.

Studies of Spanish-speaking refugees in France serve they find themselves obliged to communicate butto demonstrate the strategies used by adult learners lack the linguistic resources to do so. Falling back onto construct for themselves an interlanguage, when the forms and structures of their own language, such

217



Language learning and teachinglearners adapt and modify these, in the light oflinguistic hypotheses of their own devising, so thatthey resemble those of the target language. Studies

of pairs of languages less closely related than Frenchand Spanish are envisaged.

90-414 Hansen-Strain, Lynne (Brigham Young U., Hawaii). Orality/literacy andgroup differences in second-language acquisition. Language Learning (Ann Arbor,Mich), 39, 4 (1989), 469-96.

This paper examines group differences in second-language development from perspectives providedby the literature on orality and literacy. Findings arepresented from an empirical study that investigatestwo hypotheses: (1) that university ESL studentsfrom traditional oral cultures tend to focus signifi-cantly more on interpersonal involvement in theirESL speaking and writing than do students frommore literate cultural traditions, and (2) that incomparison with learners from more literate cul-

tures, the learners from oral traditions tend to usedifficult structures more frequently and correctly inthe spoken modality than in the written. In supportof both hypotheses the data indicate significantgroup differences in the patterning of interlanguagetask variability. In conclusion, a model of discoursevariability is proposed which takes into accountspeech modality, degree of planning, and level ofinterpersonal involvement.

90-415 Krashen, Stephen (U. of S. California). We acquire vocabulary and spellingby reading; additional evidence for the Input Hypothesis. Modern Language Journal(Madison. Wis), 73, 4 (1989). 440-64.

Of the three hypotheses proposed for languageacquisition, recent research is largely consistentwith only one of them, the Input Hypothesis (IH).IH assumes we acquire language by understandingmessages and that competence in spelling andvocabulary is most efficiently attained by reading.The Skill-building Hypothesis assumes that lang-uage is acquired through word lists, rules and

exercises while the Output Hypothesis claims thatlanguage is best learned by producing it. A con-siderable amount of current research is reviewedand it is concluded that conscious learning does notappear to be as efficient as acquisition from input.An hour of pleasure reading is far preferable to 30minutes of drills.

90-416 Lennon, Paul (U. of Birmingham). Introspection and intentionality inadvanced second-language acquisition. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 39, 3(1989), 375-96.

This paper suggests that introspective techniquescan profitably be employed with the advancedlearner to tap knowledge of strategic approach tothe L2 acquisition task, which is largely intentionaland therefore conscious. Specifically, an introspec-tive study of four advanced learners under conditionsof initial extensive exposure to the L2 community isdescribed. Analysis is based on both written reportsand interviews. A considerable degree of con-currence was found both among subjects andbetween the written and oral reports. This providessome confirmation for the validity of the techniqueand also suggests a commonness of approach amongsubjects to their learning task.

It was found that subjects initially adopted astrategy of listening similar to that described by

Wong Fillmore (1976) for young children. Subjects'motivation was essentially to learn the language, andthey did not fit into the crude classification of inte-gratively versus instrumentally motivated learnersvery well.

Subjects were focused on communication ratherthan correctness, although they did receive limitederror correction in the L2 community. Subjectstended to apply different production strategies underdifferent circumstances and reported that theirlanguage was very much influenced by the inter-locutor. They were aware of their own deficiencesand mistakes, and experimented in production toseek out feedback and practice new linguistic items.Advanced learner performance would appear to becharacterised by uncertainty.

218



Psychology of language learning

90-417 Lepetit, Daniel (U. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign). Cross-linguisticinfluence in intonation: French/Japanese and French/English. Language Learning(Ann Arbor. Mich), 39, 3 (1989). 397-413.

This article reports the findings of research on theacquisition of French intonation by native speakersof Canadian English and Japanese. Intonation islimited, in this study, to the domain of phonosyntaxwhere intonational cues are correlated with syn-tactical units. Results of the study show that cross-linguistic influence in intonation is of central impor-tance in the learner's acquisition of the target system

and that one should not underestimate the degreeof complexity of that influence. The study showsthat it is relevant to differentiate between cross-linguistic influence of intonational phonologicalrules and cross-linguistic influence of phonetic charac-teristics, and that in both aspects a cross-linguisticinfluence is at work.

90-418 Murphey, Tim (U. of Neuchatel, Switzerland). The song-stuck-in-my-head phenomenon: a melodic Din in the LAD? System (Oxford), 18, 1 (1990),53-64.

This hypothesis-raising article deals with the re-lationship between four phenomena: (1) involuntaryverbal rehearsal, also called the 'Din in the head', (2)Piaget's egocentric speech, (3) Vygotsky's innerspeech, and (4) the song-stuck-in-my-head (SSIMH)phenomena. The similarity of the Din to theSSIMH phenomenon is suggested based on atentative pilot questionnaire, the database con-

cerning the Din, a few insights from sources not yetconsidered in the Din literature (sports, neurology,and sub vocalisation studies), and parallel phenomenain visual and kinaesthetic rehearsal. It is hypothesisedthat song may act as a LAD activator, or be a strat-egy of the LAD in the ontogenetic development oflanguage.

90-419 Oxford, Rebecca L. (Pennsylvania State U.). Use of language learningstrategies: a synthesis training. System (Oxford), 17, 2 (1989), 235-47.

Existing research on language learning strategies isreviewed and synthesised. Good language learnersuse strategies in six broad groups: metacognitive,affective, social, memory, cognitive and compensa-tory. Good language learners manage their ownlearning process through metacognitive strategies, suchas paying attention, self-evaluating, and self-moni-toring. They control their emotions and attitudesthrough affective strategies, such as anxiety reductionand self-encouragement. They work with others tolearn the language, using social strategies like askingquestions and becoming culturally aware. They usememory strategies, such as grouping, imagery, andstructured review, to get information into memoryand to recall it when needed. They employ the newlanguage directly with cognitive strategies, such aspractising naturalistically, analysing contrastively,and summarising. Finally, they overcome knowl-edge limitations through compensatory strategies, likeguessing meanings intelligently and using synonymsor other production tricks when the precise ex-pression is unknown.

Research on what factors affect choice of languagelearning strategies was also reviewed. It emergedthat many factors influence learning strategy choice:

language being learned; duration; degree of aware-nesss; age; sex; affective variables, such as attitudes,motivation level/intensity, language learning goals,motivational orientation, personality characteristics,and general personality type; learning style; apti-tude; career orientation; national origin; languageteaching methods; and task requirements.

Implications for strategy training are discussed.The most effective strategy training explicitlyteaches learners why and how to (1) use newstrategies, (2) evaluate the effectiveness of differentstrategies, and (3) decide when it is appropriate totransfer a given strategy to a new situation. Strategytraining should be geared to learners' own needs:affective factors are especially important to consider.Factors such as national origin, sex, and course levelare also crucial.

Three kinds of assessment are recommended as aguide to strategy training: (i) assessing students'current learning strategies (using techniques such asdiaries, observations, interviews or surveys); (ii)determining learners' existing goals, motivations,attitudes and personality type through informaldiscussions or more formal assessment techniques;and (iii) considering students' language learning

219LTA 23



Language learning and teachingexperience, national origin, sex, age and other dividends in terms of more successful strategybackground factors. These assessments do not training,require a great deal of effort, and certainly pay

90-420 Oxford, Rebecca and Crookall, David (U. of Alabama). Research onlanguage learning strategies: methods, findings and instructional issues. ModernLanguage Journal (Madison, Wis), 73, 4 (1989), 404-19.

Strategies used by foreign language learners tomove towards proficiency may be classified ascognitive (e.g. note taking), memory (e.g. use ofmnemonics), compensation (e.g. guessing, usingsynonyms), communication (a misnomer for com-pensation strategies in speaking), metacognitive(planning one's learning), affective (e.g. self-reinforcement) and social (e.g. co-operating withpeers, developing empathy). The extensive researchin this area is summarised and classified according tothe research methods used — introspection, inter-

views and thinking aloud, note taking, diary studies,surveys and factor analysis.

Language learners at all levels use strategies, butmost are relatively unaware of them and do not usethe full range available. On the whole, moreproficient learners use a wider range of strategies inmore situations. Strategy use varies with sex,ethnicity and individual personality, but it is possibleand generally advisable to teach learners how andwhy to use, transfer and evaluate strategies.

90-421 Palmberg, Rolf (Abo Akademi, Finland). What makes a word English?Swedish-speaking learners' feeling of 'Englishness'. A/LA Review (Madrid, Spain), 6(1989), 47-55.

' Potential' vocabulary in a foreign language consistsof words not previously encountered, but which thelearner can understand by making lexical inferences.'Receptive' vocabulary consists of words which arealready familiar to the learner and to which he/shecan assign correct meaning. In practice, both typesof vocabulary include elements of both experienceand intuition. An experiment with 26 pupils(average age 14) at a Swedish-medium school in abilingual Finnish-Swedish part of Finland wasdesigned to find out what kind of words theyrecognised as English. The pupils had six years ofFinnish, four years of English, and had just begunGerman. They were given a list of 60 words andwere asked to indicate which they knew or believedto be English. Following the technique of Mearaand Buxton (1987), both real and imaginary Englishwords were included. Of these, 22 words were fromthe minimum basic vocabulary list recommendedfor 16-year-old school leavers by the FinnishNational Board of General Eduction (FNBGE).Others were selected from pupil interest areas suchas television and computers. The 20 non-Englishvocabulary items comprised imaginary, German,and Swedish words. Pupils were also asked to

provide a Swedish translation of words they believedto be English.

Their success rate in identifying English wordswas good (86 %) for FNBGE words, but dropped to48% for non-FNBGE words. Some 18 of the testwords had Swedish counterparts similar or identicalin form. Ten of these were genuine cognates sharingthe same meaning, and most pupils identified thesecorrectly as English, as they did the eight deceptivecognates or 'false friends', but these elicited manyincorrect translations. The pupils made quite ac-curate judgements on the words relating to theirown interests, but were relatively unwilling toaccept foreign loanwords, e.g. anorak, sauna, asEnglish. The non-English words in the list werelargely identified as such, although there was someconfusion about nonsense words (e.g. corandic,tarances) sharing the physical characteristics of realEnglish words. Some mistakes were simply theresult of misreadings by individual pupils, as theirattempts at translation showed. It is clear that pupilsat this level possess both receptive and potentialvocabularies in English, the sizes of which dependlargely on the input that has been available, and ontheir own interests.

90-422 Richardson, Ian M. Discourse structure and comprehension. System(Oxford), 17, 3 (1989), 339-45.

Recent discourse analysis has recommended theteaching of discourse through coherence procedure,such as conjunctions. This paper compares pro-

220

cedures with cohesion procedures with regard totheir ease of comprehension. Suggestions are madefor a model of discourse comprehension and tested



Psychology of language learning

experimentally. Ten different cloze procedures wereconstructed by the deletion of five kinds ofgrammatical categories. Coherence procedures wereidentified with nouns, verbs and conjunctions,Cohesion procedures were identified with pronounsand articles. The tests were administered to 40 Saudi

EFL students and to 15 British LI students. Inferenceof the deleted categories followed the same orderfor both groups: articles, pronouns, nouns andconjunctions. The results broadly confirmed thepredictions of the model.

90-423 Schouten-van Parreren, Caroline (Free U. Amsterdam,The Netherlands). Vocabulary learning through reading: which conditions should bemet when presenting words in texts? A/LA Review (Madrid, Spain), 6 (1989), 75-84.

School methods of teaching huge numbers ofwords are often ineffective and demotivating. Threeexperimental studies are discussed (involving adults,young children and low-ability pupils respectivelyand performed according to the principles of actionpsychology, which shed light on the psychologicalprocesses involved in vocabulary learning throughreading, and focus on the semantisation of newvocabulary. Arguments are put forward againstpresenting words in isolation and in favour ofpresenting them in meaningful contexts.

The first experiment concerned comprehensionand retention of foreign language words presented

in texts, and was meant to aid insight into thenature of the psychological processes involved invocabulary learning through reading. The secondexperiment, a case study on vocabulary learningthrough reading picture books, aimed to gaininformation on textual and psychological con-ditions. The final experiment focused on individualdifferences in a variety of tasks concerning vo-cabulary learning and reading. Much relevantinformation on presenting words in texts may begained by starting from a psychological point ofview and using the method of thinking aloud.

90-424 Stone, Gregory B. (Memphis State U.) and Rubenfield, Stepehen A.(U. of Minnesota). Foreign languages and the business curriculum: what do thestudents think? Modern Language Journal (Madison, Wis), 73, 4 (1989), 429-39.

A study is reported which aimed to find out whatproportion of business students choose to enroll incollege-level foreign language coursework, andwhat factors influence them in so doing. Data werecollected from students enrolled in five differentbusiness schools, none of which has a recognisedemphasis on international management. Resultsshowed that only about a quarter of students hadchosen to enroll in language courses. They fre-quently had non-business-related reasons for doingso, such as the desire to learn another language or

the expectation of foreign travel. These studentstended to have had positive experience of languagestudy in high school. The difficulty for languageteachers lies with the majority who have not electedto pursue language study, because they view it asmore time-consuming and more difficult thanother coursework, and irrelevant to their career de-velopment. Such students need to be sensitised tothe relevance of international business studies andthe value of foreign language skills, possibly by acampaign mounted before their junior year.

90-425 Vechter, Andrea and others. Second language retention: a summary ofthe issues. Canadian Modern Language Review (Toronto), 46, 2 (1990), 289-303.

This short summary of an extensive annotatedbibliography highlights the theoretical issues, prin-cipal studies and factors known to influence theretention of second language skills. Factors identifiedas relevant to changes in second language skilllevels are: initially attained levels of proficiency; asupportive during- and post-training environment;exposure to other foreign languages; maturityand/or general self-awareness; literacy and/or theonset of literacy; and a perceived need to use the

language after the initial training period. The notionof a 'critical skill level' which must be reached topredict/ensure retention and the effect of practiceon retention are also discussed. Eleven principalresearch studies exploring these issues are presentedin an annotated form. The article concludes with ashort question/answer section. Replies in this sectionmake reference to data reported in the annotatedstudies and to more recent studies in a Canadiancontext.

22117-2




Research methods90-426 Dowd, Janice (City U. of New York) and others. L2 social marking:research issues. Applied Linguistics (Oxford), 11, 1 (1990), 16-29.

Research on social marking in a second language(L2), with particular emphasis on pronunciation, isreviewed [examples with discussion]. Findingssuggest that marking can occur at all stages ofsecond language acquisition and in speakers ofdifferent ages, that some sounds act as markers morefrequently than others; and that while several soundsmarking the same social factor may shift in differentdirections, this may also be the case for a singlesound marking several social factors. Evidence pointsto two levels of marking, one serving to categorisespeakers on a social or biological level, the otherindicating states such as beliefs and motives.

Various issues arising from this research areexamined: inherent difficulties relating to the for-mation of hypotheses, and the analysis and inter-pretation of results are revealed. The necessarilylarge body of data and the continuous nature ofspeech poses problems for consistency in judgementsof acceptability. Issues such as whether a group ofvariables constitute an entity called a 'style' andwhether there is adequate rationale for the confirm-ation of hypotheses must be addressed if we are torecognise the effect they have on the interpretationof research results.

90-427 Grosjean, Francois (U. of Neuchatel). Le laboratoire de traitement dulanguage et de la parole de I'Universite de Neuchatel: recherche fondamental etappliquee. [The language and speech processing laboratory of the University ofNeuchatel: fundamental and applied research.] Actes des Journees Suisses deLinguistique Appliquee, I (special no. of Bulletin CILA (Neuchatel)), 50 (1989),59-65.

This article summarises the equipment and organ-isation of the Neuchatel laboratory and givesexamples of its work. Fundamental research inprogress includes studies of the mental processesinvolved in perception, comprehension and pro-duction. A particular interest is the psycholinguisticsof bilingualism: the authors reject explanations ofbilingual behaviour in terms of two separatecompetences, and use a 'holistic' model which can

account for code-switching. Bilinguals' behaviourin word-recognition and their pronunciation whencode-switching are being investigated.

Applied research includes speech synthesis toproduce a continuum between /k / and / g / andinvestigate how it is perceived, evaluation of aspeech recognition system, and work on softwarefor machine-aided translation and composition.

90-428 Higgins, John and Wallace, Ruth (Bristol U.). HOPALONG: a computerreading pacer. System (Oxford), 17, 3 (1989). 389-99.

After reviewing some research findings aboutreading and reading speed, this paper describes acomputer reading pacer, tentatively called HOP-ALONG, written at Bristol University in 1987-8.It has been subject to two sets of trials, the resultsof which are described below. Further trials anddevelopments are planned. Its main purpose is todiscover something about the interaction of a readerand a text by observing moment-by-momentdecisions taken by the reader. It does this by running

a highlight through pages of text at a speed whichthe reader can control with the arrow keys. It thendisplays a graph to show all the speed changes, andcopies the complete text to the printer with insertedmarks to show every point where the reader hasspeeded up, slowed down, paused, or re-read a pageor pages. It is hoped that it can be more than just aresearch tool, since access to this kind of informationmay well be of value to teachers and to students.

222



Research methods

90-429 McDonough, Jo and McDonough, Steven (U. of Essex). What's theuse of research? ELT Journal (Oxford). 44, 2 (1990), 102-9.

The article is concerned with the nature and role oflanguage teaching research, and teachers' percep-tions of its relevance. A distinction is drawn betweenthe classical 'top-down' research paradigm and theinitiation of research by teachers themselves.Teachers do not always perceive the relevance ofresearch findings to their own classrooms andteaching practices. Teachers are still seen to berecipients of information on academic research;they are concerned with processes (such as learning,classroom interaction, adaptability) whereas researchinsights reach them as finished products. Muchacademic research in applied linguistics shows un-familiarity with the practice of language teaching.

This is not to deny that there is some 'bottom-up ' research which has grown out of the ethos ofteacher development and of a view of the centrality

of the teacher's role. A growing trend sees theteacher in some sense as a researcher; as a starting-point for exploring teachers' perceptions of em-pirical research about language teaching andlearning, a short questionnaire was devised and ad-ministered to 34 native English-speaking teachers ofELT. Results showed that most respondents hadbeen, or were currently involved in research, usedthe product of research in their teaching, and wereable to do research in their own institutions - theywere, however, a highly motivated group and nota representative sample of teachers. Problems raisedinclude the difficulty of access to much research(both conceptually and physically), and the need forteachers to receive training in how to formulateresearchable questions.

90-430 Meara, Paul (Birkbeck Coll., London U.). Matrix models of vocabularyacquisition. A/LA Review (Madrid, Spain), 6 (1989), 66-74.

Most tests of the effectiveness of vocabulary teachingmethods are unsatisfactory because they ignorelong-term changes. Given certain assumptions, thetransitional probabilities of a learner forgetting aword previously remembered, or recalling a wordpreviously forgotten, interact over time, so that thenumber of words remembered finally (i.e. whenequilibrium is reached) is not only different frombut completely independent of the number remem-bered initially. Whilst there are certain problems

with this model, it has experimental support andwould be of practical utility in standardising re-search. To deal with the problem of what it meansto 'know' a word, a test is advocated in whichsubjects cross off a list of words which they 'do notknow well enough to say what they mean': the listcontains both target-language and nonsense words,and the test is scored by totalling crossed targetwords and subtracting uncrossed nonsense words.

90-431 Mitchell, Rosamond (U. of Southampton). Second language learning:investigating the classroom context. System (Oxford), 17, 2 (1989), 195-210.

This article reviews a number of L2 classroom-basedresearch projects, undertaken at the University ofStirling, Scotland, in which the author was involvedbetween 1976 and 1986. The main group of projectsprovide accounts of foreign language teachers'instructional practices during this period, docu-menting shifts towards a more 'communicative'approach to foreign language teaching, but alsorecording teachers' continuing commitment tostructural practice and the continuing use of Englishas a significant medium for the management of FLclassrooms. A variety of research approaches wereused in the course of these studies, most notably

systematic observation,' functional' analyses of class-room language, and action research; some evalu-ative comments are made regarding the poten-tial and limitations of these different approaches.A later section of the article records the basicprinciples used in Sterling-based evaluations of L2instructional programmes, drawing examplesmainly from an evaluation study of bilingual(Gaelic-English) primary education. In conclusion,it is argued that a full understanding of classroom-based L2 learning requires the integration ofsociolinguistic studies of the classroom context withpsycholinguistic studies of SLA processes.

223




90-432 Slimani, Assia (Inst. National d'Electricite et d'Electronique, Boumerdes,Algeria). The role of topicalisation in classroom language learning. System (Oxford),17, 2 (1989), 223-34.

The post-seventies era has seen a growing interest inthe study of classroom learning processes which arebelieved to influence second language development.What seems to be conspicuously missing, however,are relevant research techniques capable of examin-ing the on-going interactive processes which charac-terise classroom language learning.

This paper reports some of the results obtainedthrough the implementation of an innovative

technique designed to investigate the relationshipbetween classroom interaction and learning out-comes. The paper illustrates that the detailed studyof classroom interaction can explain ' uptake' -what learners claim to have learned at the end ofthe lesson. Topicalisation by the learners (i.e. whoinitiates the topics of interaction) is shown to beinfluential in accounting for learners' claims aboutuptake in one instructional setting.

Error analysis90-433 Laufer, Batia (U. of Haifa, Israel). A factor of difficulty in vocabularylearning: deceptive transparency. A/LA Review (Madrid, Spain), 6 (1989), 10-20.

A deceptively transparent word is one which seemsto provide clues to its meaning but does not; inother words, learners think they know them butthey do not. A corpus of errors collected overseveral years from students following courses inreading comprehension was categorised into fivedifferent categories: (1) words with a deceptivelymophological structure (outline, nevertheless, dis-course): (2) idioms (hit and miss, sit on the fence, missthe boat); (3) false friends (if the L2 form resemblesan LI form, the learner assumes the meaning mustbe the same); (4) words with multiple meanings(since, state); (5) 'synforms' (similar lexical forms,e.g. cute/acute, reduce/deduce/induce).

An experiment was carried out to verify whetherdeceptive transparency (DT) is a factor causingdifficulty in language learning: (a) is the frequency

of errors reduced by DT words different from thefrequency of errors induced by non-DT words? (b)Is the learners' awareness of their ignorance of DTwords different from their awareness of theirignorance of non-DT words ? Subjects were 100 first-year university students of EAP. Results showedthat errors were more frequent with DT words;students were less aware of their ignorance with DTwords than with non-DT words; there was asignificant correlation between reading compre-hension and learners' awareness of unknown DTwords. The presence of such words in tests ofvocabulary size might interfere with the results.Errors induced by DT words could provideinformation about the characteristics of the L2mental lexicon.

Testing90-434 Arnaud, Pierre J. L. (U. Lumiere-Lyon 2). Vocabulary and grammar: amultitrait-multimethod investigation. A/LA Review (Madrid, Spain), 6 (1989),56-65.

This article provides a brief historical overview ofvarious approaches to testing (e.g. the developmentof ' communicative' techniques, etc.), maintainingthat language tests serve as research instrumentswhen proficiency is included among the experi-mental variables, as well as having practical func-tions. The author also describes previous multitrait-multimethod studies (e.g. Bachman & Palmer,1981) which have tried to find correlations betweensuch traits as oral production and written com-prehension ; the present study attempted to validatelinks between grammar and vocabulary tests.

224

Competence and proficiency are respectivelydefined as the integration of language componentsby the individual (e.g. the mental lexicon), and thedegree to which an L2 speaker's performanceapproximates that of a native speaker in qualitativeas well as quantitative terms. The author thenjustifies his linkage of vocabulary and grammar asaspects of pragmatic competence: some non-nativespeakers are able to achieve meaningful communi-cation on the basis of their knowledge of vocabularyalone.

The two traits were assessed via three testing



Testingmethods, i.e. multiple-choice grammar items,French to English translation and error recognition,but the results [tabular data] indicated that the

separate existence of vocabulary and grammar ascomponents of L2 proficiency cannot yet be proven.

90-435 Blanche, Patrick (Cambridge English Sch., Tokyo. Japan) and Merino,Barbara J. (U. of California, Davis). Self-assessment of foreign-language skills:implications for teachers and researchers. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich),39, 3 (1989), 313-40.

Self-assessment accuracy is a condition of learnerautonomy. If students can appraise their own per-formance accurately enough, they will not haveto depend entirely on the opinions of teachers and,at the same time, they will be able to make teachersaware of their individual learning needs. Thepurpose of this article is (1) to summarise theliterature on self-evaluation of foreign language

skills and (2) to show what it could mean to teachersand researchers. The conclusions of several self-assessment studies are somewhat contradictory, butthese differences seem to support Krashen's MonitorModel/Theory. Therefore, both teachers and re-searchers should keep in mind that foreign languagelearners' self-estimates may be influenced to avarying degree by the use of the Monitor.

90-436 Dandonoli, Patricia (ACTFL) and Henning, Grant (Educational TestingService). An investigation of the construct validity of the ACTFL ProficiencyGuidelines and oral interview procedure. Foreign Language Annals (New York),23, 1 (1990), 11-22.

This article reports on the results of researchconducted by ACTFL on the construct validity ofthe ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines and oral in-terview procedure. A multitrait-multimethod vali-dation study formed the basis of the research designand analysis, which included tests of speaking,writing, listening and reading in French and Englishas a Second Language. Results from Rasch analysesare also reported. In general, the results provide

as astrong support for the use of the Guidelinesfoundation for the development of proficiency testsand for the reliability and validity of the OralProficiency Interview. The paper includes a detaileddescription of the research methodology, instrumen-tation, data analyses, and results. A discussion of theresults and suggestions for further research are alsoincluded.

90-437 Jonz, John (East Texas State U.). Another turn in the conversation: whatdoes cloze measure? TESOL Quarterly (Washington, DC). 24, 1 (1990), 61-83.

This study addresses a controversy in cloze testing.At issue is whether the cloze procedure measurescomprehension that ranges beyond the contextimmediately surrounding a cloze deletion. Eightcloze passages published over the past 15 years wereanalysed, using a system that (a) estimates thequantity of text required to cue closure of any oneblank and (b) considers the linguistic category of thedeleted word. The research reported here demon-strates that across the cloze tests considered, thestandard fixed-ratio cloze procedure has a high level

of sensitivity to intersentential ties and lexicalselections, and that the kinds of language knowledgerequired to complete cloze tests is virtually the samefrom one test to the next. The implication of thesefindings is that the fixed-ratio cloze procedure is farfrom erratic in its selection of item types. This studysuggests that, for deriving tests of language com-prehension, the cloze procedure produces tests thatare generally consistent in the ways they measurethe language knowledge of examinees.

225




90-438 Matthews, Margaret. The measurement of productive skills: doubtsconcerning the assessment criteria of certain public examinations. ELT Journal(Oxford). 44, 2 (1990). 117-21.

The currently fashionable test-type for productiveskills assessment criteria expressed in terms ofbehavioural traits, and recently the trend has beentowards the separate assessment of component sub-skills. This article points out that, from an assessor'spoint of view, there are serious problems relating tothis particular trend and to criterion referencing ingeneral. This problems are discussed and an alterna-tive design is proposed. The article was prompted

by experiences as an assessor for four internationalEFL examinations: the Royal Society of ArtsExamination in the Communicative Use of English

a Foreign Languate (CUEFL); the CambridgeasFirst Certificate in English (FCE); the Certificate ofProficiency in English (CPE); the English LanguageTesting Service (ELTS); and the International Gen-eral Certificate of Secondary Education (IGCSE).

90-439 Pennington, Martha C. (U. of Hawaii at Manoa) and Young, Aileen L.(Hawaiian Missionary Academy). Approaches to faculty evaluation for ESL TESOLQuarterly (Washington, DC), 23, 4 (1989), 619-46.

On the basis of research on teacher evaluation in thelarger educational context, this paper assesses theapplicability to ESL of seven common facultyevaluation methods: teacher interviews, com-petency tests, student evaluations, student achieve-ment, classroom observation, peer review, andfaculty self-evaluation. Each method is assessed interms of its strengths and limitations with regard to

faculty evaluation in general and for TESOL inparticular. A developmental orientation to facultyevaluation is outlined in which various aspects ofteaching are evaluated at different stages of theteacher's career and in which a combination ofmethods is used. The paper concludes with a seriesof recommendations for the implementation offaculty evaluation in an ESL context.

90-440 Sciarone, A. G. and Schoorl, J. J. (Delft U. of Technology). The clozetest: or why small isn't always beautiful. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich),39, 3 (1989), 415-38.

This article presents the findings of an experimentaimed at determining the number of blanks mini-mally required to ensure parallelism for cloze testsdiffering only in the point at which deletion starts.Two 200-item cloze tests were constructed, bothbased on the same Dutch text and differing only inthat, in their second halves, deletion in one versionlagged one word behind those in the other. The twoversions were administered to two groups of 38 and36 Indonesian learners of Dutch. Analysis of theirscores on various subsets of 100, 75, and 50 itemsrevealed that the required minimum depends uponthe scoring method used. With the exact-word

method, tests should contain a minimum of about100 blanks; with the acceptable-word method, aminimum of about 75 blanks will suffice. With testscontaining only 50 blanks — the number generallyheld to be sufficient — parallelism was found to be amatter of pure chance.

In an additional experiment, the tests involvedwere shown to satisfy a major requirement for thevalidity of any L2 proficiency tests: administrationto two groups of 20 and 19 native speakers ofDutch resulted in high scores, with mean acceptableresponses of 190 or more for a total of 200 items.

90-441 Wherritt, Irene and Cleary, T. Anne (U. of Iowa). A national survey ofSpanish language testing for placement or outcome assessment at B.A.-grantinginstitutions in the United States. Foreign Language Annals, 23, 2 (1990). 157-65.

This research project has two principal goals for itstest development: the first is to improve articulationof foreign language study between feeder highschools and the University of Iowa; the second is tocreate instruments to assess language competencyoutcomes necessary to meet the language require-

226

ment, completion of the major, and teachercertification. It was necessary to know what hadbeen done in foreign language assessment in theUnited States in order not to duplicate other efforts.Information on procedures for placement or out-come assessment was difficult to find, and literature



Course/syllabus/materials designreviews and professional contacts did not locate teststhat were both appropriate and affordable. A surveywas undertaken on departments of Spanish languageB.A.-granting institutions in the United States.Spanish language was chosen because most B.A.-granting institutions offer Spanish. Furthermore,Spanish language presents the biggest challenge in

placement and assessment since large numbers ofstudents study Spanish at both the secondary andcollege level. The results of the survey includeinformation on special first-year courses, purposesfor test use, tests used for freshmen placement, skillsassessed, incentives and penalties for incomingfreshmen, instructional activities, and class size.

Curriculum planning

90-442 Holliday, Adrian (Ain Shams U.. Cairo). A role for soft systemsmethodology in ELT projects. System (Oxford), 18, 1. (1990), 77-84.

There are clear uses for soft systems methodology(SSM) in ELT projects. This piece of ' technologytransfer' from the field of management may help usto see better, and therefore learn to manage, some ofthe interpersonal problems of ELT projects, againstwhich applied linguistics has proved less thanadequate. However, there is a danger that SSMcould become another example of model buildingtaking attention away from the real world. Also,

SSM can only enable an investigator to see bettergiven an initial understanding of where problemslie. This type of understanding has been particularlydifficult to achieve in many ELT projects, involvedas they are with foreign cultures. Ethnographictechniques may help in achieving the understandingwith which to begin; and SSM may provide auseful means for structuring ethnographic findings.

90-443 Nunan, David (Macquarie U.. Sydney. NSW, Australia). Using learnerdata in curriculum development. English for Specific Purposes (New York), 9,(1990), 17-32.

This paper describes an approach to curriculumdevelopment which has evolved out of a learner-centered philosophy of second and foreign languageteaching. Learner-centered curricula contain similarelements and processes as those contained intraditional curricula; however, information aboutand from learners is incorporated into all stages inthe curriculum development process. The paper

takes readers through the various stages in thecurriculum process, from initial needs analysis andgrouping of learners through to assessment andevaluation. The use of information about and fromlearners for decision-making at each of these stagesis illustrated with data from the Australian Adult(Im)migrant Education Programme.

Course/syllabus/materials design90-444 Adamson, H. D. Prototype schemas, variation theory, and the structuralsyllabus. IRAL (Heidelberg, FRG), 28, 1 (1990), 1-25.

The evolution of prototype theory and its impli-cations for language teaching are surveyed in thisarticle. A prototype is the most typical member ofa category, and from this evolves the concept of the' prototype schema', in which the elements of a classbear a family resemblance to each other, rather thanhaving essential semantic features. This theory canbe extended from semantic categories to linguisticrules. Prototype syntactic and morphological struc-tures can be studied by means of analytical methodsused by Labov in describing language variation. Asfar as language acquisition is concerned, research is

exemplified to show that linguistic knowledge, likesemantic knowledge, may be stored in prototypeform, and that prototype schemas may be theprecursors of categorical rules.

Recent research would seem to indicate that,while some structures [e.g. the copula] can belearned at any stage, others [e.g. word order inGerman] will only be learned by steps in a certainorder. This has implications for functional/notionalsyllabuses, which have hitherto tended to disregardgrading of structures, and, in particular, for a re-emergent interest in the structural syllabus.

227




90-445 John, David G. Language isn't enough: language students and careers.Canadian Modern Language Review (Toronto), 46, 3 (1990), 514-26.

When choosing fields of study, students are con-cerned about future careers. Research shows that thechoice of subject and programme is related toperceptions of career possibilities and employability.Students who find employment easily upon gradu-ation, especially jobs linked to their field of study,are happiest about their educational path. Human-ities students, among them students of languageand literature, fare badly in terms of employability

in the early years after graduation, but well in thelong term. Language studies must be linked tocareers without sacrificing the educational core ofthe discipline. Results of a survey of languagemajors enrolled in the Applied Studies Co-opprogramme at the University of Waterloo showone means to link successfully language study andcareers.

90-446 Jones, Gary M. (U. Brunei Darussalem). ESP textbooks: do they reallyexist? English for Specific Purposes (New York), 9 (1990), 89-93.

The idea of an all-embracing textbook for an ESPcourse is a contradiction in terms, yet the majorityof ESP texts are distributed globally. The demandfor them comes largely from inexperienced teachersnew to ESP. Most ESP materials are an attempt toinsert a specific subject content into an EFLframework, thus perpetuating a link betweengeneral EFL and ESP which should probably notexist. In many cases, ESP teachers are expected tomeet an immediate demand with existing resources,hence it is hardly surprising if they resort topublished material which comes fairly close tomatching their learners' needs. The publishers aimprimarily to sell books, even if they may not be ofmuch use to the buyer. What the ESP teacher really

needs is a bank of materials containing not only avariety of text types, but material which focusesattention on a topic and relates language practice tothe topic. It would be helpful if the material in thebank could be cross referenced so that the teachercan see immediately all the uses to which it might beput. Local overseas guides might be producedsuggesting how to substitute locally-relevant ma-terial where necessary. The resulting package wouldmore closely resemble a file than a book; the usercould select what was appropriate from an indexand add materials of his/her own creating. The endmix should prove highly marketable and useful toall ESP practitioners.

90-447 King, Charlotte P. (Cumberland Coll., Kentucky). A linguistic and acultural competence: can they live happily together? Foreign Language Annals(New York), 23, 1 (1990), 65-70.

This article describes a process by which authenticdocuments may be integrated into first- and second-year college and high-school classes to form acultural component in the earliest stages of foreignlanguage study. It discusses how linguistic and

cultural information may be extracted from thesedocuments in the form of 'actes de parole' toconform to the grammatical level of the students,and outlines ways by which cultural and linguisticinformation so taught may be tested.

90-448 Legenhausen, Lienhard and Wolff, Dieter (U of Dusseldorf, FRG)CALL in use-use of CALL: evaluating CALL software. System (Oxford), 18, 1(1990), 1-13.

This paper is concerned with the evaluation ofcommercially available CALL software. In a re-search project the authors tested language teaching/learning programs in everyday classroom situations.The results of two of their experiments are describedand assessed here. In the first part of the paper theydiscuss their evaluative principles and the selectionof the programs evaluated. In the second part they

show how they applied techniques borrowed fromcognitive psychology in the evaluation of textmanipulation programs of the STORYBOARDtype. The results of this experiment are discussedand conclusions are drawn as to the languagelearning potential of this program. The last part ofthe paper deals with the computer simulationGRANVILLE. The authors used discourse analytical

228



Teacher trainingmeans to analyse the communicative interactions infront of the screen when students work with thisprogram. Results indicate that GRANVILLE cannot

work properly as alanguage classroom.

simulation in the foreign

90-449 Lynch, Brian K. (U. of California, LA). A context-adaptive model forprogram evaluation. TESOL Quarterly (Washington, DC), 24, 1 (1990), 23-42.

The literature on the evaluation of language teachingprogrammes has focused almost entirely on specificissues of methodology and measurement. This articlepresents a generalised model for ESL programmeevaluation. The context-adaptive model consists ofa series of seven steps designed to guide theprogramme evaluator through consideration of theissues, information, and design elements necessary

for a thorough evaluation. These steps are illustratedwith examples from the evaluation of the ReadingEnglish for Science and Technology (REST) Projectat the University of Guadalajara, Mexico. Themodel is intended to be flexible, lending itself toeffective adaptation and refinement as it is im-plemented in a variety of ESL/EFL contexts.

90-450 Sharp, Alastair (U. of Brunei Darussalam). Staff/student participation incourse evaluation: a procedure for improving course design. ELT Journal (Oxford),44, 2 (1990), 132-7.

The limitations of testing, which is aimed atmonitoring cognitive rather than affective matters,are noted; for example, the objectives/success of acourse cannot easily be measured by testing mech-anisms; mere percentages give little real idea ofwhether or not a student's needs as a language userhave been met. Course evaluation must be moreformative, and use a broader range of strategies(including, of course, testing itself) to check whethercourse objectives are reasonable or attainable.'Illuminative' evaluation should provide such apanoramic view, being less concerned with measure-ment/prediction and more with description andinterpretation. It might also require input frompsychologists and sociologists as well as languageexperts.

A four month pre-sessional course for prospectiveundergraduates in Brunei is described, wherein theMunby (1980) needs analysis model was used. Thesubsequent post-course evaluation utilised such tech-niques as written reports from ELT staff, studentquestionnaires, end-of-course tests and feedbackfrom non-ELT university lecturers (i.e. the subject-specialist instructors who later taught the courseparticipants). Such data helped to identify problemswith the course, though it was felt, for example,that collecting candidate student opinion wasproblematic, not least because of the culturally-determined reluctance to express forthright criticismof 'superiors'.

Teacher training90-451 Berry, Roger (Inst. Filologii Angielskiej, Poznan, Poland). The role oflanguage improvement in in-service teacher training: killing two birds with one stone.System (Oxford), 18, 1 (1990), 97-105.

Language improvement components on trainingprogrammes for language teachers are often takenfor granted, but this should not be so. Drawing ona questionnaire (which investigated teachers' needsfrom teacher training and influences in theirteaching), the author suggests that language im-provement can have a dual function: firstly, andobviously, by raising teachers' proficiency level

(with everything else that this entails); secondly,and more subtly, by providing models of teachingbehaviour and thereby effecting, where desired, achange in teaching practices. The tentative con-clusion is that language improvement, if integratedwith a methodology component, can have a centralrole in in-service teacher training.

229




90-452 Brown, Raymond W. (Ain Shams U., Cairo). The place of beliefs and ofconcept formation in a language teacher training theory. System (Oxford), 18, 1(1990). 85-96.

It is accepted that a teacher's theory of teaching andlearning processes evolves during his/her profes-sional life. It is accepted also that belief systemscontribute heavily to a teacher's behaviour at thelevels of 'approach', 'method' and 'technique'.This paper argues that the same is true for theteacher trainer and that a danger for teacher traininglies in the trainer not evolving as coherent andarticulated a theory of teacher training as is possible;and that, while beliefs have their place, there is adanger of the trainer relying too heavily on themfor too much of his career. It is hypothesised here

that concept formation has a key role to play inteacher trainer development and action, and it issuggested that this direction has not been adequatelydescribed or followed up. An attempt is made toshow how concept formation could help in develop-ing the teacher trainer beyond a reliance on beliefs.The paper ends by hoping that controlled researchwill be further carried out into (a) the role ofconcepts in the development and practice of teachertraining, and (b) the possibilities for describing andteaching the relevant concepts.

90-453 Cumming, Alister. Student teachers' conceptions of curriculum: towardan understanding of language-teacher development. TESL Canada Journal(Montreal). 7, 1 (1989), 33-51.

Programmes for the education of second languageteachers necessarily base themselves on conceptionsof what learning to be a teacher entails. Butsurprisingly little study has been devoted to under-standing the processes by which second languageteachers actually develop their knowledge, or todefining what such knowledge consists of. Thispaper approaches this issue through a contentanalysis of data on one aspect of student teachers'professional knowledge: their conceptions of cur-riculum decision making. Different representations

of this knowledge emerge, ranging from schematawhich appear inadequately developed to thosewhich seem sufficient to guide curriculum decision-making effectively. Implications are drawn for theeducation and development of second languageteachers, as well as further research in this area. It isargued that current' input-output' models of teachereducation can be augmented by 'developmentallearning' models, if further understanding of lang-uage teachers' professional knowledge is obtained.

90-454 Woodward, Tessa (Hilderstone Coll. and Pilgrims Language Courses,Kent). An analysis of current approaches to process in teacher training for EFL asevidenced by teacher training manuals. System (Oxford), 17, 3 (1989), 401-8.

This article surveys 10 current EFL teacher-trainingbooks [tabular data]. The major aim of the analysiswas to focus on the ways in which these bookshandled the learning process itself, since they wereprimarily meant for self-access situations, wherethere is no intermediary course tutor or teachertrainer. Most of the TEFL books considered seem toassume that content was all important, and thatreaders will already possess the study skills andstrategies necessary to digest, recall and use theinformation presented; i.e. process was somehow totake care of itself.

In basic terms, two types of self-access/process

clues were found: (1) pre-reading exercises and (2)'moving on' exercises that presume the reader hasgrappled with and understood (but not activelyworked with) the content. It was also perceived,though, that books which have ample processsuggestions also assume a privileged and adeptprofessional reader with wide access to colleagues,classes, other books/journals, etc.) In basic terms,there are few authors who feel that the TEFL bookalone is probably inadequate, and even fewer whosee readers as individuals with different learningstyles.

230



Teaching methods

Teaching methods90-455 Arndt, Horst and others. Uberlegungen zu Sprachprogrammen furManager in Industrie und Handel. [Aspects of language programmes for managers inindustry and business.] Die Neueren Sprachen (Frankfurt am Main, FRG), 89, 1(1990), 2-19.

Foreign-language teaching geared to upper-levelmanagement in trade and industry seems to be arelatively neglected aspect of specialised, career-oriented foreign language teaching as a whole.The specific kind of communication and foreign-language skills required by managers are analysed

with the institutional framework of inhouse foreign-language training in mind. Specialised languagetraining is less important for managers than strategiesof interaction that will enable them to perform theirtasks in international negotiations.

90-456 Bahns, Jens. Consultant not initiator: the role of the applied SLAresearcher. ELT Journal (Oxford), 44, 2 (1990), 110-16.

This article examines some possible relationshipsbetween research in second language acquisition(SLA) and foreign language teaching. Specialreference is made to research findings in SLA aboutthe 'order of acquisition' of grammatical items, andto a model of application for such findings to

classroom practice. The model proposed that, forpractising teachers, SLA findings about the order ofacquisition of grammatical items are best seen asdata to be consulted when appropriate, rather thanas information which should by itself be used toinitiate change.

90-457 Carrell, Patricia L. (U. of Akron) and others. Metacognitive strategytraining for ESL reading. TESOL Quarterly (Washington, DC), 23, 4 (1989), 647-78.

Recent research in second language reading hasfocused on metacognition (literally, cognition ofcognition). These studies investigate metacognitiveawareness of reading strategies and the relationshipsamong perception of strategies, strategy use, andreading comprehension. Strategy research suggeststhat less competent learners may improve their skillsthrough training in strategies evidenced by moresuccessful learners. Relatively little research onmetacognitive strategy training has been done in asecond language context or, more specifically, insecond language reading.

This article reports a study of metacognitivestrategy training for reading in ESL. Strategytraining was provided to experimental groups.

Control groups received no strategy training, butparticipated in pre- and post-testing. Several researchquestions are addressed: does metacognitive strategytraining enhance L2 reading? If so, does one type ofstrategy training facilitate L2 reading better thananother ? How is the effectiveness of metacognitivestrategy training related to the learning styles of thestudents? Results show that metacognitive strategytraining is effective in enhancing second languagereading, and that the effectiveness of one type oftraining versus another may depend upon the wayreading is measured. Further, the results show thatthe effectiveness of the training is related to differ-ences in the learning styles of the students.

90-458 de Kock, Josse. De la ensenanza de las lenguas extranjeras. [On teachingforeign languages.] Revista de la AEPE (Madrid), 36/7 (1989), 9-18.

Mastery of a foreign language calls for linguisticawareness which in turn demands study of grammar,but of grammar in a living context, not the rigidapplication of stereotyped rules. Students at uni-versity level should study non-literary texts andtexts by modern authors which have been chosenfor their linguistic potential in exploiting thepossibilities and resources of the language, and not

for their supposed literary merits; students shouldbe led to analyse and reflect upon the inner logic andunderlying coherence of their target language.

An invaluable aid to learning, an index of therelative frequency of grammatical forms, can beestablished by the students themselves, making useof the computer.

231




90-459 Dollerup, Cay and others. Vocabularies in the reading process. A/LAReview (Madrid, Spain), 6 (1989), 21-33.

Using a study of Danish freshman undergraduates'vocabularies as a springboard, the paper exploresand discusses a number of current assumptionsabout vocabularies in the mother tongue and inforeign language teaching. The conclusion is that asfar as reading is concerned, a reader's vocabulary ispart of the process of reading: it is a function of thetexts and its contents, of the reader's reading

strategies, and of the reader's more or less stable'word knowledge'. In the reading of a specific textthere is a constant interplay between these factorswhich suggest that a vocabulary in reading is 'fluid'.Pedagogically, this theory implies that there shouldbe a deliberate teaching of reading strategies inaddition to other methods.

90—460 Haastrup, Kirsten (Copenhagen Business School). The learner as wordprocessor. A/LA Review (Madrid, Spain), 6 (1989), 34-46.

Teachers should be concerned about raising students'awareness level of communication and learning.Students need to know more about perceivedsimilarity and transfer possibilities as well as abouttop-ruled and bottom-ruled processing as poten-tially effective or ineffective inferencing procedures.Getting to understand the dynamic and interactivenature of language processing is a difficult task.

Moreover, as for vocabulary learning based onwritten input, it seems likely that in order to be agood processor of text and of words the studentmust also be a good reader in both the LI and L2.An additional requirement is knowledge of theworld, both general and L2-specific. If a student isto be a competent word processor, s/he must also bea good text processor and world processor.

90-461 Hafiz, F. M. and Tudor, I. (Free U. of Brussels, Belgium). Graded readersas an input mediunn in L2 learning. System (Oxford), 18, 1 (1990), 31-42.

The article describes an experiment into the effect ofa 90-hour extensive reading programme usinggraded readers on the language development of agroup (N = 25) of learners of English as an L2 inPakistan. Results show significant gains in bothfluency and accuracy of expression, though not inrange of structures used. It is suggested that extensive

reading can provide learners with a set of linguisticmodels which may then, by a process of over-learning, be assimilated and incorporated intolearners' active L2 repertoire. The results arediscussed with reference to a related study by thesame authors in an ESL context in the UK.

90-462 Horowitz, Daniel (International Christian U., Tokyo, Japan).The undergraduate research paper: where research and writing meet. System (Oxford),17, 3 (1989), 347-57.

Research and writing are both recursive processes.Researchers begin by asking questions, then searchfor answers, sometimes find them, and in thefinding (or not finding) discover new questions tobe answered. Writers move in a similar cyclicalpattern, from planning what they will write, tocomposing, to evaluating what they have writtenand then back again to making new plans forrevising their work. Common procedure for theteaching of undergraduate research paper writing

separates these processes into two distinct stages,research followed by writing, but this paper arguesthat there is much to be gained by encouraging theirinteraction from the very beginning. The process ofresearch writing is followed from the choosing oftopics to evaluation of the final product, andactivities are suggested which encourage students tosee research writing as the ongoing search for betterquestions, better answers, and better ways to com-municate those answers.

232



Teaching methods

90-463 Jungblut, Gertrud. 'How to call a spade a spade'. Begrundungen furmonolinguale Wortbedeutungsvermittlung im Fremdsprachenunterricht. [In defenceof monolingual aids to understanding vocabulary in foreign language learning.]Die Neueren Sprachen (Frankfurt am Main, FRG). 89, 1 (1990), 55-68.

Although the monolingual approach has beenpractised with success for years now, it is repeatedlyquestioned by critics who point to a lack of theoryto support it. In this article an attempt is made toshow that there are scientific theories which can becited to justify this teaching concept. Both generalsemiotics and the findings of neurophysiologicalresearch indicate that learning a language takes theform of a 'semiotic cycle', in which the learners are

(supposed to be) rendered capable of activatingconcepts in response to the stimuli from the thingsand events of the real world (their environment),concepts that are linked to the meaning of a wordfrom the sounds of the word in a foreign language.Thus, in the majority of cases learning a foreignlanguage entails a process of acculturation whichtakes place within the immediate context of sensoryperception.

90-464 Lund, Randal J. (Brigham Young U., Provo, Utah). A taxonomy forteaching second language listening. Foreign Language Annals, 23, 2 (1990),105-15.

This article describes a taxonomy of real-worldlistening tasks as a conceptual framework forteaching listening. The key elements of the tax-onomy are listener function and listener response. Inlistening, function is defined as ' the aspects of themessage the listener attempts to process'. The sixfunctions significant for second language teachingare identification, orientation, main idea compre-hension, detail comprehension, full comprehension,and replication. Listener response is also a keyfeature of any listening task. Nine categories aredescribed. Function and response can be selected

independently of each other, as suggested by thefunction-response matrix, allowing for wide vari-ation in task difficulty for any given text.

The implications of the taxonomy for the designof listening instruction and the selection of authentictexts are discussed. The taxonomy suggests thatgrowth in listening proficiency is a process ofexpanding to new function and response categoriesin familiar contexts. The many options in thetaxonomy enable one to structure effective listeningtasks involving authentic texts even at novice levels.

90-465 Motteram, Gary J. (U. of Manchester). Using a standard authoringpackage to teach effective reading skills. System (Oxford), 18, 1 (1990), 15-21.

This article discusses the way in which one particularpiece of computer software can be used to teach theskill of reading. The software has not been designedspecifically for this end, but can be used to teach anysubject area. The software is of the authoring typewhich means that any teacher willing to spend a few

hours becoming proficient in its use can makeeffective, interesting and useful teaching material.These materials have proved motivating and validat a variety of levels and with different types ofstudents.

90-466 Murtagh, Lelia (Linguistics Inst. of Ireland, Dublin). Reading in a secondor foreign language: models, processes, and pedagogy. Language, Culture andCurriculum (Clevedon, Avon), 2, 2 (1989), 91-105.

Current research on reading in a second or foreignlanguage is reviewed. Good L2 reading is charac-terised by fast, automatic word recognition whichreleases more time for the use of syntactic and contex-tual information. Successful readers also make gooduse of background information. Many strategiesfor L2 reading are generalised from LI reading,but the degree of successful transfer

Documents

Language learning and teaching – theory and practice · Language learning and teaching-theory and practice Theory and principles 90-401 Berns, Margie. Why language teaching needs