Applying schema theory to teaching foreign language comprehension

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Applying schema theory to teaching foreign language comprehension

Rudnytska T.H., Assistant Professor at the Foreign; Slobodianiuk A.A., Assistant Professor at the Foreign, Languages Department Vinnytsia National Technical University

The article considers the concept of schema theory as teaching methodology in language learning and teaching foreign languages. Schema theory emphasizes the importance of general knowledge and concepts that will help forming schemata. The term schema refers to a mental framework humans use to represent and organize remembered information. It is defined as a data structure for representing generic concepts stored in memory. This approach to learning examines how individuals create relationships between concepts. It is important for educators to understand the learning process, to emphasize the role of schema theory in student's thinking and to provide relevant teaching methods to achieve academic success.

Schema theory has a profound impact on reading and grammar comprehension research. The article presents some findings suggesting the profound impact of schema theory as language teaching approach on reading and grammar comprehension research. Experience shows that one of the challenges the students face is grammar comprehension. Schema facilitates learning of grammar structures and provides current reading practices. The current challenge for researchers and teachers is to apply effectively teaching techniques based on schema theory in university setting for developing academic reading skills and practicing grammar structures. Focusing on the importance of the effects of language complexity and the background knowledge of a text on reading comprehension and teaching grammar, structures, the current research suggests language teaching methodology to help learners develop new schemata and establish connection between them.

The article attempts to interpret and synthesize the relevant major linguistic sources for different grammatical structures in a comprehensible form and gives a number of practical suggestions and useful resources for fostering students involvement and proficiency level and their experience with grammar structures.

In the process of researching, developing and testing the materials the students explore their profession and gain significant work experience in their fields.

Key words: schema theory language teaching methodology, reading comprehension, grammar, linguistic competence.

Теорія схем у навчанні іноземної мови

Ключові слова: теорія схем, методика викладання мови, розуміння читання, граматика, мовна компетенція.

The essence of schema-focused relationship problems in education is to acquire methods of gaining new knowledge independently based on application of existing knowledge and skills. The major purpose of teaching problem - solving skills based on schema theory is to enable students to solve various types of tasks within an academic discipline.

The approach is particularly productive in teaching foreign languages. Teachers of English have great opportunities to contribute to this process and help students become better problem solvers of discipline- related problems.

Actual scientific researches and issues analysis

The concept of schema theory, one of the cognitive learning theories, being introduced by Frederic Bartlett and developed by David Rumelhart and Richard Anderson, has always been recognized as an important factor in teaching and learning [7, p. 34]. Many researchers have examined the role schemata play in language comprehension. R.Anderson, an American educational psychologist, used schema theory in an educational setting from a reading perspective [1, p. 24]. Positive effect of schema based instructions on students' grammar and vocabulary learning strategies was confirmed by the results of numerous studies and research application of schema theory in the classroom. Focusing the importance of the effects of language complexity and the background knowledge of a text on reading comprehension and teaching grammar, structures, the current research suggests language teaching methodology to help learners develop new schemata and establish connection between them.

Human information-processing theorists believe that the analogy of computer is a useful model for understanding the way human being think and process information. Psychologists formulated a linear model of human information processing in which information flows through three structural features: the sensory register, short-term memory and long-term memory [4, p. 92]. Different people process information in different ways. Different cognitive styles determine the quality and the success of the processed information. The information-processing model is important for educators to understand the learning process, to emphasize the role of schema theory in student's thinking and to provide relevant teaching methods to achieve academic success.

Uninvestigated parts of general matters defining

Schema theory is considered to be one of the ways to explain how information is stored in longterm memory. A schema is an abstract representation of information that contains a variety of details such as characteristics and examples. It is a system of relationships between concepts, a body of information related to a specific concept. Grammar instruction occupies a prominent role in various language teaching methods and approaches. The current challenge for researchers and teachers is to find a way to integrate grammar instruction and grammar practice with a communicative approach to teaching. Being proficient in a language implies knowing the grammatical structures and how to convey an appropriate message according to the situation, and to arrange language to convey a message. The teacher should make sure that students recall old information before teaching them related new one. For example, before teaching the application of automatic machine tools in mechanical engineering production process the teacher should ask students about the conventional machine tools such as lathes, milling, shaping, grinding machines, their use and features.

The questions will activate students exiting schemata and help students to relate new information to what they already point out the relationships between new and known information. Various methods have been proposed for dealing with this issue including techniques and resources in teaching grammar, teaching language forms and functions, schema-focused instructions for reading comprehension. The task of the teacher is to provide students with appropriate background knowledge and motivate them to activate their existing schemata.

Research objective. The study intends to find out whether teaching techniques based on schema theory can be applied effectively in university setting for developing academic reading skills and practicing grammar structures. Teachers use schemata to explain how students represent knowledge, make references about new information, perform memory searches and summarize information, make the association between new and known information.

The statement of basic materials

Schema theory has a profound impact on reading and grammar comprehension research. Schemata theory and practice will enable prospective and practicing teachers of English to better understand the grammar of the language and provide them with ideas for effectively presenting grammatical points to students. Linguists have much to contribute to teaching profession in the way of English grammar insights. We attempt to interpret and synthesize the relevant major linguistic sources for different grammatical structures in a comprehensible form. We have selected analyses from several linguistic approaches, such as transformation, traditional and case grammar [6, p. 276]. Transformational grammar is thought to be useful for understanding of syntactic operations as formation of negative sentence and question, basic sentence formation. It is better to rely on traditional and case grammar when the topic focuses more upon meaning of the word than its form as the use of verb tenses and prepositions.

The acquisition of language involves learning how to use the structures within contexts, for example passive voice and articles. The presentation of grammatical constructions will provide teachers with the most useful information available for developing skills in linguistic analysis and accumulating knowledge about the grammar of English. To encourage learners to relate new ideas to the known ones the use of advance organizers can be suggested. An advance organizer is a brief general overview of new information that is provided before the material is presented. Advance organizers activate students' existing schemata relationships between new and the known one. The activities used may include both verbal (an overview of the new chapter) and non-verbal (diagrams, schemes) instructions providing concrete models of efficient language learning. Educational psychologists have discovered that verbal learning process is more efficient when information is structured into meaningful patterns and related then to existing meaning structures in our mind [4, p. 98]. Becoming more proficient, learners can restructure incoming language data into a larger pattern and understand this pattern as a whole, the meaning structure being defined as a schema.

The approach to teaching grammar involves three dimensions of language: form or structure, semantics or meaning, and pragmatic use. Teachers can use Larsen-Freeman pie chart as a guide for developing activities that relate form to meaning and use [6, p. 280]. The relevant use of Modal verbs in grammatical structures can help students form ability to communicate in the target language.

In the teaching suggestions which follow, we have shown some ways in which the systematicity of the modals could be revealed to the learners.

Modals with Infinitive