CALL – A Corpus-based Course in Contrastive Analysis and Learner Language.Signe Oksefjell Ebeling and Hilde Hasselgård

(University of Oslo)

New Trends in Corpus Linguistics

Granada 22-24 September 2008

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1. Background Corpora and language teaching at the University of Oslo

Flexible learning environment (e-learning)

CA & LL and the Integrated Contrastive Model (CA & CIA)

2. Development and structure of the course Main features

Other components (incl. integrated corpora)

3. Teaching Practical matters

Teaching schedule

Student feedback

Exam

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Corpora and language teaching at the University of Oslo

The English department at the University of Oslo has made extensive use of corpora over the past decades

Developed the English-Norwegian Parallel Corpus (ENPC) / Oslo Multilingual Corpus (corpora of original texts and translations)

Contributed to the International Corpus of Learner English (ICLE-NICLE)

A natural development that corpora are integrated more and more into both on-campus and online teaching at the University of Oslo.

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The CALL project Flexible Learning Environment (Funded by the ”Fleksibel

læring” Initiative, University of Oslo)

Combined with on-campus teaching

Developed for students of English linguistics (2nd/3rd year of study) with main focus on:

Corpus-based approach

Contrastive analysis (English-Norwegian) (ENPC)

Learner language studies (Norwegian advanced learners of English) (ICLE/NICLE)

Combination of CA & LL

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Corpus-based Contrastive Analysiscf. Aijmer & Altenberg (1996), Johansson (2007)

Give new insight into the languages compared – insights that are likely to go unnoticed in studies of monolingual corpora

Can be used for a range of comparative purposes and increase our knowledge of language-specific, typological and cultural differences, as well as of universal features

Illuminate differences between source texts and translations, and between native and non-native texts

Can be used for a number of practical applications, e.g. lexicography, language teaching and translation

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Corpus-based Learner Language Studies(Contrastive Interlanguage Analysis)cf. Leech (1998), Granger (1998)

What linguistic features in the TL do learners use significantly more often or less often than native speakers do?

How far is the TL behaviour of the learners influenced by their NL?

In which areas do they tend to use ”avoidance strategies”, failing to exploit the full range of the TL’s expressive possibilities?

In which areas do they appear to achieve native-like or non-native-like linguistic performance?

What (in order of frequency) are the chief areas of non-native-like linguistic performance which learners in a country suffer from and need particular help with?

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Contrastive analysis and learner language

"Not all combinations of linguistic approaches are felicitous. But when they are, they can bring out fascinating facts that have hitherto been unnoticed. Two approaches that go particularly well together are Contrastive Analysis (CA) and Contrastive Interlanguage Analysis (CIA)" Gilquin: 2000/2001:95.

CIA

NL vs. IL IL vs. IL

NL: native language

IL: interlanguage (learners' language)

CA

OL vs. OL SL vs. TL

OL: original language (texts)

SL: Source language (original texts)

TL: Target language (translated texts)

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The Integrated Contrastive Model

Predictive approach

Predict potential difficulties for learners

Diagnostic approach

LL features may be traced back to the mother tongue

LL features may reflect general strategies of learning or they may have other causes.

Cf. Granger (1996), Gilquin (2000/2001)

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Main features

Short introduction to topic

Main points of required reading/lecture

Exercices

Corpora readily available

Other components

Interviews

Quizzes

Terminology checklists

Example: Week 5

Teaching contrastive analysis and learner language

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Practical matters

Campus teaching (not e-learning) but with frequent reference to the CALL platform.

Two hours a week for 14 weeks – seminar with some student activity.

19 students completed the course.

The classroom had a computer with a beamer for the teacher, but no student computers.

Two obligatory written assignments – one in contrastive analysis and the other in the analysis of learner language.

A written take-home exam which included a corpus analysis – either contrastive or learner language.

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Teaching schedule spring 2008

First half (7 weeks)

– Introduction to Contrastive analysis (CA)

– Corpora and contrastive analysis

– Lexical CA

– Grammatical CA

– Macrolinguistic CA

Second half (7 weeks)

– Introduction to learner language (LL)

– Corpora and learner language

– Lexical errors

– Characteristics of learner language

– Problems and prospects

Bringing CA and LL together

Making connections (e.g. overuse, underuse)

Using the “integrated contrastive” approach

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Student reactions (15 students answered a questionnaire)

Answer the following questions on a graded scale from 1 (poor) to 6 (very good / a lot)

1. How interesting do you think the course has been? 4.7

2. How do you evaluate your own effort in the course? 3.5

3. How much did you get out of the classroom teaching? 5.2

4. How much did you get out of reading Johansson’s compendium? 4.7

5. How much did you get out of reading the article compendium? 3.9

6. How much did you get out of using the CALL platform? 4.0

7. How much did you get out of working with exercises? 4.9

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Student reactions, cont.

Which part of the course did you like best?

– Contrastive analysis 3

– Learner language 4

– no difference 8

How often have you used the CALL platform?

– (almost) every week 2

– C. every other week 4

– C. 4-5 times 8

– C. 2-3 times 1

– once or not at all 0

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Student reactions, cont.

How user-friendly do you find the CALL platform?

– easy to use 9

– a little difficult to use 6

– very difficult to use 0

– don’t know 0

If you have used the CALL platform 4-5 times or more, what do you use? (you may tick more than one alternative):

– reading material 12

– exercises 12

– quizzes 2

– sound material 0

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Free comments – what was the best part of the course?Instruction and obligatory assignments.

I liked the exercises in class best. You then get to see what you remember and get the correct answer right away too.

Interesting material, exciting and inspiring lectures. I feel I learn a lot from writing assignments and doing exercises.

The use of humour. It’s so easy to pay attention when the teaching is sprinkled with humour.

Good lecture handouts and exercises, good information on the Internet.

The use of the parallel corpus has been very useful for learning contrastive analysis.

The demonstration of how you can systematically compare Norwegian to English for teaching purposes and not least the demonstration of typical errors that Norwegian students of English make.

This has been an incredibly exciting course. I’m going to be a teacher of English and this course has been invaluable. The course highlights “our” use of English in a good and comprehensible way and has taught me to identify errors and explain them in a simpler way.

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Which aspects of the course are you less happy with?Apart from the early start at 8 a.m. I’m actually quite happy.

That it starts at 8.15; I’m not always ready to be taught at that time!

Maybe we should have had more teaching hours. (2 students)

We could have worked more with exercises during class.

We should have had student computers in the classroom.

We should have had computers available in the classroom. There should have been more written assignments.

I think it’s a pity that we didn’t get he chance to practice using the CALL platform in class. It would have been useful to have PCs in the classroom.

Since the course was divided into two parts, CA and LL, it has often been a little difficult to see the connection between these two, but maybe it’s just me… NICE COURSE!

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Evaluation: summary

The students were generally extremely happy with the course and the way it was taught.

Many of them emphasise the benefit they got from working with exercises and the obligatory assignments; some would have liked more exercises the need for practical, hands-on work in a course like this.

Some mention the need for more teaching hours.

Many express a wish for student computers and guidance in how to use the corpora and the CALL platform.

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Exam paper (two parts had to be answered

PART I (30%)

Define and discuss THREE of the following terms / concepts with reference to relevant literature on the subject. Illustrate with examples from NICLE and/or the ENPC.

a. Interlingual vs. intralingual error

b. Lexical teddy bear

c. Congruent vs. divergent correspondences

d. Translation effects

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Part II of the exam paperWrite an essay on ONE of the following topics. You are expected to use

evidence from the ENPC and/or NICLE in your paper.

1. Explain the concept of writer/reader visibility and show how it is manifest in English texts by Norwegian learners (as compared to other groups of writers). Use the attached texts 1-4 from NICLE and LOCNESS for exemplification. In addition you should study the use of I and you in NICLE to give an account of the contexts in which they occur.

2. Study the verbs look and sound and their Norwegian correspondences in the ENPC. Include inflected forms. What do the translation patterns reveal about the uses and meanings of these words?

3. Discuss how parallel corpora and learner corpora can complement each other in the study of learner language and the improvement of language teaching.

4. Study the correspondences of Norwegian finnes (including its inflected forms) in the ENPC. What are the English correspondences? What – if any – difficulties would you assume the expression of finnes would create for Norwegian learners of English? Then study material from NICLE and state to what extent your predictions were correct.

LL

CA

LL & CA

LL & CA

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Exam statistics (19 students)

0

2

4

6

A B C D E/F

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BibliographyAijmer, Karin and Bengt Altenberg. 1996. Introduction. In Aijmer, K., B.

Altenberg and M. Johansson (eds.). Languages in Contrast. Papers from a Symposium on Text-based Cross-linguistic Studies. Lund: Lund University Press. 11-16.

Gilquin, Gaëtanelle. 2000/2001. The Integrated Contrastive Model: Spicing up your data. Languages in Contrast 3:1, 95-124.

Granger, Sylviane. 1996. From CA to CIA and back: An integrated approach to computerized bilingual and learner corpora. In Aijmer, K., B. Altenberg and M. Johansson (eds.). Languages in Contrast. Papers from a Symposium on Text-based Cross-linguistic Studies. Lund: Lund University Press. 37-51.

Johansson, Stig. 2007. Seeing through Multilingual Corpora. Amsterdam/New York: Benjamins.

Leech, Geoffrey. 1998. Preface. In Granger, S. (ed.) Learner English on Computer. London & New York: Longman. xiv-xx.

CALL Username: contrastive | Password: spring08

http://www.hf.uio.no/ilos-dyn/studier/fleksibel/contrastive_analysis/CALL/CALL.php

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Corpora

English-Norwegian Parallel Corpus

http://www.hf.uio.no/ilos/forskning/forskningsprosjekter/enpc/

International Corpus of Learner English

http://cecl.fltr.ucl.ac.be/Cecl-Projects/Icle/icle.htm

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L2 originalNorwegian

L1 translationEnglish

L1 originalEnglish

L2 translationNorwegian

Parallel original texts

Parallel translated texts

L2 original vs. L2 translationL1 original vs. L1 translation L1/2 original vs. L2/1 translation

The English-Norwegian Parallel Corpus

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