Techniques for language acquisition

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УДК 378.881

TECHNIQUES FOR LANGUAGE ACQUISITION

Olena Bovda, Tetiana Nifaka

The article explores the notion of technique in teaching foreign languages. It is defined as a simple methodical act which provides the realization of the teacher's educational objective in class. The term is claimed to entail activity, task and exercise. Activity is a broader term, with task applying to a separable element of a lesson, which is primarily geared to practicing language presented, usually involving students working with each other, and which has a specific goal. The classification of the activities depends on the following factors: 1) degree of teacher's control; 2) categories of use; 3) main types of interaction activities; 4) practice and communicative activities. Their activity types are specified. Task is treated as the basic unit of action. Some distinctions have been drawn between exercises (focused on noticing and developing aspects of the form of language) and tasks (focused on integrated use of language). To develop accuracy and fluency in communicative competence both of them are recommended. The most frequently used way of categorizing tasks is stated to be according to four macro-skills, six activity-types and higher order thinking skills. Tasks characteristics (information structure, recycling, convergence) are given.

Key words: technique, teaching, foreign language, activity, task, exercise, communicative competence, characteristic.

language foreign exercises tasks

Бовда Олена, Ніфака Тетяна. Прийоми у навчанні іноземних мов. Розглядається поняття «прийом», раціональне використання якого в процесі формування комунікативної компетенції студентів не викликає сумніву. Прийом визначається як елементарний методичний вчинок, що забезпечує успішну реалізацію конкретної практичної мети на занятті. Він характеризується комплексністю, компонентами якого виступають діяльнісне завдання, завдання, вправа. Діяльнісне завдання включає комунікативну мету, проблемно-пізнавальну та проблемно-методичну задачі, розв'язання яких здійснюється за допомогою завдань та вправ. Класифікація діяльнісних завдань продиктована такими факторами: 1) ступінь контролю викладача; 2) категорії використання; 3) головні типи інтерактивної діяльності; 4) практикування та комунікативна діяльність. Окреслено типи діяльнісних завдань. Завдання розглядається як основний компонент дії. Визначено відмінності між завданням та вправою. Під час виконання першого увага концентрується на змісті висловлювання, другої - на його формі. Критеріями для типології вправ є: основні чотири вміння; шість видів діяльності та розумові вміння. Встановлено основні ознаки (інформаційна структура, переробка, конвергенція) вправ.

Ключові слова: прийом, викладання, іноземна мова, діяльнісне завдання, завдання, вправа, комунікативна компетенція, ознака.

Бовда Елена, Нифака Татьяна. Приемы в обучении иностранным языкам. Рассматривается понятие «прием», рациональное использование которого в процессе формирования коммуникативной компетенции студентов не вызывает сомнения. Прием определяется как элементарный методичный поступок, который обеспечивает успешное осуществление практической цели на занятии. Он характеризируется комплексностью, компонентами которого выступают деятельностное задание, задания и упражнение. Деятельностное задание включает коммуникативную цель, проблемно-познавательную и проблемно-методическую задачи, которые реализируются с помощью заданий и упражнений. Классификация деятельностных заданий обусловлена следующими факторами: 1) степень контроля преподавателя; 2) категории использования; 3) главные типы интерактивной деятельности; 4) практика и коммуникативная деятельность. Определены типы деятельностных заданий. Задание рассматривается как основной компонент действия. Установлены отличия между заданием и упражнением. В процессе их выполнения первые концентрируют внимание на содержании высказывания, второе - на его форме. Критериями для типологий упражнений выступают: основные четыре умения; шесть видов деятельности, мыслительные умения. Характерными особенностями упражнений являются информационная структура, переработка, конвергенция.

Ключевые слова: прием, обучение, иностранный язык, деятельностное задание, задания, упражнение, коммуникативная компетенция, особенность.

Formulation of the research problem and its significance. One of major issues in methodology is the understanding of the notion technique, and its constituents: activity, task, exercise. The variety of the definitions given causes difficulties in teaching second language acquisition. To overcome them the teacher must identify the techniques, specify their roles in fostering real communication in class, organize into the appropriate set to accomplish a goal.

Analysis of the research into this problem. The success in teaching depends on the variety of the techniques available to a teacher which help to develop students' communicative competence in English. They set the options from which the teacher can select a given sequence within a lesson, carry out important and fundamental goal: to require native-like or near native-like proficiency. Much has been written to define, identify, and classify the techniques. Unfortunately, little research has involved a consistent system of description upon which they can be differentiated and compared.

The goal and the specific tasks of the article. The goal of the present research paper is to give the survey of the point in question. To achieve it such tasks are done: to reconsider the term “technique” and its constituents (activity, task, exercise), to reveal their characteristics that are important for successful teaching and learning, to explore the breadth of possibilities and distinguish among their uses, to classify according to the needs of communication. The research is focused on the distinguishing among them.

Statement regarding the basic material of the research and the justification of the results obtained. A technique is defined as an elemental methodical act which provides the realization of the teacher's educational objective in class. The term includes activity, task, and exercise. We define “activity” as a broader term, with “task” applying to a separable element of a lesson, which is primarily geared to practicing language presented earlier (or otherwise learned), usually involving students working with each other, and which has a specific objective.

Such teaching activities and their following ranking (from high to low usefulness) developed on the results of thorough investigations have been found actual: 1) students working in pairs/small groups; 2) role-play; 3) language games; 4) reading topical articles; 5) students making oral presentations; 6) cloze exercises; 7) using video materials; 8) students repeating teacher cue (drill); 9) exercise in free writing; 10) setting and correcting homework; 11) listening and note taking; 12) repeating and learning dialogs; 13) students reading aloud in class; 14) exercises in conference writing.

There are different classifications of activity types in teaching methods. In much early work on language teaching, the concern was on the nature of skill use, drill types and eventually types of communicative interaction. Our attention is focused on the activities classifications, which are chosen according to such criteria: 1) degrees of teacher versus student control over the performance; 2) categories of use; 3) main types of interaction activities; 4) practice and communicative activities. Teachers should be familiar with each of these types and comprehend their benefits and disadvantages.

Thus the activity types have been distinguished according to three degrees of teacher versus student control over the performance [1]. Besides such factors as the topic and the teacher's goals are taken into account too. According to the criterion given above the activities can be controlled (teacher has basic control over processes), semicontrolled and free.

Controlled activities include: warm-up: mimes, dance, song, jokes, play. This activity has the purpose of getting the students stimulated, relaxed, motivated, attentive, or otherwise engaged and ready for the classroom lesson, not necessarily related to the target language; setting: focusing in on lesson topic (either verbal or nonverbal evocation of the context that is relevant to the lesson point; by way of questioning or miming or picture presentation, possibly tape recording of situations and people, teacher directs attention to the upcoming topic; organizational: managerial structuring of lesson or class activities (reprimanding of students and other disciplinary action, organization of class furniture and seating, etc., general procedures for class interaction and performance, structure and purpose of lesson, etc.; content explanation: explanation of lesson content and grammar or other rules and points (phonology, grammar, lexis, sociolinguistics, or whatever is being “taught”); role play demonstration: use of selected students or teacher to illustrate the procedures(s) to be applied in the lesson segment to follow; dialogue/narrative presentation: reading or listening passage presented for passive reception (no implication of student production or other identification of specific target forms or functions); dialogue/narrative recitation: reciting a previously known or prepared text, either in unison or individually; reading aloud: reading directly from a given text; checking: teacher either circulating or guiding the correction of students' work providing feedback; question-answer, display: activity involving prompting of student responses by means of display questions (i. e., teacher or questioner already knows the response or has a very limited set of expectations for the appropriate response); drill: typical language activity involving fixed patterns of teacher and student responding and prompting, usually with repetition, substitution, and other mechanical alterations; translation: student or teacher translating given text; dictation: student writing down orally presented text; copying: student writing down text presented visually; identification: student picking out and producing or otherwise identifying a specific target form, function, definition, or other lesson-related item; recognition: student identifying forms, etc., as in Identification, but without producing language as response (i. e., checking off items, drawing symbols, rearranging pictures); review: teacher-led review of previous week/month/ or other period as a formal summary and type of test of student recall and performance; testing: formal testing procedures to evaluate student progress; meaningful drill: drill activity involving responses with meaningful choices, as in reference to different information.

Semicontrolled activities involve: brainstorming: a special form of preparation for the lesson, like Setting, which involves free, undirected contributions by the students and teacher on a given topic, to generate multiple associations without linking them; story-telling (especially when student-generated): not necessarily lesson-based, lengthy presentation of story or event by teacher or student (may overlap with Warm-up or Narrative recitation). May be used to maintain attention, motivation, or as lengthy practice); question-answer, referential: activity involving prompting of responses by means of referential questions (i.e., the questioner does not know beforehand the response information); cued narrative/dialog: student production of narrative or dialog following cues from miming, cue cards, pictures, or other stimuli related to narrative/dialog; information transfer: application from one mode (e.g., visual) to another (e.g., writing), which involves some transformation of the information (e.g., student fills out diagram while listening to description); information exchange: activity involving two-way communication as in information gap exercises, when one or both parties (or a larger group) must share information to achieve some goal; wrap-up: brief teacher or student produced summary of point and/or items that have been practiced or learned; narration/exposition: presentation of a story or explanation derived from prior stimuli; preparation: student study, silent reading, pair planning and rehearsing, preparing for later activity.

Free activities incorporate: role-play: relatively free acting out of specified roles and functions; games: various kinds of language game activity, if not like other previously defined activities (e.g., board and dice games making words); report: report of student-prepared exposition on books, experiences, project work, without immediate stimulus, and elaborated on according to student interests; problem solving: activity involving specified problem and limitations of means to resolve it, requires cooperative action on part of participants in small or large group; drama: planned dramatic rendition of play, skit, story, etc.; simulation: activity involving complex interaction between groups and individuals based on simulation of real-life actions and experiences; discussion: debate or other form of grouped discussion of specified topic, with or without specified sides/ positions prearranged; composition: as in Report (verbal), written development of ideas, story, or other exposition; a propos: conversation or other socially oriented interaction/speech by teacher, students, or even visitors, on general real-life topics, authentic and genuine.

W. M. Rivers and M. S. Temperley present “fourteen categories of use” which the students need to handle if they develop autonomous interaction skills [3]. Teachers can use these categories to ensure the students are involved in appropriate activities. Each category entails the following interaction: 1) establishing and maintaining social relations: short dialogues based on small situations (making a telephone call etc); 2) expressing reactions; 3) hiding one's intentions; 4) talking one's way out of trouble (awkward questions are asked, which are either answered or avoided without making any revelation); 5) seeking and giving information (interviews, surveys, small projects etc); 6) learning or teaching how to make or do something (a hobby, a sport etc.); 7) conversing over the telephone (social calls, enquiries about services, timetable etc.); 8) problem-solving (guessing games, project study, puzzle-solving); 9) discussing ideas (arising from readings, stories, films); 10) playing with language (crossword puzzles, spelling games); 11) acting out social roles (improvisation, based on simple situations and character descriptions); 12) entertaining others (through producing a show, or concert, a TV show); 13) displaying one's achievements after another activity such as a project, report; 14) sharing leisure activities (participation in celebrations, pastimes etc).

Penny Ur classifies three main types of interaction activities: brainstorming activities, organizing activities, and compound activities [4]. There are several subtypes under each category, which are given in the accompanying list.

Brainstorming activities: guessing games: guess something/somebody; finding connections between incongruous prompts, things in common, combing elements into a story; ideas from a central theme: listing objects with the same qualities, associations, characteristics; implications and interpretation: doodles, pictures, sounds, faces, foreseeing results, explanations for strange situations.

Organizing activities: comparisons: odd man out, categorizing; detecting differences: picture differences; putting in order: picture sequence, sentence sequence; priorities: rating, survival games, features and functions; choosing candidates: grant-winners, victims, teachers; layout problems: animals in a zoo, marital pairings; combining versions: combining two or more similar texts into one.

Compound activities: composing letters; debates; publicity campaigns; surveys; planning projects.

Jemery Hamer makes a distinction between practice and communicative activities [2].

Oral practice activities consist of the following: oral drills, information gap activities, games, personalization and localization (students speak about people and places they know), oral activities (students are given cards, prompts to ask questions in order to know the likes, dislikes, family, and daily habits of class colleagues).

Communicative activities includes: reaching a consensus (arguing about moral dilemma, selecting objects), relaying instructions, communication games: describe and draw, finding similarities, describe and arrange; problem solving; impersonal exchange; story construction; simulation and role play.

There exist in the literature various descriptors, and various definitions of task. There is no one agreed-upon. In our view task is the smallest unit of classroom work which involves learners in comprehending, manipulating, producing or interacting in the target language. Minimally, tasks contain some form of data or input. The task also has a goal and roles for teachers and learners. It refers to a range of work plans which have the overall purpose of facilitating language learning-- from the simple and brief exercise type to more complex and lengthy activities such as group problem-solving simulations and decision-making. The task is comprised of several elements: 1) content, the subject matter to be taught; 2) materials, the things that can be observed and manipulated; 3) activity (the things that the teacher and student are doing during the lesson); 4) goal (the teacher's general aim for the task); 5) student (especially his abilities, needs, and interests); 6) social context of instruction.

Tasks are the basic unit of action. Some distinctions have been drawn between exercises (focused on noticing and developing aspects of the form of language) and tasks (focused on integrated use of language. Thus we develop accuracy (through a focus on form in exercise) and fluency (through active use of the language in tasks). Complexity is achieved by doing both. They are classified according to input/output of information (receptive, reproductive and productive) and communication (language/no communicative, semi communicative, communicative).

The most frequently used way of categorizing tasks is according to four macro-skills: listening, speaking, reading, writing. Another way was developed in six activity-types. These include: interacting and obtaining information and using it, giving information, personal response, and personal expression. Another system of tasks focuses on higher order thinking skills: enquiring and interpreting; presenting; problem-solving; performing; creating, designing, composing; judging, evaluating, responding.

Tasks characteristics are information structure, recycling, convergence. They influence its subtypes/kinds. Information gap tasks may be designed so that each participant holds different information which must be shared verbally in order for the task to be successfully completed. The tasks produce more interactional modification (repetitions, expansions, confirmation checks). Recycling tasks require the same linguistic material to be used repeatedly. Many communicative tasks are convergent task type (lead to frequent exchange of turns and more communication units), and divergent tasks (lead to longer turns of greater syntactic complexity).

Conclusions and prospects for further research. The factors covered in this article constitute the beginning of our investigation into the utility of second language classroom materials. Being aware of them teachers will find it easier to make the best possible decisions when designing teaching. Our prospects for further research are focused on specifying the techniques, due to which each communicative goal can be accomplished.

Bibliography

1. Chaudron C. Second Language Classrooms: Research or Teaching and Learning / C. Chaudron, M. Valcarcel. - New York : Oxford University Press, 1988.

2. Hamer G. The Practice of English Language Teaching / Geremy Hamer // Longman Handbooks for Language Teachers. - 2001. - 384 p.

3. Rivers W. M. A Practical Guide to the Teaching of English as a Second or Foreign Language / W. M. Rivers, M. S. Temperley. - New York : Oxford University Press, 1987. - 399 p.

4. Ur P. A Course in English Language Teaching / Penny Ur. - Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2008. - 142 p.

References

1. Chaudron, C., and Valcarcel, M. 1988. Second Language Classrooms: Research or Teaching and Learning. New York: Oxford University Press.

2. Hamer, Geremy. 2001. “The Practice of English Language Teaching”. Longman Handbooks for Language Teachers.

3. Rivers, W. M., and Temperley, M. S. 1987. A Practical Guide to the Teaching of English as a Second or Foreign Language. New York: Oxford University Press.

4. Ur, Penny. 2008. A Course in English Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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