Communicative activities?

Which elements make this activity communicative? Is it?

English lessons to analyse

This is a video of an English lesson

Teaching grammar

This is part of a paper I wrote for the subject "Teorías de adquisición de L1 y

L2" in charged of Teacher Trainer Andrea Monserrat, at IES Olga Cossettini.

The aims of this paper are 1) to expose some conclusions from L2 research on the role of formal instruction on L2 acquisition; 2) to relate these conclusions to the concept words used to label stages in a formal lesson plan to teach grammar in the EFL classroom.

Some conclusions on the role of formal instruction on L2 acquisition

There is extensive literature reporting empirical studies on the place of formal instruction in L2 acquisition. Each survey has shed light on different aspects of the issue contributing to support some proposals for L2 methodology.

From the reviewed research Ellis (1994) concludes that formal instruction facilitates the process of natural language development and “should seek to draw learner´s attention to specific linguistic properties” (1994:660). He advocates the need of “consciousness-raising”, which he (Ellis 1993:109) defines as:

A deliberate attempt on the part of the teacher to make the learners’ aware of

specific features of the L2; it entails an attempt to instill an understanding of

the formal and functional properties of these features by helping the learners

develop a cognitive representation of them.

The concept of “consciousness” in L2 acquisition has underlied the issue of the relationship between explicit and implicit knowledge and how they are internalized.

Schmidt and Frota (1986 cited in Ellis 1993) state that:

Explicit knowledge functions as a facilitator helping learners to notice features in the input which they would otherwise miss and also to compare what they notice with that they produce, being one of the factors contributing to “intake enhancement” (information stored in temporary memory which may or may not be accommodated in the interlanguage).

From the previous statement it is necessary to clarify “noticing”, which Schmidt (1990 quoted in Ellis 1993) defines as “availability for verbal report, requiring focal awareness”.

Ellis (1993) stresses the theoretical importance of the term because for “noticed input” to become “intake” learners have to carry out a comparison of what they have observed in the input, and what they themselves are typically producing on the basis of their current interlanguage system. Schmidt and Frota (1986 in Ellis 1993) call this

“noticing- the- gap”, which is also a conscious process.

Thus “consciousness-raising” has set a new rationale for the teaching of grammar, which is now “aimed at developing explicit knowledge to raise learners’ consciousness about how the target language grammar works”.(Ellis 1993:108)

Larsen-Freeman (1991 in Ellis 1993:108) has pointed out that this approach will involve:

a)drawing attention to how grammatical forms are formed, b) developing an

understanding of how particular grammatical forms signal particular

grammatical meanings, and c) helping learners realize what constitutes

appropriate use of the forms in context.

When considering methodological options available to teachers, Ellis (1994) states that research lends support to the following compatible hypotheses:

a) Language teaching may take a “focus-on form approach”, which involves alternating in some principled way between a focus-on-meaning and a focus-on-form. (Long 1991 cited in Ellis 1994:639). Ellis explains that it occurs when teachers follow a task-based syllabus to focus learners’ attention on specific linguistic properties in the course of carrying out communicative activities. Teachers may device problem-solving tasks that supply the learners with the data they need to discover the rule for themselves (Ellis1993:109).

In this approach both meaning negotiation and corrective feedback may facilitate acquisition. (See Lightbown and Spada (1990) study cited in Ellis 1994:640)

b) Language teaching can adopt a structural syllabus, with a focus-on-forms, where grammar teaching is “directed at consciousness-raising” rather than practice”. (Ellis 1993:108)

c) Instruction should enable learners to establish form-meaning connections during comprehension. (see Van Patten and Cadierno (1993) study of how formal instruction affects learners ability to comprehend grammatical items, in Ellis 1994:646)

Ellis defines “comprehension” as “the learner´s ability to identify the meaning which can be realized by a particular grammatical structure” (1994:645) and states this concept “informs the idea of “interpretation tasks”. This approach implies that “input for comprehension is carefully planned and structured to ensure that the learner is systematically exposed to specific grammatical features to facilitate intake”.(Ellis 1993:104)

Concepts labels in formal lesson plans to teach grammar. Their link to L2 research

Scrivener (2005) illustrates how students learn a new item of language through a simple sequence of stages: ignorance, exposure, noticing, understanding, practice, active use. It is the teacher´s job to decide what to plan and what order to put the stages in. He suggests a lesson procedure based on three bricks. (see Figure 1)

Figure 1, “Building bricks” lesson procedure, (Scrivener 2005:115)

Scrivener (2005:113) defines restricted exposure as “exposure to texts specifically designed to be accessible to learners and probably to draw attention to specific language points”. It can be noted that this concept is built on:

Krashen´s (1985) comprehensible input : “real messages communicated to us that are comprehensible but just a little above our current level”; Chomsky´s Principles and Parameters theory of L2 acquisition, which stresses that “the chief role of teaching is to provide language evidence that can trigger the setting of parameters in the learners´minds” (Cook: 43); Ellis´s consciousness-raising for comprehension.

In Formal lesson Planning “restricted exposure” is realized in the Lead-in and Presentation Stages.

The Clarification stage, also called Focussing, is “a point in the lesson where the teacher wants the learner really to focus in on a piece of grammar, see it, think about it and understand it, to become much clearer on its form, meaning and use”. (Scrivener 2005:265)

Underlying Scrivener´s simple definition are Schmidt and Frota´s concepts previously discussed:

“…see it…” NOTICING

“…understand it to become much clearer on form, meaning and use…”

NOTICING-THE-GAP to enhance INTAKE

Scrivener differentiates three general categories within the heading of “clarification”:

Explanation; Guided Discovery; Self-directed Discovery (learners’ studying on their own)

Ellis`s consciousness-raising directed at explicit representation of a grammar rule admits Explanation as a suitable grammar clarification activity.

In this approach, explicit representation of the rule (explicit knowledge) can be used to monitor the accuracy of communicative output (Krashen 1977 in Ellis 1994:644); to notice new grammar features in natural input and to facilitate “noticing-the-gap” to enhance intake. (Fotos 1993, study cited in Ellis 1994:644)

Beneath Guided Discovery is the second notion of “consciousness-raising for interpretation”. The teacher´s job is to “manipulate” intake by devising activities that help learners to process input. (Ellis 1994:645) The idea of input-processing develops from Mc Laughlin´s (1983) information processing model to L2 acquisition, which assumes that :1-humans are limited-capacity information processors;

2-humans develop ways of organizing information;

3-learning a L2 involves controlled processing (temporary activation of memory nodes in a sequence), with focal attention to task demands. Controlled knowledge can convert into automatic knowledge over time through practice.

4- learning a L2 is a complex skill that involves the gradual integration of lower-level skills and their accumulation as automatic processes en long-term memory. Automatic processing involves the activation of certain nodes in memory every time the appropriate inputs are present. (McLaughlin1983:139)

5- training should involve the frequent use of a particular sentence structure in varied lexical settings, not in frequent use of particular sentences. (Mc Laughlin 1983:154)

Mc Laughlin differs from Ellis when he concludes that:

The best pedagogical results are likely to come from keeping the input clear (i.e. not too much in advance of learner´s capacities), developing an “implicit learning strategy”. That is the learner might do best to ignore explicit considerations of form, and focus instead on communication. (1983:153)

This theory advocates the communicative language classroom, but Ellis remarks that it does not provide a clear definition of practice.

Johnson (cited in Ellis 1993:647) states that for practice to be of real benefit, it may be necessary to ensure that it takes place “under real operating conditions” by providing opportunities for learners to produce the target structure in similar circumstances to those that prevail in normal communication.

Ellis points out that …”the difficulty of contriving communicative tasks, where the use of the target structure in production is essential, provides a further reason for exploiting comprehension-based tasks more fully in formal instruction.” (1993:647)

However the author recognizes that more research is needed before dismissing approaches based on the notion of practice,which “ may well serve as one of the ways in which learners can improve accuracy over linguistic features they have already acquired”. (Ellis 1994:647)

Scrivener defines Practice as Restricted Output and Authentic Output:

Restricted Output: the students work on oral practice of examples of language that has just been presented, and then do a written exercise to practice these items.

Authentic Output: students are given the opportunity to use these items, along with the other language they know, in communicative activities. (2005:273)

In the Restricted Output stage Scrivener suggests that practice exercises must draw on material from the text used in presentation, which should also be used for checking the answers. In this way Restricted Output integrates Ellis´s notion of Interpretation-tasks.

Scrivener also includes the summary of what has been learned (grammar rules, substitution tables, definitions) and the recording in notebooks as part of Restricted Output.

Underlying Authentic Output two different hypotheses can be identified:

- the skill-learning theories of Anderson and Mc Laughlin) which state we first learn rules consciously and then gradually automatize then through communicative practice.

- Krashen´s Output Hypotheses, which comes in two forms:

1-Krashen´s output + correction hypotheses, which states students try out rules or items in production and then use corrections from other speakers to confirm or disconfirm them. (Ellis 1994:281). In his view the only role that speaker´s output plays is to provide a further source of comprehensible input, through the negotiation of meaning.

2-Swain´s comprehensible output (1985-cited in Ellis 1994:282), which argues learners need the opportunity for meaningful practice, and when they experience communicative failure they are pushed into making their output more precise.

Ellis summarises:

Both versions of the Output Hypotheses attribute considerable importance to feedback, both direct and indirect. In the case of “output +correction” feedback is necessary to supply learners with metalinguistic information, while in the case of “comprehensible input” it is necessary to push learners to improve the accuracy of their production in order to make themselves understood. (1994:282)

In Formal lesson Planning at the generally-called Practice Stage (restricted and authentic output) the teacher can anticipate the kind of errors students may make and decide what, when and how to correct.

Ellis points out that Error Analysis studies have sought to identify criteria for establishing error gravity, so that teachers can be guided in what errors to pay more attention to. The general conclusion is that teachers should attend most carefully to errors that interfere with communication. (1994:67)

Scrivener states that the teacher should bear in mind the aim of the activity to decide whether to deal with the error.

If the objective is accuracy, then immediate correction is likely to be useful; if

the aim is fluency …we either need to correct briefly and unobstrusively as we

go [ ] or save any correction for after the activity has finished or later.

(2005:299)

Bley-Vroman states that although experimental evidence is inconclusive theoretical work shows that …”some errors made by FL learners suggest they hold hypotheses requiring negative evidence for disconfirmation.” (1990:12)

If negative evidence is not provided, items become Fossilized. Selinker (1972, reprinted in Richards 1994:36) defines Fossilization:

Fossilizable linguistic phenomena are linguistic items, rules, and subsystems which speakers of a particular NL (native language) will tend to keep in their Interlanguage, relative to a particular TL (target language), no matter what the age of the learner or amount of explanation and instruction he receives in the Target language.

Lightboown and Spada conclude:

We would argue that second language teachers can (and should) provide

guided, form-based instruction and correction in specific circumstances.

For example teachers should not hesitate to correct persistent errors which learners seem not to notice without focus attention on forms. (1993:105)

Conclusion

The general model of P.P.P., Presentation, Practice, Production generally adopted for formal lesson planning, has been replaced by the Presentation, Clarification or Focussing and Practice Stages.

As it was shown along this paper, the new model relies on current L2 acquisition theories that favour context interpretation, comprehension of grammatical meaning form and use, and delay production, in which the role of negative feedback appears to be most effective when incorporated into a communicative learner-centered curriculum.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bley-Broman, R. 1990. “The Logical Problem of Foreign Language Learning”. Linguistic Analysis.20: 3-49

Cook, V. 1989 ? “Universal Grammar and the learning and teaching of second

Languages” (Perspectives on pedagogical Grammar. Terence Odlin)

Ellis,R. 1985. Understanding Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: OUP

Ellis,R. 1993. “Second Language Acquisition and the structural syllabus”. TESOL

Quarterly 27: 91-113.

Ellis,R. 1994. The Study of Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: OUP

Lightbown , P. and N. Spada. 1993. How Languages are learned. Oxford: OUP

Mc Laughling, B., T. Rossman, and B.McLeod. 1983.”Second Language Learning: an

Information-processing perspective”.Language Learning 33: 135-58

Richards, J. (ed.). 1994. Error Analysis. London: Longman

Scrivener, J. 2005. Learning Teaching. Oxford: Macmillan