First off, apologies for the late post. I left HI on Mon, Dec 3, and have been up to my neck since. In fact, even before that, it was a lot of sorting and packing as I had to clear my room, and then it was a field week attending conferences and completing my papers while getting over the jetlag and adjusting to the cool, dry and polluted air in HK, which was pretty hard on my sensitive bronchii system.
I only remembered that I had to make this post, but had not, and worse, had left my notes in HI as well. So, my apologies again for this very short write-up, which Megumi contributed, and many thanks, Megumi and Masaki, for responding to my email requesting assistance. Fortunately, you will not be missing out much because Week 15 wasn't one of those "substantive" weeks. It was more of a recap, and a neat summary of what we had done in the past 4 months.
On Tue, Nov 28, Prof Ortega summed up what we have done for the term. She elicited responses from the class before putting them neatly into the various categories. Below is the bare bones of what had transpired in class (based on what I could gather).
1. Cognitive Interactionist SLA (1970, 1980s): Piaget
Interaction: Long, Gass, Pica, MacKey
Environment
Cognition
Individual Differences: DeKeyser
2. Sociocultural SLA (mid-1990s): Vygotsky, Halliday
Vygotskyan SLA: Lantolf, Swain
CA for SLA: Kasper, Markee, Mori
Language Socialization: Duff
Identity Theory: Norton, Pavlenko
Critical Theory: Canagarajah, Pennycook
Systemic Functional Linguistics
3. Formal Linguistic Approach to SLA: Chomsky
Schwatz, Bley-Vroman, O'Grady
"Native Speaker"
Emergentism: Ellis
How time flew! One term and a lot of hard work had just gone by. With the benefit of hindsight, which is 20/20, now everything seems to come together and make much greater sense once all the pieces of the jigsaw have been pieced together.
Personally, I have found this class to be very informative, and challenging at times.
On behalf of my classmates and myself, I would like to thank Prof Ortega for her patience and support as she facilitates the lessons and guides us, especially on the many installments of our own projects.
On Thu, Nov 30, we had three presenters who respectively presented their rather advanced project for this course. They were Mi Yung, Jung Min, and Masaki, in order of presentation.
Masaki's presentation was entitled "Novice Language Teachers’ Development in a Japanese Language Immersion Camp".
If you are able or so inclined, please feel free to add to this post.
Many thanks, and happy holidays!
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Greetings all.
So I pseudo-promised to post the movie my paper is based on here at the blog.
Since this version is intended for web-streaming, the quality is rather lacking. The original is much nicer, but it gives you the basics.
Well, I need to get back to my paper so I can get it emailed in today. Eeeeek!
BEN
So I pseudo-promised to post the movie my paper is based on here at the blog.
Since this version is intended for web-streaming, the quality is rather lacking. The original is much nicer, but it gives you the basics.
Well, I need to get back to my paper so I can get it emailed in today. Eeeeek!
BEN
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Interesting articles
Aloha everyone,
Building up on last week's class about ELF and the NS/NNS dichotomy, I thought I would share two articles that may be of interest for some of you. Both are from Sarah Benesch, who is a professor of applied linguistics at the College of Staten Island, The City University of New York. She has done a lot of work with EAP students from a critical perspective and I would recommend her book Critical English for Academic Purposes (2001) to anyone who enjoys reading these two articles. Plus I got to meet her last year and she's super cool :-)
I uploaded the articles on my uh website, just click on the links to download them to your computer.
The first one (1996) is a great example of a critical approach to needs analysis for EAP programs
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~chudeau/Benesch1996%20needs%20analysis.pdf
The second one (1999) is a 'rights analysis' that explores the power relations involved in NNS students' academic careers in an american university
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~chudeau/Benesch1999%20rights%20analysis.pdf
Also, if you're interested in the topic, I'd be happy to share with you the critical pronunciation materials that Dr. Crookes and I piloted this semester for the ELI.
Happy reading!
Building up on last week's class about ELF and the NS/NNS dichotomy, I thought I would share two articles that may be of interest for some of you. Both are from Sarah Benesch, who is a professor of applied linguistics at the College of Staten Island, The City University of New York. She has done a lot of work with EAP students from a critical perspective and I would recommend her book Critical English for Academic Purposes (2001) to anyone who enjoys reading these two articles. Plus I got to meet her last year and she's super cool :-)
I uploaded the articles on my uh website, just click on the links to download them to your computer.
The first one (1996) is a great example of a critical approach to needs analysis for EAP programs
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~chudeau/Benesch1996%20needs%20analysis.pdf
The second one (1999) is a 'rights analysis' that explores the power relations involved in NNS students' academic careers in an american university
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~chudeau/Benesch1999%20rights%20analysis.pdf
Also, if you're interested in the topic, I'd be happy to share with you the critical pronunciation materials that Dr. Crookes and I piloted this semester for the ELI.
Happy reading!
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Weekly Reflection: Week 14
November 20th, Tuesday,
On the two articles we got through email last Wednesday, we discussed ① what the main thesis and the authors’ positions are and ② whether we are swayed or unswayed by the authors’ position, first in a group of three, and then in a class. For the class discussion, we took either swayed /unswayed side and debated our points.
Article 1.
Ellis,E. (2006). Monolingualism: The unmarked case. Estudio de Sociolinguistica 7(2), 173-196.
The main thesis
Although there are far more bilingual and multilingual speakers in the world than monolinguals, linguists and monolinguals themselves (especially English speakers) tend to consider "Monolingualism" as the norm and thus invisible, whereas bilingual or multilingual speakers are viewed as exceptions. This paper reviews three representations of monolingualism in applied linguistic.
-Monolingual bias: monolinguals are presented as a preferred, normal, neutral,
default state. (other bias in our society: gender, race, language, etc.)
-Three representations of monolingualism
1. unmarked: state of normality, invisible
2. limitation: missing on really good values such as intellectual, cultural, social, emotional, and economic benefits.
3. disease, sickness: The forefront advocate, Skutnabb-Kangas:
"monolingual reductionism", "monolingual stupidity" etc.
-Which one of the three does the author take a position with?
#3, the most radical state.
We can tell from the way the presented this view. (It was presented in the end. Difficult point to make, but no need to be aggressive. Be reasonable and state carefully)
In conclusion, "It's the monolingual's turn to be marginalized!"
Article 2.
Seidlhofer, B. (2001). Closing a conceptual gap: the case for a description of
English as a lingua franca. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 11(2),
133-158.
The main thesis & the author's position
There is a huge gap between the phenomena of English as a lingua franca and an English teaching reality. What we need is a systematic description. In order
to narrow this gap, an ELF corpus is now in progress.
Our Voices
On the two articles we got through email last Wednesday, we discussed ① what the main thesis and the authors’ positions are and ② whether we are swayed or unswayed by the authors’ position, first in a group of three, and then in a class. For the class discussion, we took either swayed /unswayed side and debated our points.
Article 1.
Ellis,E. (2006). Monolingualism: The unmarked case. Estudio de Sociolinguistica 7(2), 173-196.
The main thesis
Although there are far more bilingual and multilingual speakers in the world than monolinguals, linguists and monolinguals themselves (especially English speakers) tend to consider "Monolingualism" as the norm and thus invisible, whereas bilingual or multilingual speakers are viewed as exceptions. This paper reviews three representations of monolingualism in applied linguistic.
-Monolingual bias: monolinguals are presented as a preferred, normal, neutral,
default state. (other bias in our society: gender, race, language, etc.)
-Three representations of monolingualism
1. unmarked: state of normality, invisible
2. limitation: missing on really good values such as intellectual, cultural, social, emotional, and economic benefits.
3. disease, sickness: The forefront advocate, Skutnabb-Kangas:
"monolingual reductionism", "monolingual stupidity" etc.
-Which one of the three does the author take a position with?
#3, the most radical state.
We can tell from the way the presented this view. (It was presented in the end. Difficult point to make, but no need to be aggressive. Be reasonable and state carefully)
In conclusion, "It's the monolingual's turn to be marginalized!"
Article 2.
Seidlhofer, B. (2001). Closing a conceptual gap: the case for a description of
English as a lingua franca. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 11(2),
133-158.
The main thesis & the author's position
There is a huge gap between the phenomena of English as a lingua franca and an English teaching reality. What we need is a systematic description. In order
to narrow this gap, an ELF corpus is now in progress.
Our Voices
- A systematic description for ELF is helpful because it can concretely explain what ELF is and goes deeper than just emotionally appealing for the existence of ELF.
- The phenomena in which the majority of English users use ELF does exist. ELF should be introduced as a means of communication. The fact that non-native teachers teach English tells us that there is no way that they are introducing ENL in the first place.
- how do you assess students' ELF if there is no standard? In order to spread ELF, a model to teach, assess, and test will be needed.
- Students still want to learn ENL.
- Do we always teach what the students want? We don't need to.
- Understanding what the students need/want is not enough. Language policy and how the language is actually viewed in the society should be concerned.
- The notion of ELF is great, but when it comes to making a curriculum for ELF, it is difficult because it involves many sociocultural, political, economical, and language ideological aspects. It's hard to decide where to start.
- How about academic writing? We are sometimes evaluated by the way we write, and are expected to reach a certain level of academic writing.
- The reality is that professors are already accepting ELF products and what we do in class is already ELF (product of ELF).
- How do we introduce ELF to beginners? Introducing many different kinds of English may confuse them. (process of being ELF)
- Three different pronunciations of "hello" does not harm children.
- Isn't it just enough to teach "English"? It doesn't need to be ELF. Just teach to be tolerate and flexible about English.
- 50 years ago, there was no language school which focused on spoken form. Written form was the best variety possible. Now, we have a description of spoken language and communicative language teaching attracts many interests. Things can change.
My Voice
First, I'm sorry if I could't get your opinion correctly or missed completely. The topic was exciting and I almost forgot my role as a recorder.You might notice that I was taking the "unswayed" side. I totally agree with the fundamental concept of teaching ELF as "the majority of English speakers are non-natives who have their own right to use English as a lingua franca, and shouldn't be discriminated against because of their variety of English". But my big question was "Isn't it good enough to change the students' perspectives about English by dealing with many topics related to global issued including many different countries, people, cultures, and languages?". "Does ELF have to be taught?" As for English skills, teachers are mostly producing the students who use ELF in FL contexts, no matter how hard they try to introduce ENL using ENL materials. So, ELF users are already right there with/without being taught ELF intentionally. All we need to do is to change the students' attitudes and perspectives toward varieties of English, and reconsider the ways to evaluate the students' ELF. And thanks to the ELF corpus in progress, teachers may be able to prioritize linguistic skills treating in class. That way, teachers can spend limited English class hours more effectively focusing more on essential aspects. I assume all I mentioned here can be done without actually teaching "ELF". Or do I still have a bias in terms of linguistic skills accepting only the concept of ELF? I wonder.... In addition, not only non-native but also native speakers of English should make efforts to communicate in ELF. Maybe, "It's the native English speakers' turn to learn ELF!"
Announcement: No reading but do something on next Tuesday.
Happy Thanksgiving !!
Megumi (ELF writer)
Monday, November 19, 2007
In Amanda's Autistic Language
Hey all,
I just watched a CNN report on autism and came across this video made by "a rising star" whose name is Amanda which I hope will trigger some fruitful discussion and interest in her LANGUAGE. The title of the clip is "In My Language".
For further information on Amanda, pls CLICK HERE.
I just watched a CNN report on autism and came across this video made by "a rising star" whose name is Amanda which I hope will trigger some fruitful discussion and interest in her LANGUAGE. The title of the clip is "In My Language".
For further information on Amanda, pls CLICK HERE.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Summary and Reflection: Week 12
Tuesday
Announcement
: Brownbag and HATESOL Workshop on Thursday (8th), Writing Workshop on Friday (9th), and Special SLS Talk on the next Monday (12th)
Discussion on Myths about L2 learning (suggested by the SLS 650 class, fall 2007)
: We had a discussion as pair-work and then as whole-class, keeping in mind: “Which one sounds completely false/true?”
▪ Myth 1: Intrinsic motivation is better than extrinsic motivation.
Generally we (including many researchers) believe that intrinsic motivation helps language learning better than extrinsic motivation, but extrinsically motivated students had better results than those intrinsically motivated in some studies. Also, it seems to be hard to decide whether learners have intrinsic or extrinsic motivation simply based on their self-report. Keep in mind that motivation can change.
▪ Myth 2: Language learners cannot acquire the native-like language fluency and accuracy until they live in the foreign county where people speak the target language.
One student told a story about a Japanese lady who was so good at using English without having any experiences abroad and without having any favor of using English (actually she was forced to use that language). This suggests that such other conditions as affect or efforts could be also important for successful language learning.
▪ Myth 3: Learners can dramatically improve their language skill in the second language context.
A story of a female who had got several harassments and cultural shocks in the second language context and eventually stopped learning a language was told by Dr. Ortega. Even though this is not a usual case, it at least tells us that simply staying in the second language context does not guarantee successful language learning.
▪ Myth 4: Making a lot of mistakes help you learn the target language.
We have heard that Dr. Norris said that trying to be accurate would help learn a language. However, Dr. Ortega said that trying not to make mistakes and trying to be accurate would not help you learn a language better and accuracy be a result of learning. Well, we can make mistakes. We do not need to be afraid of making mistakes a lot. The important thing is that we should learn from our mistakes and try not to make the same mistakes again.
▪ Myth 5: Talking with native speakers help you learn the target language rather than talking with non-native speakers.
It was generally agreed that it would depend on the proficiency level of learners. Some competent users might get benefits from talking with native speakers. One student also mentioned that we could learn an accent while talking with native speakers.
I would like to list other popular ideas introduced by Lightbown and Spada (2006). I believe that thinking about these myths contribute to a better understanding of SLA and directing where you go as a language learner, teacher, or researcher.
1. Language are learned mainly through imitation.
2. Parents usually correct young children when they make grammatical errors.
3. Highly intelligent people are good language learners
4. The best predictor of success in second language acquisition is motivation.
5. The earlier a second language is introduced in school programmes, the greater the likelihood of success in learning.
6. Most of mistakes that second language learners make are due to interference from their first language.
7. The best way to learn new vocabulary is through reading.
8. It is essential for learners to be able to pronounce all the individual sounds in the second language.
9. Once learners know roughly 1,000 words and the basic structure of a second language, they can easily participate in conversations with native speakers.
10. Teachers should present grammatical rules one at a time, and learners should practice examples of each one before going on to anther.
11. Teachers should teach simple language structures before complex ones.
12. Learners’ errors should be corrected as soon as they are made in order to prevent the formation of bad habits.
13. Teachers should use materials that expose students only to language structures they have already been taught.
14. When learners are allowed to interact freely (for example, in group or pair activities), they copy each other’s mistakes.
15. Students learn what they are taught.
16. Teachers should respond to students’ errors by correctly rephrasing what they have said rather than by explicitly pointing out the error.
17. Students can learn both language and academic content (for example, science and history) simultaneously in classes where the subjects matter is taught in their second language.
Aslo, I would like to introduce one private language school I used to work as a teacher and an academic supervisor. While hearing about the school, you can find some myths we have been talking about in class. (The following excepts are from my paper done in other class)
“G (pseudonym) is a private English institute established in June 2004. This business essentially targets elementary and middle school students, advertising that the program is formulated for the purpose of enhancing communicative language competence. Its motto is “learning English just like our mother tongue, Korean”. The primary mission of G is to provide genuine English education context, that is, to assist learners to acquire English while learning various English contents by means of innovative media.…. As for teachers, G does not hire any so-called native speakers. It says that this is because the contents per se of movies and books are the inspiring teachers and a human being teacher is just an assistant…When hired, all teachers are required to obtain a teacher education for a week. Not learning English itself, but they are mostly trained how to manipulate DVD players capably, to exploit various activities to get an attention of easily-bored students in the classroom, to support students to be on the right track of G Way such as English only policy or mimicking, to counsel with demanding parents, and to deal with other unexpected circumstances… Every classroom is equipped with a TV and DVD player, which are used throughout the class. There are two sections of the lesson: movie DVD class and book DVD class. In the first class, students watch 10-minute movie clip, do mimicking and do workbook like filling in the blanks as listening, answering the comprehension questions, and summarizing the story. In the second, students watch 10-minute book DVD, read after the storyteller, and do workbook just like doing in the first class. A teacher mostly exclaims exaggeratedly to boost the morale of the learners saying like “Let’s watch today’s exciting movie clip!” “Now, listen carefully and repeat aloud after the line!” “Excellent!” “Could you try to mimic one more time with the action?” “Great!” “What is the story about?” and the like. The teacher also relates a lot of game-like activities such as role-playing, doing puzzles, and musical chairs with class. Because of these roles, teachers in G often call themselves entertainers and guides. After the class, students do homework, which is watching 10-minute movie clip three times, reading aloud 10-minute passages of book DVD after the storyteller five times, and doing workbook with DVD…. Almost all of the children, excluding those who have experiences of having lived in an English speaking country for a while or prove substantial English proficiency, are directly stationed to the class in accordance with their age, not their level of English. G believes that low-level students can learn from high-level students, and the high-level students can also learn in some way while helping the low-level students if they study in the same class….”
SLRF 2007 Timetable
: We reviewed three dimensions affecting to L2 learning (multidimensionality); (a) Universal Influences like age, or L1; (b) Individual Differences like aptitude, and (c) Social Dimensions like identity or cultural social status. Then, we were directed to match each title of presentation shown in SLRF 2007 timetable with one of those dimensions. As Dr. Ortega said, it would be much better if we could see the abstract.
Thursday
“The Social Turn in SLA: Vygotskian theory & Identity”
▪ Facilitators: Emiko and Nick
▪ Articles: Lantolf & Thorne (2006), Norton & Toohey (2001), and Norton (2006)
▪ Concepts we covered:
Announcement
: Brownbag and HATESOL Workshop on Thursday (8th), Writing Workshop on Friday (9th), and Special SLS Talk on the next Monday (12th)
Discussion on Myths about L2 learning (suggested by the SLS 650 class, fall 2007)
: We had a discussion as pair-work and then as whole-class, keeping in mind: “Which one sounds completely false/true?”
▪ Myth 1: Intrinsic motivation is better than extrinsic motivation.
Generally we (including many researchers) believe that intrinsic motivation helps language learning better than extrinsic motivation, but extrinsically motivated students had better results than those intrinsically motivated in some studies. Also, it seems to be hard to decide whether learners have intrinsic or extrinsic motivation simply based on their self-report. Keep in mind that motivation can change.
▪ Myth 2: Language learners cannot acquire the native-like language fluency and accuracy until they live in the foreign county where people speak the target language.
One student told a story about a Japanese lady who was so good at using English without having any experiences abroad and without having any favor of using English (actually she was forced to use that language). This suggests that such other conditions as affect or efforts could be also important for successful language learning.
▪ Myth 3: Learners can dramatically improve their language skill in the second language context.
A story of a female who had got several harassments and cultural shocks in the second language context and eventually stopped learning a language was told by Dr. Ortega. Even though this is not a usual case, it at least tells us that simply staying in the second language context does not guarantee successful language learning.
▪ Myth 4: Making a lot of mistakes help you learn the target language.
We have heard that Dr. Norris said that trying to be accurate would help learn a language. However, Dr. Ortega said that trying not to make mistakes and trying to be accurate would not help you learn a language better and accuracy be a result of learning. Well, we can make mistakes. We do not need to be afraid of making mistakes a lot. The important thing is that we should learn from our mistakes and try not to make the same mistakes again.
▪ Myth 5: Talking with native speakers help you learn the target language rather than talking with non-native speakers.
It was generally agreed that it would depend on the proficiency level of learners. Some competent users might get benefits from talking with native speakers. One student also mentioned that we could learn an accent while talking with native speakers.
I would like to list other popular ideas introduced by Lightbown and Spada (2006). I believe that thinking about these myths contribute to a better understanding of SLA and directing where you go as a language learner, teacher, or researcher.
1. Language are learned mainly through imitation.
2. Parents usually correct young children when they make grammatical errors.
3. Highly intelligent people are good language learners
4. The best predictor of success in second language acquisition is motivation.
5. The earlier a second language is introduced in school programmes, the greater the likelihood of success in learning.
6. Most of mistakes that second language learners make are due to interference from their first language.
7. The best way to learn new vocabulary is through reading.
8. It is essential for learners to be able to pronounce all the individual sounds in the second language.
9. Once learners know roughly 1,000 words and the basic structure of a second language, they can easily participate in conversations with native speakers.
10. Teachers should present grammatical rules one at a time, and learners should practice examples of each one before going on to anther.
11. Teachers should teach simple language structures before complex ones.
12. Learners’ errors should be corrected as soon as they are made in order to prevent the formation of bad habits.
13. Teachers should use materials that expose students only to language structures they have already been taught.
14. When learners are allowed to interact freely (for example, in group or pair activities), they copy each other’s mistakes.
15. Students learn what they are taught.
16. Teachers should respond to students’ errors by correctly rephrasing what they have said rather than by explicitly pointing out the error.
17. Students can learn both language and academic content (for example, science and history) simultaneously in classes where the subjects matter is taught in their second language.
Aslo, I would like to introduce one private language school I used to work as a teacher and an academic supervisor. While hearing about the school, you can find some myths we have been talking about in class. (The following excepts are from my paper done in other class)
“G (pseudonym) is a private English institute established in June 2004. This business essentially targets elementary and middle school students, advertising that the program is formulated for the purpose of enhancing communicative language competence. Its motto is “learning English just like our mother tongue, Korean”. The primary mission of G is to provide genuine English education context, that is, to assist learners to acquire English while learning various English contents by means of innovative media.…. As for teachers, G does not hire any so-called native speakers. It says that this is because the contents per se of movies and books are the inspiring teachers and a human being teacher is just an assistant…When hired, all teachers are required to obtain a teacher education for a week. Not learning English itself, but they are mostly trained how to manipulate DVD players capably, to exploit various activities to get an attention of easily-bored students in the classroom, to support students to be on the right track of G Way such as English only policy or mimicking, to counsel with demanding parents, and to deal with other unexpected circumstances… Every classroom is equipped with a TV and DVD player, which are used throughout the class. There are two sections of the lesson: movie DVD class and book DVD class. In the first class, students watch 10-minute movie clip, do mimicking and do workbook like filling in the blanks as listening, answering the comprehension questions, and summarizing the story. In the second, students watch 10-minute book DVD, read after the storyteller, and do workbook just like doing in the first class. A teacher mostly exclaims exaggeratedly to boost the morale of the learners saying like “Let’s watch today’s exciting movie clip!” “Now, listen carefully and repeat aloud after the line!” “Excellent!” “Could you try to mimic one more time with the action?” “Great!” “What is the story about?” and the like. The teacher also relates a lot of game-like activities such as role-playing, doing puzzles, and musical chairs with class. Because of these roles, teachers in G often call themselves entertainers and guides. After the class, students do homework, which is watching 10-minute movie clip three times, reading aloud 10-minute passages of book DVD after the storyteller five times, and doing workbook with DVD…. Almost all of the children, excluding those who have experiences of having lived in an English speaking country for a while or prove substantial English proficiency, are directly stationed to the class in accordance with their age, not their level of English. G believes that low-level students can learn from high-level students, and the high-level students can also learn in some way while helping the low-level students if they study in the same class….”
SLRF 2007 Timetable
: We reviewed three dimensions affecting to L2 learning (multidimensionality); (a) Universal Influences like age, or L1; (b) Individual Differences like aptitude, and (c) Social Dimensions like identity or cultural social status. Then, we were directed to match each title of presentation shown in SLRF 2007 timetable with one of those dimensions. As Dr. Ortega said, it would be much better if we could see the abstract.
Thursday
“The Social Turn in SLA: Vygotskian theory & Identity”
▪ Facilitators: Emiko and Nick
▪ Articles: Lantolf & Thorne (2006), Norton & Toohey (2001), and Norton (2006)
▪ Concepts we covered:
Sociocultural Theory: a theory of learning and mental development, “the human mind is mediated”, a theory is predicated on understanding the importance of interaction between people for the formation of mental activities (Vygotsky, 1978)
Internalization: “Internalization is a negotiated process that reorganizes the relationship of the individual to her or his social environment and generally carries it into future performance”
Imitation: “ development based on collaboration and imitation is the source of all the specifically human characteristics of consciousness the develop in the child ”
The Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD): the distance between what learner can do by himself or herself and what he or she can do with guidance from a teacher (adult) or a more capable peer
▪ Task 1(Right or Wrong?)
: We discussed the statements (sorry! I failed to get all statements) and figured out if they were right or wrong, with the help of the articles.
Statement 1: Language shapes the way we view and conceive the world.
One group said that the way of influencing is not unidirectional. It is rather bidirectional.
Well, as far as I know, there are many variations in Korean describing some colors like blue, read, yellow, white, or black, compared to other languages. Does this mean that those expressions might affect the way Korean view the world or Korean cultures/spirits might affect the way of expressing colors? (Is this overly generalized? :)
Statement 2: ZPD = Scaffolding?
As the article says, there are two misconceptions about ZPD. One is that ZPD is the same thing as scaffolding or assisted performance and the other is that it is similar to Krashen’s notion of i+1. Since scaffolding mainly concerns completion of a task with help of expert, there might be quite passive role of novice in expert-novice interactions. In ZPD, we may think that the goal will be helping the learner develop and be independent. While Krashen focuses on language and langauge device (comprehensible input), ZPD focuses on the learners themselves.
▪ Task 2 (Social Context and Language Learning)
: We had a discussion on four people (Jamal, Katie, Ravi, and Mike), considering the concepts mentioned in the articles (e.g., GLL, identity, community of practice, etc.)
What predictions can you make about the language learning process of these learners of English? What could make their learning easier/more difficult?
As a teacher and expert in SLA what advice would you give them?
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Weekly Reflection in Week 13
Tuesday, November 13th
Announcement:
Thursday(November 15th): Peer-review of the interim draft
→ 1. send 1 to Dr. Ortega by way of email
→ 2. bring 1 copy to the class to work with your partner
Since we do not have reading assignments this week (due to concentration on writing the drafts), Dr. Ortega brought two activities on writing a research paper.
Activities on Writing a Research Paper:
1. Moving from analysis to interpretation
Analysis
↓
1) Results (= closer to the data, lower inference)
2) Findings (= a bit further away from the data, higher inference)
3) Interpretations
4) Implications(= so what, what else, big leap)
↑
Interpretation
☼ As moving from 1) ~ 4), it goes further from the data. The writer cannot jump but take each phase precisely to write a reader-friendly, good writing.
For a hands-on activity, we looked into 5 examples and underlined the parts to distinguish
(1= close 2= further away 3= the furthest away from the data)
1) From Buckwalter, P. (2001). Repair sequencesin SpanishL2dyadic discourse: A descriptive study. The Modern Language Journal, 85, 380-397.
1 & 2: starts very close from the data with low inference and moving on to high inference
(no direct connection with the data, cannot be guessed too much)
☼ The word "interesting" sounds subjective, but the sentence only talks about a piece of data.
2) From Kitano, K. (2001). Anxiety in the college Japanese language classroom. The ModernLanguage Journal, 85, 549-566.
2&3: nicely stated as "found...", "finding..."
: Once variables are leveled (e.g. instructional level, the experience of ...), it goes a little bit beyond the data ( results → findings): implications for teachers
3) From Tse, L. (2000). Student perceptions of foreign language study: A qualitative analysis of foreign language autobiographies. The Modern Language Journal, 84, 69-84.
1 & 2 & 3: as can be seen from the title, this is a qualitative study. The same as quantitative study, the paper organizes the data to show evidence as a starting point (close from the data), and then goes further from the data to interpretations.
☼Although when a study is a qualitative one (and the results may sound interpretation), a researcher should not stop on the 1st (result) or 2nd phase (finding). The 3rd phase(interpretation) is necessary.
4) From McGinnis, S. (1997). Tonal spelling versus diacritics for teaching pronunciation of Mandarin Chinese. The Modern Language Journal, 81, 228-236.
1 & 2 : This example includes both results and findings.
☼When there are any tables/figures ( even in appendix section), it should always be mentioned in the text (e.g. Table 1 shows...)
5) From Thompson,
1 & 2 & 3: In the middle part ("Comparing these results with those of Magnan's 1986 for French"...), the researcher compares his/her results with those of other study. In a discussion section, such a comparison is possible as an interpretation, although it is quite far from the data.
2. Avoiding the "laundry-list effect" when presenting previous research ( it's not a list review, but a lit review ☺!)
Dr. Ortega brought a nice model of a literature review from Spada & Lightbown (1999).
1) We first paid attention to some generic languages used for literature review.
e.g. Previous research has shown that..., so and so has suggested that...,
☼ Out of 15 paragraphs, only 2 paragraphs start precisely with these kinds of generic phrases. There are many ways to start a new paragraphs in lit. review. We can learn them through reading many literatures and find good models.
2) The main part of activity 2 was to examine the parts where we find the researchers' opinions. We can find such sentences in paragraph 2, 10, 13, and 15.
The researchers start their review of lit. from overview of the research topic, move on to more recent studies as their review goes on ( showing their interpretations little by little). They explicitly begin to narrow down the topic to their study from paragraph 10, writing about different studies on the similar topics to theirs. In the last part of paragraph 13, they state their position mentioning about the shortcomings of the previous studies. Then, in final paragraph, they summarize their lit. review and clearly proposes their thesis statement of their study, advocating that they would like to fill the gap between previous studies.
Could you share your good strategies to write a research paper with your classmates?
Thursday, November 15th
We had a peer-review session with the same partners as the first peer-review for the research proposal. Since all of our papers have progressed further at this phase since last draft (research proposal), Dr. Ortega advised us to pay special attention on the contents. Also, we were advised not to do oral briefing in order to provide feedback from objective point of view. Another advice from Dr. Ortega was to give feedback on organizational issues such as heading and the components in each section (e.g. divide into different section). We all had good opportunities to have objective input from the partners.
Announcement:
- Reading assignment for next week: November 20th ( Thursday is a holiday)
Two readings will be sent electronically. We are expected to read at least one of them.
Dr. Ortega have sent them soon to us after the class meeting. Following is part of email message from her.
Please read at least one of them. Here is my suggestion for who should
prioritize which:
Elizabeth Ellis' (2006) discussion of three conceptualizations of
monolingualism:
Anne
Samantha
Merica
Nick
Miyung
Shay
Emiko
Barbara Seidlhofer's (2001) discussion of English as a lingua franca:
Megumi
Ben
Jung-Min
Hatsumi
Rayoung
Sean
Hope you enjoy these two readings!
- Tentative Schedule regarding student presentations on their papers
November 29th, Thursday
Masaki, Miyung, Jung-Min
December 4th, Tuesday
Ky, Ben, Megumi
December 6th, Thursday
The rest of the students
The purpose: to get feedback to finalize our papers
Assigned time: Max in 15 minutes & 5 minutes for feedback
If some of us have difficulties to do presentation, it is negotiable with Dr. Ortega. Also, the schedule is not fixed yet. Therefore, it is advised to contact Dr. Ortega if we have any problems.
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