As can be seen in chapter 3, no single teaching method is
completely useful or effective. This is
why I think a combination of many methods makes for the most effective
teaching. A foreign language is much
like any other subject in that you will have a wide variety of students in your
class. Some may be visual learners,
others auditory, and still others kinesthetic.
That being said, you will have to vary your teaching methods and
approaches no matter what. Automatically
I would say that the audiolingual method would not work for visual learners who
need to see the written form of what they are learning. It would also seem that the
grammar-translation method would not benefit auditory learners. A happy medium between the two would be the
best option. Even better than that
however would be to incorporate elements from many of the other theories as
well so that you as a teacher could discover the most effective teaching method
for a particular class. This may take a
bit of time, but through a trial and error process you will eventually be
providing students with the best way to learn a language for their individual
needs.
As for specific types of language instruction that will
augment language learning, I would recommend strategies that encourage some
grammar and vocabulary instruction, some creative thinking, and some listening
and speaking practice. Generally, I
would advocate for the more traditional methods. I only say this because many of them offer a
variety of entry points to a foreign language.
I do not think that at all levels of learning another language that the
target language should be spoken 100% of the time. I think that this would be excellent for
students in upper levels once they have some background knowledge OR if
students are fully committed to learning the target language. In many high schools some students are
enthusiastic about foreign language while others do not really want to learn
it. Speaking in the target language 100%
of the time could possibly frustrate reluctant learners and alienate them
completely from future studies. Using
the target language 100% of the time in upper levels however should be
expected. As for explicit teaching of
grammar rules and vocabulary, I think that this definitely has to be mixed into
language instruction. Some students are
not able to simply “pick up” a language.
They need to have the building blocks to even consider actually learning
the language. Many students are concrete
thinkers and it will be necessary for them to understand grammar rules in order
to conjugate verbs or even pick the appropriate article to go with an
adjective. I do not think that teachers can
assume that students do not need explicit instruction. Furthermore, as stated in chapter 3, there
has been no evidence that explicit teaching of rules, grammar, etc. has
negatively impacted language acquisition.
That being said, I do think that students need to practice speaking and
listening to the target language after they learn the grammar. They will never be able to apply it after
they learn it on paper if they do not practice in real life situations. Overall, I think that effective language
instruction pulls from all methods to take into account the different learning
styles of students. One method followed
in its entirety cannot possible reach all students and many methods must be
attempted.
I agree that there would need to be a lot of trial and error processes that happen in order to find the "perfect" way of teaching for individual classes. Each class is different and has a different set of students so I believe that each class needs to have its own method of teaching. I definitely believe that there are different approaches based on the language level of the class, for example, a 600 level would never use the same method as a 400 level. I feel like in a 600, I would totally encourage the use of the target language 100% of the time whereas a 400 level will probably need more explanations in the L1.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with the need for a variety of different teaching methods to be used in the classroom, but you presented an idea that I failed to include in my own entry. You brought up a great point about the way that students learn. I always think about this topic in the Education classes, because for myself it is very important. I am a very visual learner, which makes auditory learning extremely difficult for me. In my Spanish classes throughout the years I also struggled with and dreaded "listening" parts of exams because I knew I would have trouble with them. Being a Spanish major, I have improved on this skill, but throughout the years I have often felt that if I had the information in front of me on a piece of paper, I would be able to understand it all, but having the listen to it would get me nowhere. That being said, I believe that it is important to mix the methods that are used in the classroom, because students learn in different ways and it is unfair to teach your students only the way that you learn best.
ReplyDeleteI like that you mentioned how some students can not simply "pick up" a language but instead need to have and see the grammar rules, the vocab lists, the basic building blocks. While some students will get absolutely nothing from lists of stem-changing verbs or step-by-step instructions on when to use the subjunctive, some students need those things to reach a successful understanding of the topic. Like you said, teachers need to be aware of the different learning styles of their students and they need to create a nice mixture of different teaching methods. I think a common problem is that teachers sometimes take the method that worked best for them when they were learning the language and they over-use that one method. Teachers need to take all the different learning styles into account.
ReplyDelete