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DOCUMENT RESUME

ED 468 305 FL 027 384

AUTHOR Carpenter, Mark, Ed.

TITLE Proceedings for the Texas Foreign Language [Education]Conference (Austin, Texas, March 31-April 1, 2000).

INSTITUTION Texas Univ., Austin. Foreign Language Education Program.ISSN ISSN-0898-8471PUB DATE 2000-00-00

NOTE 228p.; Special theme issue. For individual articles, see FL027 385-397. Supported by the Foreign Language EducationStudent Association, University of Texas at Austin Cabinet of.College Councils, and University of Texas at Austin StudentGovernment.

PUB TYPE Collected Works Proceedings (021) Collected WorksSerials (022)

JOURNAL CIT Texas Papers in Foreign Language Education; v5 nl spec issFall 2000

EDRS PRICE EDRS Price MF01/PC10 Plus Postage.DESCRIPTORS Academic Standards; Acculturation; Bilingual Education;

Cultural Differences; Drama; Elementary Secondary Education;*English (Second Language); Foreign Countries; French;Heritage Education; Higher Education; Immersion Programs;Inner City; Language Teachers; Metaphors; Methods Courses;Political Influences; Poverty; Preservice Teacher Education;*Second Language Instruction; *Second Language Learning;Sociolinguistics; Spanish; Student Teacher Attitudes; TaskAnalysis; Teacher Attitudes; Tenses (Grammar); VideotapeRecordings

IDENTIFIERS Lebanon; South Korea; Vygotsky (Lev S)

ABSTRACT

Articles in this issue include the following: "Chat in EFL:Communicative Humanistic Acculturation Techniques" (Daniel Evans); "TaskInterpretation and Task Effectiveness: A Vygotskian Analysis of a French L2Classroom Task" (Lindsy Myers); "Envisioning a Standards-Based MethodsCourse: Preparing Second Language Educators for the 21st Century" (KathleenBueno); "Teachers' Beliefs about Language Learning and Teaching: A Cross-Cultural Comparison" (Nae-Dong Yang); "Foreign Language Methods Students'Beliefs about Language Learning and Teaching" (Stasie Harrington and TammyHertel); "From a Foreign Language Perspective: A Snapshot View of a DualLanguage Program in Two Inner-City High-Poverty Elementary Schools" (SherryCoy and Lucinda Litherland); "An Infusion Curriculum for the HeritageSpeaker" (Barbara Gonzalez-Pino); "Multiple Metaphors: Teaching Second-Language Tense and Aspect to English Speakers" (Karen Cody); "Languagethrough Theatre: Using Drama in the Language Classroom" (Sarah Dodson);"Using Video to Teach for Sociolinguistic Competence in the Foreign LanguageClassroom" (Carayn Witten); "Political and Socio-Cultural Factors in ForeignLanguage Education: The Case of Lebanon" (Rula Diab); "A Qualitative Approachto Authenticity in the Foreign Language Classroom: tr Study of UniversityStudents Learning English in Korea" (Dong-Kyoo Kim); "An Exploration of Pre-Service Teacher Perceptions of Second Language Learners in the MainstreamClassroom" (Sherry Marx); and a review of "The Non-Native Teacher" (Jeong-Yeon Kim). (Papers contain references.) (SM)

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Texas Papers in

Foreign Language Education

Special Issue: Proceedings for the

Texas Foreign Language Conference 2000

ISSN # 0898-8471

Volume 5, Number 1, Fall 2000

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Foreign Language Education ProgramThe University of Texas at Austin

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ISSN # 0898-8471

Texas Papers in

Foreign LanguageEducation

SPECIAL ISSUE: PROCEEDINGS FOR THETEXAS FOREIGN LANGUAGE CONFERENCE 2000

Volume 5 Number 1 Fall 2000

1 DANIEL EVANS CHAT in EFL Communicative Humanistic Acculturation Techniques9 LINDSY MYERS Task Interpretation and Task Effectiveness: A Vygotskian Analysis of a

French L2 Classroom Task23 KATHLEEN BUENO Envisioning a Standards-Based Methods Course: Preparing Sec-

ond Language Educators for the 21st Century39 NAE-DONG YANG Teachers' Beliefs About Language Learning and Teaching: A

Cross-Cultural Comparison53 STASIE HARRINGTON & TAMMY HERTEL Foreign Language Methods Students' Be-

liefs About Language Learning and Teaching69 SHERRY COY & LUCRECIA LITHERLAND From a Foreign Language Perspective: A

Snapshot View of a Dual Language Program in Two Inner-City High-Poverty ElementarySchools

93 BARBARA GONZALEZ-PINO An Infusion Curriculum for the Heritage Speaker111 KAREN CODY Multiple Metaphors: Teaching Second-Language Tense nd Aspect to

English Speakers129 SARAH DODSON Language Through Theatre: Using Drama in the Language Class-

room143 CARYN WITTEN Using Video to Teach for Sociolinguistic Competence in the Foreign

Language Classroom177 RULA DIAB Political and Socio-Cultural Factors in Foreign Language Education: The

ease of Lebanon189 DONG -KYOO KIM A Qualitative Approach to Authenticity in the Foreign Language

Classroom: A Study of University Students Learning English in Korea207 SHERRY MARX An Exploration of Pre-Service Teacher Perceptions of Second Language

Learners in the Mainstream Classroom223 REVIEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS The Non-Native Teacher Reviewed by JEONG-

YEON KIM

FOREIGN LANGUAGE EDUCATION PROGRAM

THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

3.

Texas Papers in Foreign Language Education(TPFLE)

Chief EditorMark Carpenter

Associate EditorsJoe Haug lie, Char la Lorenzen, Charles Nelson, Mary Petron, John Sutterby

Advisory BoardZena Moore, Terri Wells, Charles Nelson, E. G. Kim-Rivera, Este la Teng

Faculty AdvisorZena Moore

TPFLE is the journal of the Foreign Language Education Program of theUniversity of Texas at Austin.

The Editors and Board gratefully acknowledge the following organizations who,through their generosity, have made possible this issue of TPFLE:

Foreign Language Education Student Association

University of Texas at Austin Cabinet of College Councils

University of Texas at Austin Student Government



4

Texas Papers in

Foreign LanguageEducation

Contemporary Issues inForeign and Second Language

Learning and Teaching



5

Contributors:

KATHLEEN BUENO is an Associate Professor of Spanish at Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville. Her research interests include educational technology, second languageacquisition, and teacher education.

KAREN CODY is a doctoral candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, where she previouslyearned her M.A. in Romance Linguistics. She has taught French and Spanish at both the

secondary and university levels.SHERRY COY is Assistant Director of Curriculum for the Oklahoma City Public Schools, and she

coordinates the Title VII Dual Language programs. In addition, she is completing coursework

for her Ed.D. in Educational Leadership at Nova Southeastern University, FortLauderdale,

Florida.RULA LUTFY DIAB is a Ph.D. candidate in Foreign Language Education at the University of Texas

at Austin. Her research interests include learner variables, socio-cultural factors, and second

language writing.SARAH DODSON is pursuing M.A.'s in both TESL and French at Colorado State University, where

she teaches ESL and French. She is has recently directed "La Cantatrice Chauve" for theuniversity French Club.

DANIEL W. EVANS is Associate Professor of TESL/Applied Linguistics in the School ofInternational Studies, Saint Michael's College, Colchester, Vermont. He has taught Englishand/or trained teachers in South Korea, Japan, Greece, Vietnam, and Texas.

BARBARA GONZALES-PINO is Associate Professor in the Division of Education at the University ofTexas at San Antonio. She has focused on classroom and proficiency testing of speaking in

her many publications, presentations, and training activities.STASIE C. HARRINGTON is a Ph.D. candidate in Spanish Applied Linguistics at the Pennsylvania

State University. Her research interests include second language teacher education,technology and language education, and language testing.

TAMMY JANDREY HERTEL, Assistant Professor of Spanish at Juniata College, is a Ph.D. candidate inSpanish Applied Linguistics at the Pennsylvania State University. Her research interestsinclude the acquisition of L2 syntax, acquisition during study abroad, and teacher training.

DONG -KYOO KIM received his Ph.D. in Foreign Language Education at the University of Texas atAustin in May 1999. Currently, he is a lecturer at Pusan National University in Korea. His

research interests include foreign language listening comprehension, language learning

strategies, and computer-assisted language learning.LUCRECIA LITHERLAND is Associate Professor of Language at Oklahoma Baptist University. Her

areas of interest include theories in second language acquisition, and current developments

in bilingualism and language policy.SHERRY MARX is a Ph.D. candidate in the Foreign Language Education program at the University

of Texas at Austin. Her interests center on improving the educational opportunities ofEnglish language learners of color through better teacher education.

LINDSY MYERS is a doctoral student of French Linguistics in the Department of French and Italianat the University of Texas at Austin, where she teaches lower division French courses.

CARYN WITTEN is a Ph.D. candidate in Spanish Linguistics at the University of Texas at Austin.Her concentration is on the use of video to teach sociolinguistic competence in the Spanish L2

classroom.NAE-DONG YANG is Associate Professor in the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures

at National Taiwan University. Her research interests include second language learningstrategies, learners' and teachers' beliefs, and learner training.

To our readers,

This issue of TPFLE celebrates the beginning of a beautiful friendship or maybewe should call it a marriage of convenience for in the following pages you'll find tenarticles that made their first impact on FLE scholarship as presentations at TexFLEC2000, that is, the Texas Foreign Language Education Conference.

Hosted by the Foreign Language Education Students' Association (FLESA) at theUniversity of Texas at Austin on March 31 and April 1, TexFLEC 2000 was the first ofwhat promises to be an important series of conferences in foreign language education.The conference drew speakers and attendees from the far reaches of the U.S. indeed, theworld as well as from the faculty and students of the FLE Program and languagedepartments at UT. So rich was the exchange of ideas at the conference that manyattendees and speakers expressed a desire to have a copy of the conference proceedings.

That's where TPFLE comes in. TPFLE readers and TexFLEC conference goers arepretty much the same sort of people. Why not combine our strengths and devote a portionof our journal to representative papers from the conference? Our editors were alreadybusy culling through a stack of manuscripts for inclusion in this issue. They would justhave to make the stack a little taller. And that's exactly what we've done. Of the thirteenarticles in this issue, ten are based on papers presented at the conference, while threearrived to us through the usual channels of submission.

First, let's review the conference papers. The first article is "CHAT in EFLCommunicative Humanistic Acculturation Techniques," by Daniel Evans. This paperpresents a surprisingly simple but logical way to make an asset of an EFL teacher'spredicament as a foreigner. Next is Lindsy Myers's "Task Interpretation and TaskEffectiveness: A Vygotskian Analysis of a French L2 Classroom Task." This articleexplores the potential of meaningful, goal-directed tasks as productive settings forlanguage learning. The next article, "Envisioning a Standards-Based Methods Course:Preparing Second Language Educators for the 21st Century," by Kathleen Bueno,describes a current model for pre-service training, reviews second language methodssyllabi, and reflects upon a particular methods course all in the process of building anunderstanding of what a standards-based second language methods course might be.

Two articles focus on language teaching and learning beliefs held by futureteachers. In "Teachers' Beliefs About Language Learning and Teaching: A Cross-Cultural Comparison," Nae-Dong Yang examines the beliefs of elementary schoolteachers in Taiwan and compares their beliefs with those of language teachers in the U.S.In the other study, "Foreign Language Methods Students' Beliefs About LanguageLearning and Teaching," Stasie Harrington and Tammy Hertel survey students inlanguage teaching methods courses to identify common student-held preconceptionsabout language learning and teaching.

Two articles reflect upon the dual-cultural status of many language learners inU.S. schools. In "From a Foreign Language Perspective: A Snapshot View of the Dual-Language Program in Two Inner-City High-Poverty Elementary Schools," Sherry Coyand Lucrecia Litherland describe a program to develop bilingual and biliteracy skills intwo urban elementary schools. Next, Barbara Gonzcilez-Pino, in "An Infusion

Curriculum for the Heritage Speaker of Spanish," reviews program models for teachingSpanish to heritage speakers in urban commuter institutions and reports on anexperiment to infuse materials about Southwest Spanish into second-, third-, and fourth-semester Spanish classes.

Finally, three articles discuss classroom techniques for helping students developlanguage and cultural skills. "Multiple Metaphors: Teaching Tense and Aspect toEnglish Speakers," by Karen Cody, proposes a synthesis of instructional methods(traditional plus constructivist) that incorporates metaphors of various types to helpEnglish speakers acquire a native-like use of tense and aspect. Sarah Dodson, in "FAQs:Learning Language Through Drama," shows how techniques of the stage can be used toteach languages. In our last article from the Conference, "Using Video to Teach forSociolinguistic Competence in the Foreign Language Classroom," Caryn Wittendescribes an input enhancement technique that incorporates video and discusses the effectof video on improving sociolinguistic competence.

Those ten articles are from TexFLEC, and they are presented first in this issue,but that is not the end of what we have to offer. Also included are three additionalarticles, each with an unusual slant on FLE education. In "Political and Socio-CulturalFactors in Foreign Language Education: The Case of Lebanon," Rula Diab describes howpolitical, social, and cultural issues affect the motivation and attitudes of Lebanese EFLstudents. In "A Qualitative Approach to Authenticity in the Foreign LanguageClassroom: A Study of University Students Learning English in Korea," Dong-KyooKim studies the effects of authentic instructional input on learning attitudes andlanguage proficiency. In our final article, Sherry Marx ("An Exploration of Pre-ServiceTeacher Perceptions of Second Language Learners in the Mainstream Classroom")discusses the different ways White and Hispanic pre-service teachers relate to Englishlanguage learners they are tutoring.

Thirteen articles, along with Jeong-Yeon Kim's review, make this issue fertileground for discovery among those of us committed to FLE research and practice. We atTPFLE want to thank the many FLESAns who made TexFLEC and hence this specialissue of TPFLE possible. We especially salute E.G. Kim-Rivera, former President ofFLESA and founder of the Conference, and Terri Wells, current President of FLESA andCo-Chair of TexFLEC 2000, both of whom blazed the trail for many TexFLECs to comeand, in doing so, raised our sights a little higher.

December 31, 2000

8iv

CHAT in EFL Communicative Humanistic AcculturationTechniques

DANIEL W. EVANS, School of International Studies, Saint Michael's College

This paper introduces the concept of communicative humanistic acculturationteaching techniques and presents examples of activities used in university EFLclasses in South Korea. The activities elicited the aid of the students in the roles ofadviser, facilitator, and counselor in the teacher's on-going struggle to cope withadjustment to living in Korea. They enhanced learners' acquisition of English by(1) providing realistic, purposeful communicative encounters that motivated stu-dents to express themselves; (2) establishing a personal relationship between stu-dents and the foreign teacher; and, by extension, (3) fostering positive attitudestoward the language, culture, and people of the United States.

INTRODUCTIONPreliminary versions of the title of this paper contained the words "expos-

ing myself in the classroom." Although I decided to select the more technicallydescriptive title, I still think that "exposing myself" rather accurately captures thegist of the paper: the idea of getting personal in the language class in ways thatwill enhance the learning experience.

A while back, I had the occasion to visit an old friend, Rob, with whom Ihad served in the Peace Corps in Korea many years ago. Rob was still involvedin the business of teaching English as a second language but no longer to bright-eyed, eager, and innocent Korean university students. Instead, he had found ateaching job in a maximum-security prison. Certainly there must be a great dealof satisfaction involved in that kind of teaching, but one thing he told me abouthis job made a very memorable impression on me. He was not allowed to giveout any sort of personal information about himself, his friends, or his familynot even real names. As a long-time English language teacher I was stunned atthe thought of the limitations of such a teaching situation. I found the notion to-tally stifling! When you develop relationships with people, you have to share in-formation, opinions, attitudes, and values not to do so creates a cold, imper-sonal, environment. It may be businesslike and efficient, but it is certainly not"humanistic."

As we know, Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) purports to bebased on a humanistic philosophy of education as one of its cornerstones (Dubin,& Olshtain, 1986; McNeil, 1977), and I guess what humanism really means is thatwe should develop real human relationships with students. By doing so, we ac-complish more than just being nice people. A warm relationship of mutual hu-man respect leads students to like their teacher, and then, by extension, to liketheir class, the learning, the target language, the target culture, and the peoplewho are members of that culture. All this liking, that is, this

* Presented at the Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2000 (TexFLEC2000), University of Texas at Austin, March 31-April 1, 2000.

2 Texas Papers in Foreign Language Education

set of positive attitudes, serves to en-hance and maximize the learningprocess. The facilitating effect of posi-tive attitudes is a well-established andwell-accepted principle of second lan-guage acquisition, supported by nu-merous empirical studies, and per-haps more importantly, it is an intui-tively appealing and obvious notion.

A CHAT ACTIVITY FOR DAY ONESo I had my humanistic princi-

ples in mind a couple of years agowhen I was scheduled to meet mynew English classes for the first day ofteaching at Jeonju University in SouthKorea. I had been offered the oppor-tunity to return to the country where Ihad spent my Peace Corps days, thistime for one semester as an exchangeprofessor. On that first day, I had theabove-mentioned set of humanisticaffective goals in mind, but I also hadin mind a set of cogni-tive/ academic/ diagnostic goals aswell. I had no clear idea of the stu-dents' proficiencies in any of the skillsof English, especially listening com-prehension and speaking. So I waslooking for a first-day, get-acquaintedtype activity that would satisfy bothsets of objectives. I came up with theTeacher's Autobiographical Dictation(adapted from Davis & Rinvolucri,1988). In this activity, the teacher pre-pares sentences about various aspectsof his (the masculine pronoun is usedbecause the teacher is male in thiscase) life: childhood, school days, pro-fessional life, hobbies, etc. He presentsthem to the class in groups of foursentences of which three are true andone is untrue. As students listen to the

sentences, they are instructed to writedown only the ones they believe to beuntrue. It is a matter of guessing sincethey have no real way of knowing theinformation. As the students listenand write, the teacher can walkaround observing how well they areable to comprehend and reproducethe sentences. This process providesan informal diagnosis of both listeningcomprehension and writing.

Below is an example set ofstatements about my graduate schooldays at the University of Texas that Imade up and shared with the Tex-FLEC audience in Austin. In the pres-entation, it provided a link betweenmany audience members and me andhelped the rest of the presentation togo smoothly. "Listen carefully andwrite down the sentence that youthink is not true," I instructed.

A. I lived in housing made from con-verted WWII Army barracks.

B. I took three courses from Dr.Bordie.

C. I taught at the Texas IEP where Ihad an office in a closet.

D. I didn't care much for Austin, but Iliked the University.

(Of course choice D is untrue. Whocouldn't love Austin?)

The appendix contains a com-plete list of the statements I used inKorea for this activity. The statementsare designed to provide leads to vari-ous aspects of U.S. culture and lifethat can be exploited in further class-

0

room communication. They also led tothe sharing of several bits of ratherpersonal information about theteacher such as being an overweightchild, not having a steady girlfriend inhigh school, going through a divorce,and the death of a beloved pet dog. Irealize that some teachers may notfeel comfortable discussing such per-sonal issues in class with their stu-dents. In any humanistic activity, par-ticipants should always have a clearlyunderstood option not to participate ifthey prefer, (Moskowitz, 1978). Like-wise, in this activity the teacher con-trols the content of the dictation andhas the option not to include whateverhe chooses not to reveal. I myself wastotally comfortable sharing these de-tails, and I felt closer to the studentsfor having done do.

Step two of this activity in-volved placing students into groups offour or five. Each group was to dis-cuss the sentences and arrive at agroup consensus as to what the un-true statements were. Of course, thiswas a communicative activity that re-quired much discussion and negotia-tion of meaning. It also provided anopportunity for the teacher to observeand diagnose students' speaking pro-ficiency levels. Each group reportedtheir consensus to the class as a wholeand the teacher finally revealed thefalse statement and elaborated on thediscussion of each statement.

As a follow-up activity, stu-dents were asked to prepare forhomework similar sets of true/untruestatements about themselves to sharewith others in small groups in the nextclass. I was very pleased with the

Chat in EFL 3

success of the Teacher's Autobio-graphical Dictation activity: It cap-tured the interest of the students; itimmediately put them at ease with thedaunting new foreigner in their midstand planted the seeds for a warm per-sonal relationship and positive arrayof attitudes; it motivated them to usetheir English for real communication;and it provided me with the academicdiagnostic information I needed forcurriculum planning.

THE POWER OF ACCULTURATION INESL LEARNING/TEACHING

So next I began consideringwhat else I could do to maximize thedevelopment of communicative skillsin this EFL environment. I had previ-ously had plenty of teaching experi-ence both in EFL and ESL contexts. Itwas painfully obvious that the mostrapid and efficient development ofEnglish communication skills was inESL contexts such as those of SaintMichael's English Language Programswhere I currently teach. What exactlyis it that promotes language learningand communication skills so well inthe ESL context? Of course the obvi-ous answer is the unlimited amount ofexposure to English the total immer-sion environment provides; there is nosubstitute for quantity of exposure.But, to go beyond the obvious, let ustry to examine some specific outcomesof the ESL immersion model that con-tribute to learners' success.

I have observed that somelearners progress much better thanothers in the ESL context. These arethe ones, I believe, who more activelyengage themselves in a dynamic ac-


culturation process a process thatcreates a multitude of interactions inwhich real communicative needs haveto be satisfied for the learner's verysurvival. There are several aspects tothis survival. (1) There is survival interms of basic human needs. They haveto interact in English to accomplishthe numerous transactions involved inlife: obtaining food and shelter, pay-ing bills, buying things, etc. Lots oflanguage learning takes place whenour basic human physical needs are atstake. (2) Then there is survival in theacademic sense. ESL students have toacculturate themselves to new expec-tations, processes, and norms of aca-demic life in the United States. Thisaspect of acculturation also requires alot of communication and languagedevelopment as English becomes thesole vehicle for academic activity. (3)Thirdly, there is social survival. ESLlearners in the United States must de-velop social relationships with othersthrough English both outside theclassroom and inside as well. Outside,the more successful learners seek outrelationships with Americans and fel-low ESL learners from other cultures.They make friends, and in the processdevelop their sociolinguistic compe-tence. Inside the classroom too, thereis a powerful social dynamic takingplace. Students find themselves thrustinto a random group of fellow learn-ers who represent, ideally, a widerange of ethnic and cultural back-grounds. Their experiences differgreatly, as do their beliefs and values.They need to seek out commonground and create bonds in order towork and learn together as a cohesive

unit. The learner becomes the repre-sentative of his or her culture andfeels an obligation to describe and ex-plain its ways as he or she finds outabout the ways of others. It is a won-derful and beautiful acculturationprocess that is one of the best parts ofESL study.

APPLYING ACCULTURATIONTECHNIQUES IN EFL CONTEXTS

Of course diversity of this na-ture and its resulting acculturationprocesses do not exist in the EFLsituation in locations such as SouthKorean universities. Comparing theEFL context to that of ESL point bypoint, first, there is very limited expo-sure to the target language and thetarget language fulfills little if any realcommunicative purposes. It is notused to provide basic human needs, itis not the vehicle for academic sur-vival, nor is it used for social interac-tions. Rather than a diverse group offellow learners using English to forgenew bonds and exchange cultural in-formation, the Korean students' fel-lows are already well known to oneanother and share virtually identicalcultural backgrounds. In short, thereare no acculturation processes to pro-pel the language learning. There is nocompelling need to communicate inEnglish.

But soon I came to realizeperhaps as I struggled to open a bankaccount, buy a bus ticket, or greet acolleague in my elementary Koreanthat there certainly was a dynamic ac-culturation process taking place. Itwas I, the helpless foreigner, who wasengaged in the acculturation strug-

12

gle not my students. I should try totake advantage of this acculturationprocess to create communicative pur-poses that might enhance the commu-nicative skills of my students. Follow-ing humanistic principles, I wouldopen up my life to them and let themvicariously experience my attempts toacculturate myself to my new envi-ronment. I would rely on their inher-ent Korean sense of generous hospital-ity to motivate them to try to help mein my struggle to survive. I wouldalso call upon their strong pride intheir own fascinating culture to moti-vate them to educate this "ignorantWesterner" in their customs and valuesystem.

THE "HELPLESS FOREIGNER"SCENARIO

The idea itself is nothing new. Iam quite certain that a lot of foreignteachers make use of the "helpless for-eigner" scenario from time to time. Irecall a very effective writing assign-ment I gave to a class at a Japaneseuniversity years ago when I had justbegun a teaching position there. I hada brand new bank account with ashinny new ATM card. The only prob-lem was that the instructions on themachine were written entirely inJapanese kanji and kana characters.Reading the instructions and using themachine were beyond me. I sharedmy dilemma with my class and gavethem the assignment of going to myspecific bank and writing a clear set ofinstructions in English, complete withdiagrams, for performing the variousfunctions I needed to perform on theATM. It was great! I was finally able

Chat in EFL 5

to retrieve my cash! And the studentshad used their English for a truly use-ful real-life communicative purpose.We were all happy, and, on the affec-tive side, we bonded a bit.

Countless language activitiesusing any or all language skills can bedeveloped that allow EFL students toprovide useful information that theforeign teacher truly needs to survivein and to better understand the hostculture. Some examples include:

How to take a train/ bus to .

What/ how to order in a restau-rant.

What kind of holiday is

USING CHAT ACTIVITIES IN KOREAThe following are brief descrip-

tions of several other ways in which Imade use of the Communicative Hu-manistic Acculturation Techniqueduring my semester in Korea.

Gift Ranking ActivityI told the class about my en-

gagement to Sinyoung, a Korean bornand raised in Japan, along with infor-mation about her family. I explainedthat I would travel to Japan over theCh'usok holidays (a kind of KoreanThanksgiving) to meet the family forthe first time. I was having trouble de-ciding what to take as a gift for thefamily. In small groups, students dis-cussed the question and mutuallyagreed on the five best gift ideas inorder of preference. Each group thenreported their results to the wholeclass. Much explanation of traditional

1 3


Korean gift items was required as wellas information on cost of items andwhere they could be bought in the lo-cal area, how to get to the store ormarket, etc.

Meeting Future In-Laws Role PlayAs a follow-up activity to the

previous gift-ranking activity, I admit-ted to the class that I was quite nerv-ous about meeting my future in-laws.How should I act? What should I say?What will they say, ask, and do? Ithen had groups prepare role playsenacting the scene and playing theroles of Sinyoung her father, hermother, and me. Scripts were gener-ated, skits were rehearsed, and finallythey were presented in class and re-corded on videotape. After viewingthe videos, the class could discuss andevaluate each group's efforts, perhapseven casting votes on best skit, bestactor, actress, etc.

Reacting to Video of Japan TripI showed the class a video that I

took on my trip to Japan that includedscenes of my fiancee's home, a typicalresidential neighborhood, a super-market, a meal in a Japanese restau-rant, and various points of interest inKyoto and Osaka. I asked students toreact in writing to what they saw, dis-cussing their impressions of Japan.Because of historical realities, Koreanshave deep seated, often negative,emotional reactions to Japan. Manystudents wrote that viewing the coun-try through this vicarious personalconnection caused them to see Japanvery differently, in a much more posi-tive manner than they otherwise

14

might have. Many of their paperswere quite touching.

Two-Brothers Midterm ExamThe personal humanistic as-

pects of CHAT can be applied even onsomething as formal and impersonalas a test. As part of a mid-term exam, Iused true personal data about mybrother and myself. The students hadstudied basic sentence combiningtechniques through a textbook exer-cise on the Kennedy brothers (e.g.,while John, Robert, and Edward Ken-nedy each shared the same environ-mental influences growing up, theyturned out to be quite differentadults). Following that example, I cre-ated a similar exercise that comparedme to my brother. After combiningthe sentences into a guided para-graph, students created short essayscomparing and contrasting them-selves to a sibling or close friend.

CONCLUSIONWhile the EFL environment of-

ten presents more challenges andfewer opportunities for language ac-quisition than does the ESL context,the employment of CHATcommunicative, humanistic, accul-turation techniques can help capturesome aspects of the ESL context thatmake it such an effective acquisitionenvironment. The communicative as-pect provides realistic and purposefulexchange of information and moti-vates learners to express themselves.The humanistic aspect establishes per-sonal relationships among studentsand teacher and fosters positive atti-tudes toward all aspects of the lan-

guage, culture, and learning experi-ence. The acculturation aspect exploitsa process of adapting to and survivingin a new environment to propel thelearning experience. In the EFL teach-ing context, the acculturation processof the foreign teacher substitutes forthat of the students in ESL contexts.

REFERENCES

Davis, P., & Rinvolucri, M. (1988). Dic-tation: New methods, new possi-bilities. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.

Chat in EFL 7

Dubin, F., & Olshtain, E. (1986). Coursedesign: Developing programs andmaterials for language learning.Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-versity Press.

McNeil, J.D. (1977). Curriculum: Acomprehensive introduction. Bos-ton: Little, Brown and Com-pany.

Moskowitz, G. (1978). Caring and shar-ing in the foreign language class:A sourcebook on humanistic tech-niques. Boston: Heinle &Heinle.

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Texas Papers in Foreign Language Education

APPENDIXTEACHER'S AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL DICTATION

You will hear groups of four sentences about your teacher. Only three of the sen-tences are true. Write down only the one statement that you think is not true.

ChildhoodI was born in the state of Missouri.I never went to kindergarten.I was always a skinny kid. (false)I was a pretty good student.

High School DaysI played on my high school football team.I had a steady girlfriend. (false)I got my driver's license when I was 16.My favorite sport was tennis.

University DaysEnglish was my major. (false)I lived in an apartment off-campus.I rode a motorcycle to school.I tried skiing for the first time.

Peace Corps DaysI taught English at Dongguk University.I got married in Korea to a Korean woman.I got a black belt in Taekwondo.I traveled to Thailand on my winter vacation. (false)

After Peace CorpsI worked in the world's tallest building.My wife and I had one son, no daughters.I went back to the University of Missouri for graduate school. (false)We came back to Korea for another two years.

In JapanI worked for Waseda University in Tokyo. (false)I had a van and a motorcycle.My son could speak Japanese better than I.My wife and I got a divorce.

In VermontI drive a red sports car.I have a large dog. (falsemy dog recently died)I live alone in a big house.I play an electric guitar.

16

Task Interpretation and Task Effectiveness: A Vygotskian Analysisof a French L2 Classroom Task*

LINDSY L. MYERS, University of Texas at Austin

This paper focuses on second language learning through task-based interaction.Language tasks encourage L2 learning by using language as a tool to accomplisha goal. This study analyzes the interaction of first-semester French students whileperforming a group task created according to criteria in recent research by Lee.Task interpretation varied among groups including type of interaction, division oflabor, use of English as a mediator, scaffolding, meta-task talk, and off-task talk.However, components of an effective task are apparent: interaction between formand meaning, real communication, interactive learning, later success, and posi-tive classroom morale. Lee's suggestions for task-based classroom interaction arecompatible with a Vygotskian framework for learning. Together they provide thetheoretical and practical basis for the potential of tasks in the classroom.

INTRODUCTION

This paper focuses on second language learning through task-based inter-action as well as the compatibility of the theories of task-based language learningand Vygotsky's sociocultural theory. Vygotsky claims that learning occursthrough interaction. Task-based learning is built on the premise that learning inthe L2 occurs through interactional modifications; paired work and group workprovide such an opportunity. The goal of this paper is to identify and explain thecomponents of an effective language task. In order to accomplish this goal, aclose examination of the interaction that occurs during the completion of a taskfrom a Vygotskian perspective is presented.

Task-Based LearningLee (2000) proposes the use of language tasks in the foreign language

classroom in an attempt to provide an arena for real communication. He rejectsthe typical classroom definition of communication where the teacher questionsand students answer. This type of interaction provides no linguistic supportyielding long moments of unproductive and uncomfortable silence. Lee thereforeredefines communication as the "expression, interpretation and negotiation ofmeaning" (p. 1). He calls for a more social view of communication; "to assert thatlanguage learners are communicating is to assert that they are given opportuni-ties to say what they mean and to work toward a mutual understanding withother interlocutors" (p. 26). In order for real communication to occur in the class-room, the instructor should abandon the need for full control and allow studentsto interact on their own.

* Paper presented at the Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2000 (TexFLEC2000), University of Texas at Austin, March 31-April 1, 2000, Austin, Texas.

17


Lee's answer to the need for commu-nication in the classroom is the lan-guage task performed in groups. Ac-cording to Lee, "the purpose of lan-guage use is to accomplish some taskrather than to practice any particularlanguage forms" (p. 12). Therefore,language tasks give an opportunity touse language in a more purposefuland natural way. In addition, "bycompleting tasks, learners use lan-guage as a means to an end" (p. 31).Tasks allow students to accomplishsomething with their language skills,no matter how basic they are. Lee be-lieves that

task-based activities addressthe shortcomings inherent ina classroom dynamic bornout of the restricted definitionthat communication = question& answer. Task-based activi-ties focused on problem solv-ing, consensus building andinterdependent group func-tioning not only promote theactive participation of eachindividual class member butcan be constructed in such away as to provide learnersvarying degrees of linguisticsupport. (p. 33)

Therefore, Lee believes that tasks willallow the classroom to be more pro-ductive, interactive and certainlycommunicative.

Lee claims that the design of thetask is essential for its success. He in-sists that not all task-based groupwork is helpful; it cannot be gratui-tous, and should not contain loose orunconnected information. He givesthe following components for struc-turing a good task:

1) Identify a desired informationaloutcome.

2) Break down the topic into subtop-ics.

3) Create and sequence concretetasks for the learners to do, for ex-ample, create lists, fill in charts,make tables

4) Build in linguistic support, eitherlexical or grammatical or both.(pp. 35-36)

Thus the well-organized task encour-ages extended discourse in real-timeon a certain topic with an informationgap. Carefully structured tasks willencourage and support communica-tion.

Sociocultural Theory and SecondLanguage Learning

Lee briefly makes a reference toVygotsky's sociocultural theory; in-deed there are many components ofVygotsky's model of learning whichare relevant to the discussion of task-based learning. Sociocultural theory isnot unknown in the field of secondlanguage acquisition; there exist manydirect and useful applications of thetheory to the present discussion.

Learning Through InteractionVygotsky claims that learning

occurs through interaction. Accordingto Lantolf, (forthcoming) "sociocul-tural theory argues that while sepa-rate, thinking and speaking are tightlyinterrelated in a dialectic unity inwhich publicly derived speech com-pletes privately initiated thought." Inother words, social interaction leads toindividual development. Therefore,group activities not only necessarily

18

Vygotskian Analysis of French L2 Classroom Task 11

encourage learning but provide a con-text for the indispensable element ofinteraction.

Activity TheoryActivity theory claims that mo-

tivation determines the realization ofany task. Coughlin and Duff (1994)propose that the same task does not,imply the same activity on the part ofparticipants. They provide the usefuldistinctions between task, which is abehavioral blueprint, and activity,which is the behavior produced whenan individual or group performs atask. They point out that

participants have their ownobjectives, and act accordingto these and the researchers'objectives, all of which arenegotiated. . . over the courseof the interaction. Further-more, activities have no in-herent parameters or bounda-ries, except those imposed bythe task and by the interpre-tations and expectations ofthe individuals involved in agiven task. In a language-based activity, constraints ontask performance might in-clude the level of knowledge(cultural, linguistic) shared bythe interactants, or the timeand interest they are willing,or able, to invest in order tocomplete the task at hand. (p.175)

Rogoff (1990) also points out that ac-tivities are interpreted and carried outin accordance with goals. Therefore,meaning and purpose are central indefining an activity. Activity theorythus may shed light on the implemen-tation and evaluation of the success of

tasks in the second language class-room.

MediationAnother related element relevant tothis discussion is the theory of media-tion. In sociocultural theory, it is be-lieved that the mind uses tools to me-diate the world. An important methodof mediation is talk. In order to regu-late a task, students mediate the activ-ity through speech. Anton andDiCamilla (1998) point out that the L1is an important tool in mediation forsecond language learners. Therefore,the L1 is not to be feared in the L2classroom. Indeed it may be construc-tively manipulated in certain contextsto encourage learning. Additionally,Brooks and Donato (1994) point outthat "what might appear on the sur-face as non-relevant task talk is in factmediating the participants' controlover the language and procedures ofthe task, each other, and ultimately theself" (p. 271). The acts of mediationand regulation therefore serve as animportant step toward learning.

Tasks and Sociocultural TheoryStudies that examine the com-

patibility of task-based learning andconcepts of sociocultural theory makean important contribution to under-standing how theory has practical ap-plication in the classroom. Brooks andDonato (1994) looked at tasks from aVygotskian perspective and concludedthat a language task is a cognitive ac-tivity, thereby justifying the applica-tion and relevance of Vygotsky in thepresent discussion. They point to thebelief that tasks, rather than being ex-

19


ternally defined, "are in fact internallyconstructed through the moment-to-moment verbal interactions of thelearners during actual task perform-ance" (p. 272). Therefore, studentsneed to be given freedom in interac-tion so that they are able to regulatetheir own activity. This idea is verycompatible with the beliefs of Lee whoargues for the need to give learnerscontrol of their learning. It has beenshown that students need to and willsuccessfully regulate their learningunder the right circumstances.Through interaction, they will justifyand redefine the task, scaffold andcommunicate.

THE STUDY

InstrumentThe researcher created a lan-

guage task based on the criteria asproposed by Lee including a goal, top-ics and subtopics, sequenced tasks andlinguistic support (See Appendices Aand B). The task focused on a particu-lar grammatical point of French, thepassé compose, or the compound past.The goal and topic included discus-sion, comparison and categorization ofactivities of the class from the previousweekend. At the end of the discussion,the students were supposed to be ableto report to the class whether theirpartner was "intellectual" "sporty" or"inactive" according to the kinds ofactivities they did. The task also con-tained a nice progression from inputto output, including a related assign-ment for the next day.

SubjectsThe subjects were 23 students

of first semester French including 18women and five men. These studentshad been doing similarly structuredtasks throughout the semester. Thestudents preformed the task in eightself-selected groups of two, three, orfour. In most cases, the groups were ofthe same composition as many infor-mal daily exercises.

ProcedureEach group of students re-

corded themselves for the entirety ofthe task. There were no specific in-structions given on how to carry outthe task (that is, the language used, thekinds of answers produced, the truthvalue involved, separate vs. groupwork etc.) except the written instruc-tions. The in-class instructions by theresearcher were paraphrases of the in-structions on the worksheet. The re-searcher moderated the task entirely inFrench except while addressing indi-vidual group questions. The re-searcher did control movement fromsection to section by check-ups andfurther instructions. The total time forthis task was approximately 20+ min-utes.

TASK INTERPRETATION: ONE TASK,EIGHT (OR 23!) ACTIVITIES

The discussion that followsconsists of a comparison of group in-teraction that occurred during comple-tion of the task. The interpretation ofthe task is defined by the approachestaken for completion of the task. Eachgroup had a different approach to thetask, yet there were several common

20


themes and methods that were appar-ent in the interactions. Relevant com-ponents of sociocultural theory are in-corporated where appropriate.

Structure of Group InteractionAn important element of task

interpretation is how students organ-ized their interaction. There appearedto be four major ways for groups tostructure their interaction, and theseare treated in the following sub-sections. It is important to note that ifa group interaction needed adjust-ment, groups easily adopted a newway to interact. However, a singletype of organization usually remainedas a common element throughout thetask.

Leader and FollowersA few groups organized their interac-tion along the lines of leader and fol-lowers.

Such an interaction, if present, wasfound in groups with more than twostudents. In the following interaction,K served as the leader, and M and Ewere involved followers.

Example 1

K: Elle a fait de l'aerobique, that wouldbe sporty

E: [sportif]

K: [sportif] for aerobics. Elle a fini unlivre, that would be intellectual, read-ing. Regarding the television, thatwould be couch potatoey

M: inactive

K:

M:

Elle a appris quelques phrases enitalien. Okay, be intellectual I suppose

Yeah

Turn-TakingAnother type of organization

may be labeled turn-taking. In thistype of interaction, students created aneat division of labor and interactedby answering every other question.The following interaction exemplifiesthis sort of interaction; T and C sharedthe work.

Example 2

C: Um, elle a fait de l'aerobique, uh spor-tif

T: Elle a fini un livre, uh, intellectuel

C: Okay, elle a regarde la tele, unless shewas watching some nature show orsomething, it's probably inactive

T: Urn, elle a perdu son chien...sportif

Cooperative ProductionThe most common type of in-

teraction was cooperative productionwhere students completed almostevery aspect of the interaction to-gether. They constantly were engagedin negotiation of form and meaning inorder to complete the task. For in-stance, in Part Two of the task, it wasquite common for a group to compilethe same activities for the entire groupsince they had developed them to-gether. This type of organization is il-lustrated by Examples 3 and 4.

14 Texas Papers in Foreign Language EdUcation

Example 3

M: We need to do something active.

Example 4

D: What else did we do this weekend?

Individual ProductionA final common type of interac-

tion was individual productionmarked by students producing manyforms and coming to conclusions ontheir own when interaction was notrequired. The interaction between Band S typifies this category; there weremoments of silence during the activitywhen they were self-regulating andcompleting individual work.

Task RegulationThis section examines the tools

used by students in order to regulatethe task given to them. These tools,used in varying proportions by thegroups, served in important ways toregulate, modify, and complete thetask.

Meta-Task TalkA significant amount of time

and effort in completing a task in-volved talking about the task. Groupsdiscussed the goals and redefined theinstructions of the task in order tomake them internally relevant. Exam-ple 5 portrays the redefinition of in-structions. It is important to note thatthis was done in English and in K'sown words.

22

Example 5

K: Okay, all right. So we're deciding ifthese activities are sporty, intellectualor...inactive, couch potatoey things

Examples 6 and 7 reveal a common-place and important discussion ondiscovering the grammatical point ofconcern in this task. The researcherdid not explicitly point out in the in-structions that the grammatical focuswas on the passé compose.

Example 6

This is in the past tense, right?

Example 7

Oh wait, we're supposed to be doingthis in past participles

The next example shows how astudent regulated the group's forma-tion of the passé compose. She realizedthat there is an auxiliary verb in thisverb formation, however it was pro-vided as part of the built-in linguisticsupport.

Example 8

C: We don't have to even mess with itreferring to the helping verb)

A final type of meta-task talkincluded re-organization of the ap-proach to the task. In the next exam-ple, J told D that he needed to partici-pate in Part Three of the task by ask-ing her what she did last weekend.


Example 9

Ask me!

Speech as MediationThe entire language activity

was obviously an exercise in speech asmediation. What is interesting in thecontext of a second language task isthe interaction between Ll and L2 incompletion of the task. The amount ofL2 used in the interaction variedacross groups. However, all studentswere consistent in their use of Englishin cases of meta-task talk, meta-linguistic talk, and evaluative com-ments. English was an important toolin creating, understanding and com-pleting the grammar, the topic and thetask. The example below exemplifiesthe use of English to talk about Frenchgrammar. Student D wanted to knowif the preposition au went in betweenthe verb jouer and the object tennis.

Example 10

D: Is it au between joue and tennis?

This particular utterance is interestingsince it would be incomprehensible tomost people outside this context.

Appeal to OtherDuring completion of this task,

there were many instances of studentsappealing to each other for grammati-cal or lexical support. This kind of ap-peal typifies learning through interac-tion. All participating members of thistask were students of approximatelythe same level, yet they were able toproblem-solve and produce on theirown. Example 11 demonstrates a typi-

cal request for meta-linguistic discus-sion.

Example 11

How do you make this into a pastparticiple?

Example 12 provides a glimpseinto the linguistic world of a first yearFrench student. A translation of thissentence would be "The past partici-ple of the French verb travailler is

formed regularly, right?"

Example 12

It's just a normal verb travailler, right?

It is important to note that these ap-peals were acknowledged and subse-quently resolved in the course of theinteraction.

ScaffoldingIn the group interactions, there

were many instances of scaffolding,where students would negotiatemeaning and form in order to comeup with the right answer. The fasci-nating aspect of scaffolding is thatstudents together were able to formu-late an answer that none of themknew at the onset. This type of inter-action allows a close-up view of theZone of Proximal Development dis-cussed in sociocultural theory. Stu-dents were learning to master thepassé compose through communicativenegotiation with their partners. Ex-ample 13 provides an excellent viewof scaffolding as students K, E and Mtogether came to an acceptable answer


by questioning, evaluating, and inter- noun "chien" in order to jointly comeacting. to a conclusion.

Example 13 Off-Task TalkThere were many instances of

K: Elle a perdu son Chien "off-task" talk during its completion.

E: Sportif? that if playing with your dog However, it was always inspired bythe content of the task itself and never

K: Oh, playing with your dog, that lasted more than a few seconds. Thewould be [sportif] ordered and productive design of the

task required students to return toE: [Or] what does perdre mean? task in a short time. In Example 14, JM: perdu and M were completing Part Two of

the task.E: perdu?

Example 14K: I don't know

M: I went dancing.E: Something your dog

You went dancing? Where did you goM: I'll look it up...to lose? dancing?

K: losing your dog? M: Bob Popular's

M: Well, I guessIn Example 15, C remarked on the in-

K: Are you sure chien is dog? active nature of his weekend whilecompleting Part Four of the task.

E: Yeah

K: Losing your dog, I don't know Example 15

C: I would have said one active thing,E: Losing your dog is a sport. Dog,

chien. but I didn't know how to say carried aT.V. all around campus.

K: Losing your dog is a sport, FINDINGyour dog is a sport T: Why did you carry a T.V. over cam-

pus?

M: perduC: We had this thing for a club I'm in...

E: Losing is tooTASK EFFECTIVENESS: SUGGESTIONS

K: All right, I'll put it down FOR A DEFINITIONThe goal of this section is to

In the above example, the stu- discuss the elements of a task thatdents negotiated the form and mean- may contribute to its effectiveness ining of the verb "perdre" as well as the the second language classroom. First

the drawbacks of tasks will be ad-

24


dressed followed by a compilation ofpotential advantages. C: Inactive unless you were shoveling it

Task DrawbacksThere are, of course, many pos-

sible drawbacks to task-based learn-ing which need to be addressed in or-der to assess their role in the class-room. Tasks take up a considerableamount of classtime. During this time,the instructor has certainly lost controlof the classroom interaction. There-fore, wrong answers and conclusionsmay be formulated and believed.There also appears to be a consider-able amount of L1 used in the lengthyinteraction. In addition, the group taskactivity may promote "off-task" talk.These objections are not withoutmerit, however, the time spent allow-ing students to negotiate meaning andinteraction, according to Vygotsky,represent an essential component ofcognition which is necessary for lan-guage acquisition.

Form and MeaningThis task displays an interde-

pendence of form and meaning builtinto the task. Students were forced tomanipulate the passé compose and thenevaluate it. By the design of this task,it was impossible to only focus onform without attention to meaning.The next example shows an evalua-tion of meaning after proper produc-tion of the form by the question pro-posed by T and the humorous re-sponse by C.

Example 16T: raj mange... inactif?

in your mouth

CommunicationNew information was shared

with the entirety of the class. By de-sign of the task, students were forcedto communicate in order to be able tocomment on the weekend of theirpartners. Most of the students wereclassified as inactive by their partners.The communicative value of the passécompose was also reinforced since stu-dents had to describe what they did.

Example 17

T: We did all inactive things

Activity ConstructionThis task allowed students the

freedom to interpret the activity ac-cording to their own needs and moti-vations. There is a delicate balance tobe found between providing enoughsupport and direction for interactionand conversely, enough freedom tocreate a unique learning situation. Thequestion arises, why did studentsstructure the activity as they did? Itappears that students understoodtheir own needs and worked accord-ingly. For example, students who hadnot yet internalized the formation ofthe passé compose engaged in muchmore interactive meta-linguistic dis-cussions on form than those who weremore self-regulated.

Learning Through InteractionScaffolding was an important

aspect of the interaction during thistask. In fact, the design of the task en-


couraged scaffolding by peers. In thisactivity, there were many lexical reali-zations as well as understandings ofgrammatical forms prompted by theinteractive demands.

Later SuccessDoes the type of interaction pre-

dict later success? A certain type ofinteraction did not appear to correlatewith later success. However, this isnot to say that how a task is ap-proached doesn't affect later success.Negotiation of form and meaning andmeta-linguistic talk are important as-pects of internalizing language. In ad-dition, English appears to be a helprather than a hindrance for later suc-cess. The follow-up homework high-lighted the general success of the task.Students reacted to the in-class taskand then they revealed their level ofmastery of the passé compose. The taskcreated an opportunity for communi-cative homework as well.

Class MoraleThe emotive clues indicated

that the students enjoyed task-structured communication. Duringthe interaction, there were many in-stances of laughter, varied intonationand evaluative remarks such as "oh,oh!". Most students became engagedin the interaction because they weretalking about something relevant totheir lives. It appears that they enjoyputting their partners into categoriesand comparing the categorization ofthe class. Consistent with the conclu-sions of Brooks and Donato (1994), itappears that "off -task talk" is natural.It enhances the experience and it imi-

tates real communication. It wouldstifle natural tendencies if follow-upcommentary were not permitted.

CONCLUSIONWould Vygotsky and Lee ap-

prove? Vygotsky would probablyconsider these tasks as a real-life ap-plication of mediated and interac-tional learning in the foreign languageclassroom. Students are given the op-portunity to talk out formation andmeaning. By interacting, they run intoproblems, issues and questions theywould not have come upon on theirown.

Do tasks do what they are sup-posed to do according to Lee? Leeprovides a suggestion for classroompractice based on observations of theworkings of the L2 classroom forwhich there is much theoretical sup-port in Vygotsky's general theory oflanguage. In the present study, therewas indeed communication as definedby the "expression, interpretation andnegotiation of meaning" (p. 1). Thereare probably elements of the task notenvisioned by Lee that played a majorrole in their realization. Use of L1 in asupposed L2 language task was wide-spread, but English was used pur-posefully in carrying out expression,interpretation and negotiation ofmeaning. However, contrary to thevision of Lee, the language was usedto accomplish a task and to practiceforms. It seems unrealistic to not pro-vide a form basis for any topic in auniversity foreign language class-room.

What makes a good task? Whatmakes a task good? Sociocultural the-

26


ory would explain their success by thefact that students are able to createtheir own interaction by a carefullystructured and ordered task that takesinto account their need for linguisticsupport, their grammatical compe-tence and interests. The bottom line, isthat in a language task there are manyformal linguistic realizations, occa-sions for practice, fun, and communi-cation. Students are given the oppor-tunity to see relevance and authentic-ity of the language they are learningby means of communication.

REFERENCES

Anton, M., & Di Camilla, F. (1998).Socio-cognitive vunctions of L1collaboration in the L2 class-room. The Canadian ModernLanguage Review, 54 (3), 314-342.

Brooks, F., & Donato, R. (1994). Vy-gotskyan approaches to under-standing foreign languagelearner discourse during com-municative tasks. Hispania 77,262-274.

Coughlin, P., & Duff, P. (1994). Sametask, different activities: Analy-sis of a SLA task from an activ-ity theory perspective. In J.

Lantolf and G. Appel (eds.) Vy-gotskyan Approaches to SecondLanguage Research. Norwood,NJ: Ablex.

Lantolf, J. (forthcoming). Introducingsociocultural theory. In J. Lan-tolf (ed.) Second Language Ac-quisition and Sociocultural The-ory. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.

Lantolf, J., & Appel, G. (1994). Theo-retical framework: An intro-duction to Vygotskian ap-proaches to second languageresearch. In J. Lantolf and G.Appel (eds.) Vygotskyan Ap-proaches to Second Language Re-search. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.

Lee, J. (2000). Tasks and communicatingin language classrooms. NewYork: McGraw-Hill HigherEducation.

Rogoff, B. (1990). Apprenticeship inthinking. New York: OxfordUniversity Press.


APPENDIX ASportif, intellectuel, ou inactif?

I. Voici les activites de votre prof le week-end passé. Avec un partenaire, classez les activitessuivantes:

elle a fait de l'aerobique sportif intellectuel inactifelle a fini un livre sportif intellectuel inactifelle a regarde la tele sportif intellectuel inactifellea perdu son chien sportif intellectuel inactifelle a appris quelques phrases en italien sportif intellectuel inactif

Partagez vos reponses avec la classe. Comment est-ce que vous classez l'ensemble de ces activi-tes?

II. Ajoutez quatre activites de votre week-end et indiquez la categorie. Justifiez vos reponses.

j'ai sportif intellectuel inactifj'ai sportif intellectuel inactifj'ai sportif intellectuel inactifj'ai sportif intellectuel inactif

HI. Interviewez votre partenaire sur ses activites et puis indiquez la categorie.Mode le: Qu'est-ce que to as fait ce week-end?

j'ai forte aux cartes.

il/elle a sportif intellectuel inactifil/elle a sportif intellectuel inactifil/elle a sportif intellectuel inactifil/elle a sportif intellectuel inactif

IV. Est-ce que votre partenaire semble plutot sportif(-ve), intellectuel( -le), ou inactif(-ve)?Modele: Mon partenaire est plutot sportif parce qu'il a joue au football samedi matin et it a fait du joggingdimanche apres-midi.

Partagez vos reponses avec la classe. Chacun met son partenaire dans une categorie.

sportif/sportive intellectuel(-le) inactif/ inactive

Quelle categorie decrit le mieux le week-end passé de l'ensemble de la classe?

V. DEVOIRS pour demain

Est-ce que vous etes d'accord avec votre partenaire? Ecrivez 6 phrases sur votre week-end passe.

118 :ESI COPY AVAILABLE


APPENDIX BSporty, Intellectual, or Inactive?

I. Here are the activities of your teacher last weekend. With a partner, classify the followingactivities:

she did aerobics sporty intellectual inactiveshe finished a book sporty intellectual inactiveshe watched television sporty intellectual inactiveshe lost her dog sporty intellectual inactiveshe learned a few phrases in Italian sporty intellectual inactive

Share your answers with the class. How did you classify most of these activities?

II. Add four activities from your weekend and indicate the category. Justify your responses.

I sporty intellectual inactiveI sporty intellectual inactiveI sporty intellectual inactiveI sporty intellectual inactive

III. Interview your partner about his/her activities and then indicate the category.Model: What did you do this weekend?

I played cards.

he/she sporty intellectual inactivehe /she sporty intellectual inactivehe/she sporty intellectual inactivehe/ she sporty intellectual inactive

IV. Does your partner seem more sporty, intellectual or inactive?Model: My partner is more sporty because he played football Saturday morning and he went jogging Sun-day afternoon.

Share your responses with the class. Each person should put his/her partner in a category.

sporty intellectual inactive

Which category best describes the class as a whole?

V. HOMEWORK for tomorrowDo you agree with your partner? Write 6 sentences about last weekend.

BEST COPY AVAILABL9

Envisioning a Standards-Based Methods Course: Preparing SecondLanguage Educators for the 21st Century*

KATHLEEN BUENO, Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville

This article envisions what a standards-based second language methods coursemight be. In exploring the possibilities, the author presents a description of a cur-rent model for pre-service training, generalizations gleaned from a study of a sec-ond language methods syllabi archive, and an analysis of and reflection upon aparticular second language methods course. The article concludes with sugges-tions for pre-service training for second language educators.

INTRODUCTIONThe beginning of a new century encourages reflection on recent accom-

plishments and on the challenges that lie ahead. During the past two decades,accomplishments in second language education have been impressive. Initiativesin the 1980s provided guidelines for measuring proficiency in a second language(ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines, 1986). Collaborative efforts in the 1990s articulateda unified vision for the profession by establishing a national set of standards anda set of student performance guidelines (Standards for Foreign Language Learning:Preparing for the 21st Century, 1996). These accomplishments give direction to cur-rent efforts by state boards of education and local school districts to promote thedevelopment of second language skills and knowledge needed in the new cen-tury. These same accomplishments also pose new challenges for second languageeducators. One crucial challenge centers on determining the knowledge base andcompetencies required to develop and to carry out standards-based second lan-guage instruction.

Current research on teacher education supports a reflective model for de-signing pre-service development (Schon, 1987; Wallace, 1991; Hudelson and Fal-tis, 1993; Kassen and Higgins, 1997). The reflective model characterizes profes-sional development as

the result of the interaction of received knowledge, a field's collective body of in-formation from research, theory and conventional wisdom, and experientialknowledge, which includes both practice and conscious reflection on that practice.(Kassen and Higgins, 1997, p. 268)

The North Central Regional Education Laboratory's (NCREL's) research-basedframework outlines the necessary components of the reflective model. These in-clude

building a knowledge base, observing models and examples, reflecting on prac-tice, changing practice, and gaining and sharing expertise. (Cited in Kassen andHiggins, 1997, p. 268)


0


Key to this model of pre-service train-ing are "repeated cycles of practiceand informed critical reflection" (p.265).

Over the past few years, con-siderable discussion has centered onthe knowledge and skill base neededto effectively carry out standards-based second language instruction. Inthe -summer 1998 issue of the ACTFLNewsletter, Glisan and Phillips outlinesuggested goals for second languageteacher preparation. Their summaryincorporates ideas gleaned from theNational Board for ProfessionalTeacher Standards (1994), the Na-tional Commission on Teaching andAmerica's Future (1996), and researchstudies in teacher education (Hudel-son and Faltes, 1993; Schrier, 1993).These goals encompass desiredknowledge bases, skills, and charac-teristics of second language teachers.The knowledge bases and skills in-clude a high degree of proficiency inthe language to be taught, an appro-priate level of knowledge of the targetculture(s), knowledge of current re-search on second language acquisi-tion, understanding of and skill in de-livering communicative languageteaching, methods, and knowledgeand ability to effectively integratetechnology in second language in-struction.

The characteristics entail acommitment to continued profes-sional development, a positive atti-tude toward student learning, a dedi-cation to the role of manager andmonitor of learning, a devotion toanalysis and reflection on the effec-

tiveness of one's teaching, and a col-laborative orientation to teaching andthe profession. This summary servesas a starting point for envisioning amodel for standards-oriented secondlanguage methodology course.

A PROFILE OF SECOND LANGUAGEMETHODS COURSES

"FLTeach"(www.cortland.edu/flteach/syllabi/) contains an archiveof foreign-language methods coursesyllabi. A comparative study of thegoals and class activities described ina selected group of eight syllabi thatrepresent different regions around thecountry provides a useful profile. Fiveof the methods courses are located ineither colleges of arts and sciences orin schools of humanities. Three arehoused in schools of education. Thecourse goals shared by all of the in-structors include

An understanding of the secondlanguage teaching/ learn-ing proc-ess

Effective techniques for teachingand evaluating the progress ofsecond language learners

Familiarity with multiplesources to enhance secondguage learning

re-lan-

An introduction to technology andhands-on practice

Familiarity with second languageteaching approaches

31

An understanding of how to inte-grate culture in the foreign lan-guage curriculum

In addition, at least half of the instruc-tors also covered the following goals:

Familiarity with the national stan-dards

Development of a picture file

These goals form a portrait of the cur-rent conventional wisdom regardingsecond language teacher preparation.

Comparisons of the variety ofactivities that exist on the syllabi pro-vide further insights into the nature ofexperiences provided pre-serviceteachers by the second languagemethods course. Seven of the eightinstructors require students to com-plete supplementary readings, towrite lesson plans, to create instruc-tional activities and to participate inclass discussions. Six assign oral pres-entations, final exams, and the crea-tion of rubrics and evaluation instru-ments. Four include critiques of jour-nal articles, picture files, peer-teaching, and a file of supplementarymaterials. Three listed web board par-ticipation, a series of three- to five-page papers, use of a list serve andtextbook evaluation. These seem toconstitute common pre-service in-class activities.

The complete set of assignedactivities displays additional alterna-tives. A number of these activities re-late to the use of technology. Otheractivities seem to relate to makingconnections to research and conven-

Standards-Based Methods Course 25

tional wisdom. These assignments paytribute to the dedication and resource-fulness of second language methodsinstructors as they endeavor to facili-tate professional development in theareas of expertise outlined in the firstpart of this article. They also provide awider repertoire for later considera-tion as the process of envisioning con-tinues.

The next step in the envision-ing process involves examining a par-ticular methods syllabus in light of theNational Standards for foreign lan-guage instruction and existing statestandards for foreign language learn-ers and for teacher certification. Forthis purpose, the author has chosen touse the syllabus from her fall 1999methods course. In examining the syl-labus, she has used three types ofinstruments. The first is a reflectiveself-evaluation of the coursecompleted in spring 1999. The secondis a course alignment grid preparedfor this study. Finally, the author hasincluded comments from studentevaluations of the course over the pastfive years. The examination of thesyllabus provides insights into theways methods classes must adapt toprovide pre-service experiences thatpromote the required knowledgebase, skills, and desired characteristicsof second language teachers.

In the reflective self-evaluation,the instructor described the methodscourse as "a challenging course toteach." First, it presents a challengebecause it draws from several disci-plines and relates them to professionalpractices. Second, the course requiresconstant updates and experimentation

32


due to advancements within the pro-fession and in educational technology.As a result, the instructor made sig-nificant changes each year, which cen-ter on a few key issues that blend in-structional concerns with issues raisedin course evaluations. These issues in-clude three interrelated concerns: pro-viding a balance between theory andpractice, prioritizing topics for inclu-sion in the course, and determiningappropriate course requirements.

Maintaining a balance betweentheoretical discussion and hands-onpractice permeates the literature onpre-service training (Savignon, 1997;Van Patten, 1998; McLaughlin, 1987).In order for pre-service teachers topractice informed critical reflectionabout their teaching, they need to ac-quire knowledge about the "who,what, where and how" of second lan-guage learning (Savignon, 1997). Thisincludes knowledge about learner at-tributes, the development of morpho-logical and syntactic features, theprocess of acquiring a second lan-guage, and the learning setting.Comments on student evaluations re-flect considerable tension regardingthe theory base. One student wrote

I felt like a fish out of waterbecause even though she wasvery available, so much of thematerial was new and hardfor me to cognitively organ-ize.

Another student commented

I didn't enjoy the first threechapters [of the textbook] somuch, too theoretical.

33

These statements encapsulatethe difficulties and reticence exhibitedby pre-service teachers when they areconfronted with the knowledge baserelated to second language instructionin the methods course.

Prioritizing topics for inclusionin the second language methodscourse requires careful deliberationand curricular planning. Decisions re-quire an analysis of the overall pre-service program to determine whichtopics constitute the exclusive venueof the second language methodscourse and which ones need to be re-cycled within the context of secondlanguage teaching. A related concernentails adaptation or substitutionwhen instructors perceive deficienciesin skill development or if state stan-dards are not being met. Studentcourse evaluations provide one sourceof information. For example, one stu-dent commented

It was nice to have an educa-tion course that actuallytaught how to make a lessonplan.

Another student added

She [instructor] expects a lot ofdetails that I hadn't previouslythought of. I am glad to see thisbecause I need to know this andshould be able to present, in de-tail the tasks that I will need mystudents to perform.

Field supervision and mentoring op-portunities further corroborate theimportance of certain topics.

The last of the interrelated is-sues outlined in the self-evaluation

entails determining course require-ments. Each year some mention of theworkload appears in the studentevaluations. The following commentsare representative:

The instruction was good andI feel that I learned the essen-tials for teaching a foreignlanguage, I just really thinktoo much homework is given.

Now that the course is almostover, I am glad to have mas-tered the workload, but dur-ing the course I sometimeswished we had less assign-ments.

This aspect of the course hasundergone the most adaptation overthe past five years, including both re-duction in topics, the development ofon-line resources, and change in thetypes of assignments required.

A final issue explored in theself-evaluation relates to preparingpre-service teachers to integrate tech-nology in second language instruc-tion. As Kassen and Higgins (1997)attest, providing pre-service trainingin instructional technology is compli-cated by the diversity and complexityof educational settings. In addition,students bring varying degrees of fa-miliarity and competency with educa-tional technology. Student commentson evaluations identify the sessionsdevoted to technology among thepositive aspects of the course. For ex-ample, one student commented that

the video and CD ROM sec-tion was very interesting.I enjoyed learning about thismaterial.


Another student added

I gained strengths in areas Ihad been weak before (e.g. us-ing the internet, using Power-Point).

The instructor continues to expandand update these sessions. Still, de-termining what background knowl-edge and what skills will serve pre-service teachers best remains prob-lematic.

In response to the issues raisedby the self-evaluation and the stu-dents' course evaluations, the authorlooked for additional resources forcourse evaluation. Driscoll (1998) pro-vides a useful instrument, the coursealignment grid. The purpose of thegrid involves aligning and analyzingall class activities and assignmentsthat meet each course objective. Dris-coll provides examples of coursealignment grids to be completed byboth the instructor and the students.In addition, she outlines how gridscan be used for course and programevaluation. For the purpose of thisdiscussion, the instructor has adaptedthe grids appropriately to align allclass activities and assignments withthe state standards for teacher certifi-cation (see Appendix). The resultingcharts serve to delineate with moreprecision and clarity the types of pre-service experiences the methodscourse provides.

Chart 1 illustrates the stan-dards addressed by the first five classsessions, which focus on the theoreti-cal background knowledge. These ses-sions include an historical overview of

3.4


Chart 1. Standards Addressed by First Five Class Sessions

Standards (See Appendix)Class activitiesand assignments

S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4 S-5 S-6 S-7 S-8 S-9 S-10

Session 1:LectureDiscussionTextbook readingWorkbook activity

XXXX

Session 2:LectureDiscussionTextbook readingWorkbook activityWeb board activity

X

X

XXX

Session 3:LectureDiscussionTextbook readingWorkbook activityWeb board activity

XX

X.

XX

Session 4:LectureDiscussionIn-class activityTextbook readingWorkbook activity

XXXXX

X

X

Session 5:LectureDiscussionIn-class activityTextbook readingWorkbook activityAssignment I

XXXXX

X

XX X

second language education in theUnited States, an introduction to pro-ficiency and the standards, and a dis-cussion of second language acquisi-tion theories and teaching methodolo-gies.

In early class sessions lectureand discussion predominate. Small-

group activities entail organizing factsand comparing theories about differ-ent aspects of second language learn-ing. For example, during the secondsession students complete a chart toshow what components of languageability are common to the definitionsof communicative competence, corn-

35

municative language ability, and pro-ficiency (Omaggio-Hadley, 1993, p.35). Some activities, such as, readingdescriptions of learners' languageability and determine the proficiencylevel of each learner apply theory di-rectly to instructional concerns(Omaggio-Hadley, 1993, p. 35).

Most homework assignmentsinclude readings, workbook questionsand web-board assignments. Theseout-of-class assignments also centeron acquiring the necessary theoreticalknowledge to guide instructionalplanning. The first truly practice-centered assignment occurs followingsession five. For this assignment, stu-dents opt to design a listening activitywith a visual aid, to describe five ac-tivities that could be done with thesame listening material, or to designin-class activities to go with an au-thentic reading (Omaggio-Hadley,1993, p. 223). During the first five ses-sions, pre-service teachers becomecomfortable with the terminology ofsecond language acquisition and be-come knowledgeable about the"what" and the "how" of second lan-guage acquisition (Savignon, 1997). Asone student wrote on the courseevaluation: "You were able to listen tous and tie our thoughts into the les-son." The sessions provide knowledgeneeded to analyze the effectiveness ofinstruction and instill the values ofdiscussion and collaboration.

Chart 2 displays the activitiesand assignments for sessions sixthrough ten. These sessions are as fol-lows: discussing accuracy, developinglistening and reading skills, develop-ing speaking skills, developing writ-


ing skills, and developing culturalawareness. Four of the five sessionsinclude small group activities. Theseactivities range from matching listen-ing and reading skills to proficiencylevels to designing activities to meetone of the national standards to com-pleting a textbook evaluation. Threesessions involve homework assign-ments requiring students to designinstructional activities or a detailedlesson plan with activities, resourcesand evaluative procedures. As thepre-service teachers apply their theo-retical knowledge to develop instruc-tional skills, they also utilize their skillin under standing recordings, readingtexts and writing materials in the tar-get language. They also employ theirknowledge of the target culture(s).Furthermore, opportunities arise tomake use of the target language tofurther knowledge of other disci-plines.

Through class activities andhomework assignments, pre-serviceteachers continue to develop their un-derstanding of the "what" and "how"of second language acquisition (Savi-gnon, 1997). At the same time, theydevelop expertise in designing activi-ties for second language learners. Fi-nally, these activities develop anawareness of their role as managerand monitor of learning.

Chart 3 delineates how the ac-tivities and assignments for the lastfive sessions relate to the state stan-dards. The topics treated in these ses-sions include test development, theintegration of technology, and theprocess of becoming educators.

36


Chart 2. Standards Addressed by Second Five Class Sessions

Standards (See Appendix)Class activitiesand assignments

S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4 S-5 S-6 S-7 S-8 S-9 S-10

Session 6:LectureDiscussionIn-class activityTextbook readingWorkbook activityAssignment II

XXX

X

X

X

XXX

X

X

X X

X

(X)

(X)

Session 7:LectureDiscussionIn-class activityMidterm Exam

X

X, X

X

X

XXX

XX

Session 8:LectureDiscussionIn-class activityTextbook readingWorkbook activityLesson Plan I

X

XXX X

X

X

X

X, (X)

Session 9:LectureDiscussionIn-class activityTextbook readingWorkbook activityWeb board activity

XX

XX

XXXXX

XXX

XX

Session 10:LectureDiscussionTextbook readingWorkbook activityAssignment III X

XX

X

S


Chart 3. Standards Addressed by Last Five Class Sessions

StandardsClass Activities andAssignments

S-1 S-2 S-3 S-4 S-5 S-6 S-7 S-8 S-9 S-10

Session 11:LectureDiscussionSoftware Evalua-tionTextbook readingWorkbook activityWeb board activityLesson Plan II

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

XX

XX

X

X

X

X

X X (X) (X)

Session 12:LectureDiscussionIn-class activitySupplementaryreadingsObservation notes

XX

X

X

Session 13:Lec-ture/DemonstrationDiscussionIn-class activityElectronic SearchWeb-based tutorial

X

X

X

XXX

XXX (X)

X X

Session 14:PresentationsDiscussionTeaching unitPower Point

X

X

XX

X

X

X

X

X

XX

(X)

(X)XX

X

X

X

(X)

(X)

X

XXX

Session 15:Web-based activityDiscussionFinal Exam

(X)X X X

X

(X)

X

X

X

Half of the class time for sessionseleven through thirteen centers onhands-on practice with technology.Students preview and evaluate soft-ware, conduct electronic searches, use

MAST COPY AVAILABLE

PowerPoint to prepare a presentation,and utilize "Filamentality" (www.kn.pacbell.com/ wired/ fil) to create aweb-based activity. While studentsengage in these activities, they utilize

3S


the knowledge and skills described inat least three of the standards. For theprojects and final exam, students em-ploy knowledge from five to sevenstandards. In addition, students workcollaboratively and share informationduring the hands-on sessions. The oralpresentations of the final project, ateaching unit, are conducted liketeacher in-service workshops. Theseexperiences build an awareness of theimportance of professional develop-ment, collaboration and dedication tothe role of manager and monitor oflearning.

The course alignment grid pro-vides a clear, concise profile of themethods course. The resulting profilesheds light on both the curricular con-cerns of the instructor and the certifi-cation requirements of the state. Forexample, the charts trace a progres-sion towards practice-centered activi-ties in later stages. Student commentson evaluations confirm this impres-sion. In addition, the charts record anincrease in activities requiring stu-dents to employ a wider spectrum ofthe recommended knowledge andskill areas.

The profile also gives credenceto issues of choosing course topics anddetermining course requirements. Thestate content standards for foreignlanguage teachers do not includeknowledge of and skills in classroommanagement, a topic previously in-cluded in the second language meth-ods syllabus. Since the necessaryknowledge and skills regarding class-room management are addressed incourses and fieldwork required by theSchool of Education, other knowledge

required by the state content stan-dards, such as, career opportunitiesfor speakers of a second language canbe incorporated in the methods courseoutline.

Since the course prepares stu-dents to teach German, French andSpanish, goals two through eight canonly be addressed incidentally. Stu-dents can use their knowledge andskills with the target language as theygather and evaluate authentic materi-als to be used for instructional pur-poses. The course can only includethis type of practice, however, in smallgroup activities or in out-of-class as-signments.

Inferences drawn from thecourse grid and from a thoroughstudy of national and state standardsdocuments provide a solid base forenvisioning course content for themethods course. In the case of Illinois,for example, the knowledge base pro-vided primarily by the second lan-guage methods course centers on fourmain areas. First, the second languagemethods course is the only resourcefor obtaining the collective body ofinformation on second language ac-quisition research as applied to class-room learning. Second, the course re-mains the principal venue for provid-ing models for cultural studies andstrategies for developing culturalawareness in classroom lessons.

In addition, the methods courseseems the most logical site for pre-service teachers to address directlyways to learn about career options forspeakers of more than one language.Finally, the Illinois State Board ofEducation Content-Area Standards for

39

Educators (2000) require that teachersin all content areas

apply technologies that sup-port instruction in their gradelevel and subject areas. He orshe must plan and deliver in-structional units that integratea variety of software, applica-tions, and learning tools. Les-sons developed must reflecteffective grouping and as-sessment strategies for diversepopulations (p. 261).

The national standards also requireteachers to manage and monitor suchactivities as discussion of

topics from other school sub-jects in the target language,including political and his-torical concepts, worldwidehealth issues, and environ-mental concerns (p. 51).

The ability to fulfill these mandatesrequires training from content areaspecialists who are familiar with thefeatures and capabilities of techno-logical tools and applications that fa-cilitate second language acquisition.

CONCLUSIONSThe meaningfulness of experi-

ences afforded by the second lan-guage methods course depends on thestructure of the overall pre-serviceprogram. Newman (1997) posits thatteacher education courses should beproblem-based and include action re-search components. To achieve thischange, she recommends increasedpractica with classroom teachers asmentors, collaborative student pro-jects, independent study modules, and


faculty involvement as members ofinquiry teams. Russell (1999) addsthat early field placements and dis-cussions of experiences in the fieldprovide "significant personal experi-ence of teaching" (p. 9). This personalexperience helps pre-service teachers"see the significance of theory both forinterpreting experience and for redi-recting" their teaching (p. 10). Fur-thermore, Kosnik (1999) found thataction research projects increased pre-service teachers' understanding of therole of the teacher and encouraged ef-fective strategies like collaboration,informed critical reflection and devo-tion to continued professional devel-opment. Finally, Newman (1997) ob-serves that since the school of educa-tion faculty is unable to cover all tra-ditional high school subject matters,collaboration across university unitsbecomes crucial. Russell (1999) con-curs that liaison roles are key to suc-cessful pre-service training. In orderto support standards-based profes-sional development, he believes thatthe liaison role will expand and be-come more complex. The challenge ofadapting and restructuring the meth-ods course will remain an importantelement in this new complex role.

Within this context of "re-peated cycles of practice and criticalreflection" (Kassen and Higgens, 1997,p.265), the second language methodscourse plays a pivotal role. The courseserves as a model for continued pro-fessional development and informed,reflective practice. Class activities andcourse assignments blend devotion toanalysis and collaborative explorationof pedagogical issues, practice in


managing and monitoring learning,and reflection on the effectiveness ofone's teaching. These kinds of experi-ences are paramount for developingthe skill to "translate" (Van Patten1998) theory into practice and to honeinstructional skills that meet "the testsof practicality, personal relevance, andeffective results" (Zephir, 2000).

Kassen and Higgins (1997)provide a general framework fortranslating theory into practice in re-gard to pre-service technology train-ing. These scholars posit that the de-velopment of knowledge and skillsrelated to technology integration de-pend on

establishing a comfort levelwith technology; integratingtechnology in the curriculum;and developing the criticalskills to use technology effec-tively (264).

They suggest following theNorth Central Regional EducationLaboratory's research-based frame-work, which incorporates the neces-sary components of a reflective model.Throughout the training, in-class ac-tivities and out-of-class assignmentsrequire students to engage in hands-on practice and critical reflection.

Ideas for implementing thiscomponent of the foreign languagemethods class can be drawn from thesyllabi archive mentioned earlier inthis study (FLTeach www.cortland.edu/flteach/ syllabi/ ). For example,Le Loup requires students to obtain anelectronic mail account and the in-structor uses electronic correspon-dence to disseminate information and

assignments to the students. In addi-tion, the students complete an on-linetechnology module and submit as-signments via electronic mail. Ken-nedy provides a plethora of on-lineresources for her students that includearticles, a discussion board, and linksto web sites. She combines these re-sources with related assignments thatinclude subscription to a list serve,participation in an on-line chat roomfor educators and a collection ofURLs. Morris includes peer-teachingassignments with technology andBueno requires Power Point presenta-tions, the creation of a web-based ac-tivity, and software evaluation.

Kassen's and Higgin's goals ofcomfort, knowledge, and skill in inte-grating technological resources can beextended to the other areas of knowl-edge and skills that second languageteachers need. In the author's classes,pre-service teachers often feel over-whelmed by the terminology and con-cepts of second language acquisition.Moore (1996) found that twenty-threepercent of teachers responding to asurvey cited that they received inade-quate training in regard to integratingculture in their classes. Van Patten(1998) discovered that many class-room teachers have misconceptionsregarding communicative languageteaching. Yet, these are the essentialknowledge and skill areas for provid-ing standards-based instruction. De-signing a standards-based methodscourse entails creating an intricatecurricular weave. The design shouldblend continued patterns of receivedand experiential knowledge that buildcomfort, skill, and informed critical

41

reflection to assure best practices inthe second language classes of our na-tion's schools.

REFERENCESAmerican Council on the Teaching of

Foreign Languages. (1986).ACTFL proficiency guidelines.Hastings-on-Hudson, N. Y.:

ACTFL.Driscoll, A. (1998). . Course alignment

grid. Center for Teaching,Learning and Assessment. Cali-fornia State University, Mon-terey Bay.

FL Teach foreign language methodssyllabi archive.www.cortland.edu/ flteach/ syllabi/ >

Glisan, E., & Phillips, J. (1998). Makingthe standards happen: A newvision for foreign languageteacher preparation. ACTFLNewsletter, 10, 7-8, 13-14.

Hudelson, S., & Faltis, C. (1993). Rede-fining basic teacher education:Preparing teachers to transformteaching. In G. Guntermann(Ed.), Developing language teach-ers for a changing world. (pp. 23-42) . Lincolnwood, IL: NationalTextbook Company.

Illinois State Board of Education(2000). Content-area standards foreducators.<www.isbe.state.il.us/ profdevelopment/ > .

Kassen, M., & Higgins, C. (1997).Meeting the technology chal-lenge: Introducing teachers tolanguage-learning technology.In Michael D. Bush (Ed.), Tech-nology-Enhanced Language


Learning. (pp. 263-285). Lin-colnwood, IL: National Text-book Company.

Kosnick, C. (1999). The transformativepower of the action researchprocess: Effects of an inquiryapproach to preservice teachereduation. Networks, 202,<www.oise.utoronto.ca/ ctd/network... urnal/ >

McLaughlin, B. (1987). Theories of sec-ond language learning. London:Edward Arnold.

Moore, Z. (1996). Culture: How doteachers teach it? In Z. Moore(Ed.), Foreign language teachereducation: Multiple perspectives.(pp. 269-288). Lanham, MD:University Press of America.

National Board for ProfessionalTeaching Standards. (1994).What teachers should know and beable to do. Detroit, MI: NationalBoard for Professional Teach-ing Standards.

National Commission on Teachingand America's Future. (1996).What matters most: Teaching foramerica's future. New York: Na-tional Commission on Teachingand America's Future.

National Standards in Foreign Lan-guage Education Project.(1996). Standards for foreign lan-guage learning: preparing for the21st century. Lawrence, KS: Al-len Press, Inc.

Newman, J. (1997). Restructuringteacher education or we're in onehell of a muddle. <www.nyu.edu/ education/ teachlearn/ ifte/>


Omaggio-Hadley, A. (1993). Teachinglanguage in context. Boston, MA:Heinle and Heinle Publishers.

Russell, T. (1999). The challenge ofchange in teacher education.Keynote address to The Chal-lenge of Change In Educationconference, University of Tech-nology, Sydney. Feb. 5-6.<educ.queensu.ca/ russellt/ howteach/ change . htm>

Savignon, S. (1997). Communicativecompetence: Theory and practice.New York: McGraw-Hill Com-panies, Inc.

Schon, D. (1987). Educating the reflec-tive practitioner. Paper pre-sented to the meeting of theAmerican Educational Re-search Association.

Washington, D.C. (1987).educ.queensu.ca/ russellt/ howteach/ schon87.htm.

Schrier, L.I. (1993). Prospects for theprofessionalization of foreignlanguage teaching. In G.Guntermann (Ed.), Developinglanguage teachers for a changingworld. (pp. 159-186). Lincoln-wood, IL: National TextbookCompany.

Van Patten, B. (1998). Perceptions ofand perspectives on the term'communicative'. Hispania, 81,925-932.

Wallace, M. (1991). Training foreignlanguage teachers: A reflective ap-proach. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.

Zephir, F. (2000). Focus on form andmeaning: Perspectives of de-veloping teachers and action-based research. Foreign Lan-guage Annals, 33,19-30.

43

Standard 1:

Standard 2:

Standard 3:

Standard 4:

Standard 5:

Standard 6:


APPENDIXTHE COMPETENT FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHER

The competent foreign language teacher comprehends the proc-esses involved in acquiring another language.

The competent foreign language teacher understands oral commu-nication and interacts appropriately in the target language in vari-ous settings.

The competent foreign language teacher understands and createswritten materials in the target language for a variety of purposesand audiences.

The competent foreign language teacher is able to use the targetlanguage to explain its structure in a manner understandable to avariety of learners.

The competent foreign language teacher understands manners, cus-toms, and ranges of cultural expression of various target languagesocieties.

The competent foreign language teacher demonstrates generalknowledge of expressive forms (e.g., music, dance, folk art, visualart, drama and architecture) related to various target language so-cieties.

Standard 7: The competent foreign language teacher understands representa-tive types of literature and various media of target language socie-ties.

Standard 8: The competent foreign language teacher understands the history,geography, social institutions, and contemporary events of varioustarget language societies.

Standard 9:

Standard 10:

The competent foreign language teacher uses the target language toreinforce and further the knowledge of other disciplines.

The competent foreign language teacher uses the target language todemonstrate knowledge and understanding of a variety of careeroptions.

Teachers' Beliefs About Language Learning and Teaching: A Cross-Cultural Comparison*

NAE-DONG YANG, National Taiwan University

Because English will be included in the required curriculum of all of Taiwan's ele-mentary schools in 2001, a better understanding of the beliefs held by prospectiveprimary school English teachers' about language learning and teaching would bebeneficial. To investigate those beliefs, a questionnaire was developed and adminis-tered to 68 participants in a training program. The results of the survey are pre-sented here and compared with the beliefs of language teachers in the U.S. Implica-tions for teacher education programs are discussed.

INTRODUCTIONEnglish education in Taiwan is entering a critical period. In the year 2001,

English will soon be included in the required curriculum and taught to fifth andsixth graders of all Taiwan's elementary schools. The extension of English pro-grams to primary schools nationwide has put the issue of teacher education inthe spotlight. In the past, Taiwan's research attention focused mainly on profes-sional preparation and qualifications for English teachers at the secondary andtertiary levels, but in recent English teaching conferences and publications in Tai-wan, several language educators have discussed issues of elementary-school-level English curriculum, teaching methodology, and material development andselection (e.g., Lin, 1999; Shih, 1999; Yu, 1999). Even so, few studies have beenconducted on the affect aspect of prospective teachers, such as their attitudes,motivations, and beliefs.

Much of the current literature on teacher education suggests that teachers'beliefs and attitudes play an important role in their decision-making and teach-ing practice (Williams & Burden, 1997). According to Richardson (1996), belief re-fers to psychologically held understandings, premises, or propositions about theworld that are felt to be true. As Richards and Lockhart (1996) have indicated,teachers' actions reflect their knowledge and beliefs. Also, these teachers' knowl-edge and beliefs "provide the underlying framework or schema which guides theteachers' classroom actions" (Richards & Lockhart, 1996, p. 29). Pajares (1992), inreviewing the literature on teachers' beliefs, went further and concluded thatteachers' beliefs had a greater influence than teachers' knowledge on their lessonplanning, decision-making, and general classroom practice.

Johnson (1994) studied preservice ESL teacher's beliefs and found these be-liefs about second language teaching were affected by prior experiences withinformal language classrooms. Mok (1994) also indicated that teacher's beliefsabout teaching were guided by their previous experience as a learner and as ateacher. Horwitz (1985) found that prospective foreign language teachers have


45


many preconceived ideas about howlanguages are learned and how theyshould be taught. She pinpointed thepossible interfering effect of these pre-conceived beliefs on prospectiveteachers' understanding and receptiv-ity to the information and techniquespresented in the teacher educationprogram.

Because learners' beliefs are im-portant determinants of their behav-ior, teacher's beliefs play a critical rolein improving second language in-struction. Uncovering these beliefs cancontribute to an understanding ofhow to refine and improve teachingand learning in a school environment(Kleinsasser, 1993). An examination ofthese prospective primary school Eng-lish teachers' beliefs about languagelearning and teaching can also benefitthe teacher trainer and trainees. Thispaper, therefore, focuses on the inves-tigation of these prospective Englishteachers' beliefs about language learn-ing and especially their beliefs aboutteaching English to children. In addi-tion, comparisons of teachers' beliefswill be made between these Taiwan-ese prospective teachers with foreignlanguage teachers in the U.S. for bet-ter understanding.

DESCRIPTION OF STUDY

SubjectsA total of 68 subjects from a pri-

mary-school English teacher trainingprogram participated in the study.Among the 68 trainees (from twoclasses), there were 5 males (7%) and63 females (93%). All the trainees hadpassed the English proficiency test

46

given by the Language Testing andTeaching Center on behalf of the Min-istry of Education. Their English oralproficiency was rated above Level 2.All of the subjects, therefore, waivedthe additional 240-hour languagecourses. Over two-thirds of the sub-jects (68%) had stayed in English-speaking countries for an average of6.7 years. About two-thirds (66%) alsohad experience teaching English. Tothe question whether they had experi-ence teaching English to children, 50percent said yes, 49 percent said no,and one person did not answer.

InstrumentA questionnaire was developed

to survey the prospective Englishteachers' beliefs in five major areas: (1)child development, (2) teaching Eng-lish to children, (3) teaching strategiesand techniques, (4) the nature of lan-guage learning, and (5) self-efficacyand expectations. Some items wereadopted or modified from Horwitz'sBeliefs About Language Learning In-ventory (BALLI) (Horwitz, 1987).Other items were written by the au-thor based on a literature review onteaching English to children (e.g.,Dunn, 1983; Halliwell, 1992; Philips,1993) and related fields (e.g., Berk,1997; Brown, 1994).

In the questionnaire, the subjectswere asked to read a statement, suchas "It's better to use English from thefirst lesson." Then, the subjects de-cided if they (1) strongly disagree, (2)disagree, (3) neither agree nor dis-agree, (4) agree, or (5) strongly agreewith the statement. Since the ques-tionnaire was designed to assess pro-

Teachers' Beliefs About Language and Learning 41

spective English teachers' beliefs andopinions, it did not yield a compositescore; rather, responses to the indi-vidual items revealed prospectiveteachers' views of language learningand teaching.

ProceduresThe subjects completed the ques-

tionnaire during the first week of thetraining session. The questionnairedata was coded and keyed in to com-puter files. The data was then ana-lyzed descriptively by calculating per-centages and mean scores. In addition,the learning diaries of the subjectswere collected and analyzed as sup-plementary information.

RESULTSThe section will discuss the re-

sults of the survey, which consist offour major areas: (1) general beliefsabout child development, (2) generalbeliefs about language learning, (3)specific beliefs about teaching Englishto children, and (4) self-efficacy andexpectation (See Appendix A). In thediscussion below, the subjects' 1 and 2responses to the Likert scale (StronglyDisagree and Disagree) are presentedtogether, as are their 4 and 5 re-sponses (Agree and Strongly Agree).This combination has been done inorder to allow generalizations aboutoverall trends in the subjects' re-sponses.

General Beliefs about ChildDevelopment

The prospective teachers sharedseveral similar beliefs about child de-velopment. For example, most (73%)

agreed that children's first-languagedevelopment is related to their sec-ond-language acquisition. This ac-cords with the common belief that thedegree to which children can use theirfirst language to communicate willreflect on their ability to acquire thesecond language (Dunn, 1983). In ad-dition, about two-thirds (66%) of theprospective teachers endorsed theconcept of individual difference andagreed that young children have greatindividual differences in their cogni-tive development. They believed thatindividual children learn and react toschool differently (97%). These beliefswere mentioned and discussed byseveral trainees when they wroteabout the most important issues theyconsidered in teaching English tochildren. Over three-quarters of theprospective teachers (79%) also agreedthat boys and girls would develop atdifferent rates and react in differentways.

These prospective teachers, how-ever, thought differently about chil-dren's physical development. Fewerthan one half (46%) agreed that chil-dren's muscular development mightaffect their ability to read, whereas25% were neutral and 28% disagreedwith the statement [1]. As Dunn statedin his book, Beginning English withYoung Children, "Not only cognitivedevelopment but also physical devel-opment plays an important role in de-termining what activities are right forthe young child" (Dunn, 1983, P. 14).It may be the case that, if teachers be-lieve it is a part of natural develop-ment for children to have difficultysitting still, then those teachers will


feel strongly that "classroom activitiesneed to give children an opportunityto move around within the class-room." Among the respondents, 64%agreed, 21% were neutral, and 16%disagreed with the previous state-ment.

Adults and the society and cul-ture in which the child lives can affectnot only the child's development but-also his or her success in learning aforeign language (Berk, 1997; Dunn,1983). Many of the prospective teach-ers believed in the great influence ofthe children's parents, for 95% agreedthat "if parents are interested in theirchildren's achievement in English andshow appreciation of their success, thechildren will be motivated." Also, 92%of the prospective teachers agreed thatpeople in Taiwan feel that it is impor-..tant to be able to speak English. Thispositive attitude toward English frommost Taiwanese people might affecttheir children's English learning.Some subjects in this study believed inthe teacher's influence, as 74%thought that "young children are ea-ger to build up a relationship withtheir teacher." In view of the possibleinfluence from local culture on thechildren as well as the majority of theimported ESL or English materialsand textbooks available in the market,over one half (59%) of the respondentsconsidered it would be unrealistic toexpect young beginners in Taiwan torespond to material and activities inthe classroom like an American,Australian, or English child of thesame age, though 28% disagreed withthe idea.

General Beliefs about LanguageLearning

Most of the prospective teachers(81%) believed that in learning Eng-lish, younger is better. It is thus notsurprising to find that 70% of theteachers agreed that it is best to learnEnglish starting in primary school.Most teachers believed that childrenare different from adults in terms oflearning foreign languages, for 84% ofthe respondents disagreed that chil-dren learn English the same way asthe adults. About 59% agreed thatanyone can learn to speak Englishwell, while 29% neither agreed nordisagreed with the statement. Only12% disagreed.

As for the nature of learning alanguage, more than half (56%) be-lieved that we acquire languageknowledge by repeatedly understand-ing expressions in the language thatare "a little beyond" our current levelof competence, whereas 32% neitheragreed nor disagreed with the state-ment. Most subjects agreed that one"can't learn without practice" (94%),one learns English "through interact-ing with other people" (90%), onelearns quickly when one understands(88%), and "entertainment will speedup the learning process" (81%). Only29% agreed "there is a secret in learn-ing English quickly," whereas 46%disagreed with the statement and 25%were neutral. A large majority (95%)rejected the statement that "we learnEnglish only through the ears," andover three quarters (78%) also dis-agreed that "we don't have to memo-rize anything to learn English." Theseteachers also cared about students'

48


correctness in learning pronunciation,for 63% agreed that if beginning stu-dents were permitted to make errorsin English pronunciation without cor-rection, it would be difficult for themto correct those errors later on.

Specific Beliefs about TeachingEnglish to Children

To teach English to children,these teachers generally agreed that itis necessary to teach about foreign cul-ture (90%). They believed that spellingand grammar should not be the firstsubjects to teach (85%). Most of themagreed that the most important part ofteaching children English is oralcommunication skills (79% agreed),not vocabulary (82% disagreed).

As to the importance of teachingother English skills to children, theseteachers held varied views. For exam-ple, 43% agreed that pronunciation isthe most important part of teachingchildren English, while 31% were neu-tral, and 26% disagreed with thatstatement. Listening comprehensionwas considered the most importantcomponent by 37% of the respon-dents, while 38% neither agreed nordisagreed and 25% disagreed withthat statement. Only 46% agreed thatsounds, words, and grammar shouldbe taught together, whereas 18% wereneutral and 35% disagreed with thatstatement.

The prospective teachers sharedseveral specific beliefs about the wayto teach English to children. The ma-jority believed that children acquiredlanguage by taking part in activities(90%) and that letting the children uselanguage to accomplish activities

helps them learn (99%). Althoughgames are popular in many children'sprivate language schools in Taiwan,96% of the prospective teachers be-lieved that not all games are suitablefor young beginners, and 80% be-lieved that games are most useful ifthey consolidate language items. Theprospective teachers were also posi-tive about the use of multimedia (suchas tapes, video tapes, CD ROM) toteach children English. Thus, 85% ofthe respondents agreed with its use inthe primary classrooms. On the otherhand, only half agreed that it is betterto use English from the first lesson.

Self-Efficacy and ExpectationIn general, the prospective teach-

ers had strong motivations and highexpectations of becoming good pri-mary school English teachers. Many ofthem (95%, of which 63% indicatedstrong agreement) felt that theywanted to be a good primary schoolEnglish teacher and considered teach-ing English in the primary school as"valuable" (92%) and "a good job"(50%). Although a large number ofthem (83%) rejected the idea thatteaching English was or would beeasy, most of them (82%) were confi-dent in becoming good English teach-ers to children and 75% believed theycould teach children English verywell. About 82% felt comfortable withchildren and 79% said they liked chil-dren a lot. In addition, 62% believedthat teaching English in the primaryschool was or would be "a lot of fun."These positive attitudes and beliefstoward themselves and teaching tasksreflected the enormous enthusiasm of


the prospective teachers in the begin-ning of the training program.

COMPARISONS WITH OTHER STUDIESBecause few studies have exam-

ined teachers' beliefs about teachingEnglish to children in particular, thispaper will attempt to compare, interms of similar belief items, the be-liefs of the prospective teachers in thisstudy with those of foreign languageteachers in other studies, particularlyHorwitz (1985), and Kern (1995).

Comparisons with Horwitz's StudyResults

Horwitz (1985) used two instru-ments, the Foreign Language Survey(FLAS) and the Beliefs About Lan-guage Learning Inventory (BALLI), toelicit prospective foreign languageteachers' beliefs about language learn-ing and teaching. As details of thespecific beliefs were not reported inthe 1985 paper, this researcher madeonly a rough comparison and foundthree major similarities between thetwo groups of prospective teachers:First, Horwitz found that the prospec-tive foreign language teachers in hermethods class, like many other Ameri-cans, felt it is easier for children thanadults to learn a foreign language.Similarly, in this study, most of theprospective Taiwanese elementary-school English teachers did not thinkthat children learn English the sameway as adults do (84%) and they be-lieved that younger is better inlearning English (81%). Moreover,Horwitz found her methods studentsconsistently agreed that it was impor-tant "to listen and repeat a lot" and to

practice in the language lab, while theprospective teachers in this study alsowere positive about the importance ofpractice and using multimedia forpractice. Furthermore, the prospectiveteachers in Horwitz's method classgenerally felt strongly that it is theteacher's responsibility to motivatestudents, whereas a large number ofthe prospective teachers reported intheir learning diaries that to motivatestudents and to develop their interestin learning English is one of the mostimportant issues in teaching Englishto children.

While the prospective teachers inHorwitz's study commonly believedthat the languages they were prepar-ing to teach were relatively easy ones,only 4% of the prospective teachers inthis study considered English as easyto teach in the primary schools. Mostof them (83%) disagreed and felt Eng-lish is not easy. This feeling might notjust be due to the difficulty of the lan-guage they are to teach, but it mightalso be related to their great expecta-tions of themselves and of the task ofteaching English in the primaryschools (see previous section on "self-efficacy and expectation"). Anotherexplanation might be found from thelearning diary entries of the prospec-tive teachers' about the most impor-tant issues in teaching children Eng-lish. Many teachers provided lists ofvarious qualifications and require-ments for a good primary school Eng-lish teacher, which revealed these pro-spective teachers' ardent anticipation,and a little anxiety, toward becominggood primary English teachers.


Comparisons with Kern's StudyKern (1995) studied the beliefs of

12 French instructors and 288 studentsbeliefs about language learning in anAmerican university setting. WhenKern's results are compared withthose of this study, especially in re-gard to teachers beliefs about lan-guage learning and teaching, one can,find three major similarities.

First, all instructors in Kern'sstudy agreed that it is important torepeat and practice a lot, whereas 94%of the prospective teachers in thisstudy thought that one cannot learnwithout practice. Eighty-four percentof the university instructors agreedthat it is important to practice in thelanguage laboratory while -85% of theprospective elementary-school Eng-lish teachers felt that it is important touse multimedia (such as audiotapes,videotapes, and CD ROM) to teachchildren English.

Second, the majority of the uni-versity instructors rejected the state-ment that learning a foreign languageis mostly a matter of learning a lot ofnew vocabulary words (92%) orgrammar rules (83%), and the pro-spective teachers in this study heldsimilar views. They disagreed withthe statement that the most importantpart of teaching children is vocabulary(82%), and they felt spelling andgrammar should not the first subjectto teach (46%).

The third similarity between thebeliefs of college instructors and theprospective elementary-school teach-ers concerns age and language learn-ing. Most of the prospective teachersbelieved that, in learning English,

younger is better (81%) and that it isbest to learn English from primaryschool (70%), while 67% of the collegeinstructors agreed that it is easier forchildren than adults to learn a foreignlanguage.

On the other hand, college in-structors differed from the prospec-tive elementary school English teach-ers in two respects. While 90% of theprospective teachers believed that it isnecessary to teach foreign culturewhen teaching English, the college in-structors were less enthusiastic aboutteaching culture. Only 25% felt that itis necessary to know the foreign cul-ture in order to speak a foreign lan-guage, while 58% were neutral and17% disagreed. In addition, the collegeinstructors were more relaxed aboutcorrecting students' mistakes, for onlya fourth of them felt that, if a learnerwas allowed to make mistakes in thebeginning, it would be hard to get ridof those mistakes later on. Half ofthem disagreed with the statementand the remaining fourth neitheragreed nor disagreed.

All of the college instructors dis-agreed with the idea that one shouldnot say anything in the language untilone can say it correctly. In contrast,the Taiwanese prospective teacherswere more concerned with the stu-dents' English errors, especially inpronunciation. This belief is similar tothat held by Taiwanese college stu-dents in previous studies (e.g., Yang,1999). Over 80% of college studentsand 63% of the prospective teachersagreed that it would be difficult forbeginning students to correct English


errors later on if they were permittedto make those errors early.

IMPLICATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

Limitations of the StudyThis study used a questionnaire,

mostly developed by the researcher(and instructor), to investigate beliefsabout language learning and teachingheld by the prospective primary-school English teachers in the trainingprogram. Owing to characteristics ofretrospective self-reports, some in-formation may be missing when re-porting (Garner, 1988). In addition,these teachers' beliefs may changeduring and after the training session.It should also noted that the resultsare based on a small sample of theprospective teachers in the trainingprogram. Thus, the generalization ofthe results to other populations in dif-ferent teaching contexts, such as highschool or university level, may be lim-ited.

Suggestions for Future ResearchThis study has attempted to ex-

amine the prospective primary schoolEnglish teachers' beliefs about theirstudents' cognitive and physical de-velopment, about the nature of lan-guage learning, about the task ofteaching English to children, andabout themselves as primary-schoolEnglish teachers. Further researchcould be conducted concerning theconsistency between beliefs and ac-tions. In addition, to examine thechanges of beliefs held by the prospec-tive teachers, a similar questionnairecould be administered at the end of

the training program. It would be in-teresting to compare the differencesbetween the two results.

To make further comparisons,the beliefs questionnaire used in thisstudy could be administered toprospective English teachers indifferent contexts or to pre-serviceforeign language teachers in theUnited States.Instructional Implications

The results of this study havethe following instructional implica-tions:

1. Examining teachers' beliefsfirst.In discussing teacher educa-

tion, there are no simple answers tothe question of what makes a goodteacher, so how can we know whatmakes a good primary-school Englishteacher? A helpful approach to an-swering the question, as suggested byWilliams and Burden (1997), seems tolie within the area of teachers' beliefs.Williams and Burden indicated thatteachers' beliefs about what learningis, whether implicit or explicit, "affecteverything that they do in the class-room" (pp. 56-57). One prospectiveteacher echoed the same point in herlearning diary:

What we believe about howchildren acquire a [sec-ond/foreign] language willpretty much determine our at-titude and approaches toteaching English to kids. Andthis belief will greatly con-tribute or do harm to under


standing and flexibility instudents' learning career andour teaching career.

Therefore, studies that focus onteachers' beliefs about learners, learn-ing, and themselves and examine theconsistency with which teachers' ac-tions reflect what they claim to believewould provide helpful information toeffective teaching. Informal examina-tion of teachers' beliefs is also benefi-cial for language teachers themselves.As the same prospective teacher wrotein her learning diary,

I believe our beliefs decidewhat we do and how we doit I think a good way toexamine our beliefs is to seeif our beliefs have createdunderstanding and inspiredlearning in the classroom,or, on the contrary, createdmisunderstanding, discour-agement (on either side), oreven worse.

Also, as Horwitz (1985) indi-cated, making the prospective teach-ers' belief system explicit is the firststep in their development as foreignlanguage teachers. Effort should,therefore, be made to assess the pro-spective teachers' beliefs about lan-guage learning and teaching.

2. Reflecting on one's teachingcritically.In this study, the prospective

teachers' positive attitudes and theirstrong beliefs toward themselves andtheir teaching tasks were a welcomesigns. They reflected the great enthu-siasm and the sometime unrealisticexpectations of most trainees in the

beginning of the training program.Later in the training session, some ofthe prospective teachers became frus-trated when they realized that, con-trary to their expectations, someteaching methods would not work aswell as they thought. They also dis-covered that, when they teach in pri-mary schools, they might face strangeteaching-learning environments andcultures that differ from their familiarEnglish learning environments abroador in the university. How to bridge thegap between their expectation and re-ality becomes an important issue forteacher educators and teachers-to-beto deal with.

On possible way to bridge thegap and to improve their future teach-ing practice is to have both the train-ing instructors and the prospectiveteachers engage in a shared "multi-level process of action, monitoring,reflection, feedback and further ac-tion" (Williams & Burden, 1997, p. 55).During the process of critical reflec-tion, prospective teachers need tolearn to be "reflective practitioners"(Schon, 1983) who consistently gener-ate questions and critically reflect ontheir teaching practices. In otherwords, prospective teachers should beaware of their belief systems and con-stantly monitor how far their ac-tions that is, teaching practicesreflect those beliefs or are in keepingwith them. They may also adjust someof their previous beliefs if possible.This critical reflection can first be con-ducted between the training instruc-tors and the prospective teachers dur-ing the training program and then

j3


gradually carried on by the prospec-tive teachers independently.

3. Changing beliefs gradually.The next step would be to

change these teachers' beliefs. Thischange should not be an impossiblemission, because the beliefs are largelydeveloped and learned, not geneti-cally endowed. Researchers have of-fered suggestions on how to changebeliefs, such as through implementingspecific teacher education programs(e.g., Richardson, 1996; Pennington,1989). The various beliefs revealed inthis study also provided a goodsource of information for the traininginstructors. As suggested by Horwitz(1985), these teachers' beliefs aboutlanguage learning and teaching weregreatly influenced by their previouslearning experiences. As a conse-quence, the best way to deal withvarious views toward a certain teach-ing method is to help the prospectiveteachers move in developmentalstages, not to directly contradict theirdeep-rooted beliefs. Moreover, someprinciples and guidelines on learnertraining can be applied to teachertraining. Therefore, the prospectiveteachers were encouraged to discusstheir views in the learning diaries(e.g., Yang, 1998). Related theories andconcepts were later introduced in thetraining courses. As one prospectiveteacher suggested, "I guess the bestthing we could do to make our beliefsrelated to teaching not so subjective isto base our beliefs as widely onknowledge, new information, and ex-perience as possible."

In short, it is essential to exam-ine language teachers' beliefs and re-flect critically on the effectiveness ofthese beliefs based on teachers' actualteaching practices. Teacher educationshould pay attention to ineffectual be-liefs of their prospective teachers andconfront erroneous beliefs with newinformation and knowledge.

NOTE:[1] The percentage has been rounded to

nearest whole number. Thus, thepercentage may not add up to 100%.

REFERENCES

Berk, L. (1997). Child Development (4thed.). Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Brown, H. (1994). Principles of languagelearning and teaching (3rd ed.).Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall Regents.

Cotterall, S. (1999). Key variables inlanguage learning: What do learn-ers believe about them. System, 27,493-513.

Dunn, 0. (1983). Beginning Englishwith young children. London: Mac-millan Publishers Limited.

Garner, R. (1988). Verbal-report dataon cognitive and metacognitivestrategies. In C. E. Weinstein, E. T.Goetz, & P. A. Alexander (Eds.),Learning and study strategies: Issuesin assessment, instruction, andevaluation (pp. 63-76). San Diego:Academic Press.

Halliwell, S. (1992). Teaching English inthe primary classroom. Essex:Longman.

Horwitz, E. (1985). Using student be-liefs about language learning andteaching in the foreign language

5 4


methods course. Foreign LanguageAnnals, 18, 333-340.

Horwitz, E. (1987). Surveying studentbeliefs about language learning. InA. L. Wenden & J. Rubin (Eds.),Learner strategies in language learn-ing (pp. 119-129). EnglewoodCliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Lin, C. (1999). Teacher preparation: Pre-paring what for prospective teachers?Paper presented in the Conferenceon English Teacher Education forthe 21st Century, Taipei, Taiwan.

Pajares, M. (1992). Teachers' beliefsand educational research: Clearingup a messy construct. Review ofEducational Research, 62, 307-332.

Pennington, M. (1989). Faculty devel-opment from language programs.In R. K. Johnson (Ed.), The secondlanguage curriculum (pp. 91-110).Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress.

Philips, S. (1993). Young learners. HongKong: Oxford University Press.

Richards, J. & Lockhart, C. (1996). Re-flective teaching in second lan-guage classrooms. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.

Richardson, V. (1996). The role of atti-tudes and beliefs in learning toteach. In J. Sikula, T. J. Buttery,and E. Guyton (Eds.), Handbookof research on teacher education(pp. 102-119). New York: Mac-millan Library Reference.

Savignon, S. J. (1976). On the otherside of the desk: A look atteacher attitude and motivationin second-language learning.The Canadian Modern LanguageReview, 32, 295-304.

Schon, D. (1983). The reflective practi-tioner: How professionals think in ac-tion. New York: Basic Books.

Shih, Y. H. (1999). Criterion for evaluat-ing primary school English textbooks.Paper presented at the eighth In-ternational Symposium and BookFair on English Teaching, Taipei,Taiwan.

Williams, M. & Burden, R. (1997). Psy-chology for language teachers: A so-cial constructivist approach. Cam-bridge: Cambridge UniversityPress.

Yang, N. (1998). Exploring a new rolefor teachers: Promoting learnerautonomy. System, 26, 127-135.

Yang, N. (1999). The relationship be-tween EFL learnerslE beliefs andlearning strategy use. System, 27,515-535.

Yu, C. (1999). A study on the primaryELT curriculum: What is good pri-mary practice. Paper presented atthe eighth International Sympo-sium and Book Fair on EnglishTeaching, Taipei, Taiwan.


APPENDIX ATHE RESPONSE (IN %) TO EACH ITEM IN THE BELIEFS ABOUT TEACHING CHILDREN

ENGLISH SURVEY

No Item Description

I Beliefs About Child Development12.If parents are interested in their chil-

dren's achievement in English and showappreciation of the success, the childrenwill be motivated.

20.Individual children learn and react toschool differently.

13.People in Taiwan feel that it is impor-tant to be able to speak English.

3. Boys and girls develop at different ratesand react in different ways.

4. Young children have great individualdifferences in their cognitive develop-ment.

9. Young children are eager to build up arelationship with their teacher.

17.How children can use their first lan-guage to communicate is related to theirability to acquire the second language.

8. Classroom activities need to give chil-dren an opportunity to move aroundwithin the classroom.

10.It is not realistic to expect young begin-ners in Taiwan to respond to materialand activities in the classroom like anAmerican, Australian, or English childof the same age.

11.Muscular development may affect achild's ability for reading.

II General Beliefs About LanguageLearning

31 We can't learn without practice.

38 We learn English through interactingwith other people.

32 Entertainment speeds up the learningprocess.

1 [a]Strong-

lyDis-agree

2 3 4

5

Strong-Mean

lyAgree

SD

0 [b] 1 3 41 54 4.49 0.63

1 1 0 47 50 4.43 0.72

3 3 3 49 43 4.25 0.89

1 4 15 53 26 3.99 0.86

0 jc) 12 21 41 25 3.88 1.14

0 10 16 52 22 3.85 0.89

4 4 18 63 10 3.71 0.88

3 13 21 53 10 3.54 0.95

7 [c] 21 12 43 16 3.49 1.38

9 [c] 19 25 40 6 3.24 1.29

1 1 3 28 66 4.56 0.76

0 1 9 41 49 4.37 0.71

0 [c] 4 13 50 31 4.16 0.99


APPENDIX A (CONTINUED)

No Item Description

30 In learning English, younger is better.

33 Learning takes place quickly when peo-ple understand.

43 Everyone can learn to speak Englishwell.

25 If beginning students are permitted tomake errors in English pronunciationwithout correction, it will be difficult forthem to correct later on.

5 We acquire by understanding languagethat is "a little beyond" our current levelof competence.

24 There is a secret in learning Englishquickly.

28 Children learn English the same way asthe adults.

26 We don't have to memorize anything tolearn English.

7 We learn English only through the ears.

III Specific Beliefs about Teaching Chil-dren English

39 Let the children use language to accom-plish something will help them learn.

14 Not all games are suitable for youngbeginners.

35 It is necessary to teach about foreignculture when teaching English.

2 Children acquire language by takingpart in activities.

41 Spelling and grammar should not be thefirst thing to teach.

45 It is important to use multi-media (suchas tapes, video tapes, CD ROM) to teachchildren English.

44 Games are most useful if they consoli-date language items.

42 The most important part of teaching 3 7 10 50 29 3.96 0.98children English is oral communication

I [a]Strong-

ly 2 3 4

5

Strly on g-MeMean

SD

Dis-agree

0 4 15 43

Agree

38 4.15 0.83

0 4 7 62 26 4.10 0.72

0 12 29 46 13 3.60 0.87

6 18 13 37 26 3.60 1.22

3 9 32 50 6 3.47 0.85

9 37 25 22 7 2.82 1.11

22 [c] 62 6 4 4 2.16 1.25

28 50 7 10 4 2.13 1.08

66 29 1 0 3 1.44 0.80

0 0 1 43 56 4.54 0.53

1 [c] 0 1 56 40 4.41 0.87

0 3 7 53 37 4.24 0.71

3 1 6 49 41 4.24 0.87

0 4 10 54 31 4.12 0.76

0 6 9 54 31 4.10 0.79

0 [c] 6 13 56 24 4.06 0.99

skills.46 It is best to learn English from primary

school.0 9 22 49 21 3.81 0.87

BBT COPY MAILABLE 57


TABLE 1 (CONTINUED)

No Item Description

1 [a]Strong

-lyDis-agree

2 3 4

5

ngoStryMean

Agree

SD

19 It's better to use English from the firstlesson.

3 16 31 40 10 3.38 0.98

23 Sounds, words, and grammar should 9 [c]be taught together, not separately.

26 18 31 15 3.25 1.42

40, The most important part of teaching 4children English is pronunciation.

22 31 31 12 3.24 1.07

36 The most important part of teachingchildren English is listening compre-hension.

4 21 38 28 9 3.16 1.00

29 The most important part of teachingchildren English is vocabulary.

25 57 12 4 1 2.00 0.83

IV Self-Efficacy And Expectation

37 I want to be a good primary school 0 0 4 32 63 4.59 0.58English teacher.

16 Teaching English in the primary schoolis valuable.

0 0 9 46 46 4.37 0.64

22 I am confident in becoming a good 0 3 15 53 29 4.09 0.75English teacher to children.

15 I am comfortable with children. 1 3 13 54 28 4.04 0.82

34 I like children a lot. 0 1 19 54 25 4.03 0.71

18 I believe I can teach children Englishvery well.

0 1 24 46 29 4.03 0.77

21 Teaching English in the primary schoolis (or will be) a lot of fun.

1 4 32 52 10 3.65 0.79

27 Teaching English in primary school is agood job.

0 9 41 38 12 3.53 0.82

6 Teaching English in the primary schoolis (or will be) easy.

34 49 13 1 3 1.91 0.89

Notes:[a] 1 = Strongly disagree, 2 = Disagree, 3 = Neither disagree nor agree, 4 = Agree, and 5

Strongly agree.[b] The percentage has been rounded to nearest whole number.[c] There is one person who did not answer this question (1%).

58

Foreign Language Methods Students' Beliefs About LanguageLearning and Teaching*

STASIE C. HARRINGTON, The Pennsylvania State UniversityTAMMY JANDREY HERTEL, Juniata College

The present study is an attempt to further the work initiated by Horwitz (1985)on future foreign language teachers' preconceived ideas about language learningand teaching. Two surveys were administered at the beginning and the end of twoforeign language methods courses taught at different universities. Quantitativedata from these surveys and qualitative data from student belief statements arediscussed. Conclusions drawn from this study point to the need for educators tocontinue to provide their students with opportunities to examine their tacit beliefsabout how languages are learned and should be taught.

INTRODUCTION

How we, as teacher educators, view and define the process of learning toteach determines the type of instruction and experiences that our teacher-learners receive during their professional development. Such development hastraditionally been conceptualized as transmission, that is, the combination ofpresentation and practice. For example, during methodology courses, languageteachers are introduced to a "codified body of knowledge about language, lan-guage learning, and language teaching . . . [and] a range of teaching practices ormethodologies" (Freeman & Johnson, 1998, p. 402).

A key component is missing from this conceptualization of learning toteach: the important role of the teacher-learners' beliefs. The teacher-learnerswho enter the methodology course do not come empty-handed; rather, theybring with them beliefs and knowledge that serve as powerful advance-organizers through which the knowledge and experiences gained during theirprofessional development are evaluated and consequently accepted, re-formulated, or rejected. Thus, the teacher-learners' beliefs are an essential com-ponent of the process of learning to teach. Teacher education programs, insteadof focusing their attention on transmitting knowledge, must begin to helpteacher-learners' recognize, articulate, and reflect upon the knowledge and be-liefs they already possess. By having opportunities to reflect on their beliefs andpractices, teacher-learners become empowered. In other words, teacher empow-erment occurs when control, rather than being external to the teacher her or him-self, comes from within as the teacher examines and questions her or his beliefs,intentions, understandings and practices:

[T]eacher empowerment does not occur without reflection and the developmentof the means to express justifications. Without such empowerment, teachers maybecome victims of their personal biographies, systemic political demands, and


59


ecological conditions, ratherthan making use of them indeveloping and sustainingworthwhile and significantchange (Richardson, 1990,p. 16).

Such empowerment is essential sincethe process of learning to teach doesnot begin and end with the method-ology course, rather, it is a life-longprocess (Armaline & Hoover, 1989;Britzman, 1992; Richardson, 1990;Zeichner & Liston, 1996).

Changing Paradigms in TeacherEducation

The teaching profession isconstantly evolving; novel or tradi-tional ideas and perspectives emergeor re-emerge, thus calling for a re-evaluation of the status quo.Changes ranging from minor ad-justments to complete paradigmshifts have been a defining variablethroughout the history of education,and teacher education has not es-caped such scrutiny and 'demandsfor transformation, although it hastypically lagged behind (Freeman &Johnson, 1998; Richardson, 1996).

Prior to the mid-1970s, behav-iorism and a process-product para-digm dominated the field of educa-tion. Behaviorism posited a hierar-chical and transmittal view ofknowledge, in which knowledge wastransmitted in the following order:researcher, textbook, administrator,teacher educator, and teacher. Thus,inherent in this top-down structure,notions such as "expert" and "exper-tise" were valued and levied against

Co

teachers, who were positioned at thebottom of the hierarchy (Richardson,1996). Teaching was conceptualizedas "a set of discrete behaviors, rou-tines, or scripts drawn from empiri-cal investigations of what effective orexpert teachers did in practice," andsince it was assumed that behaviorswere linked to learning outcomes,the goal of research became thesearch for optimal teaching behav-iors (Freeman & Johnson, 1998, p.399).

The effect of behaviorism andthe process-product approach in thearea of teacher education was mani-fested in the adoption of its trans-mission conceptualization of knowl-edge. A training model was used toguide the instruction of studentteachers: a teacher educator trans-mitted "accepted" behaviors andtechniques, as deemed by research,to the student teachers, and it wasassumed that they learned skillsfrom the model and changed theirbehaviors. Therefore, teacher change,as seen through the lens of behavior-ism, consisted of an external demandplaced upon the teacher by the "ex-perts," i.e., the knowledge sourceson higher levels of the hierarchy.Teachers were then required to in-ternalize the externally mandatedchanges without question (Richard-son, 1996).

Starting in the mid-1970s, anew body of educational researchbegan to develop that challengedbehaviorism and the process-product paradigm. It raised socio-political questions about teachers

Beliefs About Language Learning and Teaching 55

and their role and epistemologicalquestions about the nature of whatteachers knew and how they ac-quired that knowledge (Elbaz, 1991;Freeman, 1996). This new concernfor teacher thinking and socializationemerged "in high-profile researchreports in the United States and inEngland and in the publication oftwo books that became highly influ-ential: Philip Jackson's (1968) Life inClassrooms, and Dan Lortie's (1975)Schoolteacher: A Sociological Study(Freeman, 1996, p. 355). Lortie (1975),basing his work on that of Jackson,examined the powerful influence ofschools and schooling. His conceptof the "apprenticeship of observa-tion" referred to the way in whichteachers' past experiences as stu-dents within the educational system,during the approximately 13,000hours spent in the schools, affecttheir beliefs and knowledge. Thus,schooling was believed to have moreof an influence on teacher's class-room practices than any formalknowledge acquired during methodscourses or student teaching. Conse-quently, this belief in the importanceand tenacity of schooling prompteda questioning of the value of teachereducation programs.

Following this initial impetusto place more attention on teachersocialization and thought, a con-structivist conception of teachinghad taken root by the 1980s. Theworld of teaching, according to theconstructivist tradition, viewedteachers as constructors of knowl-edge rather than mere recipients andconsumers (Richardson, 1996).

Moreover, the constructivist concep-tion of teacher change stressed theimportance of teachers' control overwhen, why, and how change wouldoccur and the fact that change is aconstant variable in the learning-to-teach process (Richardson, 1994). Fi-nally, the constructivist viewpointchallenged behaviorism's transmittalview of knowledge; it leveled theimposed top-down hierarchy.Teachers were no longer viewed asempty vessels waiting for "experts"to provide them with knowledge;consequently, the traditional trainingmodel of teacher education was re-placed by one of teacher empower-ment. The goal of teacher trainingwas to provide the teacher-learnerswith tools that would help themconstruct their own knowledge byfirst recognizing their personal be-liefs and conceptions of teaching andthen joining them with their teachingpractices. Teachers' construction ofknowledge, accomplished on both apersonal and social level, i.e., boththrough personal reflection andthrough engaging in open dialoguewith others, formed the basis of thedynamic and continuous process oflearning to teach.

Teacher BeliefsArmaline and Hoover (1989)

and Horwitz (1985) addressed theissue of understanding one's beliefsand knowledge about teaching. Spe-cifically, they examined the influenceof schooling and prior experienceson teacher-learners' beliefs and iden-tity and how this tacit knowledgemay be made explicit.

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Armaline and Hoover (1989)used critical reflection to help stu-dents begin to articulate the beliefsthat define their conception of teach-ing. Through the process of criticalreflection, the exposed beliefs areopen to scrutiny and then modifica-tion or replacement. According tothese authors, teacher education,must proceed in a series of steps de-signed to prepare student teachersfor the culminating field experience.The initial activities are aimed at"dislodging students from belief sys-tems rooted only in their own unex-amined experiences of having beenin schools as students" (p. 46). Pro-viding the student teachers with corefield and classroom experiences inwhich they are asked to evaluate andcritique the teaching practices theyboth observe and demonstrate thenchallenges these initial beliefs. Ac-tivities such as microteaching andpeer teaching serve as opportunitiesfor such reflection on practice. Fi-nally, the field experience allows forboth practice teaching and reflectionon practice so that the studentteacher goes beyond "merelymodel[ling] the conventional activi-ties of teaching and schooling" (p.46).

Horwitz (1985) studied for-eign language teachers' precon-ceived ideas about how languagesare learned and how they should betaught. Over several years whileteaching a methods class, Horwitzhad her students fill out two instru-ments, the Foreign Language Atti-tude Survey (FLAS) [1] and the Be-liefs About Language Learning In-

62

ventory (BALLI). Administered asthe first activity of the methodscourse, the inventories assessed theteachers' beliefs in four main areas:foreign language aptitude, the diffi-culty of language learning, the na-ture of language learning, and ap-propriate language learning strate-gies. The purpose of having the stu-dents complete the inventories wasto challenge student opinions andprovide a type of advance organizerto subsequent course content. Fromher experience with these instru-ments, Horwitz concluded that theyprovided a systematic way of assess-ing language teachers' beliefs andallowing the teachers to consciouslyexamine the beliefs that otherwisemay have remained tacit. Neverthe-less, she pointed to the need for re-search that would documentwhether the beliefs that surfaced as aresult of completing the inventorieswere subsequently maintainedthroughout the teaching career of themethods students. The present studywas an attempt to further Horwitz'work on pre-service teachers' beliefsabout language learning and teach-ing, examining their beliefs both atthe beginning and end of the foreignlanguage teaching methods course.

METHODSParticipants included twenty

undergraduate students enrolled intwo foreign language teachingmethodology courses at two differ-ent universities during the Fall 1999semester. Most students were simul-taneously enrolled in a practicum


experience at the high school or post-high school setting.

Both quantitative and qualita-tive methods were utilized. The twoquantitative instruments were thoseused by Horwitz (1985): the ForeignLanguage Attitude Survey (FLAS)and the Beliefs About LanguageLearning Inventory (BALLI). For thepurposes of the present study, threestatements were added to the BALLI:numbers 28, 29, and 30. See Appen-dices A and B for copies of these in-struments. Both surveys included afive-point Likert scale. They wereadministered at the beginning andthe end of both methods courses.Qualitative data consisted of beliefstatements written by the partici-pants at the beginning and end of thesemester. Analysis of the survey dataconsisted of a Marginal Homogene-ity test, the non-parametric versionof a repeated measures t-test (p waspreset at <.05. A Mann-Whitneytest was also performed to determinewhether there were differences be-tween the responses of the twomethods classes, and no significantdifferences were found (p<.05).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Significant Changes in BeliefsThe following section dis-

cusses five survey statements foundto be significant; that is, statementsfor which a significant difference be-tween the pre- and post-test meanswas found. Each statement is firstpresented with quantitative datafrom the surveys, and then followed

by supporting quotes from the par-ticipants' belief papers.

Participants' responses to thefirst statement, "The student'smotivation to continue languagestudy is directly related to her/hissuccess in actually learning to speakthe language," illustrate that while atthe beginning of the semester theyremained neutral (x=3.32) at the endof the semester they moved towardagreement with the statement(x=3.73) (see Figure 1).

5

4

3

2

5--strongly agree 1=strongly disagree

CI Pre-test

Post-test

Figure 1. Means for "The student'smotivation to continue lan-guage study is directly relatedto learning to speak the lan-guage."

This belief in the importance of mo-tivation can be illustrated by the fol-lowing quotes, taken from the par-ticipants' belief papers at the end ofthe course:

Learning a foreign languagerequires much interest, joyand intrinsic motivation. Tosucceed in a foreign language


is not so much the teacher'sdoing (well, of course theteacher can make the class in-teresting and fun instead ofboring and dry and can ex-plain grammar well) but thestudent's. His development ismostly dependent on his ef-forts.

I will prepare learners to be-come intrinsically and extrin-sically motivated and to enjoythe language throughout theirlifetime.

It is interesting to note the differencein perspective between these twoquotes. While the first participantfocused on the students motivatingthemselves, the second chose tostress the teacher's responsibility tomotivate the students. This contrastwas reflected in many of the partici-pants' belief statements.

The second statement was"Language learning ability is innate;therefore, everyone should be capa-ble of learning a second language ifshe/he is capable of learning a firstlanguage." While staying relativelyneutral, it is evident that the partici-pants, at the end of the course,moved toward agreement with the.statement (pre-course, x=2.77; post-course, x=3.32) (see Figure 2).

Participants' agreement withthis statement is illustrated by thefollowing quotes, taken from theirend of the semester belief state-ments:

I believe that all students havedifferent learning abilities andwith the right help from goodteachers, they can become

5

4

3

2

5=strongly agree 1=strongly disagree

01111111P041111

On

0 Pre-test

Post-test

Figure 2. Means for "Languagelearning ability is innate; there-fore, everyone should be capa-ble of learning a second lan-guage if she/he is capable oflearning a first language."

avid speakers of a second lan-guage.

It is not easy to learn a secondlanguage and for some itcomes more easily than toothers, but every studentshould be encouraged to atleast give it a try and with thehelp of the right teacher, theymay end up achieving flu-ency.

It is important to note that bothmethods courses included a discus-sion of the Standards for Foreign Lan-guage Learning, and one of the threemain assumptions of the Standardsis the ability of all students to be suc-cessful language learners. Thus, thisdiscussion may have influenced par-ticipants' beliefs regarding this state-ment.


Regarding the next statement,"It's important to repeat and practicea lot," the participants agreed lesswith the statement at the end of thecourse (pre-course, x=1.59; post-course, x=2.14). (Note that5=strongly disagree and 1=stronglyagree the scale was reversed on theBALLI). (see Figure 3). So while par-ticipants still agree with this state-ment, they do agree less strongly.

The first quote below was takenfrom a participant's pre-course beliefpaper, and it clearly demonstrates astrong belief in the value of repeti-tion and practice:

Second languages are learnedthrough repetition. [...] Whenbabies begin to learn their firstlanguage, they listen to theworld around them and then

5=strongly disagree 1=strongly agree

Figure 3. Means for "It's importantto repeat and practice a lot."

begin to repeat what they hear.They constantly repeat wordsthat they know that the adultsaround them give a positive re-action to hearing. [...] The stu-dents are in unfamiliar territory

and starting off on new ground,just as babies are when they firstattempt speaking.

This participant deleted the entireparagraph when revising her state-ment at the end of the semester. An-other participant voiced her concernfor the potential problems associatedwith repetition and practice. Thisquote was written at the end of thesemester:

Drill exercises tend to be toorepetitive and the studentsmay begin to despise the lan-guage because of the tedioustask.

The fourth statement was "Itis important to expose learners to thenatural speech of native speakers."While participants agreed with thestatement at the beginning of thecourse (x=1.81), they agreed evenmore strongly at the end of thecourse (x=1.43) (see Figure 4).

5=strongly disagree 1=strongly agree

Figure 4. Means for "It is importantto expose learners to the natu-ral speech of native speakers."

65


Strong belief in the value of nativespeech is demonstrated by the fol-lowing quotes, written at the end ofthe semester:

Whenever possible, secondlanguage teachers shouldbring native speakers into theclassroom, whether physicallyas guest speakers or throughtechnological devices liketaped dialogues and/ orInternet.

One of the discussions we'vehad in class that has rein-forced my beliefs was aboutthe role of negotiation ofmeaning as input for students.I feel that these ideas rein-forced my belief that authen-tic conversation with nativespeakers is an important fac-tor in learning a language.

These quotes, along with many oth-ers not included, demonstrate theparticipants' strong belief in the im-portance of exposing students to na-tive speakers' speech.

The final statement was "Theinclusion of cultural material in asecond language course increasesstudent motivation to learn andspeak the language." While the par-ticipants agreed less strongly withthis statement at the end of the se-mester, the pre-test mean of 4.86 wasthe highest of all pre- and post-testitems and the post-test mean of 4.59still expresses strong agreement withthe statement (see Figure 5).

The following quotes, takenfrom the belief papers at the end of

66

5

3

1

5=strongly agree 1=strongly disagree

4.86 4.59

o Pre-test

B Post-test

Figure 5. Means for "The inclusion ofcultural material in a secondlanguage course increasesstudent motivation to learnand speak the language."

the semester, reveal partici-pants' strong belief in the rela-tionship between the inclusionof culture and student motiva-tion:

Cultural content is essential to thestudy of a language and will onlyserve to increase the students' interestand enthusiasm for the language.Important roles of the teacherare to peak students' interest inthe language and make themwant to learn the language byintroducing them to other as-pects of the language such asculture.

These quotes, along with numerousothers not included, show the valuethe participants place on culture inthe teaching of foreign languages.


Beliefs That Remained ConstantThis section presents the find-

ings for six additional survey state-ments. As these statements did notshow statistically significant differ-ences between pre- and post-testmeans, they demonstrate the reso-lute nature of the participants' be-liefs during the duration of themethods courses (see Table 1).

Regarding the first statement,"It is important for students to learnrules of grammar", the participantsexpressed agreement both and at thebeginning and at the end of thesemester. For example, oneparticipant stated the following inher pre-course belief paper:

The mastery of material is animportant component of sec-ond language acquisition be-cause the learner will never beable to build upon his or her

abilities without completelyunderstanding the basicgrammar rules and vocabu-lary. Grammar can be man-aged through a lecture andpractice method while vo-cabulary can be reinforcedthrough memorization . . .

Second languages are learnedby teaching the rules andgrammar of the language andthen expanding upon that.

Then, at the end of the methodscourse, the same participant ex-pressed the following in her post-course belief paper:

The mastery of material is animportant factor in secondlanguage acquisition becausethe learner will be able tobuild upon his or her abilitiesthrough comprehension ofbasic grammar rules and vo-cabulary.

Table 1: Survey Statements That Remained Constant Throughout The MethodsCourses

Survey statementParticipants'

response"It is important for students to learn rules of grammar." Agree

"The teacher should always require that the responses in thetarget language be linguistically perfect."

Disagree

"When a student makes syntactical errors, this should beregarded as a natural and inevitable part of language acqui-sition."

Agree

"Simulated real-life situations should be used to teach con-versation skills."

Stronglyagree

"The ability to exchange ideas in a spontaneous context re-quires skills beyond a knowledge of linguistic structures."

Agree

"Language learning should be fun." Stronglyagree


Through a comparison of thesequotes, it is evident that while the par-ticipant no longer uses the word"completely" nor mentions "a lectureand practice method" or "reinforce-ment through memorization, she stillexpresses a strong belief in the impor-tance of learning grammar rules.

For the second statement, "The. teacher should always require that theresponses in the target language belinguistically perfect", the participantsvoiced disagreement:

Through my adaptation to acommunicative philosophy, Ihave also changed my beliefsabout error correction. While Iam still unsure of how I willdeal with this in class, I knowthat I will correct a lot less er-rors than I previously wouldhave.

The classroom is a place ofgrowth and expression; there-fore mistakes should be ac-cepted.

This belief surfaces again withthe third statement, which is, "When astudent makes syntactical errors, thisshould be regarded as a natural andinevitable part of language acquisi-tion." The following quotes illustratethe participants' agreement with thisstatement:

It also does not matter if theymake mistakes in learning thelanguage. I have come to realizethat it is a natural and neces-sary step of learning the lan-guage. Allowing errors will ac-tually enable the students tolearn more, because they won'tbe so afraid of failure.

I believe that when learning alanguage mistakes are inevita-ble and should be corrected de-pending on whether the activityfocuses on accuracy or commu-nication.

It is clear that the participants feel thaterrors are natural and that requiringlinguistic perfection of their studentswould only serve to hinder the acqui-sition process.

Participants strongly agreedwith the fourth statement: "Simulatedreal-life situations should be used toteach conversation skills" as the fol-lowing quotes demonstrate:

I believe that the studentsshould learn what can be util-ized in the real world and prac-tice real life situations and notjust written exercises.

[Teachers should] guide [stu-dents] toward the ability toconverse using the target lan-guage in real life situations. In-viting native guest speakersinto the classroom would mostlikely enhance conversationskills.

For the fifth statement, "Theability to exchange ideas in a sponta-neous context requires skills beyond aknowledge of linguistic structures,"the participants expressed agreement.One participant, for example, ex-pressed her belief that knowledge ofgrammar and vocabulary can onlytake a language learner so far:

63

Another aspect of socio-linguistic issues has to do withlanguage in context. It is impor-


tant to teach language uses thatare common and acceptable indifferent situations. Studentsshould know how to react ap-propriately in a social situation.For example, when I went toSpain and ordered a coffee forthe first time I said somethinglike 'Necesito un café'. Thewaiter laughed at me and Ireally wasn't sure why. I laterlearned that the verb 'necesitar"is only used in a certain context(of survival) and that I didn'tuse it correctly even though mysentence made sense grammati-cally speaking.

Another participant stated the follow-ing:

An invaluable asset of foreignlanguage acquisition is the abil-ity to communicate with speak-ers of diverse languages, some-thing that can be fosteredthrough the use of and empha-sis on communication skills inthe classroom. Students need tobe able to utilize these gram-matical and vocabulary con-cepts to form understandableand communicative conversa-tions to further their develop-ment and encourage cross-cultural interaction. This com-municative ability is a valuableasset to the student in his abil-ity to deal with an increasinglymulticultural world and pro-motes an awareness and accep-tance of cultural diversitywithin the classroom, thecommunity and society as awhole.

Finally, the participants stronglyagreed with the sixth statement, "Lan-guage learning should be fun."

I stay strong on the idea that sec-ond languages should be fun.When I am thinking about lessons,the first thing I think of is 'Willthis put the students to sleep?'. Ifthe answer is anywhere close to a`yes', I need to rethink my lesson.

I believe all learning can andshould be fun and meaningful.It is important to relate learningto students' lives in order tomotivate them to want to learn.A teacher can be very creativeteaching a foreign language andthis can only help make it funfor the students.

While this final statement was not acentral topic of discussion in themethods courses, it was mentioned bythe majority of the participants intheir belief papers.

CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE

DIRECTIONSForeign language methods in-

structors need to move away from atransmission view of teaching by rec-ognizing that students bring beliefswith them into the methods course.During their apprenticeship ofobservation (Lortie, 1975), that is, themany hours spent as students in lan-guage classrooms, they formulatedbeliefs about how languages arelearned and how they should betaught. As was seen in the data, manyof these beliefs remained consistentthroughout the methods courses.However, some beliefs did changesignificantly, and these changes couldbe attributed to the ideas presentedand discussed in the methods courses.Therefore this study points to theneed for educators to continue toprovide their students with


with opportunities to examine andsurface their tacit beliefs about howforeign languages are learned andhow they should be taught.

Future research would benefitthrough revision of the surveys to in-clude statements reflecting currentpractice, such as the use of technologyand the Standards for Foreign LanguageLearning. In addition, it would be in-teresting to follow participantsthroughout their teaching careers todocument their growth, with the aimof better understanding teacher beliefsand how they influence their prac-tices.

NOTE:[1] Horwitz (1985) adapted the FLAS

from Rebecca de Garcia, Sue Rey-nolds, & Sandra J. Savignon, 1974,Nashville Metropolitan PublicSchools.

REFERENCES

Armaline, W., & Hoover, R. (1989).Field experience as a vehicle fortransformation: Ideology, edu-cation, and reflective practice.Journal of Teacher Education,40(2), 42-48.

Britzman, D. (1992). The terrible prob-lem of knowing thyself: To-ward a poststructural accountof teacher identity. Journal ofCurriculum Theorizing, 9(3), 23-46.

Elbaz, F. (1991). Research on teacher'sknowledge: The evolution of adiscourse. Journal of CurriculumStudies, 23,1-19.

Freeman, D. (1996) . The "unstudiedproblem": Research on teacher

7 0

learning. In D. F. Freeman & J.C. Richards (Eds.), Teacherlearning in language teaching (pp.351-378). Cambridge: Univer-sity Press.

Freeman, D., & Johnson, K. (1998) .

Reconceptualizing the knowl-edge-base of language teachereducation. TESOL Quarterly,32(3), 397-417.

Horwitz, E. (1985) . Using student be-liefs about language learningand teaching in the foreign lan-guage methods course. ForeignLanguage Annals, 18(4), 333-340.

Jackson, P. (1968). Life in classrooms.New York: Holt, Rinehart andWinston.

Lortie, D. (1975). School teacher: A socio-logical study. Chicago: Univer-sity of Chicago Press.

Richardson, V. (1990). Significant andworthwhile change in teachingpractice. Educational Researcher,19(7), 10-18.

Richardson, V. (Ed.). (1994). Teacherchange and the staff developmentprocess: A case in reading instruc-tion. New York: Teachers Col-lege Press.

Richardson, V. (1996). From behavior-ism to constructivism in teachereducation. Teacher Educationand Special Education, 19(3), 263-271.

Standards for Foreign Language Learningin the 21st Century. (1999). Na-tional Standards in ForeignLanguage Education Project.

Zeichner, K., & Liston, D. (1996). Re-flective teaching: An introduction.New Jersey: Lawrence ErlbaumAssociates.

Beliefs about Language Learning and Teaching 65

APPENDIX A

FOREIGN LANGUAGE ATTITUDE SURVEY (FLAS)

[Adapted from Rebecca de Garcia, Sue Reynolds, Sandra J. Savignon; Copyright1974, Nashville Metropolitan Public Schools]

This attitude survey has been developed to serve as a tool for helping teachersexplore their own attitudes and assumptions concerning foreign languagelearning and teaching.

React to each of the statements below by circling one of the following responses:5 strongly agree; 1 strongly disagree.

1. Foreign languages are hard to learn.2. Language learning should be fun.

3. "Proficiency" means correct application

of the four skills.

4. The student's motivation to continue languagestudy is directly related to her/his success inactually learning to speak the language.

5. A good foreign language teacher does not needaudio-visuals to build an effective program.

6. It is important for students to learn rules ofgrammar.

7. The teacher should always require that theresponses in the target language be linguisticallyperfect.

8. The sound system of the foreign language shouldbe taught separately at the beginning of the firstsequence of instruction along with phonetictranscription.

9. Taped lessons generally lose student interest.10. One problem with emphasizing oral competence

is that there is no objective means of testing suchcompetence.

11. The inclusion of cultural material in a secondlanguage course increases student motivation tolearn and speak the language.

12. Learning a second langauge requires much selfdiscipline.

13. Pattern practice does not provide a meaningfulcontext for learning to use the target language.

14. Today's students won't take foreign languagesbecause they don't want to work.

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 . 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1

5 4 3 2 1


15. Language learning ability is innate; therefore,everyone should be capable of learning a secondlanguage if she/he is capable of learning a firstlanguage. 5 4 3 2 1

16. The language laboratory is an indispensible devicefor teaching and learning a second language. 5 4 3 2 1

17. Second-language learning should begin inelementary school. 5 4 3 2 1

18. It usually happens that the major part of a student'sgrade in a foreign language course reflects her/hisperformance on written tests. 5 4 3 2 1

19. Simulated real-life situations should be used to teachconversation skills. 5 4 3 2 1

20. Foreign language teachers need not be fluentthemselves in order to teach effectively, forcommunication. 5 4 3 2 1

21. Students should answer a question posed in theforeign language with a complete sentence. 5 4 3 2 1

22. Speaking and listening are the skills which weshould stress most in our language classes. 5 4 3 2 1

23. When a student makes syntactical errors, this shouldbe regarded as a natural and inevitable part oflanguage acquisition. 5 4 3 2 1

24. If English teachers taught grammar as they should,it would be easier for us to teach a secondlanguage. 5 4 3 2

25. The ability to exchange ideas in a spontaneouscontext requires skills far beyond a knowledge oflinguistic structures. 5 4 3 2 1


APPENDIX BBELIEFS ABOUT LANGUAGE LEARNING INVENTORY (BALLI)

TEACHER VERSION

[Adapted from Horwitz, 1981, 1985]

Below are beliefs that some people have about learning foreign languages. Read eachstatement and then decide if you 1) strongly agree, 2) agree, 3) neither agree nor disagree,4) disagree, 5) strongly disagree. Questions 4 and 11 are slightly different and you shouldmark them as indicated. There are no right or wrong answers. We are simply interested inyour opinions.

1. It is easier for children than adults to learn a foreignlanguage. 5 4 3 2 1

2. Some people are born with a special ability whichhelps them learn a foreign language. 5 4 3 2

3. Some languages are easier to learn than others. 5 4 3 2 1

4. The language am planning to teach is:1. a very difficult language2. a difficult language3. a language of medium difficulty4. an easy language5. a very easy language

5. It's important to speak a foreign language with anan excellent accent. 5 4

6. It is necessary to know the foreign culture in orderto speak a foreign language. 5 4

7. You shouldn't say anything in the foreign languageuntil you can say it correctly. 5 4

8. It is easier for someone who already speaks a foreignlanguage to learn another one. 5 4

9. It is better to learn a foreign language in the foreigncountry. 5 4

10. It's ok to guess if you don't know a word in theforeign language. 5 4

11. If someone spent one hour a day learning a language,how long would it take her/him to become fluent?1. less than a year2. 1-2 years3. 3-5 years4. 5-10 years5. You can't learn a language in 1 hour a day

12. Learning a foreign language is mostly a matter oflearning a lot of new vocabulary words. 5 4 3 2 1

13. It's important to repeat and practice a lot. 5 4 3 2 1

3 2 1

3 2 1

3 2 1

3 2 1

3 2 1

3 2 1

BEST COPY MAILABLE 7 3


14. If you are allowed to make mistakes in the beginningit will be hard to get rid of them later on. 5

15. Learning a foreign language is mostly a matter oflearning a lot of grammar rules. 5

16. It's important to practice in the language laboratory. 517. Women are better than men at learning foreign

languages. 518. It is easier to speak than understand a foreign

language. 519. Learning a foreign language is different from learning

other school subjects. 5,20. Learning another language is a matter of translating

from English 521. If students learn to speak this language very well, it

will help them get a good job. 5

22. It is easier to read and write a language than to speakand understand it. 5

23. People who are good at math and science are not goodat learning foreign languages. 5

24. Americans think that it is important to speak a foreignlanguage. 5

25. People who speak more than one language well arevery intelligent. 5

26. Americans are good at learning foreign languages. 527. Everyone can learn to speak a foreign language. 5

28. It is important to expose learners to the naturalspeech of native speakers. 5

29. Technology can enhance language learning. 5

30. It is necessary to modify texts written for native

speakers because otherwise they are too difficult

to understand. 5

74

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

4 3 2 1

From a Foreign Language Perspective: A Snapshot View of a Dual-Language Program in Two Inner-City High-Poverty ElementarySchools*

SHERRY COY, Oklahoma City Public SchoolsLUCRECIA LITHERLAND, Oklahoma Baptist University

Dual language programs are bilingual education immersion models designed toaddress the needs of limited English proficient students and native English speak-

ers by providing an additive language approach. In this program, English andSpanish are used for the purpose of developing bilingual and biliteracy skills instudents. This project was structured after the 90/10 model, which provides for90-percent Spanish and 10-percent English instruction in kindergarten and firstgrade. Instruction in English is increased by 10 percent with each grade until abalance of 50/50 is reached in the fifth grade. This paper provides informationabout the program as implemented in two inner-city elementary schools.

INTRODUCTIONIn an attempt by the Curriculum and Instruction Department of the Okla-

homa City Public Schools (OCPS) to comply with Oklahoma law (H.B. 1017),which requires the teaching of foreign languages and cultures in elementaryschools, while at the same time meeting the linguistic needs of limited Englishproficient (LEP) students, the idea emerged to implement a dual language pro-gram. In August 1997, a Title VII Bilingual Education Grant was awarded to thedistrict for the purpose of providing an enrichment program in Spanish foreignlanguage instruction for native English speakers and a sound English develop-ment and academic curriculum for LEP students. The Empowering SchoolCommunities, Yes! Title VII project serves two high-poverty schools, Shidler andWheeler Elementary Schools.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PROGRAMDual language programs are additive bilingual education models in

which native English-speakers and, in this case, native Spanish-speakers, and bi-lingual students are placed together in the same classroom where English andSpanish are used as the vehicle for instruction. The program is voluntary and re-quires a five-year commitment and the active involvement of parents in the edu-cational process. The goals of the dual language program implemented at Shidlerand Wheeler Elementary Schools since the fall of 1997 are for students to attainhigh levels of proficiency in their first and second languages, to perform aca-demically above grade level in both languages, and to develop high levels of self-esteem and positive cross-cultural attitudes. This program is a Title VII project

* Presented at Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2000 (TexFLEC

2000), University of Texas at Austin, March 31-April 1, 2000.

75


(see Appendix A for description) in .

which the teachers and instructionalassis-tants foster high academicachievement by teaching content areasusing both English and Spanish, andliteracy skills are acquired in bothlanguages. The structure of the class issuch that English and Spanish domi-,nant students are placed together sothat students learn from each other aswell as from their teachers. Shelteredinstruction and cooperative and col-laborative activities, in conjunctionwith hands-on learning techniques,are used to increase understanding ofschool subjects, all of which are alsoeffective teaching strategies for in-structing children from poverty(Payne, 1998). The student populationof the two schools consists of slightlyover 50% Hispanics, and the povertyrate is 99%, both factors contributingto the need for a strong language andacademic development program.

The instructional design chosenfor these two elementary schools is the90/10 model similar to the River Glenbilingual immersion program in SanJose, California. This model providesfor 90% of Spanish instruction and tenpercent English language develop-ment in K-1 grades. Art, music, physi-cal education, character education,and various special activity classes areconducted in English. In secondgrade, 80% of core subjects are taughtin Spanish, and 20% in English. Inthird grade, the ratio will vary to70/30, in fourth grade to 60/40, and infifth grade to 50/50. This model of in-struction was chosen based on thesynthesis of research by James Craw-

ford, who concluded that dual lan-guage programs achieved the mostpromising results in both languageand academic gains for all studentscompared to bilingual education pro-grams (Crawford, 1997).

Underlying Principles of Dual Lan-guage Programs (Adapted fromCloud, Genesee, Hamalayan, 2000)

Additive bilingualism: The stu-dents learn to speak, read, and writein a second language without risk oflosing their native language. A secondlanguage is added for both limitedEnglish proficient and English-speaking students.

Use of the languages in separateareas: Languages are kept separate bybeing the vehicle of instruction in dif1:-ferent domains. There is not code.switching (using a language differentfrom the instructional language) by__the teacher in class.

A variety of instructional ap-proaches: Subject content is taughtthrough various approaches, such assheltered instruction, hands-on tasks,cooperative learning techniques,teacher modeling language, and pro-viding many opportunities for mean-ingful student output as well as draw-ing information from research on mul-tiple intelligences, comprehensible in-put, etc.

Alternative and ongoing assess-ment: There is a repertoire of assess-ment techniques and methods that in-sure the students are mastering aca-demics in both languages. It includesportfolios, journals, teacher-made

Two Inner-City Dual-Language Programs 71

tests, standardized testing, classroomobservations, and others.

Parent involvement and commit-ment: Parents are involved from thevery beginning. Parents agree to par-ticipate in regular parent group meet-ings and in school activities; parentsmust cooperate with the school insur-ing that the students attend school ona regular basis, and commit to at leastfive years in the program. Parents areregularly informed of their children'slanguage and academic progress inthe program.

Curriculum ComponentsThe curriculum is to parallel, as

much as possible, the academic corecurriculum in the regular program.Content is taught through thematicunits based on the E. D. Hirch's CoreKnowledge curriculum, and is intro-duced through literature. The curricu-lum is also based on the district'sBenchmarks for Progress, a comprehen-sive document which includes theOklahoma Priority Academic StudentSkills (PASS), and the national stan-dards of all the core subjects. The useof technology is another importantcomponent of the curriculum. Eachclassroom is equipped with three stu-dent computer stations where stu-dents work on a variety of softwaresuch as Josten's Spanish LanguageArts and English Language Develop-ment, Kid Pix, Millie's Math, ScienceHouse, and others. Internet access andviewing by the whole class is alsoavailable. For sample of lessons ob-served in first grade Spanish languagearts and second grade Science in Eng-lish, please refer to Appendix B.

BACKGROUND LITERATUREDual language instruction has

been touted as an enrichment bilin-gual education approach that is asso-ciated with significantly higher stu-dent achievement than the main-stream programs (Thomas and Col-lier, 1997). This model of enrichededucation is designed to serve non-English speaking children as well asnative English speakers. It is an addi-tive bilingual education strategy thatembraces another culture and lan-guage for the purpose of developingbicultural attitudes and bilingualismin all students. With the increase ofminority cultures and languages inthe United States, it seems sensibleand wise to use those resources to ex-pand our students' knowledge of lan-guages. Richard Riley, U.S. Secretaryof Education, said, "It is high time webegin to treat language skills as theasset they are, particularly in thisglobal economy. Anything that en-courages a person to know more thanone language is positive and shouldbe treated as such. Perhaps we shouldbegin to call learning a second lan-guage what it truly is bi-literacy" Ri-ley, 2000, p. 4).

According to Griego-Jones(1994), the willingness to learn a sec-ond language is influenced by atti-tudes about languages and relation-ships with speakers of both languages.Oftentimes, minority language stu-dents feel ashamed of their heritagelanguage, and must learn to deal withfeelings about their minority status inthe United States before they can useEnglish productively (Ramirez, 1985).One way to promote better under-

7


standing and more productive rela-tionships among the diverse culturalgroups is to provide natural experi-ences through the classroom setting(Cummins, 1988). Cummins statedthat children must experience naturalinteraction with native speakers ofother languages to promote cross-cultural understanding and to en-courage second language learning.Research from the National Clearing-house for Bilingual Education inWashington, DC, shows that secondlanguages are best acquired naturallyand through sheltered content instruc-tion in academic subjects (Crawford,1997).

Perhaps the most importantstudy addressing dual language pro-grams was reported by Thomas andCollier (Thomas and Collier, 1997).Their research examined bilingualeducation programs across the UnitedStates and linked student achievementto instructional methodology in ef-forts to identify those factors thatmost strongly affected academic suc-cess. Through this study they identi-fied "three predictors of academic suc-cess" (p. 15). The first predictor foracademic success of language minor-ity students were challenging aca-demic instruction through the stu-dents' first language through at leastgrade five, and challenging instruc-tion in English for a portion of theschool day. The second predictor wasthe instructional strategies used whileteaching through two languages suchas cooperative learning techniques,thematic units, and discovery learn-ing. The third predictor was the creat-ing of an additive bilingual setting in

which the language learner experi-ences a supportive context for learn-ing in two languages. Thomas andCollier also stated, "In addition, Eng-lish-speaking parents who choose toenroll their children in two-way (dual)bilingual classes have discovered thattheir children also benefit stronglyfrom academic work through twolanguages" (p. 15).

Well-implemented dual lan-guage programs for English languagelearners can overcome the effects ofpoverty on student achievement(Thomas and Collier, 1997). In a studyof 42,000 language minority studentsin five districts in Illinois, all studentsin dual language programs outper-formed native English speakers aftersixth grade (Pawinski, 1998). In thissame report, the author stated, "Ineducation there seems to be a correla-tion: The poorer the school, the lowerthe test scores. But dual languageseems to work for English- and Span-ish-speaking students regardless oftheir socioeconomic status" (p. 2).Many native English speakers in pov-erty also suffer language delay, andaccording to Lewis (1996), "the core ofthe problems of those on or nearly onwelfare is the inadequacy of theschools' efforts to teach what theyshould first and foremostlanguage"(p. 187). According to Payne, poorchildren are more likely than thosechildren who do not suffer from pov-erty to be developmentally delayed(Payne, 1998). The author also statedthat children from poverty scorelower than children from more afflu-ent families on standardized assess-ments, and are more likely to drop out

Two

of school. For these reasons, thestrategies used in dual language pro-.grams are essential to students whosuffer language delay, are second lan-guage learners, and live in poverty.

DATA COLLECTIONThe dual language program is a

Title VII Project, which must meet theaccountability requirements to disag-gregate data over time to show aca-demic growth. Database formats werecreated to collect student informationand an articulated system with multi-ple indicators of student performance.Specifically, they were created tobuild a balance assessment strategy tohelp inform program improvementand to help make judgments about theeffectiveness of the instructional pro-gram.

The database format includesstructures for

1. Disaggregating data2. Identifying factors that lead to stu-

dent academic success3. Identifying appropriate invest-

ments in professional development4. Recording information on student

progress in language acquisition,reading and writing, academictests, etc.

5. Developing reports on studentperformance

6. Assisting schools and teachers toplan for program improvement

7. Disseminating accurate informa-tion

8. Highlighting strengths and weak-nesses

In addition, there are five cate-gories that are the basis for the data

Inner-City Dual-Language Programs 73

collection of the dual language pro-gram.

1. Student/ school/parent demo-graphics and characteristics, in-cluding needs assessments

2. Staff characteristics3. Instructional services4. Medium of instruction5. Standards-based accountabil-

ity/ assessment

For Title VII reporting pur-poses, an appropriate data collectionsystem serves to measure the effect ofthe program on student performance.Data collection can also be a powerfultool for inquiry and change forschools by helping lead to the creationof responsive, accountable schools.

STUDENT LANGUAGE AND ACADEMICASSESSMENT

Students in dual language pro-grams generally perform below aver-age on academic tests until the fourthor fifth year in the program due to thefact that they are learning academiccontent and a second language at thesame time. However, research hasshown that by fifth grade, these stu-dents generally perform better onstandardized tests than monolingualstudents (Thomas and Collier, 1997).The students at Shidler and WheelerElementary Schools have receiveddual language instruction for twoyears and their scores were expectedto be lower than the students in themonolingual classes on the norm-referenced tests. Dual language stu-dents are administered several teststhroughout the school year for the


purpose of collecting multiple ongo-ing assessments. (See Appendix C forassessment calendar). In the fall andspring, these students take one batteryof language proficiency tests, the Lan-guage Assessment Scales (LAS) in Eng-lish and Spanish, and another one ofacademic achievement, the Supera, theSpanish equivalent of the Terra Novanorm-referenced test. In addition tonorm-referenced tests, both dual andEnglish language development teach-ers are expected to make use of jour-nals, portfolios, district assessments,observation, and other instruments tomeasure progress. Furthermore,yearly documentation using the Span-ish and English Reading and Writing Ru-brics is recorded for students in thedual language program.

English and Spanish LAS pre-tests were given in September 1999and posttests were administered inApril 2000. Pre/Post LAS test scoreswere recorded to determine level oflearning from Fall 1999 throughSpring 2000. Figure 1 indicates therewas a clear increase in the Englishlanguage for both Spanish and Eng-lish speakers, although first gradersreceived only10% English languageinstruction, and second graders re-ceived 20% English instruction. Fig-ures 1 and 2 provide the first and sec-ond grade average test scores, not pro-ficiency level, for the LAS (Englishand Spanish). Average scores continueto indicate an increase in both Spanishand English proficiency at both gradelevels.

Figure 1. Dual Language Program Participants LAS(English) Pre- and Posttest Scores by Grade

0

99

49

O PRE TEST

E POST TEST


II

81ST

57.7

77.7

2ND

56.2

74.7

Figure 2. Dual Language Program Participants LAS(Spanish) Pre- and Posttest Scores by Grade

For a measure of academic per-formance, first and second grade stu-dents in the dual language programwere tested using the Spanish versionof the Terra Nova Basic Battery (CTBMcGraw-Hill), and students in theequivalent monolingual classes re-ceived the Terra Nova Basic Battery(CTB McGraw Hill) in English. Allwere administered a pre and post-testin the areas of reading, language, andmath.

The following Figures 3 and 4provide information regarding Me-dian National Percentiles of Wheelerfirst and second grades in areas ofreading, language, math and an over-all composite scores. Overall, firstgrade students in the dual languageprogram performed better than stu-dents in the monolingual classes. Inthe areas of reading and language

they achieved significantly higher andabove the national average, which isunusual at this grade level.

While the second grade test re-sults indicate a change from the firstgrade comparison in the areas of read-ing and language, they are performingat the expected level. It should benoted, however, in the area of math,second grade dual language studentsare excelling at a greater rate than themonolingual students. It is notewor-thy that the monolingual students arescoring 65% or better in all areas. Twoyears ago (1997), Wheeler was on thestate "low performing" list due to lowtest scores. Since that time, all teach-ers, including those of monolingualclasses, have received the same ESLand second language acquisition


=ceL'goa.

99

79

59

39

19

READING LANGUAGEIMATH TOTAL

OSupera 71 60 46 53

OTerra Nova 46.5 44.3 45 45

Figure 3. Wheeler First Grade Median National Percentiles

9

89

79

69

caa) 59

illC 49a)r.

39

29

19

1

LANGUAGE MATH TOTAL

CI Terra N ova 68 65 68 71.3

Figure 4. Wheeler Second Grade Median National Percentile


training offered to dual languageteachers due to the high numbers LEPstudents.

The following figures provideinformation regarding Median Na-tional Percentiles of Shidler first andsecond grades in areas of reading,language, math and an overall com-posite scores. Figure 5 indicates thatfirst grade dual language studentsperformed better in reading and lan-guage than students in monolingualclasses, but performed poorly in math.These results have prompted projectworkers to provide summer tutoringfor Shidler first grade dual languagestudents and to explore the variablesthat may have contributed to thesescores.

Figure 6 indicates that Shilder'ssecond grade dual language students'math scores far exceed the monolin-gual classes. The reading and overall

composite scores also indicate that thestudents in dual language are per-forming slightly better than those inthe monolingual classes.

INSTRUCTIONAL STAFFAlthough every effort is made

to find elementary certified bilingualteachers, six of eleven dual languageteachers in the district are K-12 Span-ish teachers who do not hold an ele-mentary teaching certificate. How-ever, all dual language and Englishlanguage development teachers re-ceive intensive training in second lan-guage acquisition, ESL teachingstrategies, teaching content throughlanguages, early childhood, using al-ternative assessments, dual languageand English language development,learning centers, etc., throughout theschool year and in the summers (seeAppendix D for summary of training).

9989796959493929199

-1

Figure 5. Shilder First Grade Median National Percentiles


99 -V89-779-769-759-749-739-V29-7-19-7-9-7;,

-1READING LANGUAGE MATH TOTAL

0Supera 37.5 35 74 52

Terra Nova 31.7 45 48 43

Figure 6. Shilder Second Grade Median National Percentile

In addition, all staff membersreceive training in ESL and secondlanguage teaching strategies and areencouraged to gain knowledgethrough college work in multiculturalstudies and ESL. Teachers maintainup-to-date inventory of all curriculummaterial and other resources utilized,as well as any other type of evidenceof professional growth, such as con-ferences attended/ presentations, writ-ing grants, etc.

To measure the transfer ofknowledge gained through profes-sional development to classroom use,a survey of school staff was conducted(see Appendix E for survey and re-sults of Wheeler survey). The princi-pal and project evaluators will use anew classroom observation instru-

ment in the future to help determinethe effect of professional developmenton instruction and student learning(see Appendix F for instrument).

CONCLUSION

The impetus for the creation ofthe dual language program in theOklahoma City Public School Districtfocused on three ideas: (1) the recogni-tion that more successful approachesto addressing the academic needs ofLEP students were needed, (2) thepersonal belief of the Director of theCurriculum and Instruction Depart-ment that every child should have theopportunity to become bilingual, and(3) that the language and cultural re-sources already in existence at the twosites would be used, and not the mag-

8 4


net school approach. After two yearsof dual language instruction studentsare performing better than expectedboth academically and in languageacquisition.

Locally, the dual language pro-gram is expanding within the districtand schools have begun to develop aliaison with Shidler and Wheeler. InAugust 2000, Rockwood Elementarywill begin a dual language program inkindergarten and first grade. This ex-pansion is significant in that it is twoyears ahead of schedule. The programwill continue to meet the current ob-jectives with the addition of becominga more research-based project. Duallanguage staff, schools, and adminis-trators will work with the externalevaluator, develop a statistically datadriven research-based project. Historyhas shown that, with community sup-port, the dual language program canbe an effective educational strategyfor teaching students a second lan-guage.

REFERENCES

Cloud, N., Genesee, F., Hamayan, E.(2000). Dual language instruc-tion: A handbook for enriched edu-cation. Boston, MA: Heinle &Heinle Publishers.

Crawford, J. (1997). Best evidence: re-search foundations of the bilin-gual education act. Nationalclearinghouse for bilingual educa-tion report. Washington, DC:The George Washington Uni-versity.

Cummins, J. (1988). From multicul-tural to anti-racist education:An analysis of programmesand policies in Ontario. InSkutnabb-Kargas & Cummins,J. (Eds.), Minority education:From shame to struggle. Phila-delphia: Multilingual Matters,LTD.

Griego-Jones, T. (1994, Spring). As-sessing students' perceptions ofbiliteracy in two-way bilingualclassrooms. The Journal of Edu-cational Issues of Language Mi-nority Students, 13, 79-93.

Lewis, A. (1996, November). Breakingthe cycle of poverty. Phi DeltaKappan, 78, (3).

Pawinski, P. (1998, May 27). Dual lan-guage students thrive. TheDaily Northwestern. [On-line].Available:http:/ / www. ed. gov/ pubs/ schoolpoverty/ index.htm/ .

Payne, R. (1998). A framework for un-derstanding poverty (Rev. ed.).Baytown, TX: RFT Publishing.

Ramirez, A. (1985). Bilingualismthrough schooling: cross-culturaleducation for minority and major-ity students. Albany NY: StateUniversity of New York Press.

Thomas, W., & Collier, V. (1997, De-cember). School effectivenessfor language minority students.NCBE Resource Collection Series.Washington, DC: Center for theStudy of Language and Educa-tion, The George WashingtonUniversity.


APPENDIX AEMPOWERING SCHOOL COMMUNITIES, YES!

TITLE VII BILINGUAL EDUCATION OVERVIEWAWARD No. T290U70357

Empowering School Communities, Yes! is a project designed to address moreeffectively the needs of LEP students and native English speakers by implement-ing a model dual language program in Shidler and Wheeler Elementary Schools,which can be replicated in other elementary schools in the district.

Length of Grant: Five (5) yearsAmount of Grant: $1.45 millionGrant Personnel: Project Director: Sherry Coy, Assistant Director of Curricu-

lum and Instruction, Oklahoma City Public SchoolsProject Coordinator: Patrick Marc-CharlesProject Secretary: Jan LollarProject Consultants: Dr. April Haulman, Bilingual and Mul-ticultural Education, University of Central Oklahoma; Dr.Stacy Souther land, Modern Languages Department, Uni-versity of Central Oklahoma

Project Partner: University of Central OklahomaProject Goals: Participating students will (1) develop high levels of pro-

ficiency in their first language, (2) achieve high levels ofproficiency in their second language, (3) perform aca-demically at or above grade level in both languages, and(4) develop high levels of self-esteem and positive cross-cultural attitudes.

Project Curriculum: Benchmarks to Progress, district curriculum, which con-tain thePriority Academic Student Skills (PASS), state cur-riculum, and core subject National Standards.Core Knowledge Curriculum, E.D. Hirsch

Project Activities: Ongoing professional development activitiesCollege courses in ESL and Spanish certificationAdult education programParent/community involvement activities and trainingprogram

Teaching Strate- Sheltered instruction, cooperative learning, technology asgies: instructional tool, TPR, role-playing, language experience

approach, language taught through content, and otherdual language teaching strategies.

Technology: A teaching computer with television monitor in every

Assessment:


classroom, three student computers with Internet access,teleconferencing and distance learning capacities.Language Assessment Scale-Oral, Reading and Writing inEnglish and Spanish (CTB McGraw-Hill)Terra Nova and Supera norm-referenced tests (CTBMcGraw-Hill)State CRT testsMobility ratesParent surveysStudent interviewsStudent sociogramClassroom observation instrument


APPENDIX BSAMPLE OF LESSONS FROM CLASSROOM OBSERVATIONS

First Grade - Spanish Language ArtsTeacher: Mr. Noe GodoySchool: WheelerFebruary 2000

The first lesson observed in Mr. Godoy's class was entitled: Isla (Island). Thechildren sat on a carpet in rows and read in unison the lines to the story. Theyworked on vocabulary (approx. ten different words), and the teacher asked ques-tions on the story. The purpose of the lesson was to emphasize theVowel+Consonant syllable, as in the title "isla", and in other words from thestory, such as "estaba, estuve, espero, escalera." At one point, one of the students(English native speaker) asked in Spanish about volcanoes, and the teacher re-sponded to him, also in Spanish without ever using any English at all.The second lesson was entitled Bosque (Woods), and it was in the form of a dia-logue. Here, the children read individually, and the teacher would take care ofcorrections by repeating after the students with proper intonation and pronun-ciation. The purpose of this lesson was still the V+C syllable pattern, as in the ti-tle "Bosque," and in the line: "i Que to gusta, Gustavo?" (What do you like, Gus-tavo?). Afterwards, the teacher wrapped up the lesson with an oral review of thepossible combinations (each of the five vowels+C) as were displayed in severalposters around the room.

Second Grade - Science (English)Teacher: Mrs. Lili MichelSchool: WheelerFebruary 2000

The dual language teacher is expected to teach science in English, whichmeans that at no time should Spanish be used for instruction. "The magic hour"begins and ends with the science lesson. On this particular day, Mrs. Michel in-troduced the "Life Cycle of Insects." With all the students sitting as a large groupon the carper, Mrs. Michel introduced the theme with a large number of visuals,drawing from students' background knowledge as much as possible. As the stu-dents would recognize the insect, she would have them spell it very slowly whileshe was writing the name of each insect on a big display poster board. In fact,when the picture of a dragon-fly came up, a student was quick to point out thatthe first part of this name was the same in Spanish. After each insect was spelledcorrectly, she would have the students read it aloud. Afterwards, her assistantused a calendar of insect pictures to have the students once again identify the

88


names and review the new ones or least known, such as the praying-mantis. Af-terwards, the students went to their assigned groups and they were asked toagree on one insect (probably their favorite), choose a book from the many avail-able, and use it if necessary for reference to draw one. They were challenged touse different sizes, colors, and details although several students in the groupwould be drawing the same insect.


APPENDIX CASSESSMENT CALENDAR

Data Collection and Evaluation ScheduleDual Language Program

Date Instrument Person ResponsibleAugust Report student information

Administer LAS in English and Spanishto K-5 dual language studentsAdminister LAS in English to all nativeEnglish speakers in all K-5 monolingualclassesAdminister LAS Spanish to all nativeSpanish speakers in K-5 monolingualclasses

Dual language teachersDual language teachers

Classroom teachers andassistants

Classroom teachers andassistants

September Administer Pre Supera test to all dual Ian-guage students

Administer Pre Terrallova Test to all stu-dents in monolingual classesInterview Advisory Board

Dual language teachers

Classroom teachers

EvaluatorOctober Parent Survey Coordinator and all

teachersNovember Dual language student interviews (socio-

gram)Interview Advisory Board

EvaluatorEvaluator

December Adult education evaluations Coordinator and in-structors

January Parent Focus Groups Coordinator andevaluator

February Classroom observationsInterview Advisory BoardParent Focus Groups

Evaluator, CoordinatorEvaluatorEvaluator, Coordinator

March Administer ITBSAdminister Post Supera test to all duallanguage studentsAdminister Post Terrallova test to all stu-dents in monolingual classesConduct additional classroom observa-tions if necessaryRecord Spanish Rubrics for Writing and

PrincipalDual language teachers

Classroom teachers

Evaluator


90


Speaking Spanish for students in dual lan-guage programRecord English Rubrics for Writing andSpeaking for students in dual languageprogramRecord schools' Statistical Profile informa-tionAdminister 5th grade Spanish test to allstudents in 5th gradeAdminister LAS in English and Spanishto students in K-5 dual language classesAdminister LAS in English to students inK-5 monolingual classesAdminister LAS in Spanish to NativeSpanish-speakers in K-5 monolingualclassesInterview Advisory Board

English language de-velopment teachers

Coordinator

Fifth grade teachers


Classroom teachers andassistantsRegular teachers andassistants

Evaluator


APPENDIX DTRAINING PROVIDED To STAFF

Date Training Hours Participants FundJuly 2000 "Aims" Science 30 3 certified Title II

Title VIIJuly 2000 Dual Language 6 6 certified Title VIIJuly 2000 Core Knowledge 30 10 certified

2 supportDistrictTitle VII

August 2000.

English Lan-guage Develop-ment

12 10 certified4 support

Title VII

September 2000 Front Page (tech-nology)

6 7 certified DistrictTitle WI

October 2000 Great Expecta-tions

30 2 certified Title VIIDistrict

October 2000 Tech Masters(technology)

30 2 certified State

October 2000 Know-It Reading 6 4 certified Title VIISeptember-May2000

Spanish Conver-sation


Title VIITitle VI

September-May2000

Effective Schools 40 18 certified8 support

CSRD Grant

November-January 2000

Literacy First 30 8 certified District

November 2000 Tom Snyder(technology)

6 6 certified Title VII

January-April2000

Compass, Accel-erated Readerand other Tech-nology


District

January - May Teaching Chil-dren from Pov-erty

12 9 certified Title VIIDistrict

January-May Train the TrainerDistrict Certifica-tion

30 5 certified1 classified District

July-May 2000 College CoursesESL Master Pro-gram

Total of 38 credithour classes

5 certified Title VII

July-May 2000 Spanish Cert.Program

Total of 12 credithour classes

4 certified Title VIITitle VI

July-May 2000 General Educa-tion Courses

Total of 38 credithour classes 3 support Title VII

92


APPENDIX EPROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT SURVEY

An informal survey was conducted to measure teacher perception of the valueregarding professional development activities. A total of 70 surveys were dis-tributed to Wheeler and Shidler staff (i.e., educators, administration, supportpersonnel, etc.) Thirty-nine surveys were returned from Wheeler Elementarypersonnel and 21 from Shidler Elementary personnel. Demographics of the re-turned surveys were as follows in Table 1.

Table 1. Surveyed Teacher DemographicsArea Of

Speciality# Wheeler

Respondents# Shidler

RespondentsPre-K - K 6 1

First Grade 2 2Second Grade 3 2Third Grade 3 3Fourth Grade 4 2Fifth Grade 1 0Other* 11 11

* Includes administrative staff, special education, assistants,custodians, etc.

Surveys revealed teachers received a total of 3,545 hours of professional devel-opment training. Of these hours, 60% (2,072) were staff from Wheeler Elemen-tary. Respondents indicated the most attended training was Effective School (922hours), with 260 hours spent in Great Expectations, 240 hours in Compass, 179hours of training in LAS, and 128 hours in literacy.

Two of the most noted ways in which the training was implemented werethrough the use of technology and implementation of the Spanish in the class-room. Respondents indicated they used the technology to make presentations,maintain inventory, provided ESL teaching strategies. Over 28% of the respon-dents used the training to implement the new technology, and 18.9% indicatedthey implemented their Spanish training in the classroom. Table 2 notes howeach school's educators implemented the training into the classroom.

In this same survey respondents were asked, "How has the school culturechanged since the implementation of the dual language program?" As indicatedin Table 3, 45% stated that the climate has become "Very Positive". Educators be-lieved that native Spanish speaking children now feel more comfortable to learn


Table 2. Educators' Implementation Of Training Into The ClassroomAction Implemented Wheeler Shidler

Alternative assessment strategies 1 1

Administering of LAS test 1

Cooperative learning 1

ESL teaching strategies 8 11

Math and language skillsLanguage development

5

Parent involvement 2Problem solving 2Reading 4Software programs andcomputer technology; internet

11 10

Spanish 9 5

Story telling 3

Table 3. School Culture ChangedCulture Change Wheeler Shidler

No change, possibly in the future 1 1

Hispanic children are shown more respect, appear more con-fident, and are learning more

3

Lack of positive support from the district 1

Negative, lack of district support 2

Parents more involved and are coming to school 6 3

Very positive 9 14Students learning Hispanic and Anglo culture...increasedawareness of diversity

4 1

Students learning more in their own language 1 2Teachers are more knowledgeable as to how languages arelearned

1

and are not ashamed to speak their language. Another noted effect was theblending and understanding by both native Spanish and English speaking chil-dren regarding each other's culture. A key noted effect was that parent involve-ment seemed to have increased with the addition of the dual language program.Table 3 provides a description of how the culture has been affected. Respondentswere asked about any additional training that they desired. Of the 24 who com-pleted this information:

12.5% stated they need more training in parent involvement

9 4


12% needed more training in the technology/software/internet related is-sues12% felt more training was needed in Spanish language and culture.


APPENDIX FSTRATEGIES FOR TEACHING LANGUAGE LEARNERS:

OBSERVATION CHECKLIST

TeacherSchoolGrade LevelNumber of Students

DateObserverLesson ObservedStart Finish

Directions: Place a check mark for Observed (0), Not Observed (NO), or NotApplicable (NA) for each section and number.

A. Comprehensible Input and Output1. Uses contextual references (visuals, realia).2. Implements listening activities to assist students in

developing the sounds of language.3. Allows for an initial listening (or "silent") period for

students at the pre-production level.4. Uses a variety of questioning strategies and activities

to meet the needs of individuals at varying stages oflanguage acquisition.

5. Exposes students to higher levels of comprehensiblelanguage.

6. Links new vocabulary and language to previouslylearned information.

7. Provides activities and opportunities for increasedstudent talk as students develop English.

8. Taps into and accesses students' prior knowledge.

B. Negotiation of Meaning1. Monitors student comprehension through interactive

means such as checking for comprehension and clari-fication, utilizing questioning strategies, having stu-dents paraphrase, define, and model.

2. Modifies instruction as needed using strategies suchas scaffolding, expansion, demonstration, and model-ing.

3. Encourages students to communicate in the languageof instruction, using familiar vocabulary and struc-tures.

4. Modifies teacher-talk to make input comprehensible.5. Uses extra-linguistic clues (e.g., gestures, facial ex-

pressions) to emphasize or clarify meaning.

96

0 NO 'NA


6. Matches language with experience.7. Models the language with natural speech and intona-

tion8. Provides opportunities for students to use English

with varied audiences and for a variety of purposes.9. Verifies that all students comprehend before moving

on.

C. "Sheltered " Content Instruction1. Modifies the language input according to the needs

of the students (e.g., rate of speech, added definitionsand examples, controlled vocabulary, and careful useof idioms).

2. Reviews main topic and key vocabulary and ideas.3. Checks frequently for understanding.4. Bridges new "unknown" material to "known" what

students have already learned.5. Organizes instruction around themes and content

appropriate to students' grade level.6. Engages students in active participation activities and

responses.7. Integrates culture and content instruction.8. Uses added resources and strategies to help students

access core curriculum.

97


D. Thinking Skills1. Asks questions, gives directions, and generates activi-

ties to advance students to higher levels of thinking(from recalling to evaluating).

2. Elicits student questions and encourages them tosupport their answers.

3. Allows ample wait time after asking questions.4. Guides students through learning using varied

groupings and configurations.

E. Error Correction1. Practices sensitive error correction, focusing on errors

meaning rather than form.2. Accepts appropriate student responses.3. Encourages taking risks in the language of instruc-

tion.4. Develops classroom activities to address recurring or

systematic errors.5. Allows for flow of uninterrupted student thought.

F. Classroom Climate1. Uses relevant material.2. Displays of student work are evident.3. Utilizes (and demonstrates respect for) students'

home language and culture.4. Nurtures a positive climate.5. Rewards attempts at language.

Comments:

An Infusion Curriculum For The Heritage Speaker Of Spanish*

BARBARA GoNzALEz-PING, University of Texas at San Antonio

The author presents an overview of the literature on program models for teachingSpanish to heritage speakers, noting definitions, intake and placement procedures,typical offerings, and effective approaches, and covering a proficiency orientation, in-fusion of subculture materials, study of sociolinguistics, community involvement,cooperative learning, etc. She then focuses on three studies conducted in an urbancommuter institution with a large number of heritage speakers to determine stu-dents' views of mixed classes, motivations for rejecting heritage classes, and assess-ment of their own language background and abilities. Finally she reports on anexperiment to infuse materials about Southwest Spanish into second-, third-, andfourth-semester classes. The experiment was well received by students and suggestsboth a permanent infusion curriculum for the regular Spanish course sequence andthis approach to interesting some additional heritage learners in classes tailored totheir needs.

MEETING THE NEEDS OF THE HERITAGE SPEAKERHeritage speakers constitute a significant percentage of enrollments in many

Spanish language programs, and the language knowledge and skills they bring totheir studies are increasingly recognized as valuable national resources (Campbelland Peyton, 1998), resources that we must build upon and develop further ratherthan deprecate and attempt to replace (Latoja, 1997). Nevertheless, only 26 percentof Spanish programs in the nation offered heritage classes in 1990 (Wherritt, 1990),and only an estimated 32 percent do so currently. While we do not have clear statis-tical information regarding the number of programs that have enough heritagespeakers to warrant special courses for those students, given the ever-growingnumber of Hispanic students in our schools we can well be concerned whether theneeds of many are being well met at the 32 percent level. Mixed classes are still thenorm in many settings (L. LeBlanc and Lally, 1997), and we have little to no infor-mation about any special efforts being made to meet the needs of heritage studentswithin those classes when heritage classes are not available.

IDENTIFYING THE HERITAGE SPEAKERIn practice, we refer to the target population as heritage speakers, Spanish

speakers, native speakers, and a subset of false beginners, among other terms. Wealso may associate varying definitions with those terms, referring to those whospeak Spanish in the home and community, those who hear Spanish in the homeand community, those who are foreign-born and perhaps at least partly educated ina Spanish-speaking country, and those who may have spoken or heard the languagein the home or community and studied it in school at some level for some period.Indeed, the profile is complex, even more so when we examine a thorough treat


99


ment such as that of Valdes (1997),which highlights factors such as thecountry of origin, the length of resi-dence in this country, the particular dia-lect and all its sociocultural associa-tions, the proficiency level, prior lan-guage study, and range of prior aca-demic success. While the literature hasfocused more on programs offered tothe more fully proficient heritage or na-tive-speaker student, with less attentiongiven to programs for students withprimarily listening skills only(D' Ambruoso, 1993), most of the typesof students mentioned above are servedwithin the framework of programs cur-rently in operation.

WHAT THE LITERATURE TELLS USAmong the 32 percent of pro-

grams that offer courses for heritagespeakers, there is no single way to iden-tify the heritage student from amongthe rest and place him or her in theproper course. Schwartz (1985) indi-cates that some institutions use ques-tionnaires about language use, someuse interviews of potential students byfaculty, some use credit equivalenciesstated in the catalog (Schwartz, 1985),and some use self-placement, perhapsguided by a rubric that students use tomake their decisions (LeBlanc andLally, 1997). A few institutions use aspecial test to sort heritage speakersfrom other types of false beginners,such as that used at the University ofTexas at El Paso, a test with some ques-tions focused on language characteris-tics that only a heritage speaker wouldknow and that are normally not taughtin Spanish classes. Others use the samestandardized tests that are used in gen-

eral for placing nonheritage students,such as those from Brigham YoungUniversity, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Flor-ida (LeBlanc and Lally, 1997). Amongthese are the Wisconsin College LevelPlacement Examination, the SAT II, theOPI, and MAPS from ETS. Some 39 per-cent use local course-specific tests(Wherritt, 1990), which are thought bysome researchers to be more effectiveplacement tools (Blackie, 1997). Most ofthe tests measure listening and readingcomprehension skills, however, andthus do not separate the students whospeak and write the language fromthose who do not. Further, all the pos-sible measures, tests, questionnaires,and interviews are subject to manipula-tion by students, who can respond orperform as they wish in order to appearless proficient and often do so (R.LeBlanc and Painchaud, 1985, Wherritt,1990). In addition, in the case of self-placement with rubric or checklist, stu-dents at the lower end of proficiencymay not have sufficient informationabout their capabilities to assess them-selves accurately and may overestimatetheir abilities (Jordan, 1985).

Finally, while 79 percent of insti-tutions offer a placement test, accordingto Wherritt (1990), far fewer requirestudents to take it (49 percent), andeven fewer require students to act onthe basis of the results (Wherritt, 1990).In many instances students register be-low the level of their placement eventhough general or Spanish advisersmay try to influence them to register atthe proper level and/ or in a heritageclass. Schwartz (1985) reported that 42percent of California students regis-tered below placement level or in first

1 0 0

Infusion Curriculum for Heritage Speakers 95

semester, as did Klee and Rogers (1989),who also indicated that students oftendid so in order to improve grade-pointaverages. Kondo (1999) also supportsthe concept of grade-point motivationand adds that most students are moreinterested in speaking skills than inreading-writing skills and thus are of-ten not concerned about taking thehigher levels. Wherritt (1990) notes that88 percent of false beginners enter firstsemester and only 32 percent of institu-tions offer credit for the lower levelswith a higher placement as an incentiveto go to the higher level. In some cases,of course, state policy does not allowpublic institutions to give away credithours in this manner. Finally, only 28percent penalized students who chosethe lower level by awarding no credit,even though there is a widespread con-cern about using limited higher educa-tion funds to reteach students skillsthey acquired elsewhere (LeBlanc andLally, 1997).

The literature also tells us thatmost heritage programs are limited inscope, comprising only one or twoyears of courses and mixing heritageand nonheritage students by third year(D'Ambruoso, 1993, and Villa, 1997).Since many heritage students, espe-cially in the border areas, enter a pro-gram with Intermediate High or Ad-vanced-level proficiency on the ACTFLscale, a level nonheritage students maynot reach until the end of a major (Hip leand Manley, 1987), special offeringsmay be inadequate to addressing theneed. Further, students in the upper-level classes may differ widely in theirprior exposure to reading and writingthe language. The nonheritage students

will likely have had exposure to all fourlanguage skills, although their speakingmay still be in the Intermediate range.The heritage students who enter upperdivision with CLEP credits and no priorcoursework in Spanish of any kind (15-20 percent at the author's institution)may have no prior experience withreading and writing the language.These students often report that they"read the CLEP reading passages aloudto themselves in order to hear them"and thus, along with their listeningskills, achieved a score necessary toplace in third year even though theyhad in some cases never read Spanishbefore, never written it, and, in not afew cases, spoken it little. In such in-stances, the program that has only oneor two years of heritage courses is notmeeting the needs of this type of heri-tage learner when he or she moves di-rectly into upper-level literaturecourses, as is often the case. Further,many upper-level programs in theSouthwest are heritage programs onlyby virtue of their populations, whichmay be primarily heritage speakers. Tothe extent that professors are unfamiliarwith the characteristics of the students,the literature on the most effective pro-gram models for heritage students, andthe need to consider language devel-opment in all courses (including cul-ture, linguistics and literature), the stu-dents' needs are not met. Finally, al-though faculty generally want the sub-set of heritage students who are non-prestige dialect speakers to shift to aprestige form of the language, thesesame faculty are often unaware that,even in the best circumstances, this shiftwill not occur in one course. Hidalgo


(1993) indicates that in some programsin Mexico a student is expected to take600 contact hours to make this shift.

The literature is clear on effectiveapproaches for heritage students. Build-ing proficiency is primary, as evident innewer texts such as those by Blanco etal (1995) and Roca (1999), which em-phasize developing all the skills in task-related contexts of high interest levelsto students. In addition, content-basedinstruction, sociolinguistics (Merino etal., 1993, Pino, 1997), classes to developacademic domains in Spanish (Sanchez,1997, Carrasquillo and Sagan, 1998),community-based projects (Trueba,1993, Pino, 1997, Varona, 1999), Chicanoliterature to infuse culture (Merino etal., 1993), cooperative learning (Valdes,1997), and opportunities to tutor otherstudents are all shown to facilitate stu-dent involvement and learning. Allthese approaches fit Valdes-Fallis (1978)recommendation of the comprehensiveapproach to instructing heritage stu-dents, as opposed to the "normativeapproach." Some students have alreadyinternalized society's negative views oftheir dialect (Roca, 1997), and some fac-ulty continue in this negative vein withtheir own negative views of dialect andassumptions of the superiority of onevariety of native speech over another(Koike and Liskin-Gasparro, 1999). Ifonly the confident student will use thelanguage extensively outside of class(Kondo, 1999), these faculty may be in-hibiting their students' further learningin more than one way. In general, pro-fessors rate Chicanos below other heri-tage speakers and even below anglo-phones (Valdez, 1998), possibly becausefew faculty are from Mexico and are

thus less familiar with educated Mexi-can Spanish (as compared to their ownvariety) and even less familiar with thesubset of Chicano speech. Given thissituation, the confident heritage studentin the Southwest should be rare.

A MIXED-METHOD APPROACH ToWORKING WITH THE HERITAGESTUDENT

At the author's urban, largelycommuter institution, there were oncelower-division heritage Spanish coursesto serve a varied community of Span-ish-speakers of many different nationalorigins and from one to eight genera-tions in the area. Many are of Mexicandescent, however; and the number ofminority students in the institution isapproaching fifty per cent of the morethan 18,000 students attending, accord-ing to recent enrollment figures . At onepoint, heritage students objectedstrenuously to being segregated intoclasses for Spanish-speakers and drewanalogies to bilingual programs in thepublic schools, which they said alsosegregated students. Thus the courseswere dropped from the curriculum. Re-cently, the heritage courses were of-fered again, with extensive publicityemphasizing the positive nature andpotential benefits of the classes; but thecourses did not make. Thus, heritagestudents continue to enroll in the stan-dard communicative sequence, gener-ally enrolled below their placementlevel. A few begin with an intermediateconversation and composition course,an intermediate culture course, or aspecial-purposes course, all of whichcan be more appropriate to their needs;but most choose the regular sequence.

10 2


Many first-year classes are more thanfifty percent Hispanic; many second-year classes may be eighty percentHispanic. Since there is no language re-quirement for students in most pro-grams, it is often heritage students whoare more interested in taking theclasses. Cross-cultural communicationmodules and Chicano literature selec-tions in Spanish have been used insome classes as an enrichment, al-though some students have reacted un-expectedly (since the literature recom-mends these selections as a way to in-fuse relevant culture) by saying theyobjected to reading about poor people(Gonzalez Pino and Pino, 1997). TheUniversity does not place heritage stu-dents effectively, since the requiredscantron placement test covers only lis-tening and reading comprehension andtends to place heritage students higherthan they feel comfortable. However,they can choose to ignore the place-ment; and many do so.

At the upper-level and Master'slevel, the program includes many ele-ments recommended in the literature.Proficiency-building is facilitatedthrough a series of three oral communi-cation courses and three compositioncourses. Expansion into the academicdomain is especially facilitated throughan advanced reading course in whichstudents work with materials from avariety of disciplines. Task-oriented ac-tivities and community-based activitiesare meshed and provided in a numberof courses, depending on the instructor,and are particularly emphasized in in-ternships in the community. There arecourses at both levels on SouthwestSpanish and Chicano literature, and

several instructors (though not all) usecooperative-learning techniques. Thusmuch of what has been recommendedin the literature has been incorporatedand used successfully at these levels,where most of the students are heritagespeakers. Given that circumstance, theneed has seemed particularly to infuseeven more of these elements into theregular lower-division program sincethe students were not interested in en-rolling in special courses.

STUDYING THE CONTEXTA first step was to determine

what students' perspectives were re-garding the classes they were in, thetype of classes they wanted and why,and their own language variety, abili-ties and needs. During 1998, 1999, and2000 students responded to question-naires on these topics so that facultycould consider the findings and theirimplications for an even more effectiveprogram design. The first questionnairein 1998 (See appendix.) addressed howstudents viewed mixed classes, the kindof classes in which they were currentlyenrolled. Two hundred students in firstthrough fourth semester participated;and of these, 45 percent classified them-selves as heritage speakers. Twenty-fivepercent were true beginners, and thirtypercent were other types of false be-ginners. A majority of the students (70percent) thought that students shouldbe allowed to register for any coursesfor which they did not have priorcredit, even if overqualified (the currentpolicy). One hundred percent of themthought that overqualified studentswished to improve their grade-pointaverage. A majority of the students


found the mixed class helpful, since 76percent could learn from more profi-cient students and 63 percent found themore proficient students willing tohelp. Unlike the literature (Loughrin-Sacco, 1992), more of the heritagespeakers apparently enjoy helping thenon-heritage students, and the anglo-phones are less intimidated . Seventy-five percent thought the course wastaught at its appropriate level, undis-torted by the mixture; and only 12 per-cent thought a true beginner could notearn an A.

Serious curricular implicationswere found, however, in the fact thatonly 36 percent thought there should beaccelerated courses and only 42 percentthought heritage courses should evenbe offered (not required). Indeed, 72percent thought that, if offered, heritagecourses should be optional to thosewho qualify to be in them. An over-whelming 94 percent thought one se-quence was sufficient for everyone.

Another important question con-cerned how many students actuallyidentified themselves as heritagespeakers, as it seemed that many stu-dents who had significant exposure tothe language did not so envision them-selves. A second questionnaire wasused in 1999 (See appendix.) with an-other 200 students in first and second-year Spanish. This time, seventy per-cent were Hispanic. Indeed, seventypercent of the Hispanics indicated thatthey were true beginners in the lan-guage, even though more than half ofthese individuals indicated prior expo-sure to Spanish, either hearing orspeaking the language in the home,with family, and /or in the community.

Eighty percent indicated that theywould not register for heritage classesand that they wanted to be in the regu-lar sequence to use what they know toadvantage and to make good grades.Thirty percent thought heritagecourses would be too demanding.Clearly there was a discrepancy in fac-ulty views of students and students'views of their own language back-grounds. Again, there was little interestin heritage courses.

A SPECIAL INFUSIONSince the program was already

communicative and proficiency-oriented, cooperative-learning and pairactivities were already used, cross-culture communication and Chicanoliterature were infused to some extent,some instructors included community-based activities, and expansion into theacademic domains was available tosome extent in the special-purposescourses, the primary element from theliterature which could appear to belacking was the sociolinguistic study.Thus the third questionnaire in 1999and 2000 (See appendix.) focused onthis area. Initially a limited amount ofmaterial about Southwest Spanish (Seeappendix.) was infused into second-year classes and selected second-semester classes in order to benefit heri-tage speakers by providing informationthey might normally have accessed inheritage classes or advanced classes(which they might never take) and tobenefit non-heritage speakers who arevery aware also that the language of theclassroom and the language of thecommunity are often not identical. Theinfusion was also intended to determine

Ion


whether this information would be ofinterest to the heritage student. Mate-rial on Southwest Spanish was pre-sented as a handout to students andwas discussed in classes on several oc-casions, as well as addressed via thethird questionnaire to collect students'reactions to the material. Another 200students participated, with nearly 70percent Hispanics. One hundred per-cent of the students found the materialhelpful and interesting. Fifty percentwanted more information, 25 percentrecommended creating a study guide,and 35 percent recommended creating alower-division course on this topic.Fifty percent recommended offeringheritage classes, slightly up from the 42percent on the previous questionnaire;but 70 percent said to offer this materialin the regular classes, that it wasneeded there.

Clearly the infusion of materialabout Southwest Spanish was well-received and should be continued.While it did not seem to create an in-stant and large increase in the numberof students interested in heritageclasses, there might be a trend there. Asmall amount of such instruction in-fused into the regular program mighthelp over time to interest more studentsin heritage classes, and thus further ma-terial is being developed by the author.

CONCLUSIONSThe road to meeting the needs of

heritage students may be a bumpy one.Obviously not all students are inter-ested in special courses, although thisresearch suggests that students may bestrongly interested in many of the com-ponents of successful instruction in

model programs for heritage students.Since the population is a very diverseone, perhaps the responses to meetingtheir needs can be equally diverse. Asthe students reported in the literature,many students in this context seem toprefer lower placements and highergrades at the same time that they areinterested in a communicative class,task-based instruction, cooperative andpair learning, acquisition of varied aca-demic vocabulary, ties to their cultureand community, and a greater under-standing of their Southwest languagevariety. For programs such as this one,with a similar cadre of students, per-haps an infusion curriculum is an ap-propriate option. Certainly it will meetthe needs and interests expressed bythe heritage students at this time, and itmay later lead to an expansion of op-tions for these students if a somewhatgreater number of them eventually be-come interested in special courses.

For the time being, infusion willmeet the students where they are andwill overcome the special problem ofmany of the heritage learners seeingthemselves as true beginners. FollowingCubillo's (2000) advice about mixedclasses and the incorporation of lan-guage variants, culture, and communityalong with communication, we maymake our programs more successful.Infusing material about SouthwestSpanish may add the final piece neededto address more of the students' needsand heighten their interest in the entiretopic of developing as heritage learners.

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APPENDIX ASPANISH CLASS PROFILE QUESTIONNAIRE

1. In my Spanish class there are students who are : (Circle all letters that apply) :a. True beginners in the language. Students that have had little or no former experience

with Spanish.b. False beginners in the language. Students that have studied Spanish before entering the

University.c. Native speakers from the U.S. who have been exposed to Spanish but who do not speak it

fluently.d. Native speakers from the U.S. who are fluent in Spanishe. Native speakers from Latin American countries who are very fluent.

2. My classification: (Circle one letter from .a through f that best applies to you) :a. True beginner - I had little or no experience with Spanish before entering the University.b. False beginner - I had studied Spanish before entering the University.c. Native speaker from the U.S. but I do not consider myself fluent m Spanish.d. Native speaker from the U.S.-I am fluent in Spanish.e. Native speaker from another Latin America country - I am fluent in Spanish.f. Other (Please describe):

3. Have you been given a language placement exam at UTSA? (Circle one):a. Yes b. No

4. Is this your first university level Spanish language course? (Circle one):a. Yes b. No

5. How were you placed in your first Spanish course (which may be this course) at UTSA? (Cir-cle the answer that best applies.)a. I was placed in my first Spanish course based on the results of the placement exam.b. I was placed in my first Spanish course based on the Advanced Placement credits I

earned m high school.c. I was placed in my first Spanish course based on the CLEF credits I earned.d. I placed myself in my first Spanish course based on my own assessment of my Spanish

language skills/needs.

6. If you placed yourself below your Spanish language level in your first Spanish course, whichof the following bestexplains your reason for doing so. (Please circle the answer that best ap-plies or fill in your own response.)a. Because I didn't learn enough Spanish in my prior Spanish courses.b. Because I wanted to be sure I had a firm foundation in the language before going on.c. Because I felt I didn't remember much from my prior Spanish courses.d. Because I wanted to improve or protect my GPA.e. This question does not apply to me.f. Other:

7. In this course, do you think you are learning at, above, or below your current Spanish languageability?(Circle one): a.. At my level b. Above my level. c. Below my level

8. Age: (Circle one): a. 18 to 30 years

9. Sex: (Circle one): a. female

[Turn page over]

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b. 31 to 50 years

b. male

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c. over 50 years


SPANISH CLASS PROFILE QUESTIONNAIRE (Continued)

[On the original form, for each item below the student designates strong agreement,agreement, no opinion, disagreement, or strong disagreement.]

10. Please mark the column that most closely describes your opinions or reactions to fol-lowing statements.

a. Students should have the right to register for any course for which they do not already havecredit even if they are overqualified for the course.

b. Students should not be allowed to register below their placement level and should be re-quired to register at their true proficiency-placement level.

c. Students should have the opportunity to test out of any lower level course for credit.

d. Over-proficient students often register for lower-level courses to improve their grade pointaverage since successful testing results only in academic credit, not in grade point credit.

e. I feel I can learn from students who are more proficient than I am and I welcome their pres-ence.

f. I feel intimidated by students who are more proficient that I am.

g. The more proficient students are usually helpful to others.

h. The more proficient students don't really want to help others.

i. The instructor calls on the more proficient students much more often.

j. The instructor calls on the on-level students more often.

k. The teacher involves all students more or less equally.

1. The level of the course is harder than it should be because of the more proficient students.

m. The mstructoi moves through the material too fast because the more proficient students al-ready know it or learn it faster.

n. The false beginners/native speakers get all the good grades. A true beginner can hardly earnan A.

o. Anyone who does all the work and studies hard can earn an A or B m this class.

p. This course is targeted at a particular level in the language development sequence and theinstructor generally stays at that level.

q. There should be accelerated courses for false beginners.

r. There should be special courses for speakers of U.S. Spanish focusing more on read-ing/ writing and less on listening/ speaking.

s. Accelerated or special-speaker courses should be optional, not required, for those who qual-ify for them.

t. Each course should target a proficiency level. Then with appropriate placement, special oraccelerated courses are not needed and all students will move from where they are tohigher levels of proficiency.


APPENDIX BLANGUAGE PROFILE QUESTIONNAIRE SPRING 1999

In order to serve our students of Spanish better, we would like to make adaptations to OUT pro-gram based on the language profiles of our students. In order to do this, we need more informa-tion about your language background and hope that you will assist us by answering the follow-ing questions, anonymously, of course. We appreciate your help. When we refer to heri-tage/Spanish-speaker, these are courses which assume the student has been around Spanish alittle (lower level) to a lot (higher level) and which target reading, writing, vocabula expansionand culture and emphasize listening and speaking skills less than in courses for true beginners.

AGE RANGE (Check one.): _Under 25 _26-39 Over 40 GENDER: _M _F

FAMILY LANGUAGE BACKGROUND (Check the one that best fits your background.):_1. I did not speak Spanish at home nor with relatives._2. I did not speak Spanish at home but did with relatives or friends.._3. I heard Spanish at home but did not speak it._4. I did not hear Spanish at home but did with relatives._5. I spoke Spanish at home and with relatives._6. I spoke Spanish at home, with relatives, and with friends._7. I spoke Spanish at home, with relatives and friends, and at school and/or work.

FAMILY RESIDENCE BACKGROUND (Check the one that best fits your situation.)_8. I was born in the U.S., and so were my parents and grandparents._9. I was born in the U.S., as were my parents; but my grandparents were not._10. I was born in the U.S., but my parents and grandparents were not._11. I was born outside the U.S.

YOUR VIEW OF YOUR SPANISH LANGUAGE SKILLS (Check the one that best fits you.)_12. I am a true beginner in the language because I've never spoken or studied it before now._13. I consider myself a learner in progress because I've been around the language at home._14. I'm a learner in progress who's been around the language at home and studied it before._15. I'm a learner in progressI studied the language before but not been around it otherwise.

YOUR VIEW OF HERITAGE SPEAKER/SPANISH SPEAKER COURSES (Check one.)_16. I would sign up for such a course at my level if the day, time, instructor, etc. were right._17. I would not sign up for such a course because I am a true beginner.....18. I would not sign up for such a course even though I've been around Spanish some or alot.

(If you checked Item 16 or 18, please continue. If Item 17, you are finished,and we thank you.)

CHECK ALL THAT APPLY:_19. I want the regular sequence as I don't know the language well & don't want to missthings._20. I want to benefit from what I already know and be able to make an A in a regular class._21. Special sections are discriminatory._22. Special sections are likely to be too demanding._23. Even though I've been around Spanish, I don't consider myself a Spanish-speaker.L.24. In order to attract me a special course would need a better title, such as

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_25. I need a course with _listening, _speaking, _reading, _writing, _grammar, _vocabulary._26. I'd like a course that included study of Hispanic cultural heritage in the Southwest._27. I'd like to study cross-cultural comparisons and intercultural communication._28. In a special course I'd like_29. Overall my opinion of such special courses is

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APPENDIX CSOUTHWEST SPANISH:

UNDERSTANDING IT AND MAKING THE MOST OF IT

OVERVIEWThe Spanish language and Spanish speakers are spread all across the United States today;

and Spanish is a second language here rather than a foreign language, making it an integral partof our society. Spanish has also risen dramatically in importance for us because of our vastly in-creased contact with people, agencies, and companies in the enormous entity known as LatinAmerica (which some say even includes an overlay of the United States because of our historyand the Hispanic cultures among our citizenry). Therefore, more and more students are studyingSpanish at all levels of their education, for these reasons and many others.

The varieties of Spanish taught in our educational institutions are not always exactly likethe varieties spoken in our communities, however. Just as we recognize that there are many varie-ties of English in the world today, we recognize that there are also many varieties of Spanish, de-riving from many different national origins, social classes, regions, and other societal variants. Wealso recognize that there are different registers of Spanish, or levels of formality in our speech,just as there are in English and other languages. Because Spanish-speakers and heritage speakersof Spanish (those who are from the United States but who have lived and learned with Spanish aspart of their families and/or communities), are ever more numerous in the United States, it is im-portant that we recognize the vital natural resource that Spanish constitutes in our citizenry andour communities.

By understanding the variety of Spanish known in this country as Southwest Spanish, allthose of us who are learning and/or using Spanish can do so even more effectively. Those whoare learning Spanish for the first time can also learn at least in part to understand this importantdialect of the language with which they will undoubtedly be in contact if they use the language inthis environment. Those students who are heritage speakers of the language can learn more pre-cisely how this variety of Spanish fits into the larger constellation of the entire Spanish-speakingworld; and if they themselves and their families are speakers of Southwest Spanish, they cancompare its characteristics with those of the more universal variety of the language taught in theirclasses. This comparison will empower them to add the additional form of the language to theirrepertoire more easily, building on the strengths they already possess from their lifelong expo-sure to the language, maintaining their Southwest Spanish for use in its appropriate settings, andadding the more universal forms to enable themselves to communicate more effectively in abroader context.

Southwest Spanish has many roots. First and foremost, it is Spanish and is especially re-lated to the Spanish of rural Northern Mexico. It is also affected by English and contains angli-cisms. It is a repository for some archaic forms of Spanish, which dropped from use long ago inmore populated parts of the Spanish-speaking world, areas that have had more interaction withone another, especially through the media in more recent times, and where formal education hasoccurred through the medium of that language. Here the language evolved for a long time inmore isolated communities, certain sound shifts and changes in usage have occurred and beenreinforced without contact with those other areas and without significant widespread contactwith print media in many instances.

Most beginning and intermediate Spanish texts treat transnational differences in the lan-guage, but none to date provide any extensive information about Southwest Spanish. While thereare textbooks written especially for the heritage speaker population, many students who speakSouthwest Spanish do not have access to or do not avail themselves of these courses and thus donot have the opportunity to compare their dialect with the more universal forms. In addition,some heritage speakers suffer from being told by relatives, community members, teachers orother contacts that their form of the language is inferior and best forgotten, when in fact theyhave an enormous advantage in the form of a variety of skills and knowledge that can easily be


expanded into a more fully utilizable and extremely valuable resource. The Southwest speakerwill at least have comprehension skills and a start on natural-sounding pronunciation. They likelyhave some subconscious knowledge of syntax, and they possess a certain vocabulary. If this indi-vidual also speaks the language, he/she has an even greater advantage over the person who isjust beginning the language.

If one is interested in being familiar with or in expanding Southwest Spanish for profes-sional use, it is helpful to understand the characteristics of Southwest Spanish and how thesecompare to the more universal national forms of the language. In the material that follows, youwill engage in a brief perusal of some of the areas of comparison. Should you find this materialhelpful, you can interact with your Spanish instructor regarding further readings and/or classesthat would help you continue this vein of study.

LEXICON1. While Southwest Spanish uses much universal vocabulary, there are also ANGLICISMS.

Words such as troca, biles, espelear, huachar, and tichar are common adaptations of Englishwords. Expansion will help us add the universal words for these concepts to our reper-toire.

2. There are also archaic forms. When we use maneas for brakes, truje for brought or estofatafor post office, we are using forms that were part of the language when it was brought here,but these are concepts for which speakers in other locales have since developed otherterms. Other examples comprise haiga, ansina, nadien. A good course or resource helps uslearn these new forms.

3. There are many cognates (words similar in two languages) for English and Spanish.Mathematics and matematicas are a good example of the many pairs that help us to expandour vocabularies in both directions.

There are some false cognates, however, words which appear to be the same but are not.Embarosado and constipado are common and humorous examples of these; but there areother more subtle examples. Educado is a good example. In English it refers to formal educa-tion; in Spanish it refers to good manners, knowing how to treat others appropriately. Letra,libreria, atender, suc(c)eso, parientes, papel and nuevas are additional examples.

4. In the Southwest we use many mexicanismos, words which work quite weil in a Mexicannational environment but which are sometimes different in other settings. Ouajolote, tecoloteand zoquete are good examples. Again our classes and resources can help us become famil-iar with additional forms.

5 In the Southwest we tend, as do speakers in other parts of the Spanish-speaking world, tooverwork some of our vocabulary and function with a rather limited repertoire in somecases. A good example is the verb agarrar, which we may use for getting the bus, getting acold, getting the idea, etc., much as we might overwork "get" in English.

6. We also codeswitch, meaning that we mix English and Spanish into the same sentence,switch languages from one topic to another and switch languages from one listener to an-other.

GRAMMAR1. In the Southwest we have sometimes changed the gender of vocabulary items. It is not un-

common to hear la problema, la sistema, la mapa, el canci6n, la papa. It is also common for us totranslate the two-word verbs from English (to come back, to call back, to give back, for ex-ample) into Spanish as llamar pa' iras, doy pa' tras.

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2. We change past participles, sometimes to regularize them, and not using the irregularforms common elsewhere. We say murido, escribido. abrido, cubrido instead of muerto, escrito,abierto, cubierto.

3. We may use prepositions in different ways. We may say debo que ir or necesito que ir. We may say lascosas que ellos necesitan ayuda instead of las cosas con que (or con las cuales) ellos necesitan ayuda.

4. We may mix tic and usted liberally and are generally less familiar with the use of this dis-tinction.

5. We may use an archaic ending in the past, e.g., by saying to hablastes or to hablates insteadof tic hablaste.

PRONUNCIATION1. We may add sounds, as in the following examples: (a)tocar, (a)bajar, o(y)ir, cre(y)o, mu(n)cho.2. We may subtract sounds, as in (a)hogarse, (ha)ber, (es)taba, telefon(o), pa(ra), clas(e). e(Il)a,

torti(ll)a, ne(ce)sita, or tam(b)ien.

3. We may switch sounds, as in luenga, siudad, pader, porblema, estogamo,

4. We may otherwise change sounds, as in estoria, deficit, ofecina,joventud, dicir, dishonesto,nojotros, pos, gradar, experencia, cencia.

POSTSCRIPTThe foregoing are a few examples of the areas that are helpful for us to understand as we

learn to communicate both in the Southwest environment and in a much broader one. Certainly theperson who knows all the above forms already has much valuable vocabulary (though most heritagespeakers don't exhibit all these forms) and, with the opportunity for study in class or with appropri-ate materials, can build on what is already known to broaden Southwest Spanish as a valuable re-source and foundation for a universal Spanish.

TO LOWER DIVISION SPANISH STUDENTSWe are interested in knowing how you react to the reading on Southwest Spanish, as we

are including material of this type in our classes. Please read the selection and answer the follow-ing questions, as your input would be very helpful to us. Thank you for assisting.

CHECK ALL THAT APPLY.1. The material is helpful.2. The length is appropriate.3. The material is too brief.4, The points are clear.5. More examples are needed.6. Additional information is needed.7. Delete some of it.8. Create a self-study guide with tape/CD and exercises.9. Create a lower division course to cover this in depth.

10. Offer courses for heritage speakers.11. Include this material in the regular 1014, 1024, 2013, 2023.12. This material is needed.13. The tone of the material is positive and constructive.14. Other comments:

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Multiple Metaphors: Teaching Tense And Aspect To English -Speakers

KAREN CODY, University of Texas at Austin

Recent research points to evidence that second language learners acquire "skills"(declarative knowledge) that can be proceduralized through systematic practiceand finally automatized by a period of repeated opportunities to use that knowl-edge in meaningful communication. This article proposes a synthesis of instruc-tional methods from both traditional/explicit grammar and learner-centered/contructivist camps. This synthesis also incorporates metaphors of manytypes (visual, abstract, kinesthetic) in order to lead learners from declarative toproceduralized to automatized knowledge, thus enabling a more complete cogni-tive organization of a more native-like use of aspect.

INTRODUCTIONMost teachers of Romance languages agree that speakers of English en-

counter major difficulties in acquiring the concept of aspect. Traditional teacher-based methods of explicit grammar instruction, founded on theories of behavior-ism and structuralist linguistics, are no longer supported by current research inlinguistics and second language acquisition (Blyth, 1997). Learner-centered orconstructivist approaches, associated with Piaget, Vygotsky, and others, rejectthe notion that there even exists an objective reality for the traditional teacher totransmit to students; instead, one might expect to find in the classroom multiplerealities or multiple ways of knowing that spring from theories about the effectof meaning-bearing input and negotiation of meaning.

Recent research carried out by both deKeyser (1998) and Johnson (1999)points to evidence that second language learners acquire "skills" (declarativeknowledge) which can be proceduralized through systematic practice and finallyautomatized by a period of repeated opportunities to use that knowledge inmeaningful communication. Given that a single methodology is not sufficient toensure success for all learners or for all linguistic "rules," I propose a synthesis ofinstructional methods from both traditional/explicit grammar and learner-centered/contructivist camps which also incorporates metaphors of many types(abstract, visual, kinesthetic) in order to lead learners from declarative to proce-duralized to automatized knowledge. This integrative, synthetic approach wouldarguably result in several different or multiple ways of "knowing" aspect, pro-viding learners with a more complete cognitive organization of that which is en-compassed in native-like use of aspect.

PRESENTATION OF DECLARATIVE KNOWLEDGEMy instructional strategy includes an explicit pedagogical grammar refer-

ence for the rather complex rules about the formation of the passe compose and

*Presented at the Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2000 (TexFLEC2000), University of Texas at AL.,tin, March 31-April 1, 2000.

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imparfait in French. I follow then withrules and metaphors about the choiceof tense/ aspect (Appendix A).

Students receive a homeworkpacket which reviews the formation ofthe passé compose and the imparfaitwhich they have already covered buthave not yet mastered and still needto practice (Section A). This presenta-tion is terrifically long and complexbecause the material is neither simpleto understand nor is it easily transfer-rable from their native English. I'vealso chosen such a thorough treatmentsince the formation of the passé com-pose and the imparfait has beenstretched over several chapters of ourtextbook, Paralleles (Allen & Fouletier-Smith, 1995). I mean it to be a refer-ence grammar to solidify declarativeknowledge before tackling the presen-tation of the "new material," differ-ences in the uses of the two pasttenses, which involves a juxtapositionof concepts very difficult for the Eng-lish-speaking student to grasp, muchless manipulate.

In the presentation of materialnew to the student (choice betweenthe passé compose and the imparfait,Section B) I followed fairly closely thepresentation of Punto y aparte (Foersteret al., 1999), which incorporates Bar-dovi-Harlig's proposal that both An-dersen's aspect hypothesis and thediscourse hypothesis must be acti-vated (though not necessarily overtlyor explicitly) to assist second languagelearners toward a more native-likedistribution of tense-aspect morphol-ogy. The aspect hypothesis claims thatthe distribution of interlanguage ver-bal morphology is determined by lexi-

cal aspectual class, that is, that certainverbs tend to be used in onetense/aspect or the otherpunctualevents as primarily passé compose andstatives as imparfait. The contrast offocus on the beginning or endpoint ofan action vs. the middle of an action isa concept incorporated in lexical as-pect explored in depth by Smith(1991). The discourse hypothesisclaims that the distribution of inter-language verbal morphology is de-termined by narrative structure, thatis, passé compose to foreground the se-quential events that move the story-line and imparfait to background theatmosphere, the description, theevaluative comments, and so forth.The presentation I have designed in-corporates both hypotheses by includ-ing both Westfall's metaphor (1995),which underlines narrative discourse(Appendix A, Section B, Part 1: TheMetaphor), and the usage chart (Ap-pendix A, Section B, Part 2: UsageChart), which objectifies lexical aspect.The student is able to formalize de-clarative knowledge by analyzingothers' narratives in order to eventu-ally construct his/her own narrativewithout burdening him/ her withcomplex concepts or meta-language.Also helpful to these beginning learn-ers is a visual mnemonic (AppendixA, Section B, Part 3: How Events TakePlace In Time) that helps symbolizethe characteristics of eachtense/aspect and that can be used as areminder when the student is "online." An answer key is provided forthe numerous exercises designed forthe student to work through outsideof class.

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Multiple Metaphors in Teaching Tense and Aspect 113

To evaluate this presentationagainst Swan's six criteria for peda-gogic language rules (1994): first of all,the rules for formation presented aretrue while the guidelines for usagechoice tend to be more rule of thumb- -nature of the beast. The domain ofboth presentations is fairly clearlydemarcated. The wording is clear withvery little complex theory or metalin-guistic terminology and the metaphorused, colonne/ chair (spine /flesh) is avery helpful one. While neither forma-tion nor use of passé compose /imparfaitis very simply explained, the parts ofthe presentation are logical and or-derly and broken down into manage-able and easily practiced components.I can't say that the presentation is par-ticularly parsimonious since the for-mation rules are so complicated andthe concept of tense/aspect choice isso complex. However, all the informa-tion given (and exemplified) is neces-sary (and relevant) for the students inorder for them to work toward mas-tery and, as pointed out above, themeta-language is minimal.

PRACTICEPROCEDURALIZATIONLearners then continue practice

with a series of exercises in whichthey analyze native narratives in bothcartoon and text formats beginningwith visual and then discourse-basedmetaphors before re-analyzing withlexical aspect and translation (Appen-dix B).

Pratique 7Students are divided into five

groups and assigned one of the pic-tures. Each group is to pick which sen-

tences match their picture and thenwrite some logical original sentences.While the groups are working, the dis-course metaphor chair/ colonne isdrawn on the board or shown on anoverhead transparency as well as thepop-up reminder of fouree points ofusage chart, the symbols X and ivy ,and a reminder of the formation of thepassé compose and imparfait. The sen-tences are eventually written on theboard in the appropriate column (col-onne/ chair) and each group justifiesusage and formation.

Pratique 8I then incorporate TPR (total

physical response) exercises usingboth the French narrative and its Eng-lish translation to provide a kines-thetic metaphor. The class turns toface me at the back of the room while Iread the entire story out loud. Thestudents either snap fingers for thepassé compose or paddle the desktopfor the imparfait. I remind them: "Youwill be indicating if the verb I read iscolonne or chair [Westfall metaphor,discourse hypothesis]; if it is a com-pleted action, sequential action, lim-ited by time , a summary or if it is acontinuous, habitual action or a de-scription or background detail [usagechart, lexical aspect hypothesis]; i.e., ifthe verb could be symbolized with Xor with a wavy line [visual mne-monic]." And afterwards: "So whenyou heard a verb in the passé composewhat did you do? (snap) And whenyou heard a verb in the imparfait you(paddle). Now what happens when Itell you the same story in English?Can you hear whether it is pc/imp? So

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you'll really have to concentrate onwhat the verb does, move the story-line or add flesh. Remember the hintabout translations and adverbs possi-bly helping you decide" and so on.

Pratique 9Eventually, learners engage in

a communicative activity in whichthey analyze an oral narrative theyhear using as many of these meta-phors as possible while negotiatingwith their learner-partner the possiblemotivation of the use of passe composevs. imparfait. Once the class comesback together, we list on the board col-onne X events and chair description inorder to decide if story was moreeventful (active) or descriptive (emo-tional). Then the script of the narrativewith all verbs omitted is flashed onthe overhead while each pair is sepa-rated into two groups: the group ofCharles Monotone, who use only thepassé compose in boring voices, andthat of Floriane Bavarde, who useonly the imparfait in excited voices.Charles' group brainstorm some addi-tional sentences to add events to thestory, while Floriane's group adds de-scriptions and details. Finally, the firststudent from Charles' group gets upin the middle of the room to startforming a colonne vertebrale, while stu-dents from Floriane's group link armson either side to start fleshing out thestory, thus providing both kinestheticand visual metaphors.

These tasks meet Lee's criteriafor operationalizing communication:they are extended discourse; thelearners share information (gap); thetasks have an unrehearsed element,

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are goal-oriented, are processed inreal-time. One or more of the tasks al-low for the expression, interpretationand negotiation of meaning; requirestwo-plus participants; privileges thelearners' use of language. There is anidentified informational outcome; thetopic has been broken down intosteps; there are concrete tasks for thelearners to do; there has been built inlinguistic support.

PRODUCTION/AUTOMIZATIONFinally, learners are guided in

writing their own original narrativeby use of a handout that incorporatesa simplified narrative model ofLabov/Polanyi along with observa-tions by Fleischman (1990) and Liskin-Gasparro (1996) and discourse worldsby Lafford (1999) (Appendix C,Pratique 10). The class brainstormstogether on the board (or overhead)many verbs useful in talking about thefirst day of class as an exchange stu-dent in France, incorporating the vo-cabulary and cultural themes of thechapter. These verbs, as well as com-mon verbs of daily routine, are sug-gested in the infinitive but are placedunder the probable columns of use(colonne/ chair) The students are told towrite a story of at least 15 completesentences using at least 12 differentverbs and some other subjects in addi-tion to "I." They are reminded of allthe metaphors and encouraged topractice their story aloud until theycan tell it without reading their paper.

The oral production task thefollowing day is a recounting of thatpersonal narrative without referringto notes. The students tell their story


in their groups while their grouptakes notes with the stated objective ofvoting on the most eventful/most de-scriptive. Students are directed to takenotes using the narrative structure oftheir hand-out (Pratique 10), includingarranging the verbs they hear in theappropriate column.

The final communicative task isto take notes (and possibly negotiatemeaning) as the best of each groupread their narratives to the entireclass. The class then votes on the mosteventful (most pc), most emo-tional/vivid (most imp), most typical,most horrific, funniest, and so on.Students are then advised to look overtheir notes and all handouts aboutnarrating in the past before the testthe following day.

The task-based test, oral orwritten or both, which holds thelearner responsible for in-class interac-tion, is to recount in French his/herfavorite narrative (not his/her own).Learners were prepared to be success-ful in their choice of passé com-pose/ imparfait (and with the correctforms both or either oral and writ-ten) with the steps and practice lead-ing up to the test that have automa-tized their declarative knowledge.There is also a very traditional dis-crete point test, a cloze test, over theuse of the passé compose/ imparfait.

This integrative, synthetic ap-proach to teaching tense/ aspect hasresulted in the production of muchmore native-like narratives in thelearners in my classes. A close analy-sis of learner-learner dialogs duringthe communicative activities indicatesthat most students use several of the

metaphors simultaneously to cogni-tively construct a much more compre-hensive personal concept of aspectwhich has resulted in higher scores onobjective tests, even for the less-ablelanguage learners.

REFERENCES

Allen, W., & Fouletier-Smith, N.(1995). Paralleles: Communicationet culture. Prentice Hall.

Andersen, R., & Shirai, Y. (1994). Dis-course motivations for somecognitive acquisition principles.Studies in Second Language Ac-quisition, 16,135 -156.

Bardovi-Harlig, K. (1998). Narrativestructure and lexical aspect:Conspiring factors in secondlanguage acquisition of tense-aspect morphology. Studies inSecond Language Acquisition, 20,471-508.

Blyth, C. (1997). A constructivist ap-proach to grammar: Teachingteachers to teach aspect. TheModern Language Journal, 81, 50-66.

deKeyser, R. (1998). Beyond focus onform: Cognitive perspectiveson learning and practicing sec-ond language grammar. In C.Doughty and J. Williams (Eds.)Focus on form in classroom secondlanguage acquisition. In Cam-bridge Applied Linguistics Series.Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-versity Press.

Fleischman, S. (1990). Tense and narra-tivity: From medieval performanceto modern fiction. Austin: Uni-versity of Texas Press.

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Foerster, S., Lambright, A., & Alfonso-Pinto, F. (1999). Punto y Aparte.McGraw-Hill College.

Johnson, K. (1999). Teaching declara-tive and procedural knowl-edge. Grammar and Learning,121-131.

Labov, W., & Waletzky, J. (1996). Nar-rative analysis: Oral versions ofpersonal experience. Journal ofNarrative and Life History, 7(1-4)3-38.

Lafford, B. (1999). Co-existing dis-course worlds and the analysisof NNS and NS narratives: casestudies from Spanish (notesfrom talk) Colloquium on His-panic and Luso-Brazilian Lit-eratures and Romance Linguis-tics, Austin, TX.

Lee, J. (2000). Tasks and communicat-ing in language classrooms. TheMcGraw Hill Second LanguageProfessional Series; Directions inSecond Language Learning. p.34

Lee, J. (1999). An introduction to task-based instruction: From creatingactivities to task-based testing.Unpublished manuscript.

Liskin-Gasparro, J. (1996). Narrativestrategies: A case study of de-veloping storytelling skills by alearner of Spanish. The ModernLanguage Journal, 80, iii, 271-286.

Polanyi, L. (1989). Telling the Americanstory: A structural and culturalanalysis of conversational storytel-ling. Cambridge: MIT Press..

Smith, C. 1991. The parameter of aspect.Dordrecht: Kluwer.

Swan, M. (1994). Design criteria forpedagogic language rules ingrammar and grammars. InMartin Bygate, Alan Tonkyn,and Eddie Williams (Eds.)Grammar and the languageteacher (pp 45-55). New York:Prentice Hall.

Westfall, R. (1995). Simple and progres-sive forms of the Spanish tensesystem: A semantic and pragmaticstudy in viewpoint contrast. Un-published Ph.D. dissertation,University of Texas at Austin.

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APPENDIX APRESENTATION OF DECLARATIVE KNOWLEDGE

(NARRATING IN THE PAST)

Narrating or storytelling in the past requires that you know the past-tenseverb forms and that you study and practice using the passé compose that youlearned in Dossiers 5, 6, and 7 and the imparfait that you learned in Dossiers 8and 9. To help you learn to narrate well, this section contains:

(A)(B)

A review of the verb forms for the passé compose and the imparfaitHints for understanding the relationship and differences between themthrough the use of the metaphor colonne/ chair (backbone/flesh), an explana-tion chart, and symbols to show how events take place in time and in rela-tion to each otherA list of verbs with different meanings in the passé compose and the imparfait.

FORMATION of the passé compose and the imparfait

Remember that in Dossier 5 the passé compose was introduced as a com-pound tense made of two parts, the auxiliary or helping verb which isconjugated and the past participle.

1.1 The past participle is normally formed by replacing the infinitive ending (-er,-ir,-re) with the corresponding participle ending (-6,4,-u):

parler -> pane finir -> fini attendre -> attendu

but you also have learned a list of irregular past participles studied so far:

avoir -> eu(clec)(c)ouvrir -> (clec)(c)ouvertoffrir (souffrir) -> offert (souffert)etre -> ete(de)(re)(pre)venir ->(de)(re)(pre)venuboire -> buvouloir -> vouludevoir -> cli1savoir -> sudire -> dit&tire -> ecrit

faire -> fait(ap)(com)(sur)prendre -> prismourir -> mortnaitre -> nerecevoir -> recumettre -> mispouvoir -> puconnatre -> connusuivre -> suivilire -> lu


1.2 Most verbs conjugate with the auxiliary avoir, though about 17 high-frequency verbs of movement and change of state conjugate with the aux-iliary etre.

J'ai pane a mes amis.Tu as fini tes devoirs.Il a attendu le bus.

Nous sommes alle(e)s au cinema.Vous etes arrive(e)(s) de Paris.Elles sont nees en 1979.

In Dossier 6 we used the House of Etre and Dr & Mrs Vandertrampp to helpus recall these verbs:

(de)(re)venir aller arriver #(r)entrer #monterrester #descendre tomber #sortir partir#passer #retourner naitre mourir

# Remember that these six "AC/ DC" verbs can be used both transitivelyand intransitively (with and without direct objects). They conjugate withthe auxiliary avoir when used with a direct object and with the auxiliaryetre when used intransitively.

Je suis sorti(e) avec mes amis.Tu es descendu(e) en vile.Elle est rentree vers minuit.

J'ai sorti le vin de la cave.Tu as descendu la chaise du dewdeme etage.Elle a rentre la voiture dans le garage

In Dossier 7 you learned that all pronominal verbs also conjugate with theauxiliary etre.

je me suis leve(e)to t'es amuse(e)on s'est reveille

nous nous sommes couche(e)svous vous etes trompe(e)(s)elles se sont enervees

1.3 The past participle reflects agreement in writing with the addition of anextra -e or -s or -es at the end, though you can't usually hear any change inthe pronunciation. You learned in Dossier 9 that verbs conjugating withavoir rarely show agreement in the past participle, only with the direct ob-ject and only when it comes before the verb either in another clause or as apronoun.

Voila la photo que j'ai montree a mes parents. Je l'ai montree a mes parents.(Xi sont les lettres que j'ai envoyees? Je les ai envoyees de France.Je les ai mises ici.

Verbs conjugating with etre almost always show agreement in the past par-ticiple with the subject.

Its sont morts. Nous sommes venu(e)s en avion.Elles se sont depechees en classe. A quelle heure t'es-tu endormi(e)?

1 3


*But remember that if the pronominal verb has a stated direct object (often abody part) or if it is a verb that only takes indirect objects there is no agreementin the past participle.

Elle s'est lavee. BUT Elle s'est lave les cheveux.Its se sont brosses. BUT Its se sont brosse_ les dents.Elles se sont telephone_ (telephoner a)Its se sont repondu_ (repondre a)

So to summarize, there are three main points to remember in forming the passécompose:

1.1 Formation of the past participle: -e, -u and irregulars1.2 Choice of auxiliary: only 17 verbs and pronominals use etre, every-

thing else conjugates with avoir1.3. Agreement: rarely with avoir, almost always with 'etre

1.4 Don't forget that, to form the negative, ne and pas go around the conju-gated verb (either avoir or etre), never separating pronouns from the verb:

Je n'ai pas parle a Fifi. Elle n'est pas morte. Its ne se sont pas fiches.

1.5 And also remember the list of short common adverbs that normally areinserted between the auxiliary and past participle: bien/mal, toujours/souvent,beaucoup/peu/assez, deja/encore, vibe

On a bien compris. Tu n'es pas souvent venu(e). Elles ne se sont pas encore coffees.

PRATIQUE 1 FORMATION OF PASSE COMPOSEReview the formation of the passé compose. Remember to pay attention to

1.1 The past participle1.2 The choice of auxiliary1.3 Agreement1.4-5 Placement of negatives/adverbs.

1. La premiere journee de classe, Odile (se renseigner)

2. Puis elle (regler) les frail d'inscription.

3. Ensuite, elle (vite aller) a la Faculte de droit

4. Elle (passer) un examen d'entree mais elle (ne pas reussir)


2. The imparfait is formed by removing the -ons from the first-person plural(nous) form of the present tense. To this stem you add the imperfect endings:

-ais -ions-ais -iez-ait -aient

parler: je parlais, tu parlais, il/elle/on parlait, nous parlions, vous parliez, ils/ellesparlaient

finir: je finissais, tu finissais, it finissait, nous finissions, vous finissiez, its finis-saient

attendre: j'attendais, tu attendais, it attendait, nous attendions, vous attendiez, ils at-tendaient

There is only one irregular verb: etre

tu etais, il/elle/ on etait, nous etions, vous etiez, ils/elles etaient

*Verbs without a nous form: falloir -> fallait pleuvoir -> pleuvait

*Verbs irregular in the present form the imparfait in the same way as regularverbs:

boire: je bois, nous buvons -> je buvais, tu buvais, etc.preferer: je prefere, nous preferons -> je preferais, tu preferais, etc.acheter: j'achete, nous achetons -> j'achetais, tu achetais, etc.

*Verbs ending in -cer and -ger keep the spelling changes to maintain pronuncia-tion:

placer:

nager:

je plagais, tu placais, it plagais, ils plagaient BUT nous placions,vous placiezje nageais, to nageais, it nageais, ils nageaient BUT nous nagions, vousnagiez

*Verbs ending in -ier have two i's in the nous/vous forms: oublier, fire, etudier

etudier: retudiais, tu etudiais, il etudiait, nous etudiions, vous etudfiez, ilsetudiaient

PRATIQUE 2FORMATION OF IMPARFAITReview the formation of the imparfait:

1. Quand je/j' (etre)amphitheatre.

etudiant, nous (avoir) tous nos cours dans un

2. 11 (falloir) arriver tot pour pouvoir s'asseoir.


3. Combien de cours (suivre) -tu normalement?

4. On (rediger) des memoires d'une quinzaine de pages.

(B) USING the passé compose and the imparfaitWhen talking about the past, the perspective one assumes is central

to the distinction between the passé compose and the imparfait. Up to thispoint your textbook has been careful to focus on one perspective or theother. Often, however, the two perspectives appear together in the samesentence and certainly in a paragraph or story.

As a general rule, the passé compose is used to report events thatwere completed in the past. The focus may be on the beginning of anevent (11 a commence a etudier), the end of an event (I1 a fini de preparer sonexpose), or on the event from the beginning to the end (II a itablit son emploidu temps). On the other hand, when the focus is on the middle of the ac-tion, with no concern for when it started or ended, the imparfait is used. (IIfaisait froid) Think of verbs in the passé compose as moving the storylineforward (the backbone or colonne vertebrale) and verbs in the imparfait asthe descriptive filler (the flesh or chair) used to enhance the listener's abil-ity to picture more fully the circumstances of the past event being de-scribed. This distinction will be presented in three ways:

(1) As a metaphor to guide you as you analyze and create past time dis-course

(2) As a general explanation of when to use the preterite or the imperfect(3) As an explanation of how events take place in time.

(1) The metaphorThe backbone/ flesh (colonne/ chair) metaphor can help you understand therelationship between the passé compose and the imparfait. Think of thebackbone (la colonne vertebrale) as the information that moves a story for-ward, a series of completed actions. As each event ends (as representedwith an X), a new event begins, which in turn moves the story forward intime. Notice that, in the events narrated below, each verb in the passé com-pose moves the storyline forward in chronological order, from the point ofwaking up to the point of going back to bed.

Annie s 'est reveillee a 6h30. X

Elle s'est mal habillee. X

Elle est sortie de son appartement a 7h05. X

Elle a rate le bus. X

Elle est rentTee. X


Elle s'est remise au lit. X

Verbs in the imparfait do not introduce new events into the storyand therefore do not move the storyline forward. The imparfait is con-nected to a time (which can be a moment or an extended interval of time)that has been or will be referred to in the preterite. In other words, the im-parfait stops the storyline to fill in descriptive details or to "flesh out" thestory. Hence, the reference to the imparfait as the flesh (la chair) of thestory. Notice how the imperfect adds details to the above story.

Annie avait toujours sommeil.Elle etait fatiguee.Elle devait se rendre au campus de bonne heure.Les couleurs de ses vetements n'allaient pas bien ensemble.Il pleuvait et it faisait froid.Annie etait de mauvaise humeur.Le bus partait.

Notice how the imparfait refers to a time specified by the passé composestoryline.

At 6:30 when Annie woke up, she was still sleepy and tired.She needed to be on campus early so she got dressed but the colors of her clothes

clashed.At 7:05 when she left her apartment, it was raining and cold and Annie was in a bad

mood.The bus was already leaving so she missed it.She went back inside and went back to bed.

PRATIQUE 3 USING METAPHOR (SYNTHESIS)Now use this metaphor of colonne/ chair to put the whole story together in Frenchwith the pictures.

tine journee qui tourne court. Racontez au passe la mini-histoire&Annie filmee ci-dessous.

41,.

51,

.

'

3 -I . se reveiller. avoir toulours sommeil.

etre fatiguee

2. s'habiller. mettre unejupe et un chemisier. leacouleurs ne pas aller bienensemble

2 7

3. sortir. pleuvoir. faire froid.etre de mauvaise humeur. lebus ne pas arriver

4. rentrer dans son appartement. seremettre au lit

Bar COPY AVALABLE


PRATIQUE 4 USING METAPHOR (ANALYSIS)This metaphor is helpful in analyzing existing texts in French and it will also bevery helpful when you create your own stories in the past. Read the followingnarrative. On a separate sheet of paper indicate the colonne and the chair found inthe narration using the previous example as a model.

L'annee passee, je suis all& au Quebec pour assister au Carnaval. Comore it n'yavait pas de vol direct, j'ai pris l'avion de Dallas et j'ai passé par Chicago. Le vol etait ter-rible parce y avait du vent et l'avion tremblait. J'etais malade quand je suis arrivee aMontreal. Je n'ai trouve personne que je connaissais. J'ai attendu une demi-heure et puisj'ai cherche un taxi pour m'amener a l'hotel. Il faisait ties froid et it neigeait. Je n'ai pasreussi a avoir un taxi; it y en avait un ou deux qui circulaient mais ils ne se sont pas ar-retes. J'ai fini par prendre le bus. Quel desastre de debut mais mes vacances ont fini tresbien. Je me suis bien amusee finalement.

HINT: If you are confused about what happened in a particular passage, take outthe verbs in the passé compose so you have the backbone of the story.

(2) Usage chartHere are some of the more common uses of the passé compose and the im-parfait:

PASSE COMPOSEa. completed action

b. completed actions insuccession

c. completed action withspecific time period ornumber of times indicated

d. summary or reaction

IMPARFAITa. middle of an action with no

focus on beginning or endb. habitual action

c. description of physical andemotional states, includingpast opinion and desires

d. background informationsuch as time, weather, age

Let's examine these four main points of contrast more closely.

Passé composea. Completed actions may be those that happened and ended quickly: Elle

s'est assise. They may refer to the beginning or end of an action: it s'est decided'y alien Its ont fini leurs devoirs. Or they may refer to actions that started andended in the past: Elle a range toute la maison.

b. Completed actions in succession are a series of actions, one ending beforethe other begins: Elle s'est levee, s'est vite lavee, et s'est habillee.


c. Completed action with specific time period or number of times: J'ai passé 2ans a Paris. Its sont retournes a Paris 3 fois Palm& passee.

d. Summary or reaction statement to a series of events packaged as a whole:

J'ai aime ce filmil a ete extra (overall reaction to picture as a whole)

Imparfaita. Middle of an action with no focus on the beginning or end. The imparfait is

used to express what was in the process of happening at the time of thestory in the past: Je faisais les achats pendant qu'elle faisait le menage.

b. Habitual action in the past is one that used to occur when no definitelength of time is mentioned: Nous mangions toujours notre petit dejeuner.

c. Description of physical and emotional states, past opinions and desires,characteristic states in the past: II etait grand et beau. II voulait s'en aller. Il etaittoujours tres nerveux.

d. Background information to set the scene of the action: II etait 3h de l'apres-midi mais le ciel etait sombre. En 1978 elle avait 13 ans.

*Note that the imperfect can also be used to refer to the future in the past (oftenin indirect statement): Elle m'a dit qu'elle allait se coucher tout de suite.

PRATIQUE 5--USING THE USAGE CHARTIn these exercises, indicate which of the four uses discussed above are being ex-pressed.

passé compose

1. Jean et Robert ont commence leurs etudes universitaires en 1990. (a,b,c,ou d)

2. Le jour qu'ils sont alles en classe a ete fantastique.

3. Tous leurs amis sont inscrits aussi, se sont renseignes sur les cours et ont etabli leurs horaires.

4. Its ont assiste a leur cours magistra110 fois avant de le secher.

imparfait

1. Le premier jour de classe, Jean et Robert etaient un peu nerveux.

2. Il n'y avait plus de place dans l'amphitheatre.

129


3. Jean cherchait 2 places pendant que Robert parfait au prof.

4. Jean toujours pensait plus serieusement aux details importants que Robert.

(3) How events take place in time. You may use the following symbols tohelp visualize the usage of the passé compose and the imparfait:at a specific point in time continuous, in progress ,fu,

Elle a dit non. X Je jouais du Chopin.sequential continuous, interrupted by another action

Elle a regarde sa montre, elle a Tu faisais tes devoirs quand to t'esferme la WM, puffs elle endormi(e). elYnaest partie. X X X

*The usual translations of the verbs into English expressions may also give youclues on the use of the passé compose and the imparfait:

J'ai parle = I spoke, I did speak, I have spokenJe parlais = I spoke, but also I was speaking, I used to speak

PRATIQUE 6Next to the sentences of Practique 4, place the appropriate symbol (X, X) andalso the probable English translation of the verb

(C) Verbs with DIFFERENT MEANINGS in the passé compose and the impar-fait. These are verbs whose meaning changes depending on how they are used:

PASSE COMPOSE11 a connu Marie au lycee.

(he met her)Elle a su la reponse.

(she found out)J'ai du partir avant minuit.

(I had to, must have)Tu n'as pas voulu aller en ville.

(you refused)Ds ont pu partir.

(they were able to, and DID)

IMPARFAITIl connaissait Marie au lycee.

(he knew her)Elle savait la reponse.

(she knew)Je devais partir avant minuit

(I was supposed tobut maybe didn't)Tu ne voulais pas aller en vile.

(you didn't want)Its pouvaient partir.

(they were able to, but DIDN'T)

An answer key to all at-home practices is included in the handout packet.


APPENDIX B

PRACTICE/PROCEDURALIZATION

PRATIQUE 7CONSTRUCTING STORIES

Line soiree memorableLook at the cartoon and tell what happened to Jules and Mireille last week.Match the sentences below to the pictures. Then write some of your own sen-tences that logically add to the story. Finally, write how the evening ended.

a.b.c.

d.e.

f.

g.h.i.

jk.

C'etait une robe tres elegante, blanche aux grands pois noirs.Elle etait furieuse.Jules a pris rendez-vous pour vendredi soir a 8h.Its se sont parle pendant une heure.Jules a telephone a Mireille mardi soir a 8h15.Elle a mis une jolie robe pour sortir avec Jules.Mireille est arrivee au restaurant a l'heure.Jules travaillait tard a son bureau.Its etaient contents tous les deux.Vendredi, Mireille s'est habillee avant 7h.Mireille attendait Jules impatiemment.

PRATIQUE 9--COMMUNICATIVE TASK"Tu ne vas jamais croire ce qui m'est arrive hier soft. II faisait noir et je

courais dans un grand foret parce qu'un monstre me poursuivait. Tout d'uncoup, Harrison Ford est apparu. Il a arrete le monstre et it l'a tue avec un grandcouteau. Je voulais remercier Harrison donc je l'ai embrasse. Malheurusement jeme suis reveillee brusquement parce que le telephone sonnait. Je me suis renducompte que je revais."

arrivercourirapparaitretuerembrassersonnerrever

col X chaire col X chaire ivyfairepoursuivrearretervouloirse reveillesse rendre compte


APPENDIX CPRODUCTION/AUTOMIZATION

PRATIQUE 10NARRATING IN mit PAST

OPENINGIntroduces the story into a conversation:

"II etait une fois"Je me rapelle...

Line fois...

EVENTS X

COLONNE PClisting in order: D'abord

puisensuite

adverbs: soudaintout d'un coupbrusquemment

DETAILS/BACKGROUNDCHAIR IMP

adds emotion et le pire &alt. . .

C'etait incroyable,etc.

adverbs: generalement,souvent

d"habitude, toujoursrarementpendant quequelquefois

CLOSINGFinishes the story

Enfin/Finalement. . .

Et c'est pourquoi je ne vais jamais oublier. . .

Voila pourquoi je deteste. . .


Written task-based testOf all the stories that we heard in class and that you took notes on, write

your favorite (En frangais, bier siir, and it can't be your own). Remember all theguidelines we've been talking about in the choice of passé compose/ impalfait andin their formation. Write at least 10 sentences. Then in English, explain in a cou-ple of sentences why you liked this story so much.

Oral task-based test: TELL your favorite story that you heard in class.

Discrete point testdoze test.

133

FAQs: Learning Languages Through Drama

SARAH L. DODSON, Colorado State University

Although drama has played a role in language classrooms for more than three dec-ades, theatre techniques and plays have not been fully taken advantage of for learn-ing second and foreign languages. Using a format of frequently asked questionsabout teaching with drama, this article will explore the evolution of this approach,its benefits and drawbacks, and a wide gamut of theatrical activities than can beused to teach languages. I hope to convince other teachers and graduate students inlanguages and education to try some of these techniques with their students.

How DOES DRAMA FIT INTO THE COMMUNICATIVE APPROACH TO LANGUAGETEACHING?

In the communicative approach to language teaching, students use lan-guage for a purposeto convey real meaning and to solve real problems. Dramais a communicative language-learning technique because is student-centered andmeaning-based. With theatre activities, students use language in a genuine wayin a context that engages them. The idea of "theatre in the language classroom"encompasses everything from improvisation and role-play activities that encour-age fluency, to reading and discussing plays as literature, to producing full-length plays that require careful attention to language and pronunciation whiledeveloping problem-solving skills in the target language.

How HAS THE IDEA OF DRAMA IN THE LANGUAGE CLASSROOM DEVELOPED?The use of drama in language classrooms is not a new concept; it has

played a small but consistent role in language teaching in Britain and the UnitedStates since the 1970's. This section will very briefly trace the evolution of dramaas a language-teaching tool.

1970's and 1980'sThe early, most well-known advocates of drama in the Ll classroom were

Heathcote (collected writings, 1984) and Bolton (collected writings, 1984), whoencouraged teachers to integrate the theatre into all that they did. Bolton, in par-ticular, championed the use of drama in classes for all subjects, making it "thecentre of the curriculum." These ideas soon transferred to L2 practitioners andgained many proponents.

As early as 1973, in fact, Hines commented that drama, and especially roleplay, "has long been recognized as a valuable and valid means of mastering alanguage" (ii). Pioneers in the field of ESL/EFL include Via (1976), Maley andDuff (1982), and Smith (1984), who all published books based on their experi-ences as language teachers who have used drama in their classrooms. Their


134


books are a mix of theory and prac-tice. Via's students have acted in playsduring his whole career as an ESLteacher. Smith speaks to practicingteachers and develops an analogy be-tween L1 actors and L2 students aswell as provides many communicativetheatrical activities. Maley and Duffalso collect myriad activities and offeradvice on how to use them.

These authors are followed bymore and more others who also en-courage the use of drama in the lan-guage classroom. Wessels' Drama(1987) is a very practical book thatprovides rationale for using drama aswell as a number of activities. Shealso offers suggestions of how a classmight 'go about staging a play in thetarget language and describes onesuch experience that she had with aclass. Porter Ladousse. (1987) pub-lished a similarly useful book, hersdevoted to role plays, with justifica-tion and many examples.

1990s-PresentSome professional books also

discuss the theories behind theatretechniques and language learning.Half of the volume edited by Byramand Fleming (1998) is devoted to de-scribing how teachers have useddrama to promote cultural under-standing and awareness among theirstudents. In a different vein, Kao andO'Neill (1998) explain the techniqueand the merits of process drama, anextended role play activity that usesintegrated skills to involve the wholeclass. Brauer (in press) has edited avolume about the connections amonglanguage, writing, and drama.

Books with practical drama ac-tivities for teachers continue toemerge as well. Whiteson (1996) is theeditor of a volume of activities in theTESOL New Ways series written bypracticing language teachers. Theseare games, lessons, and exercises thatare based on theatrical techniques.Another book by Hess (in press), Allthe World's a Stage, will offer moresuggestions of activities. Other gen-eral books for teachers also includesuggestions for theatrical activities,like Woodward's Fun With Grammar(1996), written to accompany the AzarESL/ EFL grammar books. Rinvoluccri(1984) also has some creative ideas.

TextbooksIn the field of ESL/EFL, some

textbooks take advantage of whatdrama can offer. Rathburn's TakingCenter Stage (1997) is an advancedcontent-based text about the history ofdrama and plays that also encourageswriting and acting. The Play's theThing (1998), by Whiteson andHorovitz, is an intermediate text witha whole language approach toESL/EFL, using short scenes fromclassic plays. Finally, the Best Plays(1998) anthologies are suitable forstudents of English and exist at threelevels (beginning, intermediate, andadvanced), offering one-act plays andacts taken from full-length plays withunmodified language, including Tri-fles, Driving Miss Daisy, and Our Town.

Other Resources for ProfessionalsAfter quickly exhausting this

list of books about drama and lan-guage teaching, I must conclude that

13

most textbooks, SLA, and theorybooks for professionals, in the field ofESL/EFL, at least, don't pay enoughattention to drama's prospects for lan-guage teaching and learning.

The outlook for other forumsfor professionals is similarly bleak. Atthe TESOL 2000 international conven-tion, while there were nearly onedozen presentations listed in the pro-gram book about teaching withdrama, only half of the presentersshowed up. Professional journals likeTESOL Quarterly and The French Re-view have published only a handful ofarticles about teaching with drama(see Dickson (1989), and Haggstrom(1992) for examples of teachers whohave used drama to teach French); theTESOL Journal "Tips for Teachers" sec-tion has occasional descriptions aboutsuccessful role plays and drama ac-tivities (see Ernst-Slavit and Wenger(1998) for an example).

Other forums that reflect whatclassroom practitioners are currentlydoing, like listserves, have not yieldedmuch information recently either.However, a February 2000 discussionof role play on TESL-L offered sugges-tions of new ones to do with students,and it is worth noting is that these ex-changes did not question the value ofthese drama exercises--each personwho posted seemed to be a strongproponent of this type of activity.Suggestions for games that incorpo-rate theatrical elements have alsocome up on TESL-L. On the otherhand, no one has recently commentedon drama as a technique. In fact, whenI responded to a post asking for ideasof communicative activities by de-

Language Through Theatre 131

scribing some drama games and re-questing other suggestions, there wereno responses to my message. FL-Teach, another popular listserve forteachers and professionals, also hasnot lately dealt with drama--the clos-est they get is discussing Total Physi-cal Response Storytelling. When Iposted to FL-Teach in the summer of2000, asking for suggestions and ad-vice for directing a play in French at auniversity, I received only one re-sponse, off -list. [To join TESL-L, sendan e-mail to

[email protected]

and type ,"subscribe TESL-LFirstname Lastname" (don't type thequotation marks) in the message area.To join FL-TEACH, send an e-mail to

[email protected]

and type "subscribe FL-TEACHFirstname Lastname" (don't type thequotation marks) in the message area.]

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF USINGDRAMA IN THE LANGUAGECLASSROOM?

The most immediately appar-ent benefit of using dramatic activitieswith L2/FL students is that they ac-quire and practice new vocabularyand grammatical structures. Equallyimportant, the affective filter is low-ered: increases in sell-esteem, self-confidence, and spontaneity often re-sult from theatre activities in the class-room, thus reducing inhibitions, feel-ings of alienation, and senstivity torejection (Via 1976, Stern 1980, Kao &

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O'Neill 1998). Other psychologicaland social benefits include developingproblem-solving skills, working wellin groups, and taking more risks. Ad-ditionally, students explore variationof register and style, and developconversational skills such as turn tak-ing, topic changing, and leave taking.

Perhaps the most importantfacet of using drama in the languageclassroom, however, is at the core ofall these ideas: the students are learn-ing the language because they arepracticing it with communicative ac-tivities in a real context. In drama, ex-pressing and understanding is what isimportant. Moreover, students fre-quently come to better understandand appreciate the culture(s) of thetarget language. And overall, I wouldlike to emphasize how much the stu-dents and teachers like it: most of mysources that discuss the theories be-hind this approach use the words"fun" or "enjoy" when describing it.

ARE THERE ANY POTENTIAL DRAW-BACKS To USING DRAMA IN THELANGUAGE CLASSROOM?

Why, then, has the majority ofthe language-teaching world not em-braced drama as a language-learningtechnique? Some possible drawbacks,which I will refute or offer sugges-tions for mitigating, include students'backgrounds, teacher preparation,and the perception of drama as notserious.

Individual DifferencesIt is true that students differ

widely in background, abilities, per-sonality, confidence, motivation, and

13

expectations, and that acting in playsmay not meet the needs of all the stu-dents all the time. However, this doesnot mean that certain drama activitiescannot be useful teaching tools withmany students. Theatre can be onecomponent of a class that focuses onone aspect of the language, likegrammar; it can be part of a content-based class, like role plays in a Busi-ness English course (see Rebscher(1998) for one example of this); it canbe used to complement the plays stud-ied in a college-level foreign languageliterature class; and it can be offeredas a stand-alone integrated skills class.Making courses such as the latter op-tional, not mandatory, means thatthose who are not comfortable withthe prospect of doing theatre do nothave to sign up.

To help overcome students'fears of speaking and performing, Iwould suggest easing them intodrama activities don't require themto "act" in front of their peers with nopreparation or no warning. You canbegin with low-key activities, likepantomime games designed to elicitcertain vocabulary words or keygrammatical structures, and work upto activities that necessitate more lan-guage. Keep the class atmospheresupportive by applauding and com-plimenting and congratulating thestudents who participate. Create anenvironment where students feel com-fortable discussing and volunteering,where they know that teachers andpeers will not ridicule them whenthey make mistakes. In fact, you canthank them for making mistakes thatlead to productive "teaching mo-

ments." Also, be aware of your stu-dent population when doing activitiesthat require more physical interaction,for some students may be unable orunwilling to participate.

Teacher BackgroundAnother argument that I hear

from language teachers is that if theythemselves are not actors and direc-tors, there's no way they can teachtheir students to be. But you don'thave to be an "actor" to lead yourstudents in improvisation games orhelp them recognize good intonationwhen they read from a script. Besides,as teachers, we put on a show everytime we are in front of our students,and the classroom becomes our stage.

Additionally, teachers whowere not trained to teach communica-tively may shy away from drama. Butincorporating certain aspects of thetheatre into your teaching does notrequire that you change your entireteaching philosophy you just addnew ideas to your "bag of tricks."

Student SkepticismHowever, students may be as

skeptical as their teachers about thebenefits of drama in the languageclassroom. Because our students atfirst may not see it as learning, weneed show them that it is fun but notunstructured. Highlight what they'relearning all along point out whatskills, structures, language they're us-ing. After the activity, you can do a"debriefing" session where you em-phasize what they have learned andpracticed.


Commotion in the ClassroomA final problem that I have

heard people express about drama inthe language classroom is that chaosand noise are inevitable. Well, so islaughter and I don't see that as adrawback.

How CAN I USE DRAMA IN MY ESLCLASSROOM?

The first half of this article wasdesigned to convince current and fu-ture language teachers to use dramain their classrooms. The second halfwill describe a number of differentways to integrate drama into yourteaching, beginning with very simpleactivities and culminating in full-fledged theatre projects. This list is byno means comprehensive; it is limitedto what I have used successfully as ateacher. And while the majority ofthese activities were carried out in anESL setting (an intensive English pro-gram) with adults who plan to enrollin an American university, I believethey will carry over into other L2 andFL contexts.

PantomimePantomime is a good place to

start. Like the familiar party game ofCharades, it is simple and fun becauseit is non-threatening to the studentperforming. He doesn't have to worryabout speaking it is his classmateswho must produce the language. Youcan use pantomimes to elicit specificvocabulary and grammar from rest ofclass or to have other students de-scribe what is being acted out, whichencourages fluency.

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Some examples of pantomimesthat I have used in an intermediategrammar class include the following:differentiating verb tenses like thesimple past and the past progressive(students mime actions like washing acar which suddenly starts rollingdown a hill or washing a dog thatsuddenly bites) or the simple past andthe past perfect (for example, the stu-dents act out a situation like "the childhad already eaten all the cookieswhen Mom got off the phone"). Thesesituations require that the studentswatching produce the correct verbtenses, formed correctly and used cor-rectly to contrast with the others.

Jazz ChantsJazz chants, popularized by

Graham for ESL/EFL, certainly havedramatic elements; in fact, some arewritten as fairy tales to act out, someas role plays. Students seem to enjoyjazz chants, and they appreciate hav-ing a script to follow, which focusestheir attention on the language, par-ticularly supersegmentals. (See Gra-ham (1991) and Graham (1993) for ex-amples of dramatic jazz chants.)

Role Play and SimulationsTeachers seem to be very com-

fortable with role plays, traditionallyusing them to practice vocabulary ap-propriate to certain situations (i.e., inthe airport, in a restaurant). But roleplays do not need to be limited only tothis function. They can illustrate dif-ferent levels of register, for example,when students write or act out thesame basic situation or conflict (suchas trying to get an appointment with a

busy doctor) in two different waysrude and ultra-polite.

Role plays also seem to lendthemselves well to teaching modals.For instance, two students sit side-by-side in front of the class; one is learn-ing to drive while the other is tryingto teach her. As the driver asks ques-tions (using modals) and makes mis-takes, the teacher yells out what she'sdoing wrong and how to fix it (usingmodals). The class should be encour-aged both to take note of which mo-dals are used and to call out otherpieces of advice to the driver. This canget quite lively, especially if the driverexaggerates her problems.

Moreover, role plays work wellin reading and writing classes; theycan be used to demonstrate compre-hension of both fiction and non-fictiontexts. A student (or a pair or a group)can assume the roles of the peoplethey read about, while others askquestions and they respond in charac-ter. Or groups of students can act outwhat they have studied. The latter isespecially effective with short storiesthat the students have enjoyed read-ing. When there are not enough rolesto go around, the other students be-come key parts of the set, reacting towhat is said, moving when appropri-ate.

I have also made short roleplays required in my listen-ing/ speaking classes, where the stu-dents are supposed to study idioms.Each pair of students is responsiblefor choosing an interesting phrase thatseems important and writing a veryshort skit that illustrates and uses theidiom. Their classmates then try to

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identify the phrase and explain itsmeaning. When each class begins thisway, it quickly becomes a ritual thatwe all look forward to.

Fairy Tales and Folk TalesFairy tales and folk tales easily

turn into skits (which can be writtenand edited as well as acted out spon-taneously) because they draw fromstock characters and familiar plots.Perhaps fairy tales are best used withFL students who have a commonbackground and common knowledgeof these tales. For example, a group ofmy high school students in Francefirst acted out "Cinderella" and"Hansel and Gretel," and then wrote aplay that combined the two of themto show after the "happily ever af-ter" and because these girls wereenamored of American television, theconflict was solved when X-FilesAgents Mulder and Scully intervened(and then Cinderella ran off withGeorge Clooney). My ESL students,on the other hand, have read andacted out fables they studied in read-ing classes like "The Fox and theCrow." Grammar students have actedout "Goldilocks and the Three Bears"to emphasize the past perfect progres-sive ("Someone's been eating my por-ridge....").

ImprovisationMany theatre games that actors

use lend themselves well to languageclassrooms. The emphasis is on flu-ency and creativity, little preparationor materials are needed, and depend-ing on how much control the teacherallots to the students, the games can


be highly structured or very free. Inan advanced listening/ speaking class,my students did improv for an entireclass period once a week, and clam-ored for more.

Most of the ideas I used wereadapted from Maley and Duff (1982),Wessels (1987), and Spolin (1999). Ice-breakers and warm-up activities withdramatic elements also worked well,as did simple games like Freeze andhaving the students invent advertise-ments selling an object in the class-room for a new purpose. (In Freeze,two players begin acting out a situa-tion provided by the audience. Itshould involve a lot of movement.Another actor calls out "freeze!" andthe two on stage stop moving. Thethird actor takes the place of one ofthem and begins a different scene, thisone suggested by the positions of theactors.)

The activity that my studentshave perhaps liked the most is TheLast Scene. The premise is that thestudents have walked onto a stageempty except for a table with six ob-jects on it. The audience is still in theirseats, and the actors must continue theplay for them. The students must de-cide, based on the objects, what theplay is about, what the title is, who thecharacters are, and how the play ends.After a short period to plan and re-hearse, they present the last scene ofthe play.

Reading PlaysBy "reading" plays, I mean

both studying them as literature andreading them out loud. In many for-eign language classes in the United

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States, it is common to read a play, orscenes from a classic play, eventually.However, rarely is this play acted out,and rarely does this happen in the ESLclassroom. Yet what better way to un-derstand the beauty of the languagethan by participating in such carefullycrafted dialogue; and how better toexpose them to the culture? Addi-tionally, Whiteson, a champion ofdrama in ESL, explains that "by intro-ducing students to English drama andreal literature, we pay them the com-pliment that they are capable of enjoy-ing the best that English has to offer"(1996, p. 9).

And after reading and discuss-ing plays, the class can move on toreader's theatre. In this activity, stu-dents sit on stools, script in hand, infront of the audience. Because theyare not moving around, they musttake care to make their voices veryclear and expressive. This is a lowpressure situation for the students,because they are not required tomemorize lines or blocking, but it isstill excellent for improving pronun-ciation and intonation. Students in myintermediate university French classwho read Merlusse by Marcel Pagnol(1935) delighted in playing the roles oflittle boys and mean teachers.

Watching or Listening to PlaysIt is important to encourage

students to attend plays, at least in L2environments, where it is easy to findplays in the target language. Fieldtrips to theatres could also becomepart of a listening/speaking class orculture class, where the students mustprepare questions, take notes, and

then write reactions. When a wholeclass attends a play together, it islikely that they could receive a back-stage tour and an interview with someof the actors, or at least a group dis-count on the tickets.

When going to live theatricalperformances is impossible, studentsstill can get a lot out of watching onplays on video. They could watchplays they have studied or look atothers as a basis for listening andspeaking activities. Some plays arealso available on audiocassetteLucille Fletcher's Sorry, Wrong Number(1948), for example, which was on the1940's radio program Suspense, andLou Spaventa's Stranger in Town(1992), which was written especiallyfor ESL students and recorded by pro-fession actors.

Scene StudyScene study is another theatre

activity that brings many benefits.This involves selecting and intensivelystudying short scenes, which are thenpresented before an audience. It re-quires much reading, discussion, andanalysis as well as pronunciationpractice with word stress, thoughtgroups, and intonation. For theteacher who wants to do some kind ofa performance with her students, thelogistics are much easier than tryingto find the perfect play at the correctlevel with the correct number of maleand female parts; it is also easier, lesstime-consuming, and less dauntingfor a few groups of students to pre-pare a ten-minute scene than it is forone large group to rehearse a longerplay. And the performances can be in

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front of a paying audience in a theatreor in front of a group of peers. TheFrench high school students I workedwith really enjoyed picking out theirown scenes and "directing" them-selves with little input from me; thenthey memorized and performed infront of the others students in the Eng-lish club. (See Bayoff (1986) and Fancy(1991) for descriptions of Americanand Canadian college students whodid scene study in their Frenchclasses.)

Staging PlaysStaging plays is a large project

that can be done with as many or asfew bells and whistles as theteacher/ director wishes. It can be afull-length production with lights,sounds, sets, costumes, and memo-rized lines in a theatre, or a one-actplay done in a room with scripts inhand, depending on the context of theclass and the time and money limita-tions. Producing plays in other lan-guages has been described in Wessels(1987), Smith (1984), and Augot et al.(1993), but not recommended any-where else that I've seen. However, Ifeel that the intensive work with lan-guage that ensues is very valuable, asis the pride that it instills in the stu-dents.

When I taught an ESL dramaclass, the culminating project was aperformance of one of the plays wehad studied. The students chose Ed-mond Rostand's The Romancers (1915),a one-act parody of the story of Ro-meo and Juliet. They had very posi-tive reactions to the play: in a repre-sentative response on the teacher


evaluation, one student explained "Ireally enjoyed acting it was a big stepfor me. I feel that I gained confident inSpeaking and I am more enthusiasticand optimistic thanks to you." An-other student remarked that "it is sur-prising that it is easier for [her] to playin English than in Japanese."

I am currently directing a playfor a university French club: La Canta-trice Chauve by Eugene Ionesco (1954).After the two-month rehearsal period,it will be performed in French at asmall salon-style university theatrewith surtitles projected above thestage for the non-francophone mem-bers of the audience. All of the prepa-ration auditions, rehearsals, deci-sions about lights, sound, costumes,set, and props takes place in French,and all the actors, techies, and transla-tors receive independent study creditin French.

Writing and Staging PlaysHaving the students create

their own original play is not some-thing that I've encountered in the lit-erature, which is unfortunate, becauseit seems to be a very productive andexciting way to learn the language. Ifthe thought of writing an entire playfrom scratch seems overwhelming,there are other ways to go about writ-ing an original piece. For example,modifying stories or books into playsor skits is not too difficult, because theplot and characters (and frequentlydialogue) already exist. For example,high school students I once observedat a French camp had written a shortplay about the characters from thecomic strip "Peanuts." Students can

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also write scenes that happen beforethe beginning of the play or in be-tween acts to practice writing dia-logue and doing character develop-ment. The students in my ESL dramaclass wrote whole acts to add to theend of Stranger in Town; they thenmodified the language and the endingof The Romancers, because they wantto make it funnier and more accessibleto other ESL students in the audience.They also changed the gender of mostof the characters and created an en-tirely new character so that each stu-dent (all female) could have a part inthe play.

Benefits of These ActivitiesOverall, all these techniques

require that students communicate inEnglish to succeed. At the same time,they are internalizing the language,improving intonation and pronuncia-tion, and having fun. What's more,these activities can serve as a spring-board to writing and to the otherskills.

WHAT DIRECTIONS SHOULD DRAMAIN THE LANGUAGE-LEARNINGCLASSROOMS TAKE IN THE FUTURE?

ResearchWhile it would be hard to pin

down the quantifiable benefits of do-ing plays and drama activities, I

would like to see studies that try toexamine psychological and linguisticresults. My students in many differentclasses have responded favorably ontheir evaluation forms, but just saying"I liked the games" is not enough

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proof that their language improvedbecause of it.

Reading and Writing PlaysStudents should not be de-

prived of the joys that drama canbring and of the great feeling of satis-faction that can come from creativewriting. They should be allowed totake ownership of the language. Be-sides, one of the best ways to editone's own writing is by reading italoud, and drama is the perfect me-dium. When my students write scriptsand act them out in groups, they fre-quently can hear wheri the grammarand punctuation is wrong, and theyreceive suggestions from peers of howto fix it.

CALL and DramaTechnology makes so much

available that language teachers. Andas more and more of our students arecomputer-literate, they expect to usetechnology in their language classestoo. There is some drama-relatedESL/EFL software, in fact: HollywoodHigh (1996) provides sets and charac-ters, while students write dialoguethat the animated characters on thescreen speak; Karaoke Conversation(Bradin 1994) is listening software thatenables students to record themselvestaking part in an onscreen role play.

Besides software programs,there are film clips on the web,listserve discussions about the theatre,radio shows on audio files, researchpossibilities on the web, and muchmore. My ESL drama course had aweb page and a class web forumwhere the students responded to the

plays we read and the activities wedid. You are welcome to visit ourpage at the following address:

http:/ / lamar.colostate.edu/ sdodson

Integrated Skills Drama ClassesI feel that the various language

skills should not be taught separately,for it is rare that we as language usersonly employ grammar or only speak-ing or only writing. Drama is an idealway to bring the skills of grammar,reading; writing, speaking, listening,and pronunciation together in acourse 'where the focus is not on formbut rather fluency and meaning.

"Language and pronunciationthrough, theatre" is the ESL dramaclass that I taught at an intensive Eng-lish program. In this course, studentsread and analyzed one-act plays;learned about the history and the con-ventions of American drama; touredtheatres; attended plays; intervieweda playwright; explored improvisationactivities; interacted with Americanstudents who volunteered in the class;and modified and performed a one-act play. All along, they wrote theirreactions and ideas and their ownscenes in a computer web forum jour-nal, learning vocabulary, practicingpronunciation, and gaining fluencyand confidence.

CONCLUSIONAs a language learner and stu-

dent of the theatre, I had alwayswanted to combine the two to help mepractice the language, but could neverconvince my teachers of its merit.Therefore, when I began to teach, I


was determined to try it with my stu-dents. Through the activities I've donewith these brave and creative studentsand through the research I've done onmy own, I have come to see that thea-tre provides myriad ways for studentsto learn and appreciate language inmeaningful, communicative contexts.I urge you to try it too!

REFERENCESAugot, M., et at (1993). Moliere a

l'universite. Le francais dans lemond, 258, 53-57.

Azar, B.S. (1999). Understanding andusing English grammar. Thirded. Upper Saddle River, N.J.:Prentice Hall Regents.

Bayoff, M.-J. (1986). La conversationpar le theatre. The French Re-view, 59(4), 675-680.

Best plays, advanced level. (1998). Lin-colnwood, IL: Jamestown Pub-lishers.

Bolton, G. (1984). Drama as education:An argument for placing drama atthe centre of the curriculum. Es-sex, England: Longman.

Bradin, C. (1994). Karaoke Conversation[Computer software].

Brauer, G. (Ed.) (in press). Body andlanguage: Intercultural learningthrough drama. JAI Press.

Byram, M., & Fleming, M. (Eds.)(1998) Language learning in in-tercultural perspective: Ap-proaches through drama and eth-nography. Cambridge: Cam-bridge University Press.

Dickson, P. S. (1989). Acting French:Drama techniques in the sec-ond language classroom. TheFrench Review, 63(2), 300-311.


Ernst-Slavit, G., & Wenger, K. (1998).Using creative drama in theelementary ESL classroom.TESOL Journal. 7(4). 30-33.

Fletcher, L. (1948). Sorry, Wrong num-ber. New York: Dramatists PlayService.

Fancy, A. (1991). Didactique du fran-cais langue seconde, dramatisa-tion et theatre. The CanadianModern Language Review, 47,341-350.

Graham, C. (1991). Rhythm and roleplay. Studio City, CA: Jag.

Graham, C., Brennan, M., & Farrell,M. (1993). Jazz chant fairy tales.Studio City, CA: Jag.

Haggstrom, M. A. (1992). A performa-tive approach to the study oftheater: Bridging the gapbetween language and litera-ture courses. The French Review.66(1), 7-19.

Heathcote, D. (1984). Collected writingson education and drama. Hut-chinson.

Hess, N. (in press). All the world's astage

Hines, M.E. (1973). Skits in English as asecond language. New York: Re-gents Publishing Company,Inc.

Hollywood High [Computer software].(1996). Emeryville, CA:Theatrix Interactive.

Ionesco, E. (1954). La cantatrice chauve,suivi de la lecon. Paris: Galli-mard.

Kao, S.M., and O'Neill, C. (1998).Words into worlds: Learning asecond language through processdrama. Stamford, Conn: AblexPublishing Company.

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Maley,A., & and Duff, A. (1982).Drama techniques in languagelearning. New York: CambridgeUniversity Press.

Pagnol, M. (1935). Merlusse. NewYork: Henry Holt and Com-pany, Inc.

Porter Ladousse, G. (1987). Role Play.Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.

Rathburn, A.K. (1997). Taking centerstage: Drama in America. AnnArbor: The University ofMichigan Press.

Rebscher, M. (1998). A Real-life busi-ness role play. TESOL Journal,7(3).

Rinvolucri, M. (1984). Grammar games:Cognitive, affective and drama ac-tivities for EFL students. Cam-bridge: Cambridge UniversityPress.

Rostand, E. (1915). The Romancers.Trans. B.H. Clark. In Gassner, J.and Little, F. (Eds.) (1967).Reading and staging the play: Ananthology of one-act plays. NewYork: Holt, Rinehart andWinston, Inc.

Smith, S. (1984). The theater arts and theteaching of second languages.Reading, MA: Addison-WesleyPublishing Co.

Spaventa, L. (1992). Stranger in town.Brattleboro, VT: Pro LinguaAssociates.

Spolin, V. (1999). Improvisation for thetheater. Evanston, IL: North-western University Press.

Stern, S. (1980). Drama in second lan-guage learning from a psycho-linguistic perspective. LanguageLearning, 30(1).

Wessels, C. (1987). Drama. Oxford: Ox-ford University Press.

Whiteson, V. (Ed.) (1996). New ways ofusing drama and literature in lan-guage teaching. Bloomington, IL:TESOL.

Whiteson, V, & Horovitz, N. (1998).The play's the thing. New York:St. Martin's Press.


Woodward, S. (1996) Fun with gram-mar. Pearson.

Via, R. (1976). English in three acts.University Press of Hawaii.

Using Video to Teach for Sociolinguistic Competence in the ForeignLanguage Classroom*

CARYN WITTEN, The University of Texas at Austin

This paper examines the findings from a classroom research project that involveddeveloping the sociolinguistic competence of learners of first-year Spanish. Thisproject used input enhancement techniques that required the learners to activelyview video. Research shows that native speakers are more sensitive to sociolin-guistic errors than to grammatical errors made by nonnative speakers. Therefore,it is hoped that educating language learners about sociolinguistic differences willresult in their having more positive relationships in future contacts with speakersof other languages. The data from the study are encouraging regarding learners'ability to both recognize and use more culturally appropriate linguistic formsonce they are overtly made aware of sociolinguistic differences.

INTRODUCTIONThe focus of the classroom research project described in this paper was to

assess the effect of implementing input enhancement strategies that encourageactive video viewing on the development of the learners' sociolinguistic compe-tence in a second-language (L2). To date, studies have been conducted in thisarea that employ video, audiotape, role play, and classroom meta-pragmatic dis-cussion as independent variables to assess the development of sociolinguisticcompetence (Overfield, 1996) and that employ mainly meta-pragmatic classroomdiscussion (Pearson, forthcoming). The uniqueness of this current project is thatit attempted to hold classroom discussion as constant as possible while isolatingthe effect of independent viewing of video with consciousness-raising activitieson the L2 learning process.

Consciousness-raising has been defined as "the deliberate attempt to drawthe learner's attention specifically to the formal properties of the target lan-guage" as opposed to "natural circumstances where attention to form may beminimal and sporadic" (Sharwood-Smith, 1981). The term "consciousness-raising," which refers to processes occurring in the learner's brain, is often re-placed with the term "input enhancement" (Sharwood-Smith, 1993), which refersto what the instructor is doing to manipulate the learning process. This redefini-tion came about because it is much easier to document what the instructor is do-ing externally than to document what the learner is doing internally. The firststudies that looked at input enhancement in the L2 context examined the acquisi-tion of grammatical structures (Gass and Madden, 1985; Schachter, 1988; Shar-wood-Smith, 1981, 1986; Tomlin and Villa, 1994). These researchers concludedthat focusing the learner's attention on specific features of the L2 did increase ac-quisition of those features.

* Presented at the Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2000 (TexFLEC2000), University of Texas at Austin, March 31-April 1,.2000.

1 4 7


Since Hymes (1968, 1971)coined the term "communicativecompetence," L2 instructors have beenincreasingly interested in areas of lin-guistic competence other than gram-mar. As defined, communicativecompetence is composed of threeabilities. These are grammatical com-petence, strategic competence, and so-ciolinguistic competence (Cana le andSwain, 1980; Cana le, 1984). These re-searchers later added discourse com-petence. This paper examines the areaof sociolinguistic competence, whichthese researchers defined as the abilityto use language appropriately in agiven social context. Pragmatic com-petence is a closely related concept.While Cana le and Swain proposedthat pragmatic competence is a com-ponent of sociolinguistic competence,other researchers (Bachman, cited inHadley, 1993) have proposed that so-ciolinguistic competence is a compo-nent of pragmatic competence. Be-cause of this ambiguity of terminologyin the research, the two terms will beused interchangeably in this paper.

Soon after some researchersbegan looking at the connection be-tween input enhancement strategiesand grammar acquisition, other re-searchers, especially Schmidt (1990),began theorizing about their applica-tion to the development of sociolin-guistic competence. Other research(Ochs, 1979; Gleason, 1980; Bruner,1981; Becker 1990, 1994) has docu-mented that, while the bulk of thegrammar of a child's first language(L1) is not overtly taught, the prag-matics of the L1 are overtly taught bythe child's caretakers. This difference

seems to imply that input enhance-ment techniques may be even moreimportant in the area of L2 pragmaticsthan in the area of L2 grammar.

Unlike grammatical compe-tence, sociolinguistic competence ismuch harder to teach in the classroomsetting. It may require contextualized,interactive language such as thatfound in video (Koike, 1989). Fortu-nately, modern technology has madevideo much more accessible for L2 in-struction. Not only are many class-rooms now equipped with VCRs, butit is reasonable to ask learners to viewvideo independently outside of theclassroom.

In part because of the popular-ity of Krashen's Monitor Model (1982,1983, 1985), instructors often usevideo for passive "comprehensible in-put" to develop learners' listeningcomprehension skills. Further compli-cating this situation encountered in L2pedagogy, which encourages passiveviewing, is the observation that sincechildhood, we have become accus-tomed to watching television pas-sively (Lonnergan, 1984), so it is natu-ral for the learner to view pedagogicalvideos this way. Current research pro-jects, such as mine, consider researchon input enhancement in addition toKrashen's Monitor Model and attemptto change the learners' mode of inter-action with the video component ofthe language course. In an attempt tochange the learner's lifelong viewinghabits, some researchers and instruc-tors are asking learners to watch videoactively, by noticing and recordingformal properties of the language inaddition to following the develop-

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Using Video for Sociolinguistic Competence 145

ment of the plot (Overfield, 1996;Pearson, forthcoming; Altman, 1989;Garza, 1996; Berwald, 1985; Gale andBrown, 1985; Gillespie, 1985; Lavery1984; Mount, 1988).

One way for learners to acquirethe pragmatic features of an L2 wouldbe to immerse themselves in the targetculture. Since immersion is not possi-ble for many learners, video is thenext best thing. In his research,Altman (1989) found that learnerswho viewed a Total Physical Re-sponse (TPR, Asher 1977, 1982) ses-sion performed as well as studentswho actually participated in the ses-sion. This finding implies- that videocan be a form of virtual reality for thelanguage learner. An interesting studyby Olshtain and Blum-Kulka (1985)concluded that, in the absence of overtteaching, it can take a languagelearner approximately 10 years to ac-quire sociolinguistic competence evenin a total immersion environment.This evidence supports the claim thatinput enhancement is crucial to thedevelopment of L2 pragmatic compe-tence, especially in a non-immersionsetting.

Most research in the area of so-ciolinguistic competence has beenconducted within the English as aSecond/ Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) community. This type of re-search in Spanish as a Second Lan-guage is growing, but still not as plen-tiful (Koike, Pearson, and Witten, inprint).

While illuminating, research inESL/EFL is not always readily trans-ferable to the situation faced by otherL2 educators for two main reasons.

First, EFL instructors are dealing withlearners who are in total immersionsituations. Furthermore, learners ofEnglish are often more motivated byboth intrinsic and instrumental factors(Terrell, 1977), because many plan toeither immigrate to an English-speaking country or to obtain em-ployment in which English is essen-tial. On the other hand, instructors oflanguages other than English are moreoften dealing with learners who aresimply fulfilling a language require-ment or who have other motivationsto master an L2 that are not as strongas that of the typical ESL/EFL learner.

Whatever the individual L2learner's motivation, however, socio-linguistic competence is important forall of them. Research shows that na-tive speakers are more sensitive to so-ciolinguistic errors than to grammati-cal errors made by nonnative speakers(Olshtain and Blum-Kulka, 1985).Therefore, in order to facilitate posi-tive reactions by native speakers whena learner is interacting in the L2 envi-ronment, it is important that all L2learners (including those who maynever plan to master the language, butwho may want to be able to use it atleast informally throughout their livesor careers) be exposed to the existenceof pragmatic differences within andacross languages.

With the aforementioned fac-tors in mind, this current researchproject investigated beginning learn-ers of Spanish at a large, publicAmerican University and focused ontheir awareness of Spanish sociolin-guistic differences as well as their useof certain forms.

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RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The Research QuestionsThis study addressed three re-

search questions. They are as follows:

1. What is the role of consciousawareness in the learning of L2pragmatic features?

2. How can interactive video viewingenhance pragmatic input?

3. Does form-focused input en-hancement affect learners' globalcomprehension?

The SubjectsThe subjects for this study were

more than 200 students enrolled in anaccelerated first-year Spanish courseat a large, public American university.This course condensed the first twosemesters of the regular program intoone semester. To qualify for thiscourse, students had to achieve a cer-tain score on the department's place-ment exam. Because of the nature ofthe class, the students tended to be ata relatively equal ability level. Stu-dents were assigned to the varioussections of this course at random bythe university's computerized sched-uling system. Likewise, the authorchose sections for this study at ran-dom. Also, the assignment of sectionsto either the test or control group wasdone randomly.

The study began with morethan 200 subjects; however, almosthalf of the subjects were eliminatedfor various reasons. Students whowere heritage speakers of the lan-

guage or who had more than 3months travel abroad exposure to thelanguage were eliminated from thestudy. Also, those who did not com-plete all three feedback instruments atthe end of the semester were elimi-nated. In the end, there was a total of106 subjects. The test group consistedof 62 subjects, while the control groupconsisted of 44.

The Nine Control Group TreatmentsThe control group was given

the department's suggested (thoughnot mandatory) instructional method-ology. They were asked to independ-ently view episodes of Destinos: AnIntroduction to Spanish (VanPatten, etal., 1992) on nine occasions during thesemester. Destinos is a pedagogicalSpanish video program that, thoughscripted, exposes the learners to au-thentic language and culture in a soapopera format as the protagonist trav-els to various Spanish-speaking coun-tries. Each of the nine sessions viewedat home by the learners containedroughly an hour of video. Followingeach viewing session, the studentswere required to take in-class quizzesprepared by their individual instruc-tors, which focused solely on the plotof the video story. The quizzes wereworth 5 points each and consisted oftrue/false, multiple-choice, or shortanswer questions. Thus, the nine Des-tinos quizzes were worth a total of 45points. The semester grade was basedon a 1,000-point system, so the videocomponent was 4.5% of each student'ssemester grade.

1ST


The Nine Test Group TreatmentsThough the test group saw the

same episodes of the video and re-ceived the same amount of points foreach assignment, it was given a muchdifferent approach. Before each of thenine viewings, the test group subjectswere given a take-home quiz to fillout while watching the video. Thiscloser involvement with the video iswhy their viewing style has beencalled "active" or "interactive" as op-posed to the control group's viewingstyle, which was relatively passive incomparison. Since classroom instruc-tion was held to a minimum for thisexperiment, the instructors who par-ticipated in both the control and testgroups were unaware of the goal ofthe research project. They were simplytold that we would provide the testgroup with Destinos quizzes andwould also correct the quizzes.

Since pilot studies had con-firmed that L2 learners do not readilyunderstand the concepts of sociolin-guistic competence and strategiccompetence (Witten, 1999), a brieftwo-page handout was provided tothe students along with the first Desti-nos take-home quiz. A copy of the so-ciolinguistic portion of this handoutcan be found in Appendix A. An ex-ample of the first take-home quizgiven to the learners in the test groupcan be found in Appendix B. Thequizzes, which will also be calledtreatments throughout this study,asked students to find examples in theareas of grammatical, strategic, andsociolinguistic competence from thevideo. The treatments also asked themto find examples of new cultural

knowledge and to provide a summaryof the plot.

In studies done by VanPatten(1989, 1990), it was discovered thatfocusing the learners' attention on theformal properties of a language dur-ing listening exercises can have dele-terious effects on overall, global com-prehension. Since this is not a favor-able situation, in this study, we alsowanted to determine whether wewere negatively affecting students'overall comprehension. Therefore, weasked the subjects to provide plotsummaries in order to stress the im-portance of global comprehension. Wealso examined plot comprehension inthe final feedback at the end of thesemester in order to address our thirdresearch question.

For the purpose of this study,only the questions in the area of socio-linguistic competence on the take-home quizzes (treatments) are rele-vant. While it would be interesting toknow if and how this approach in-creased the learners' strategic andgrammatical competence and worldknowledge, these areas do not fallwithin the scope of this study. Theseother lines of inquiry were included inthe treatments for pedagogical rea-sons as well as to serve as distractersto keep learners and their instructorsfrom knowing the purpose of thisstudy.

Upon completion of the firsttreatment, the test group instructorsprovided the author with the subjects'responses to the treatments. Thesequizzes were corrected and were re-turned to the instructors along with alist of two or three "good" sample re-


sponses to each area of the take-homequizzes. Instructors were asked to al-low these students to read their an-swers to the class, so that those whohad been denied credit would under-stand why. This minimal interventionin the learning process was deemednecessary since the learners were be-ing graded on these treatments.

As with the control group, thelearners of the test group were given 5points for each of the treatments.Since they were being asked to domuch more work for their 5 pointsthan those in the control group, affectwas a concern. Affect of both test andcontrol groups was examined at theend of the semester, because it hasbeen demonstrated to influence thelearning process (Gardner and Lam-bert, 1972, Horwitz, 1988; Young,1992).

Some Sample Responses to the NineTest Group Treatments

In order to provide the readerwith an example of the type of infor-mation the author was soliciting withthe treatments, the following are somesample responses from the first treat-ment (Appendix B) in the two areas ofsociolinguistic competence. For exam-ple on Question 1, which asked stu-dents to provide examples of charac-ters using either the formal or infor-mal Spanish address, two typical re-sponses were as follows:

"When Juan walked into thekitchen when Arturo and Pedro weretalking, Raquel and Angela were talk-ing on the phone. They were having afriendly conversation using the to (in-formal) form."

"When Raquel was callingPedro, she was talking to his house-keeper (the woman in pink). Raquelsaid '. . . y usted?' (formal form) whenresponding to the housekeeper. I

think she said this, because the house-keeper was older. She said it to be re-spectful."

The first responder was askedto explain why he thought the twocharacters used the informal addressform. It was hoped that he would in-fer that "friendliness" was not neces-sarily a factor in choice of address.The second responder was asked toread her example to the class, becauseit contained a specific rationale for theuse of the formal address.

For Question 2, which askedstudents to look for examples of char-acters using various speech acts in or-der to determine if they were similaror different from what would be usedby a native speaker of their languageor dialect, below are two typical re-sponses:

"When Pati was being told thather play was controversial and sheshould change it, she rebuked this.When she rebuked this fact, she be-came very fidgety for example, shemoved her hands a lot. I think thatthis is very much alike in English. Ithink we also move our hands foremphasis when we disagree."

"When they answer the phone,they say 'bueno' (good) instead of'hello."

The learner who provided thefirst response was asked to provideactual quotes the next time. Thoughbody language is certainly importantto communication, pragmatic compe-

r9


tence is concerned with linguistic re-alizations of communication. The sec-ond responder was asked to read hisresponse to the class, because it was agood example of pragmatic differ-ences between English and Spanish.

In order to vary instruc-tional strategy and also to look at dif-ferent types of processing, the treat-ments given to learners took both de-ductive and inductive approaches totesting the learners' ability to respondto the different areas addressed in theDestinos quizzes. For example, in thefourth worksheet (Appendix C), in-stead of being asked to glean a quotefrom the episodes, students wereasked to look for and analyze a spe-cific quote in the episode they wereviewing. The former approach is moreinductive in nature, because it askslearners to pick a specific quote from ageneral corpus. The latter approach ismore deductive in nature, because itasks the learner to take a specificquote and then to draw some generalobservations from that quote.

In response to the sociolinguis-tic section on the fourth quiz, here aresome "good" answers, which studentswere asked to share with the class:

Question 1. "Jorge says toRaquel 'Me puedes tutear. iEl tuteo esmas intim, no?' (You can use the in-formal address form with me. It ismore intimate, don't you think?) InEnglish, we cannot say this, becausewe only use the word 'you.'"

Question 3. "Raquel says ' 11\locrees que es mejor que el mismo compre elcine?' (Don't you think it is better thatHE buys the theater with his ownmoney?) I think if I were to make a

suggestion it would be similar to this,if I were talking in English."

In the fifth treatment (quiz)(Appendix D), in both the sociolin-guistic and grammatical competencesections learners were asked to lookfor specific examples from the dia-logue. In this way, learners wereasked to use both inductive and de-ductive strategies throughout the se-mester.

Data Collection MethodologyAt the end of the semester,

three feedback instruments weregiven to learners in both the test andcontrol groups to determine if andhow their sociolinguistic awarenessand use were affected by the differenttreatments (quizzes) that the twogroups received throughout the se-mester. Following are an explanationof the feedback instruments and ananalysis of the data that was obtainedfrom them.

DATA ANALYSISThe three feedback instruments

given to both the test and controlgroups at the end of the semesterwere a two-part written feedbackform that contained several lines ofinquiry, an oral role-play instrument,and a multiple-choice instrument thatwas included as part of the semesterfinal exam. These instruments can befound in Appendices E, F, and G, re-spectively. The results from thesethree instruments are shown on Table1. They will now be discussed in de-tail.

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TABLE 1RESULTS FROM THE THREE FEEDBACK INSTRUMENTS

Testgroup*

Controlgroup*

T>C ratio** Chi square*** t test***

Written feed-back (Part B)

55% 45% 12 out of 15 Sig. or trend on 6out of 15 items

0.002

Oral feedback 56% 48% 7 out of 10 N/ A 0.15

Multiple choicefeedback

59.40% 59.30% 4 out of 8 Sig. on 1 out of8items

0.97

Pragmaticawareness

51% 48% 9 out of 11 N/A 0.016

Pragmaticuse/ production

57% 51% 15 out of 24 N/ A 0.046

Affect 10 out of 11 Sig. or trend on 5out of 11 items

N/A

Time on task-missed episodes

14% 24% N/A 0.144 0.03

Time on task-minutes

102.5 66.8 N/ A 0.017 N/ A

Plot items re-called

9.1 7.3 N/ A 0.531 0.08

*Raw scores/total percent of items answered correctly**Number of items on which the test group outperformed the control

group. For example, on the written feedback, the test group scoredhigher than the control group on 12 out of a total of 15 items.

***Statistical significance p= or < .05; Statistical trend p>.05-.10

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The Written Feedback EffectFirst, the feedback provided in

the various areas on Part A and Part Bof the written feedback form (Appen-dix E) will be analyzed. In Part A,items 1 through 9, 12, and 13 dealtwith areas of affect, such as the learn-ers' attitudes toward the video com-ponent of the course, the way it waspresented, and its usefulness. Of these11 items, the test group's responseswere more positive on 10 items. (Thisinformation can be found under thecolumn labeled "T>C ratio" and in therow labeled "Affect" on the above ta-ble.) Furthermore, statistical signifi-cance was found in the responses tothree of these items. Statistical signifi-cance was defined as a p value ofequal or less than .05 on the chi squaretest.

There were also some interest-ing "internals" concerning the feed-back in this data. For example, therewas statistical significance whenlearners were asked if and why theydreaded watching the video (Item A5,Appendix E). This was the only affectquestion on which the test groupshowed more negativity than the con-trol group. However, on closer analy-sis it was found that the test groupgave both more positive and morenegative responses on the Likert scale,while the control group was moreneutral.

When asked if the video helpedwith the learners' pragmatic acquisi-tion (Item A7), 46% of the test groupresponded with a 1 or a 2 on theLikert scale, while only 16% of thecontrol group did so. (On the Likertscale developed for this study 1 indi-

cated the highest level of agreementwith a statement and 5 indicated thehighest level of disagreement with astatement.) When asked about thevideo's usefulness to learn about cul-ture (Item A4), the test group's re-sponses were more positive; however,once again, the test group also gavemore negative responses as well,while the control group was moreneutral on the subject.

Statistical trends, which weredefined as a probability of coincidence(p value) of greater than .05 but notover .10 on the chi square test, werefound in response to two affect items.In response to Item Al regarding thevideo's usefulness in learning gram-mar, 40% of the test group respondedwith a 1 or 2 on the Likert scale, whileonly 16% of the control group agreedwith the statement. On Item A6 deal-ing with perceptions of fairness re-garding the Destinos quizzes, the twogroups gave nearly equal positive re-sponses, while the control group gavemore negative responses. In otherwords, a nearly equal number of re-spondents from each group re-sponded with a 1 or 2 on the Likertscale, but more control group subjectsresponded with a 4 or 5, while moretest group subjects responded with aneutral 3. The responses to this itemwere interesting because students inthe test group were asked to work somuch harder on each 5 point quizthan those in the control group. Ap-parently this hard work did not havea negative influence on the testgroup's attitude toward the treat-ments as was expected.

155


An interesting, though not sta-tistically significant, response was thaton Item A8 in which the learners wereasked to rank the importance of dif-ferent components of the course.While 60% of the control group sawthe video as the least important com-ponent of the class, only 43% of thetest group thought so. This differencein attitude may indicate that thetreatments made the video componentof the course more meaningful to thelearners in the test group.

In response to Item Al2, whichasked students for suggestions onhow to improve the course, 42% of thetest group suggested that there shouldbe more support in the classroom.This response was not surprisingsince, as the reader will recall, the testgroup instructors were purposefullyleft out of the process of giving andcorrecting quizzes to the greatest ex-tent possible. The surprise is that aslightly higher percentage of the con-trol group, 50%, also wished their in-structors had spent more time on thevideo component of the course duringclass time. Though the author offeredto correct the control group quizzes,they were designed by the individualinstructors. The fact that so many stu-dents expressed a desire to spendmore class time on the video compo-nent seems to indicate that both testand control group instructors gave thevideo component of the course lessimportance relative to the other com-ponents of the course. Therefore, theintervention into the learning processby the treatments developed for thisstudy did not seem to have a discerni-ble effect on the instructors' emphasis

on the video component. It is impor-tant to note that this component of thecourse was treated as relatively unim-portant by the instructors (remember,it was given a small weight in theoverall grade, 4.5%), because it makesthe results that will be presented laterseem even more impressive.

As for the affect section as awhole, it is noteworthy that the testgroup had a much more positive atti-tude toward the video component ofthe class. Since affect influences moti-vation and learning, affect could beseen as an intervening variable in theexperiment. Providing the studentswith input enhancement instrumentsand encouraging them to watch videoactively apparently resulted in a morepositive affect, which could have inturn influenced the learners' prag-matic awareness and use (which willbe discussed later in this section).

The Written Feedback-Time on TaskAnother possible intervening

variable that could have an effect onstudents' awareness and acquisition ofpragmatic features of the L2 could betime on task. We therefore includedtwo items on the written feedback todetermine if the test group spent moretime on task than the control group.This was done with Items A10 andAll of Appendix E. Statistical signifi-cance was found on both questions.(The two rows labeled time on task onTable 1 present these findings.) Whilethe test group on average missed 14%of the viewings, the control groupmissed 24%. Also, the test group spentan average of 102.5 minutes on each

156


assignment while the control grouponly spent 66.8 minutes.

The Written Feedback-Global Com-prehension

In order to address the third re-search question in this study, whichwas "Does form-focused input en-hancement affect learners global com-prehension?," we included two itemson the written feedback instrument todetermine if interactive video viewingwith form-focused input enhancementassignments would influence thelearners' comprehension of the plot ofthe video series (Items A15 and B15 ofthe written feedback instrument inAppendix E). As the row labeled "plotitems recalled" of Table 1 shows, thetreatments did not have a deleteriousaffect on the learners' global compre-hension. In fact, the test group re-called more details on average thanthe control group did on Item B15.The chi square test, which comparesthe frequency of individual answers,showed no statistical significance be-tween the two groups; however, the ttest, which compares overall means,did find a statistical trend when com-paring the performance of the twogroups.

On Item A15 learners in the testgroup were also given the opportu-nity to provide a self-report styleopinion regarding how they believedthe take-home quizzes affected theirability to comprehend the plot of Des-tinos. The results of this inquiry werealso positive. Of the learners in thetest group, 44% believed that thetreatments actually increased theirglobal comprehension, 32% had a

neutral opinion, and only 24% of therespondents believed that thesetreatments had a negative effect ontheir overall plot comprehension.

The Written Feedback-Deductiveand Inductive Learning

In response to Items A16 andA17 on the written feedback form,learners in the test group providedsome interesting feedback. Table 2 be-low outlines this feedback. These re-sponses were surprising, because itwas thought that the open-ended typequestions like that on the first quiz(Appendix B) would pose less diffi-culty than specific questions like thoseon the fourth and fifth quizzes (Ap-pendices C and D.). The learners,however, disagreed. They also seemto adhere to the "no pain, no gain"philosophy regarding their responsesto Item A17.

The Written Feedback-PragmaticAwareness and Use

Part B of the written feedbackinstrument dealt with learners'awareness and use of appropriatepragmatic features of the Spanish lan-guage. There were a total of 15 items.As the row labeled "Written feedback(Part B)" and column labeled "T>Cratio" on Table 1 indicates, the testgroup responded more appropriatelythan the control group on 12 of the 15items, while the control group re-sponded more appropriately on twoof these items, and the two groupstied on one. The t test for statisticalsignificance showed that the testgroup's overall superior performance

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TABLE 2INDUCTIVE VS. DEDUCTIVE TREATMENT ITEMS (Test group only)

Level of difficulty Level of learningInductive 38% 43%Deductive 25% 13%Equal 32% 40%

on the written feedback section wassignificant.

The author also performed chisquare tests for significance on each ofthe 15 items. Statistical significancewas found in 6 items. Of these, the testgroup outperformed the controlgroup on five. These five items in-cluded Items Bl, 3, 7, 9, and 12. Thecontrol group, however, did signifi-cantly better on Item B5. A statisticaltrend (meaning a chi square p value ofover .05 but not over .10) was foundon one of the 15 items. This was onItem B6 in which the test group had amore sociolinguistically appropriatestyle to introduce two friends to eachother.

The Oral FeedbackAs Table 1 indicates, the test

group also used more pragmaticallyappropriate forms than the controlgroup on the oral feedback instru-ment. As can be seen in Appendix F,there was a total of 10 items whichwere addressed during the oral roleplays. The test group responded moreappropriately on 7 items (1, 2, 3, 5, 7,8, and 9), while the control group gavemore pragmatically appropriate re-sponses on two items (6 and 10). Theytied on Item 4. However, the t test p

58

value of .15 is not low enough to claimany statistical significance or trend be-tween the two groups' performanceon the oral feedback instrument.These results indicate that, while thestudents in the test group had a betterawareness of pragmatic differencesbetween Spanish and English whenthey had time to think on the writtenfeedback form, when they had tospeak spontaneously, they did notproduce significantly more appropri-ate utterances than the control group.

The Multiple-Choice FeedbackThree weeks after the written

and oral feedback were obtained fromthe subjects, they took their semesterfinal. On the final, we placed an op-tional section for the students to re-spond to. We were not very optimisticthat many students would respond tothis section, but were pleasantly sur-prised that almost all students didtake the time to fill it out. Very fewsubjects had to be eliminated from thetotal original corpus due to noncom-pliance with this section of the feed-back.

This third and final feedbackinstrument can be found in AppendixG. It consisted of eight multiple-choicequestions. As Table 1 indicates, the


data from this instrument showednearly equal performance by the twogroups. Overall, the control groupoutperformed the test group on half ofthe items (Items 3, 4, 6, and 8). Chisquares on the responses to the indi-vidual items showed statistical signifi-cance on only one item- Item 2. Onthis item, 87% of the test groupmarked the correct answer while only72% of the control group did so.

These disappointing resultsseem to indicate that, while the testgroup learners performed better onboth written and oral productiontasks, when the correct answer wasavailable in a multiple choice format,all learners had roughly equal L2pragmatic awareness. Since this in-strument was given three weeks sub-sequent to the other two, it also couldindicate that short-term advantageswere soon lost.

Pragmatic Awareness and UseFinally, separate analyses were

done on all items of the three feedbackinstruments (written, oral, and multi-ple choice) involving actual written ororal use of appropriate sociolinguisticforms. All items of the three feedbackinstruments that dealt with awarenessof pragmatic differences between thetwo languages were also analyzed.

We analyzed pragmatic aware-ness as well as actual use, because ageneral awareness that pragmatic dif-ferences exist is very important to fu-ture performance of language learn-ers. As was previously mentioned, weare taught the pragmatics of our L1 atan early age by our caretakers. How-ever, during this acculturation process

we are not taught that certain utter-ances are appropriate in our specificlanguage community, but we aretaught that they are the only politeand correct utterances expected in agiven social situation. This childhoodacculturation process leads people tobelieve that sociolinguistic conven-tions are universal. Because of this be-lief, L2 learners have a tendency totransfer their Ll pragmatics to the L2(Kasper, 1992; Koike, 1995). When thetransfer is based on incorrect assump-tions, interpersonal problems canarise. The L1 language learning phe-nomenon explains why we tend to bemore offended by foreigners' prag-matic errors than by their grammarerrors. In other words, we expectgrammatical errors, but not pragmaticerrors. Thus, showing L2 learners thatthere are pragmatic differences be-tween languages, changes their a pri-ori assumption that such differencesdo not exist. This realization thatpragmatics are not universal can leadto more positive intercultural interac-tions.

Another reason that it is impor-tant to simply heighten the L2learner's awareness that pragmaticdifferences will exist in the L2 ratherthan to only rely on teaching the useof specific features is that all prag-matic features of an L2 cannot belearned in the classroom. All thesociolinguistic differences between anL1 and an L2 cannot be overtly taught,because there are too many of them.Also, there are not only differencesbetween languages, but there are alsosociolinguistic differences betweensame language groups or subcultures

59


based on such factors as age, gender(Tannen, 1990), socioeconomics, re-gion, and ethnicity.

As the rows labeled "Pragmaticawareness" and "Pragmaticuse/ production" on Table 1 indicate,the test group demonstrated a statisti-cally significant greater overallawareness of pragmatic differencesbetween the two languages whenrelevant items on all three feedbackinstruments are considered. On allitems of the three feedback instru-ments concerning actual productionand use of specific pragmatic featuresof Spanish, the test group also showedstatistically significant superior per-formance.

CONCLUSIONSThough the mean scores given

in Table 1 suggest that much morework needs to be done with theselearners, it is encouraging that afteronly one semester and with the ma-nipulation of only 4.5% of the coursegrade, the test group did seem to learna great deal about pragmatic differ-ences between the English and Span-ish language.

We now return to the threeoriginal research questions posed atthe beginning of this paper. In re-sponse to the first of the three researchquestions, it appears that the role ofconscious learning seems to be impor-tant in the learning of L2 pragmaticfeatures. The input enhancement ac-tivities appear to have led the learnersof the test group to outperform thoseof the control group at statisticallysignificant levels in several areas. Webelieve that researchers now need to

combine these instructional strategieswith others that have had some sig-nificant results (such as metaprag-matic discussion and role play in theclassroom) in order to obtain a higherlevel acquisition of L2 pragmatic fea-tures.

In response to the second re-search question, it appears that inter-active video viewing had positive ef-fects on the learners' affect and timeon task as well as on fomenting agreater sociolinguistic competence.The intervening variables of a morepositive affect and more time on taskmay have assisted in increasing thelearners' acquisition of L2 pragmaticfeatures. Also, though not relevant tothis study, other components of L2acquisition (e.g., grammar, strategiccompetence, vocabulary, pronuncia-tion, etc.) could have been positivelyaffected by these intervening vari-ables.

As for the third research ques-tion, the experimental treatments ap-pear to have helped increase thelearners' global comprehension. Thisis probably because learners wereprimarily looking for lexical-level de-tails, which are a component of globalcomprehension.

AREAS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH ANDPEDAGOGICAL APPLICATION

This research could be easilyextended and applied to more areas ofsecond language learning. With thedata that has been collected for thisexperiment, we would now like tolook at individual speech acts, such asrequests, salutations, and introduc-tions, to ascertain any effects of the

160


treatments that the test group wasgiven on these specific linguistic be-haviors.

It would be interesting to con-duct a similar experiment, but to alsoanalyze the effects of input enhance-ment treatments and interactive videoviewing on the development ofgrammatical and strategic competencein addition to the development of so-ciolinguistic competence.

As previously mentioned inthis study, other researchers (Over-field, 1996, Pearson, forthcoming)have conducted similar experimentsdealing with using video to developbetter sociolinguistic competence.While this experiment held classroominteraction and instruction as constantas possible, these other researchersdid intervene in the classroom teach-ing process with metapragmatic dis-cussions and role plays. They also ob-tained some positive responses totheir treatments. It would be interest-ing to now combine their and our in-structional strategies to determine if amore profound effect on the learningof sociolinguistic features of an L2could be achieved.

Finally, once researchers de-termine which combination of strate-gies provides the best results, we needto develop instructional materials thatbest address raising L2 learners' socio-linguistic competence. We also canuse this and other research to helpraise L2 learners' communicativecompetence levels in all areas throughthe use of input enhancement tech-niques and interactive materials usedin conjunction with pedagogical videoprograms.

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323). Cambridge: NewburyHouse.

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Sharwood Smith, M. (1981). Con-sciousness-raising and the sec-ond language learner. AppliedLinguistics, 2, 159-169.

Sharwood Smith, M. (1986). Compre-hension versus acquisition:


Two ways of processing input.Applied Linguistics, 7, 239-253.

Sharwood Smith, M. (1993). Input en-hancement in instructed secondlanguage acquisition: Theoreti-cal basis. Studies in Second Lan-guage Acquisition, 15,165 -180.

Tannen, Deborah. (1990). You justdon't understand: Women andmen in conversation._New York:Ballantine.

Terrell, T. (1977). A natural approachto second language acquisitionand learning. Modern LanguageJournal, 61, 325-337.

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APPENDIX ADEFINITION AND EXPLANATION OF SOCIOLINGUISTIC COMPETENCE

Sociolinguistic competence involves the appropriate use of language withinvarious social contexts or situations. It can be seen as "verbal etiquette." Researchhas shown that parents rarely teach any grammar to their children, but that theyare very active in teaching them how to make appropriate requests, apologies,expressions of gratitude, etc. From this we may infer that humans are more con-cerned with appropriateness than correctness in speech.

If you remember back to your childhood, you were probably never told tosay "May I please have a piece of candy" instead of "Give me some candy," be-cause that is the way that people in your country should make requests. On thecontrary, you were probably taught to say it that way, because it was "good" and"polite." In other words, verbal "manners" are taught as though they are exactlythe same among all humans. The problem is that this is not always the case. But,since people are taught this way, they expect all people to have the same con-cepts of what would be polite and what would be rude to say in a given situa-tion. So, while people are tolerant of grammar errors in young children and for-eigners, they are not as tolerant of sociolinguistic faux pas. Therefore, when youtravel to a foreign country or deal with foreigners in the future, sociolinguisticcompetence is perhaps the most important indicator of how you will be per-ceived by the people to whom you speak.

While parents focus on sociolinguistic competence and allow children tolearn grammar mostly on their own, in the foreign language classroom, instruc-tors take the opposite approach. Grammar is taught extensively while matters ofsocial etiquette are usually relegated to the end of the chapter where they areusually overlooked due to time concerns. In defense of instructors, these sectionsare also overlooked, because sociolinguistic competence would be extremely dif-ficult to teach in a classroom setting. While young children are in natural socialsituations where their parents can be constantly reminding them of the appropri-ate thing to say in each situation, in a classroom, only the teacher is a native ornear-native speaker and the setting is not "natural" at all. The only way theteacher could reasonably teach appropriate requests would be to say, in English,something like "When you're in a fancy restaurant, say . . x . ., When you're in adive, say . . y . ., When you're with a friend, say . . z . ." The instructor could tryto simulate these different situations in the classroom, but again, this would bevery artificial and might still not be helpful to the students. This is where Desti-nos can be very helpful. In this program native Spanish speakers interact in manydifferent situations with people of different ages, socioeconomic status, gender,and regional backgrounds. If you focus your attention on what is said in varioussituations, you will learn a great deal about sociolinguistics. The exercises in thispacket will help you to do this.

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APPENDIX BWORKSHEET No. 1

Destinos, Episodes #1 and 2 and #48 and 49 (Review of Episodes 3-18)

*Please do the plot summary in Spanish. It will be graded for content only, notfor grammar. The remaining sections may be done in either English or Spanish.

Plot summary:

1. Sociolinguistic competence: Give an example of a character using either for-mal (usted) or informal (hi) address with another character. Provide the con-text of the situation, and state why you believe the formal/informal was usedin this situation.Situation and charactersActual quoteWhy do you think this form was used?

2. Sociolinguistic competence: Note how language was used in social situationsin Destinos. Provide the context and state which speech act you were observ-ing (request, apology, compliment, insult, argument, suggestion, complaint,refusal, rebuke, etc.). Here you may also note examples of "deixis" (coming,going, bringing, taking, here there, etc.). Mention how Spanish manners andexpressions are alike or different from English or other languages which youknow.Situation and charactersActual quoteType of speech actIs this alike or different from what should be said in the same situation inEnglish or in another language that you know well?If different, what would be more appropriate in your language (culture) tosay in this same situation?

Strategic competence: How did you use context clues (a few key words) to makesense of an ambiguous situation or dialogue? With these limited "pieces" ofthe entire puzzle, what do you think was being said or done?Key words (quote)Your interpretation of what was going on

Grammatical competence:_Which of the grammar points from a recent class didyou notice in the episodes? Provide speakers, situation, actual words, andnote which grammar point the characters wre applying.Situation and charactersActual quote


New grammar point being used

Language as a tool to increase world knowledge: Name what you learned abouthistory, geography, art, music, health, economics, politics, business, law, etc.from watching these episodes. (i.e., What Jeopardy question could you an-swer today that you would have missed yesterday?)Jeopardy categoryNew knowledge


APPENDIX CWORKSHEET #4

Destinos, Episodes #23 and 24

*NOTE: There have been some changes. Read before viewing**Please do the plot summary in Spanish. It will be graded for content only, notfor grammar. The remaining sections may be done in either English or Spanish.

Plot summary:

Sociolinguistic competence: In episode 24, Raquel takes a strong dislike to acharacter she has recently met. What does this character say that makesher dislike him? (Focus on words, not actions.)Quotes:

In this same situation, how does Raquel express her dislike of this indi-vidual without being blatantly rude? Comment on both verbal expressionand body language.Quotes:

In episode 24, Raquel makes a suggestion to Angela on a rather touchysubject. How exactly does she phrase her suggestion? Is this similar to ordifferent from the way you would make such a suggestion in English?Quote:

Alike or different from English?Explain:

Grammatical competence: Which of the grammar points from a recent class didyou notice in the episodes? Provide speakers, situation, actual words, andnote which grammar point the characters wre applying.Situation and characters-Actual quote-New grammar point being used-

Language as a tool to increase world knowledge: Name what you learned abouthistory, geography, art, music, health, economics, politics, business, law,etc. from watching these episodes. (i.e., What Jeopardy question could youanswer today that you would have missed yesterday?)Jeopardy categoryNew knowledge

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APPENDIX DWorksheet #5

Destinos, Episodes #27 and 28

*NOTE: There have been some changes. Read before viewing**Please do the plot summary in Spanish. It will be graded for content only, notfor grammar. The remaining sections may be done in either English or Spanish.

Plot summary:

Sociolinguistic competence: In episode 27, at one point Raquel and Angela thinkthere is a mistake in the hospital registration list. EXACTLY what words doesRaquel use to ask the receptionist whether it's possible that there's a mistake?Would an exact translation of her words be equally polite in English?Quote:Translation:Cross-cultural analysis:

2 and 3: While there's not a lot of action in these two episodes, there are lots ofexamples of speech acts. Find one example of each of the following: request,leave-taking (saying good night or good bye), consoling/comforting. How werethese similar to or different from the way they are done in English (or any otherlanguages you speak)?Request quote:Compare to English:Leave-taking quote:Compare to English:Consoling quote:Compare to English:

4 and 5. Grammatical competence: Find three examples each of the use of preter-ite and imperfect verbal aspects. How can you explain the choice of aspect ineach case?PRETERITE quotes:1.why?2.why?3.

I. 6 9


why?IMPERFECT quotes:1.why?2.why?3.why?


APPENDIX EWRITTEN FEEDBACK

INSTRUCTOR NAME

(No one, but Caryn Witten will read individual responses. They will be held instrict confidence. If any are used in my research, a pseudonym will be used. I ap-preciate your candid observations.)

PART APLEASE RATE THE FOLLOWING STATEMENTS ON A SCALE OF 1 - 5.

1. Destinos helped me to improve my Spanish grammar.Agree Disagree Don't know

1 2 3 4 5

[To save space, Likert scale is omitted for the following items.]

2. Destinos improved my Spanish listening comprehension.

3. The Destinos part of the course seemed mostly like "busy work" to me. Itdidn't help improve my Spanish much.

4. Destinos was useful to learn about Hispanic culture.

5. I always dreaded the days I had to watch Destinos.

EXPLAIN WHY OR WHY NOT

6. Our Destinos quizzes seemed fair to me, because they accurately reflectedwhat I learned from the program.

7. Destinos taught me a lot about what to say in different situations in Spanish-speaking countries. (For example, it taught me when to use the Itti' or'usted' form, how to answer the phone in Spanish, etc.)


8, PLEASE RANK THE FOLLOWING ACTIVITIES IN ORDER OF HOWUSEFUL THEY WERE IN TEACHING YOU SPANISH. 1=1st, 2=2nd mostuseful, etc.

Reading PortfoliosWritten CompositionsDestinosHomework grammar assignmentsOral interviews and presentations

9. , DESTINOS IS THE MOST USEFUL FOR LEARNING. . . 1=1st, 2=2nd mostuseful, etc.

GrammarListening ComprehensionTo learn what Spanish speakers say in different situationsCulturePronunciation

Of the 9 Destinos viewings, how many did you miss? (Rememberthese answers are confidential.)

11. How much time on average did you spend on Destinos each week?

12. If you were a Spanish instructor, how would you make Destinos more usefulto the students?

13. What do you think about Destinos and the way it was used in this class?

(The remaining questions are for students who had take home Destinosquizzes only)

14. Which statement best describes your approach to doing the take-home quiz-zes (check all that apply)

a. I would get the information needed to fill out the questions assoon as possible and then relax and watch the rest of the showfor the sake of the plot only.

b. I would watch the show focusing on the plot and then get the in-formation for the quizzes near the end of the episodes.

c. I would look for answers to the quizzes at a relaxed pacethroughout the episodes.

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d. After I got the answers, I would keep sociolinguistic competence,strategic competence, etc. in mind while watching the rest of theepisodes.

e. I watched the episodes long enough to get the answers to thequestions.

f. Other

15. How did doing the take-home quizzes affect your overall understanding ofwhat was going on in Destinos?

a. They helped me to understand the plot better, because I had toconcentrate more.

b. They were distracting and made it hard to focus on the plot.c. Other reaction

16. Which type of question did you find more difficult?a. Questions that asked me to find a quote in a GENERAL area (gram-

mar, sociolinguistics, etc.) on my own.b. Questions that asked me to find a SPECIFIC quote (ex. What did Jorge

say to Raquel when....)c. They were equally challenging.

17. Which type of question made you LEARN more?a. Questions that asked me to find a quote in a GNERAL area on my ownb. Questions that asked me to find a SPECIFIC quotec. They were equally useful/ practical to improve my Spanish.d. They were equally useless to improve my Spanish.

PART BPLEASE RESPOND WITH SHORT ANSWERS IN ENGLISH OR SPANISH. YOUMAY USE THE WAY THE CHARACTERS IN DESTINOS TALKED TO EACHOTHER TO HELP YOU ANSWER.

1. When a person says, "Me puedes tutuear. El tuteo es mas intirno," what isbeing suggested?

2. Have you notice any differences between what English-speaking Americansand Spanish speakers say when beginning or ending a telephone conversa-tion or is what they say a direct translation of what we say?


3. Give some examples of situations when the 'hi' form would be used andsituations when the 'listed' form would be used.

a.

'Tti'a.b.c.

'Usted'

b.c.

4. Is the following suggestion polite in Spanish when one thinks an error hasbeen made?"zNo sera un error?" YES NO DON'T KNOW

EXPLAIN

Is an exact translation acceptable in English? YES NO

EXPLAIN

5. In Destinos when Angela wanted to go to Mexico with Raquel, did shespeak to her family in a way that would be different in American culture?YES NO EXPLAIN

6. Give an example of a typical introduction of one person to another inSpanish. You can use names or 'person a,"person b,' etc.

7 In English, while we're talking we use lots of expressions like "hmm. . .,""well. . .," "anyway. . .," as "connectors" or to give us time to think of ournext point. Have you noticed any such expressions used in Spanish?

YES NO EXAMPLES:


8. In the episodes of Destinos that you've seen, Angela and Raquel began tocall each other 'td.' If in the future they meet at a formal, black-tie party,what should they call each other?to usted

EXPLAIN

What have you noticed about the concept of politeness (manners) in "typical"Spanish-speaking countries as opposed to "typical" American English cul-ture?

What similarities and differences have you noticed regarding how we consolepeople in the above two languages/cultures?

What similarities or differences have you noticed regarding how we make re-quests in the above two languages/cultures?

Have you noticed people using the term 'please'/ 'por favor' more in English orin Spanish?

ENGLISH SPANISH DON'T KNOW

13. In Destinos, there were characters from many different countries. Whatdifferences did you notice in the way they spoke Spanish?

14. Have you noticed any terms that one group of Spanish-speakers uses tocriticize another group of Spanish-speakers (i.e., 'ethnic slurs' betweenSpanish speakers)?YES NO

EXAMPLES

15. Please take a minute or two and write quickly in note form and in Englishthe details that you remember from the episodes of Destinos that you sawthis semester.

1 7.5


APPENDIX FORAL FEEDBACK

INSTRUCTIONS FOR ORAL ROLE PLAYS:

Decide who will be 'Person A' and who will be 'Person B' before going any fur-ther.

Briefly, cover each of the four situations listed below using the Spanish wordsthat "typical" Spanish-speakers would most likely use in these situations. Youmay use what you remember from the characters in Destinos as a guide.RELAX and speak into the mike. This will not be graded and it is totally anony-mous!

[NOTE: Numbers were added later. They indicate the items that the were beinganalyzed for the study.]

Situation 1--Person A calls person B on the phone

1. B: Answer phone.2. A: Greet and identify yourself.

B: Greet.3. A: Ask if you can use Person B's Spanish book.

B: Say yes.4. A and B: End call.

Situation 2 Person B waits tables in a fancy, five-star restaurant. Person A is thecustomer.

5. B: Greet and ask for A's order.6. A: Order wine.

B: Respond.

Situation 3 Person A goes to a party with Person B. Person A runs into an oldfriend named Maria. Person A introduces Maria to Person B.

7. A: Greet Maria. Then introduce her to Person B.8. B: Respond appropriately.

176


Situation 4 (For this one, Person A is a 'don Juan and Person B is a female he hasmust met!) Person A, B, and A's naive girlfriend are at the beach. WhilePerson A's girlfriend is not looking, he flirts with her friend, Person B.

9. A: Flirt with B by asking two personal questions. Wait for an an-swer between each one.

10. B: Deflect these advances firmly, but quietly, so that your friend,A's girlfriend, will not hear.

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APPENDIX GMULTIPLE-CHOICE FEEDBACK

EXPERIMENTAL SECTION-DESTINOSThe following section will not affect your grade on the exam or in the course, butit will help researchers to find effective ways of using the Destinos programs andof teaching certain important sociolinguistic concepts. Please answer the follow-ing questions to the best of your ability.

PLEASE MARK THE MOST CULTURALLY APPROPRIATE RESPONSE TOTHE FOLLOWING SITUATIONS. USE THE WAY THE CHARACTERS INDESTINOS TREATED EACH OTHER TO HELP ANSWER.

1. You are in a Spanish-speaking country and someone knocks on your door.While you're on the way to answer, you should say:a. Con permisob. Vengoc. Ya voyd. Estoy viniendo

2. An older person of the opposite sex stops you on the street to ask for direc-tions to the nearby movie theater. You should reply:a. Doble usted a la derecha.b. Dobla to a la derecha.c. No response, any communication would be improper.d. Voy contigo.

3. While you're in your hotel room in Mexico the phone rings. How shouldyou answer it?a. Holab. Buenos dias

c. LQuien habla?d. Bueno

4. You go to have dinner with a family who has a five-year-old child. Howshould you ask him his age?a. zCuantos ailos tiene usted?b. zCuantos afios tienesc. Inappropriate question in this cultured. Ask parents; not child


5. How should you order a glass of wine in a five star restaurant?a. Dame un vino tinto por favorb. Deme un vino tinto.c. Me gustaria un vino tintod. zPuedo tener un vino tinto?

6. When is it appropriate to say 'buenas noches' in Spanish?a. Only when you are leavingb. Only when you first see peoplec. Both of the aboved. Neither of the above

7. You walk into a friend's apartment for the first time and want to compli-ment her apartment.. You say:a. iQue guapo!b. iQue lindo!c. iQue bueno!d. Mi apartamento es mas grande

8. From Destinos, what have you noticed about the concept of politeness indifferent cultures?a. Direct translations of what is polite in English sound just as polite inSpanish.b. What is friendly in English may sound unfriendly in Spanish and viceversa.c. English speakers are more polite.d. Spanish speakers are more polite.e. Other

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Political and Socio-Cultural Factors in Foreign Language Education:The Case of Lebanon

RULA DIAB, University of Texas at Austin

This paper examines the importance of political and socio-cultural factors in for-eign language education, focusing on EFL learning in Lebanon. A brief historicalreview of foreign language education in Lebanon and an overview of the currentrole and status of English in the Lebanese context will be provided, on the basis ofwhich a discussion of the main political and socio-cultural factors that influenceLebanese EFL students' motivations and attitudes towards learning English willbe presented.

INTRODUCTIONStudents' motivations and attitudes towards the learning of foreign lan-

guages are often influenced by the broader socio-cultural context. In the case offoreign language education in Lebanon, political and socio-cultural factors havebeen fundamental in influencing, and perhaps even shaping, Lebanese students'motivations and attitudes towards learning the two main foreign languages,English and French. This paper will focus on the importance of such factors inthe particular case of EFL learning in Lebanon. A historical review. of foreignlanguage education in Lebanon and a discussion of the current role and status ofEnglish in the Lebanese context will reveal several inter-related political andsocio-cultural factors that play a crucial role in EFL learning in Lebanon.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUNDThe role of foreign languages in Arab countries in general and in Lebanon

in particular is a long and complex one. Several factors have contributed to theteaching and learning of foreign languages, mainly English and French, in theArab World. Among these factors are the strategic geographical position of theMiddle East and the ongoing Western interest in the economics and politics ofthe region, the British and French colonization of Arab countries in the middle ofthe 20th century, and the emergence of English as a leading international lan-guage for business, technology, and communication.

The above factors apply very well in the case of Lebanon. A historical re-view of foreign language education in Lebanon will reveal how the Western mis-sionaries in the 18th and 19th centuries, the colonization by France right after theend of World War I until the Lebanese Independence in 1943, and the emergenceof English as a leading international language all had a major influence on thelearning and teaching of foreign languages, mainly English and French, in Leba-non.


Prior to World War IDuring the period of the Otto-

man rule (1516-1918), Lebanon man-aged to maintain a great degree ofautonomy, mainly because of the na-ture of its religious makeup, a multi-sectarian one composed of six maincommunities: Maronite Christians,Greek Orthodox Christians, CatholicChristians, Shiite Muslims, SunniMuslims, and Druze. According toShaaban and Ghaith (1999), this multi-sectarian society prompted Europeancountries to support communities inLebanon that shared the same reli-gious faith. Thus, France supportedMaronite and Catholic communities,Russia supported the Orthodox, andTurkey sided with the Muslims.

Following the establishment ofthese ties between the various Leba-nese religious communities and theWest, competing missionaries arrivedin Lebanon and established severalschools that exposed the Lebanese toWestern cultures and languages. Ac-cording to Shaaban and Ghaith (1999),the most active of these missionarieswere the French Jesuits and theAmerican Protestants. The FrenchJesuits established strong relationswith the Maronite Christians andfounded several schools based on theFrench system of education, includ-ing, in 1875, the institution of higherlearning now known as the Universityof Saint Joseph, which uses French asthe language of instruction in mostsubjects and is still considered astrong cultural link between Franceand Lebanon.

American missionaries alsofounded several schools, including thewell-known American University ofBeirut (AUB), previously known asthe Syrian Protestant College, whichwas founded in Beirut in 1866 byAmerican Protestant missionaries inLebanon and Syria at a time whenBeirut was part of Syria under Otto-man rule. AUB, which uses English asthe medium of instruction, later cameto be viewed as the leading institutionof higher learning in the Middle East,attracting students from several na-tions in the Middle East, Mediterra-nean region, and Europe. Needless tosay, the existence of such a prestigiousAmerican institution in Beirut has hada big impact on the role and status ofthe English language in Lebanon. In acountry largely influenced by theFrench language and culture, AUBwas a major factor in promoting theAmerican system of education andAmerican English language in Leba-non.

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According to Shaaban andGhaith (1996), foreign languagesspread mainly along sectarian linesduring that period, with Catholics andMaronites learning French, most Mus-lims Arabic, and Muslim and GreekOrthodox elite English, a situationthat obviously links religious back-ground to language education andimplies that Catholic and Maronitegroups were not only learning Frenchbut were not learning English. Con-stantine (1995) contends that LebaneseMaronite Christians did not welcomethe American missionaries, wanting tomaintain their relations with France

and fearing the expansion of Protes-tant Churches. Thus, schools of Frenchmissionaries were mainly establishedin Maronite villages and regions,while American missionary schoolsthrived in Orthodox and Druze vil-lages.

Indeed, most Lebanese Ma-ronite and Catholic communities to-day still have strong affinities forFrance, a country that they think of astheir "protector;" not surprisingly, ina predominantly Muslim Arab region,these Christian communities hold onto their strong ties with France. Chris-tian Orthodox communities, on theother hand, preferred to establish tieswith American Protestants. In fact,when the missionaries first arrived, alarge proportion of the Lebanese Or-thodox community was converted toProtestantism. Thus, religious back-ground seems to play an importantrole in the Lebanese population's af-filiations with the West and conse-quently with Western foreign lan-guages, particularly English andFrench.

The French Mandate (1920-1943)Even before the period of the

French mandate, a large portion of theLebanese population, mainly Ma-ronites, were already influenced bythe French language and culture. Ac-cording to Mansfield (1976), in hisbook The Arabs, France had no need toimpose its language and culture onthe Christian Lebanese, since they hadalready "long accepted it [the Frenchlanguage] as an instrument of educa-tion" (p. 240).

The Case of Lebanon 179

However, not surprisingly, theFrench mandate strengthened thisFrench influence in Lebanon. Duringthe period of the French mandate, theFrench language became an officiallanguage in Lebanon in addition toArabic; French was taught in allschools and was the medium of in-struction for sciences, mathematics,and social studies at all levels of edu-cation (Shaaban & Ghaith, 1999). Evenprivate American and British schoolswhich use English as the medium ofinstruction had to teach French aswell. In addition, the French intro-duced a system of public examina-tions modeled on their own educa-tional system.

Needless to say, a proficiencyin French was essential for academicand professional success in Lebanonduring that period; French became thelanguage of the educated and the elite.In addition, the majority of students atFrench schools were Christians,which, according to Shaaban andGhaith (1999), resulted in educationalinequalities in favor of Catholic andMaronite groups in Lebanon and cre-ated resentment among Muslims, whobelieved that the French were creatinga Christian political and economicelite affiliated with France and theFrench language and having no alle-giance to Arabic. Thus, this situationhelped to foster feelings of Arab na-tionalism and rejection of Western cul-tures and languages among certain(mainly Muslim) groups in Lebanon.


The Independence Era (1943-1975)After Lebanese independence

in 1943, Arabic became the only offi-cial language in Lebanon, and in 1946,English became one of the two com-pulsory foreign languages in secon-dary schools, along with French. In-deed, the Lebanese government's offi-cial curriculum for public schoolsgave equal importance to French andEnglish. All schools, national and for-eign, were required to use the officialLebanese curricula; however, schoolswere allowed to choose their own in-structional methods.

During this period, several de-crees pertaining to language educa-tion were issued, most of which aimedat strengthening the role of Arabic ineducation and using it as a medium ofinstruction. However, these decreeswere mostly a hasty expression of na-tional pride and did not result fromcareful planning; the fact remainedthat French and English were "deeplyrooted in the Lebanese educationalsystem" (Shaaban & Ghaith, 1996, p.101) and both remained dominant asmedia of instruction in many Leba-nese schools. Economic reasonsmainly contributed to this spread offoreign languages as media of instruc-tion, especially English, which at thattime was starting to become more in-fluential than French in Lebanon,mainly because of the internationalinfluence of the United States and thegrowing importance of the Englishlanguage in international business,science, and technology (Shaaban &Ghaith, 1996).

163

The Civil War (1975-1989)When the civil war broke out in

Lebanon in 1975, it resulted in a cha-otic educational situation, with declin-ing standards in most schools becauseof the lack of qualified faculty, loss ofinstructional time, and destruction ofschool facilities. Quality education de-teriorated drastically at most publicschools in the country and schools inthe former South Lebanon "securityzone" region that was occupied by Is-rael from 1978 until May 2000. At thesame time, however, there was an in-crease in the number of privateschools, mainly in the Greater Beirutarea, and the use of English as a me-dium of instruction continued to rise.Most private schools established dur-ing the civil war were English-medium schools, regardless of theirideological or religious orientations(Shaaban & Ghaith, 1996), and newEnglish-medium universities were es-tablished, even in traditional "French-oriented" regions, which further con-tributed to the elitist system of educa-tion where those who could not affordexpensive private schools with strongEnglish programs did not have muchchance of professional or social ad-vancement.

The Present SituationIn 1989, the Lebanese civil war

officially came to an end, and neweducational plans were issued. Theseplans emphasized the importance ofArabic as the native language and theonly official language in Lebanon;however, there was also an acknowl-edgment of the importance of foreignlanguages, mainly English and

French, exemplified by the new Leba-nese Curriculum issued in 1997 thatgave equal weight to Arabic and ei-ther English or French, depending onwhether the particular school is Eng-lish or French-medium. The numberof hours both the native language andeither English or French is taught isequivalent at all the educational levels(Shaaban & Ghaith, 1999).

Currently, both private andpublic schools are also allowed to de-cide which language is appropriate forinstruction. Indeed, in 1994, an officialdecree stated that foreign languages,mainly English or French, can be usedas media of instruction in all cycles,even pre-school and elementary lev-els, indicating a shift from using Ara-bic as an instructional language(Shaaban and Ghaith, 1999). In addi-tion, there are currently plans to mod-ernize the educational system in Leba-non and train foreign languageteachers in general and EFL teachersin particular on a large-scale basis,which further reveals that foreign lan-guages, and especially English, arelikely to remain an essential compo-nent of the Lebanese educational sys-tem.

THE CURRENT ROLE AND STATUS OFENGLISH IN LEBANON

As revealed in the historical re-view, proficiency in English has be-come essential for academic and pro-fessional success in Lebanon, and bythe middle of the 20th century, Englishwas starting to become more influen-tial than French. Constantine (1995)claims that the importance of theFrench culture and language in Leba-


non has been gradually weakening,mainly because of the competitionfrom American culture. Statistics forthe academic year 1993-1994 showthat there were 132 primary and mid-dle public schools which had adoptedEnglish as the main foreign languagealongside Arabic during that aca-demic year, a large number comparedwith the early 1970's when only a fewschools had English as the main for-eign language (Constantine).

Moreover, according to Shaa-ban and Ghaith (1999), the traditionalcultural-linguistic conflict betweenArabic and foreign languages as me-dia of instruction is now shifting to-wards "full-fledged multilingualismin society as well as in education" (p.1) and is being gradually replaced bya struggle between English andFrench, with English gaining groundso far, mainly because of economicand practical considerations. Mostprestigious private universities inLebanon, such as the previously men-tioned American University of Beirut(AUB), the Lebanese American Uni-versity, and the University of Bala-mand, use English as the medium ofinstruction and require scores on Eng-lish entrance examinations that de-termine whether students are admit-ted or not and how many English lan-guage courses they are required totake. In addition, many business cor-porations currently demand that theiremployees demonstrate a certain levelof proficiency in English. The need forintensive English language teachingprograms in Beirut, and the prolifera-tion of English language teaching in-stitutes throughout the country also

8 4


reveal the growing importance ofEnglish in Lebanon.

Furthermore, the favorable atti-tudes of young Lebanese towards theEnglish language also reveal the im-portant role of English in the country.In a study investigating the motiva-tions and attitudes of Lebanese uni-versity EFL students towards learningEnglish, Yazigy (1994) found that ofthe 164 students (71 males and 93 fe-males) participating in her study, 98%disagreed that learning English is "awaste of time" and an average of 84%reported that they plan to learn Eng-lish as much as possible and speak itoutside the classroom if given the op-portunity. Overwhelmingly, the stu-dents in this study revealed positiveattitudes towards the English lan-guage and rated it as a "useful, valu-able, and practical" language, a find-ing that Yazigy suggested might beattributable to the current interna-tional importance of English. Based onthis study, Yazigy concluded thatthere is a need in Lebanon to knowthe English language as "the languageof the world, commerce, higher edu-cation and to an extent for communi-cative purposes" (p. 72).

Another strong indication ofthe expanding role of English inLebanon is the fact that 63% ofFrench-medium schools currentlyteach English as a third language asopposed to only 26% of English-medium schools that teach French as athird language (Smaily, 1996, as citedin Shaaban & Ghaith, 1999). Thus,teaching English in Lebanon is obvi-ously regarded as essential, with eventraditionally French-centered schools

realizing that they need to offer EFLclasses if they want to attract students.In the few schools that use Arabic asthe medium of instruction, parents areconcerned about their children losingcareer opportunities because they ha-ven't achieved a certain level of profi-ciency in English (Shaaban & Ghaith,1999).

Finally, a committee set by the(Lebanese) National Center for Educa-tional Research and Development hasaimed at developing an EFL curricu-lum to be implemented nation-wide inLebanon. Shaaban and Ghaith (1997),coordinators of the work of this com-mittee, identify three main goals ofteaching EFL in Lebanon, based onboth the principles of a new educa-tional policy in post-war Lebanon aswell as contemporary thoughts in thefields of curriculum planning and for-eign language education: "using Eng-lish as a medium of instruction in con-tent areas; using English for commu-nication in social settings; and usingcorrect and appropriate English aca-demically, socially, and culturally" (p.201). Thus, the English language obvi-ously holds great power in the Leba-nese context, in which anyone hopingto advance academically, socially, orprofessionally must attain a certainlevel of proficiency in English.

INFLUENTIAL POLITICAL AND SOCIO-CULTURAL FACTORS IN THE LEBANESE

CONTEXTBased on the above historical

review and the discussion of the roleand status of English in Lebanon, sev-eral inter-related variables emerge ascrucial factors influencing Lebanese

185

students' motivations and attitudestowards learning foreign languages ingeneral and English in particular.

Religious BackgroundAs seen in the historical review,

religious background seems to play animportant role in the Lebanese popu-lation's affiliations with the West andconsequently with Western foreignlanguages, particularly English andFrench. According to Constantine(1995), the multi-sectarian nature ofLebanon stands out and must be takeninto account; as discussed above, thesix main religious communities canhave very different attitudes and be-liefs about several aspects of life inLebanon, including foreign languagelearning and the relative importanceof English and French.

Political AffiliationsPolitical affiliations, which are

closely related to religious back-ground in Lebanon, are also influen-tial in shaping Lebanese students' mo-tivations and attitudes towards learn-ing foreign languages. Kraidy (1998)aptly points out that Lebanon appar-ently suffers from an "identity crisis:"Is Lebanon, as Lebanese nationalistsargue, "a unique country with Phoe-nician ascendance, Western affinities,distinct from its Arab environment,"(p. 3) or is it an inseparable part of theArab world, sharing the history, cul-ture, and national identity of itsneighboring Arab countries? This con-flict is important to consider whenanalyzing Lebanese students' motiva-tions towards learning Western for-eign languages. According to Shaaban


(1990), using English or French as amedium of instruction can be consid-ered "a form of conscious identifica-tion with the West" for some groupsin Lebanon, who feel that knowledgeof foreign languages and cultures,namely French and English, "setsthem apart from the rest of the Arabsand brings them closer to the westernheritage" (p. 25).

Shaaban (1990) also points outthat some Lebanese groups are verymuch in favor of the "Arabization" ofeducation in Lebanon, making Arabicthe official and only medium of in-struction, while other Lebanesegroups vehemently oppose such apolicy. He provides the example ofthe (then) Minister of Education inLebanon, a Maronite Christian, statingin 1991 that "under no circumstanceswould we think of Arabizing educa-tion in Lebanon," (as cited in Shaaban,p. 25), a strong statement that theLebanese Makassed Islamic Philan-thropic Association reacted angrily to,since this association had initiated aproject to Arabize the teaching ofmathematics and sciences at the ele-mentary and intermediate levels in itsschools.

Thus, this conflict betweenArab nationalism and western orien-tation reveals that religious back-ground is associated with certain po-litical affiliations and orientations inLebanon, and the two factors worktogether to shape motivations and at-titudes towards foreign languagelearning. Lebanese students' motiva-tions for learning English as a secondlanguage as opposed to learningFrench, for example, are presumably

1EG


largely shaped by their family's reli-gious and political affiliations. Onemight expect that most MaroniteChristians, having a long history ofattending French-medium schools andplacing much importance on the im-portance and prestige of French,would want their children to continuein this tradition; however, the impor-tance of English in commerce andbusiness nowadays might promptthese same individuals to encouragetheir children to learn both languages.Lebanese who have no affiliationswith France and the French language,on the other hand, are likely to en-courage their children to learn Englishwith little concern about their learningFrench.

Socio-Economic StatusStudents from different socio-

economic backgrounds might alsohave different attitudes and motiva-tions towards learning English. Socio-economic status plays an importantrole in the choice of school studentsenroll in, and consequently in the kindof EFL education they receive. Thereare great differences in teachers' quali-fications and instructional programsamong the various schools in Leba-non; private schools in Beirut areknown to be more rigorous and havehigher standards of education andstronger foreign language programsthan public schools and many schoolsoutside Beirut (Shaaban & Ghaith,1996).

It is probably safe to assumethat most middle-class and upper-class families enroll their children inprivate schools that have strong Eng-

187

lish or French language programs andthat probably have either language asa medium of instruction. Indeed, ac-cording to Shaaban and Ghaith (1999),the educational inequalities today aremostly a result of socio-economicrather than sectarian divisions; lowmiddle and working classes cannotfinancially afford expensive privateschools with strong English programsand therefore do not have muchchance of professional and social ad-vancement. However, it is importantto keep in mind that religious affilia-tion and socio-economic backgroundmay interact in complex ways, sincebetter-educated Christians and eliteSunni Muslims tend to dominate theupper and middle classes.

Therefore, students comingfrom English-medium private schoolsare obviously expected to be moreproficient in the English languagethan students coming from French orArabic-medium schools and evenEnglish-medium public schools. Hav-ing had the opportunity to practiceEnglish in most of their classes and tobe taught by qualified EFL instructorsin American-oriented schools, thesestudents might also be expected to bemore motivated and to have morepositive attitudes towards learningEnglish than those who have not hadsuch opportunities.

Influence of Arabic as the NativeLanguage

A factor that might also influ-ence some Lebanese students' motiva-tions and attitudes towards languagelearning is the perception of Arabic,particularly among Muslims, as a sa-

cred God-given language, appreciatedfor its beauty and vast literary tradi-tion in addition to its religious value(Yazigy, 1994). Thus, some Lebanesegroups might regard English orFrench as inherently inferior to Ara-bic, an attitude that can have a possi-bly harmful effect on their learning ofthese foreign languages.

GenderA final important factor to con-

sider in the particular Lebanese EFLsocio-cultural context is gender. Ac-cording to Ehrlich (1997), the socio-cultural contexts in which second orforeign languages are acquired andthe way in which gender is locallyconstructed in these specific speechcommunities should be taken into ac-count when examining differences insecond or foreign language learning.Thus, it is important to consider theway gender is socially constructed inthe particular Lebanese socio-culturalcontext and to examine the possibledifferences in motivation and atti-tudes towards learning English be-tween males and females in Lebanon.

First, since more females inLebanon are currently enrolled inhigher education and entering the jobmarket than ever before, a large num-ber of both male and female EFLlearners in Lebanon are expected to beinstrumentally motivated to learnEnglish. At the same time, however,females might also be interested inlearning English for non- career orprofessional related reasons. Whilemale Lebanese students tend to bemore interested in learning Englishfor purely professional and career as-


pirations, for many females in Leba-non, speaking English well is alsoconsidered a status symbol, indicatinga higher social class and a higher levelof education.

In addition, the gender of theteacher may have an influence on theachievement, attitudes, and motiva-tions of the students towards the lan-guage (Cross, 1983). In Lebanon, EFLteachers are predominantly female.Thus, even though several other fac-tors are involved in the EFL learningand teaching situation, it might be ex-pected that female EFL learners inLebanon will be higher achievers,more motivated, and have more posi-tive attitudes towards EFL learningthan males. Moreover, the large num-ber of EFL female teachers helps infostering the popular idea that EFLteaching is a female domain; there-fore, having almost no male EFLteachers as role models, very fewmales might be motivated to major inEnglish or become EFL teachers them-selves.

A final possible gender differ-ence in the Lebanese context mightinvolve the fact that many women inLebanon admire certain Western cul-tural values that offer greater socialfreedom and choices for women thanmost countries in the Arab world, in-cluding Lebanon. Abu-Rabia andFeuerverger (1996) found that maleArab students in Canada showed onlyan instrumental motivation in learn-ing English, while females indicated astrong integrative motivation. Basedon interviews conducted with the par-ticipants, the authors concluded that


male Arab students viewed the Cana-dian context as one that

clashes with their own culturalvalues, while female Arab studentsrevealed a positive attitude towardCanadian society's approach towomen's goals and ambitions. Abu-Rabia and Feuerverger (1996) attrib-uted the Arab female students' strongintegrative motivation to the admira-tion they seem to hold of the greaterpersonal and professional freedomthat women in Canada and in theWest generally have. The same phe-nomenon certainly holds for manywomen in Lebanon, implying thatmore female EFL learners in Lebanonmight be integratively motivated inlearning English than males. Never-theless, we have to keep in mind thatgender will obviously interact in verycomplex ways with other backgroundvariables and a combination of factors,not any single variable, will influenceand shape Lebanese students' motiva-tions and attitudes towards learningEnglish.

CONCLUSIONThis paper has attempted to

examine the importance of politicaland socio-cultural factors in foreignlanguage education, focusing on EFLlearning in Lebanon. A brief historicalreview of foreign language educationin Lebanon and an overview of thecurrent role and status of English inthe Lebanese context reveal severalinter-related political and socio-cultural factors influencing EFL learn-ing in Lebanon. Factors such as reli-gious background, political affilia-tions, and socio-economic status play

a crucial role in shaping Lebanesestudents' motivations and attitudestowards learning English as a foreignlanguage. Lebanon is composed ofseveral heterogeneous groups that canhave very different and even conflict-ing opinions about foreign languagelearning and teaching, an importantfact to consider when examining theforeign language situation in Lebanonin general or the Lebanese EFL learn-ing and teaching situation in particu-lar.

REFERENCES

Abu-Rabia, S., & Feuerverger, G.(1996). Toward understandingthe second language learning ofArab students in Israel andCanada: The relationship of at-titudes and cultural back-ground to reading comprehen-sion. Canadian Modern LanguageReview, 52, 359-385.

Constantine, N. (1995). Teacher train-ing for intercultural educationin Lebanon. In R. Gagliardi(Ed.), Teacher training and multi-culturalism: National studies.Studies in comparative education(pp. 114-139). Paris, France. In-ternational Bureau of Educa-tion. (ERIC Document Repro-duction Service No. ED 389671)

Cross, D. (1983). Sex differences inachievement. System, 11 (2),

159-162.Ehrlich, S. (1997). Gender as social

practice: Implications for sec-ond language

acquisition. Studies in Second LanguageAcquisition, 19, 421-446.

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Kraidy, M. (1998). State control ontelevision news in post-warLebanon. Proceedings of the An-nual Meeting of the Associationfor Education in Journalism andMass Communication, 81st, Bal-timore, Maryland. (ERICDocument Reproduction Ser-vice No. ED 423 566)

Mansfield, P. (1976). The Arabs. Lon-don: Penguin Books Limited.

Shaaban, K. (1990). A sociolinguisticanalysis of language-related is-sues in the Arab World. Al-Abhath, 38, 17-35.

Shaaban, K., & Ghaith, G. (1996). Lan-guage-in-education policy andplanning: The case of Lebanon.Mediterranean Journal of Educa-tional Studies, 1, 95-105.


Shaaban, K., & Ghaith, G. (1997). Anintegrated approach to foreignlanguage learning in Lebanon.Language, Culture, and Curricu-lum, 10, 200-207.

Shaaban, K., & Ghaith, G. (1999).Lebanon's language-in-educa-tion policies: From bilingualismto trilingualism. Language Prob-lems and Language Planning, 23,1-16.

Yazigy, R. (1994). Perception of Arabicas native language and thelearning of English. LanguageLearning Journal, 9, 68-74.

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A Qualitative Approach to the Authenticity in the ForeignLanguage Classroom: A Study of University StudentsLearning English in Korea

DONG-KY00 KIM, Pusan National University, Korea

This qualitative study intends to provide a deeper understanding offoreign lan-guage learners' attitudes toward authentic input and to examine their changes inattitude and proficiency after instruction using authentic input in the foreign lan-guage classroom. Twenty-six Korean university students from two groups wererandomly selected and interviewed. The experimental group was instructed withboth graded and ungraded input, whereas the control group was instructed withonly graded input. Each subject was interviewed at the end of the study. The re-sults showed that both groups reported considerably low levels of confidence intheir understanding of authentic input. However, the majority of students in theexperimental group reported that their attitudes toward authentic input werechanged positively, and their English proficiency improved over the treatment pe-riod. This study concludes with suggestions for using authentic input to improveEFL education.

INTRODUCTIONThe term "input" refers to language that is written or spoken to the foreign/second

language learner, either by a native speaker or another foreign/second language learner(Ellis, 1985). One of the most debatable aspects of second or foreign language (L2) ac-quisition theory is whether input should be intentionally simplified for L2 learners (Ox-ford, 1993). In fact, such learners are often exposed to some modified or scripted formrather than authentic input in their foreign/second language learning (Bacon, 1992b;Chaudron & Richards, 1986; Derwing, 1989).

Several studies have explored how teachers and others alter input in-tended for learners. In a study by Chaudron and Richards (1986), speakers inten-tionally slowed their rate of speech when they perceived their audience as non-native speakers. While analyzing conversation between native and nonnativespeakers, Derwing (1989) also discovered that native speakers increased theamount of background detail they provided to nonnative speakers when therewere communication difficulties between them.

However, the effects of these kinds of modifications on comprehensionand learning are less clear. Ketch (1985) found that a reduced speech rate waspositively correlated with comprehension. Jacobs, et al. (1988) showed a signifi-cant effect of pausing on listening comprehension, but failed to see a significantrelationship between the rate of speech and listening comprehension. Accordingto Jacobs et al., a lengthy pause or slowed speed may trigger listeners' boredomor loss of focus so that their comprehension is impeded. Chaudron and Richards

191


(1986) also suggested that lallthoughlearners may benefit by being able tosegment words in slowed input, theirshort-term memory lacks the capacity tohold thoughts long enough for furtherprocessing. In addition, slowedspeech, or artificially inserted pausesor other discourse markers may causethe hearer to lose linguistic informa-tion, such as intonation, which is im-portant for comprehension" (1986, p.399).

The idea of using authentic in-put in L2 instruction has been gainingsupport from a number of researchers(Allen, Bernhardt, Berry, & Demel,1988; Bacon, 1992b; Bacon & Finne-mann, 1990; Bragger, 1985; Ciccone,1995; Herron & Seay, 1991; Lee, 1995;Secules, Herron, & Tomasello, 1992).These studies posit that authentic in-put offers L2 learners both linguisticand cultural information that may notbe available in pedagogical texts usedin the traditional classroom. Bragger(1985) argued that "[e]verything wedo with the language must be authen-tic" (1985:85). Bacon (1992b) observeda high value of authentic input in for-eign/ second language classrooms.According to her, authentic input en-riches the cultural ingredient of thecurriculum, mirrors real language use,and challenges teachers to help stu-dents develop appropriate learningstrategies. Young (1980) noted that au-thentic input is motivating, interest-ing, and useful, with content that doesnot cause foreign language learners'culture shock or discomfort. Glisan(1988) argued that foreign languagelearners should not practice their lis-

teeing comprehension through theexclusive use of question-answer for-mats to follow listening passages orconversations. She contended that for-eign/second language teachersshould give their students practicewith natural listening tasks to im-prove their listening proficiency.Garza (1990) maintained that authen-tic input provides foreign languagelearners with cultural richness, whichis a key element in understanding theforeign language.

Although using authentic inputin foreign language instruction is be-coming more common, some consid-erations are needed. Bacon (1992b)perceived a fine line between inputthat enhances and that which frus-trates the learner. Several researchers,in fact, have proposed that learningwith authentic input too early in for-eign language acquisition could be notonly a frustrating and anxiety-riddenexperience for students but also animpractical approach for teachers. Forexample, Ur (1984) and Vande Berg(1993) suggested that activities withunedited input will increase learners'frustration; thus, those activitiesshould be reserved for the highestlevels in the curriculum.

Benefits and drawbacks of us-ing authentic input in the for-eign/second language classroom canbe considered in Krashen's Input Hy-pothesis (1981), which proposes thatlanguage is acquired through com-prehensible input. "Comprehensibleinput" can be defined as language thatis simplified or appropriate to the lan-guage learner's capability. Implicit ac-

1.92

quisition of grammatical rules occurswhen input to the learner is just a littlebeyond the learner's present linguisticcapability (i+1). There is some doubtwhether authentic input can be com-prehensible input for L2 learners, es-pecially for those at early stages oflearning.

Omaggio (1993) argued that al-though authentic input may provideforeign language learners with cultur-ally appropriate input, this languagemay not expose students to compre-hensible input at the earliest stages ofacquisition. Finally, Oxford (1993) ob-served both advantages and disad-vantages of using simplified, editednonauthentic input in the foreign lan-guage classroom. Based on the aboveobservations, .the present study is anattempt to have a closer look at for-eign language learners' attitudes to-ward authentic input and to examinetheir changes in attitude and profi-ciency after instruction using authen-tic input in the foreign language class-room.

METHOD

SubjectsThe subjects for this qualitatiVe

study were 26 students, randomly se-lected from two universities in Korea,with an intermediate level of English pro-ficiency. The subjects included 12 maleand 14 female students who had enrolledin English classes as part of their programrequirements. 17 students were chosen toform a control group, and the other ninestudents were assigned to the experimen-tal group. The control group was in-structed using only nonauthentic input thatwas scripted and graded for the English

Authenticity in the Classroom 191

lessons. For the experimental group, how-ever, authentic input replaced the nonau-thentic input in some portions of the les-sons.

InstrumentationThree instruments were used in

this study: 1) Interview Guide, 2) TheTest of English for InternationalCommunication (TOEIC), and 3) TheTest of English with Authentic Input(TEAL). First, the Interview Guide wasdeveloped by the author in order toobtain more in-depth information onthe subjects' English learning and ex-isting attitudes toward authentic in-put. It included 24 items divided intofour sections: four warm-up ques-tions, eight questions concerning gen-eral English study, ten questions per-taining to authentic input, and twoclosing questions.

The TOEIC, a graded andScripted test, was developed to meas-ure the English proficiency of indi-viduals whose native language is notEnglish. The test consists of two sec-tions with a total of 200 questions. Thefirst section aims to test students' lis-tening comprehension, and the othersection pertains to reading compre-hension. Each section has 100 multi-ple-choice items. For this study, onlythe listening section was adopted.

Finally, the author developedthe TEAI, an English test using au-thentic input. The test is composed of20 open-ended questions pertaining toa passage from the Associated Press(AP) news service. All questions in thetest were written in the students' L1.Subjects were also allowed to answerin the L1. The author selected the

199


newscasts to measure students' Eng-lish proficiency in comprehending au-thentic input because they are di-rected to native English speakers.Thus, they contain normal spokenspeed and accents. The speed andstructure in the AP newscasts werenot altered for nonnative speakers ofEnglish.

Data Collection ProceduresDuring the present research,

the author was employed as a part-time lecturer for English dasses at twouniversities in Korea. In order to gen-eralize more effectively, the authorfollowed a random sampling proce-dure by choosing every tenth studenton the roster of every class. 28 stu-dents from a total of 284 were selectedby this procedure. However, two ofthose chosen declined to be inter-viewed. The interviews were con-ducted at the end of the semester.Prior to an interview, each studentread and signed a consent form re-garding the study. The interviewquestions were open-ended, and theentire session lasted about 30 minutesfor each subject. In order to control forthe differences in the interviewees'levels of speaking proficiency in Eng-lish, each interview was tape-recordedin Korean. All students were askedthe same questions in the interviewguide. However, several questionsabout authentic input were excludedfor subjects who had not been ex-posed to authentic input during thestudy.

All subjects took the TOEICand TEAI twice, in the beginning andat the end of the semester. For the

194

TOEIC, the subjects were given 45minutes to answer the 100 listeningquestions. For the TEAL, the subjectsread the questions before they listenedto each news passage. Subjects weretold prior to each question that the fol-lowing section would be about a cer-tain question and stopped the tape-recorder for each question. The sub-jects heard the passage for each ques-tion twice, and were allowed about 15seconds to answer each question. Thetest took about 20 minutes.

Data AnalysisThe author analyzed the inter-

view data according to the followingprocedure: 1) transcribing the inter-views, 2) coding the transcripts, and 3)constructing the results. First, the au-thor transcribed the interview tapes.Next, the author began the codingprocess, which assisted in transform-ing the raw interview data into aggre-gated, meaningful units (Coffey & At-kinson, 1996). The transcripts wereinitially coded based on the questionsfrom the interview guide. Scrutinizingeach transcript, however, the authorwas able to identify common themesand patterns. Each interviewee wasassigned a unique number from 1 to26, and this number, along with theapplicable code, was listed in a codingmatrix. This procedure enabled theauthor to note which codes were evi-dent within each interview, and whenseveral interviewees discussed similarissues or concerns within any giventheme. From this procedure, a codematrix, that is a list of common codesand themes, was constructed.

In the process of constructingthe results, the author attempted toestablish trustworthiness by engagingin the following two techniques: 1)triangulation and 2) negative caseanalysis. Triangulation of multiplesources is a crucial technique em-ployed by a researcher to establishtrustworthiness and enhance thecredibility of the study (Lincoln &Guba, 1985). In order to triangulatethe data, the author examined multi-ple interview transcripts for commoncodes, themes, and patterns. This in-formation was compiled by code. Thecode matrix served at a quick glanceas a means to identify the recurrentpatterns among the interviews byshowing whether a code was evidentin one, some, or all of the interviews.Therefore, the code matrix assisted theauthor in examining the results be-cause it delineated triangulatedthemes as well as codes supported byonly one individual.

The author also used negativecase analysis in order to providetrustworthiness in interpreting resultsof this study (Lincoln & Guba, 1985).The author carefully and critically ex-amined the transcripts for examplesthat were contradictory; these inci-dents are discussed in the results (be-low). Thus, this study attempted toreport both the majority and the mi-nority points of view, noting areas ofconflict as well as consensus.

RESULTSThe interview data was ana-

lyzed and grouped into three themes,according to common characteristics:1) general English learning, 2) atti-


tudes toward authentic input, and 3)suggestions regarding instruction.Each theme contains its own sub-themes as listed in Table 1. Each sub-theme will be discussed using quoteswhen appropriate in the followingsections. Many of the characteristicswere triangulated by a number of theparticipants, and in several cases byall interviewees.

Theme 1: General English LearningThis section provides general

information about the subjects' Eng-lish learning. Most subjects reportedthat they began their English studieseither in the first grade of middleschool or a year before entering mid-dle school. The purpose for studyingEnglish was diverse across subjects;however, career preparation was adominant motivation. Most subjectsreported the critical role of Englishproficiency in their careers. One stu-dent pointed out, "English is an essen-tial part of the examination for everyjob opening. I think 90% of any job ex-amination includes English" (#1: 49;here and in all other notations, thefirst number refers to the intervieweeand the second number refers to theline(s) from the transcript of the inter-view).

By contrast, several studentswhose future careers did not mandateEnglish proficiency displayed a lack ofmotivation to study English (#20 and#22). For example, English was an op-tional subject for students majoring inLaw. According to these students, theywere allowed to choose any foreign lan-guage for their required test. They men-tioned that English was an attractive

195

194 Texas Papers in Foreign Language Educcition

TABLE 1DESCRIPTIONS OF SUB-THEMES OF MAJOR THEMES

MajorThemes

Abbrevia-tion Of

Sub-Themes

Description Of Sub-Themes

General Eng-lish Learning

GEL 1 The purposes for studying English and the impor-tance of English in one's career

GEL 2 Areas of confidence and lack of confidence inlearning English

GEL 3 Difficulties in listening comprehensionGEL 4 The important areas in learning EnglishGEL 5 Methods of learning English prior to the semesterGEL 6 Levels of satisfaction with previous English educa-

tionAttitudestoward Au-thentic Input

AAI 1 Experiences with listening to authentic input priorto the semester

AAI 2 Listening to authentic input in the presentAAI 3 Comprehension level of authentic inputAAI 4 Comparisons of authentic input and general in-

structional input in terms of the levels of difficul-ties

AAI 5 Feelings about listening to the AP newscast in thepretest

AAI 6 Feelings about listening to the AP newscast in thepresent

AAI 7 Comparison of authentic input and general in-structional input in terms of their benefits in learn-ing English

AAI 8 Future plan about listening to authentic inputSuggestions S Suggestions for better English education

196

language to most applicants for a legalposition; however, the level of theEnglish test was extremely high com-pared to that of other foreign lan-guage tests such as those for French,Spanish, or German. Therefore, thoseforeign languages were preferred forlater testing instead of English (#20:17-23; #22: 25-30).

The results also showed thatreading comprehension was the areaof greatest confidence, whereas listen-ing and speaking were the most vul7nerable areas in English learning (#1,2, 3, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 22,and 26). DifficultieS in listening com-prehension included the rapidity ofEnglish utterances (#11, 13, 14, 15, 16,17, and 25); the flap phenomenon inEnglish utterances (#15 and 16); andthe unfamiliarity of words in Englishutterances (#12 and 15). Several stu-dents also mentioned that they felt lis-tening comprehension to be very dif-ficult because what they had learnedor knew about English pronunciationwas so different from English spokenin real situations (#2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, and13).

For instance, students in theexperimental group reported the fol-lowing: "I realized that the pronuncia-tion in the AP newscasts is differentfrom what I know" (#6: 119). "I doubtif English cassette tapes sold in storescontain real English native speakers'voices. . . . When I listened to thosekinds of tapes and met native speak-ers of English, I found that there arehuge differences between Englishfrom the two sources....General listen-ing input in cassette tapes seems to be


easy to understand, but the AP news-casts or CNN is too difficult for me. Itseems to be too fast. I rarely catchwords" (#4: 95-106).

The majority of students inter-viewed believed that listening andspeaking are more important thanreading and writing in foreign lan-guage learning (#1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10,14, 17, 18, 21, 23, 24, and 26). Duringtheir middle and high school days,reading comprehension and grammaranalysis tended to be the main foci inEnglish lessons, whereas developingCommunication skills was overlooked(# 1, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16,17, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, and 25). Accord-ing to the subjects, English teachersspent a great deal of time analyzingthe contents of texts and explaininggrammar in their classes. That direc-tion of English instruction reflects anemphasis on reading comprehensionand grammar analysis in the Englishtest for college admissions in Korea(#3: 91-92; #5: 47; #6: 84-85; #7: 97; 16:95-86; # 17: 78-79; #24: 55-59). How-ever, most students (except # 12 and24) showed dissatisfaction or regretwith their English learning duringtheir middle or high school days. Forexample, one student indicated, "Inretrospect, I am not satisfied with theway I learned English in middle andhigh school days. However, we hadno choice at that time. We just had tofollow the teacher's direction. Wewere very passive" (# 21: 90-91).

Theme 2: Attitudes Toward Authen-tic Input

q


The Associated Press (AP)newscasts provided by the AmericanForces Korean Network (AFKN) areaccessible to most Koreans, dependingwhere they are living. The interviewdata indicated that more than half ofthe subjects (16 out of 26 students)had previous exposure to authenticinput prior to the semester; however,the total amount of the exposure wasextremely small. Several students re-ported that listening occasions lastedjust a few seconds while they changedchannels (#2: 115; #4: 123; #6: 115-121,#12: 151-153; #26: 119). Additionally,some students watched or listened toauthentic input for fun without un-derstanding it (#1, 3, 13, 19, 21, 24,and 25). Among this group, two stu-dents obviously showed that they didnot attempt to understand what theyheard. "I just watched it without pay-ing attention" (#3: 113) "When I wasbored, I just watched it without pay-ing any attention" ( #13:162).

The interview data revealedthat most students were not confidentin comprehending authentic input;moreover, the level of authentic inputcomprehension was influenced bytheir background knowledge. A num-ber of students reported that if theywere provided visuals, they couldconnect what they knew to incomingmessages (#3, 8, 13, 14, 19, 21, 25, and26). For this reason, listening to theradio was a more difficult task forthem than watching TV. Severalcomments included: "If I know some-thing about the content of the news-cast, I might understand around 30%of the newscast, whereas if I don'tknow the issue, I might understand

only 10% of the newscast" (#3: 125-127) "Frankly speaking, I understandEnglish broadcasts more on screenthan from the sound alone" (#8: 103)."Radio seems to be more difficult thanTV. With TV visuals, it is easier to un-derstand" (#14: 165).

Authentic input also seemed tobe too difficult for a majority of thestudents (23 out of 26 students) to un-derstand, compared to graded input.The biggest difficulty in understand-ing authentic input was the fast speak-ing rate (#4, 7, 11, 13, 14, 15, 17, and25), followed by unclear articulation(#2, 7, and 15), lack of word knowl-edge (#4), and lack of proper back-ground knowledge on the listeningtext (#5). Examples of comments are:"I think the AP newscasts are muchharder than the TOEIC.... Words inthe AP newscasts are Greek to me,and the speed of the AP newscasts istoo fast for me" (#4: 131). "The tone ofvoice in the AP newscasts change sorapidly" ( #2:127).

Several students reported thatgeneral English learning materials likethe TOEIC are graded and edited fornonnative speakers of English (#1, 7,19, and 22). Thus, these materials areeasy for them to understand. Accord-ing to these students, the TOEIC has acertain format. Therefore, test takerscan become accustomed to the testwith practice. The AP newscasts,however, always provide somethingdifferent, challenging one's listeningskills. Several students' commentssuggested these aspects: "Tests suchas the TOEIC has (sic) a certain for-mat, so our scores on the TOEIC willbe conspicuously increased if we

19S

study it for several months, accordingto my senior friend" (#1: 178-179)."There was one thing that I definitelyrealized while I took the TOEIC. Na-tive speakers of English seemed tospeak in abnormal speed during thetest in order to let students listen well.However, when I listened to the APnewscasts, I felt that I was listening toreal English" (#22: 150-152).

The majority of the studentsreported that they were frustrated orembarrassed when they took the pre-test of the TEAI (except #15, 17, and26). This attitude was expressed as fol-lows: "I am at a loss" (#2: 134)."Frankly speaking, I was shockedwhen I took the test the first time. Ithink everybody felt the same. It's toofast....I was really embarrassed" (#3:133-136). "I thought, 'How can I un-derstand this kind of thing....' It's kindof frustrating" (#6: 143). "I felt that Iwas the worst" (#18: 134).

The question of one's feelingsabout listening to the AP newscast atthe end of semester was appropriateonly for the students in the experi-mental group. Seven out of nine stu-dents in this group reported somekind of positive aspects from thetreatment. First, in psychologicalterms, their frustration or embarrass-ment with authentic input seemed todiminish during the treatment. Twostudents reported that their sense ofawkwardness when hearing authenticinput seemed less than earlier in thesemester (#2: 141; #9: 151). Other stu-dents revealed changes in their atti-tudes as well. "I was less frustratedand embarrassed when I took the sec-ond test than the first test" (#3: 146-


147). "I cannot say that I am perfectlyaccustomed to that kind of news, but Iam a little more accustomed to thoseinput" (#7: 169-171).

Second, their comprehensionseemed to improve over the semester.Several students mentioned this. "Myknowledge of English words becamebetter....I can understand some part ofthe news now" (#5: 161-163). "I thinkmy listening comprehension for au-thentic input has improved" (#6: 147)."I just got about two words at first,but I got five or six words later" (#7:161). Finally, they seemed to note thevalue of authentic input in their Eng-lish learning. Several students com-mented on this: "I felt the necessity ofstudying authentic input much duringthe semester. . . . I feel I need to studyauthentic input" (#2: 143-148). "Thesedays, I try to concentrate more on lis-tening to authentic input" (#6: 151).One student reported that the TOEICseemed to have become much slowerlistening input to him over the treat-ment period. Because he was accus-tomed to listening to rapid speech, ason the AP newscasts, he became morecomfortable when he took the TOEICtest later (#8: 140-149).

On the other hand, one studentreported that there was no change inhis attitude toward authentic inputbetween the pre- and post-test (#1:196). In addition, several studentssuggested that although they learnedmany words, they still had difficultyunderstanding authentic input (#1:200; #5: 161; #7: 163-164).

Sixteen out of 26 students fromthe two universities thought thatstudying authentic input would be

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more conducive to the improvementof their English learning. The reasonfor this belief was that they involveddiverse topics that rouse the subjects'interest and motivation to listen. Theypointed out the merits of using au-thentic input in English learning incomments such as these: "Authenticinput such as the AP newscasts will bemore beneficial for us .... It's realhappenings....The TOEIC is too mo-notonous. Though the TOEIC is easyto understand, it will be not be as use-ful as the AP newscasts in the future"(#2: 150-157). "In my opinion, thoughauthentic input is difficult to compre-hend, they are interesting and moti-vating because they talk about currentissues" (#3: 150-151). One student of-fered a metaphor to compare authen-tic input and a graded textbook as fol-lows: "I want to describe the gradedtextbook as a dictionary that has onlyA, B, and C. But authentic material is adictionary that contains A to Z" (#23:231-232).

Several students, however, hadnegative attitudes toward the use ofauthentic input in the classroom. "Thespeed of the AP newscasts is too fastfor beginners, I think. . . . Nobody canunderstand them" (#1: 204-210). "Formotivation, I think the TOEIC is betterbecause it is more familiar to me"(#11: 165). "The AP newscasts weretoo difficult, to tell the truth" (#17:168).

Some students proposed acombination of both authentic andstructured materials. "In my opinion,if you combine those two, studentswould like it" (#3: 154). "Both materi-als are good" (# 4: 162). Two students

revealed that they think the TOEIC isbetter as an instructional tool, whilethe newscasts are better for generatingstudents' motivation (#7: 176, 190,203-206; #8: 153-154). Conversely, onestudent thought that studying theTOEIC was more interesting, but thatthe AP newscasts would be more ef-fective for improving the individual'sEnglish proficiency (#9: 158-159). Astudent also confessed that she couldnot prefer one over the other becauseshe thought that the TOEIC would bebetter for beginners and the AP news-casts would be better for advancedlearners (#15: 158-159).

Instruction with a good balanceof the two types of input was re-garded as a desirable approach to fa-cilitate students' English learning; thatis, excessive use of authentic inputwould be detrimental to students'English learning. One student sug-gested the following: "In my opinion,if a teacher uses the authentic inputsometimes, it will prompt students'motivation. But if the teacher alwaysuses the input, it would yield adverseeffects for the students" (# 17: 172-173).

Theme 3: SuggestionsFinally, subjects in this study

were allowed to comment on anythemes they previously had discussedin their interviews. The data offer sev-eral suggestions for English foreignlanguage education in Korea. First, thesubjects maintained that there was adire need for fundamental reform inEnglish education (#2, 3, 7, 8, 14, 16,18, and 24). According to them, theirEnglish education during middle and

high school days mainly emphasizedreading comprehension and grammaranalysis. These subjects regretted thatthey had received insufficient instruc-tion in listening and speaking duringthat period.

One student's comments areespecially notable because he de-scribed how listening comprehensionactivities were converted to readingcomprehension activities. Accordingto him, although English classes forlistening comprehension were allottedto students in high school, the classeswere supplemented with readingcomprehension activities. The Englishteachers in high school spent theirtime more in analyzing sentences orgrammar of listening materials in-stead of letting the students hearthem. The English teachers assumedthat the written form would not onlybe easy for them to deal with, but alsoeasy for their students to study. Thestudent, however, strongly disagreedthat this kind of transfer would occur(#24:198-203).

Second, many subjects sug-gested that English teachers shouldtry to make English class interestingand lead the class in the practical useof English (#4, 5, 6, 12, and 13). Ac-cording to them, English lessonsshould stimulate their interest. If not,they will become exhausted easily (#4,5, and 13). Teachers should introduceintriguing materials into class (#15)and provide students with the oppor-tunities to "use the English of dailylife as much as they can" (#16).

Finally, they proposed thatstudents should listen to authentic in-put in order to improve their English


listening proficiency. One studentstated that English teachers in Koreaseemed to be somewhat careless abouttheir English pronunciation or accentbecause they seldom speak English intheir classes (#10: 239-241). Therefore,for students, there was a lack of ex-perience with listening to English.This subject further maintained thather English teachers' pronunciationwas much different from that of na-tive speakers of English. Other stu-dents commented as follows: "I thinkthat textbooks for listening compre-hension in college are too easy for us. Iwant to ask the teachers to raise thedifficulty level of the textbooks in or-der to comprehend authentic inputsuch as the AP newscasts" (#18: 196-197). "I think one should become ac-customed to the speed of nativespeakers of English. We have becometoo accustomed to the edited speed"(#22: 207-208).

DISCUSSIONThe qualitative approach ap-

plied in this study is intended to in-form a better understanding of theseindividuals, taking into account therelevant context of their learning. Asummary and discussion of this ap-proach to the research follows.

The results showed that Koreanuniversity students were generallyhighly motivated to study English,largely because of their future careers.They had more confidence in readingthan in listening and speaking becausegreat emphasis had been placed onreading comprehension and grammarin their previous English courses.Their difficulties in listening compre-

2 0


hension included the rapidity ofspeech, the flap phenomenon, the lackof background knowledge, and theunfamiliarity of words in English pas-sages. They perceived that their listen-ing and speaking skills were theirweakest areas in their English learn-ing, and they attributed their weak-ness in those skills to the impractical-ity of the English they had learnedduring their middle and high schooldays.

Although many subjects hadbeen exposed previously to authenticinput, the length of exposure was verylimited. In addition,, most experienceswith authentic input were generallyfor entertainment, without any at-tempts to understand the material.Most students regarded authentic in-put as very difficult, so that they werenot confident at all in understandingthe input. Because they had seldombeen exposed to authentic input andthey had no experience with tests thatused authentic input, most studentsexpressed their embarrassment orfrustration in their performance on thepretest of the TEAI. However, the ma-jority of students in the experimentalgroup reported that their affectivestate had improved on the posttest ofthe TEAI. In addition, they thoughttheir comprehension of the authenticinput had improved as well, althoughthey still thought that comprehendingauthentic input was a very difficulttask.

There were conflicting re-sponses pertaining to the benefits ofauthentic input in English learning.More than half of the students re-ported that authentic input would be

conducive to gains in English profi-ciency in the long run. In particular, anumber of students felt that the use ofauthentic input generated motivationand interest. Several other students,however, opposed incorporating au-thentic input into the English class-room because they thought it was sodifficult that it would discourage stu-dents or jade their interest in English.

Most students' suggestions forEnglish education in Korea pertainedto the need to shift from emphasizingreading comprehension and grammarto listening and speaking. They alsosuggested that more intriguing mate-rials and practical teaching methodsshould be employed in order to facili-tate their English learning. Finally,they felt that they should listen to au-thentic input to improve their Englishproficiency substantially.

Like most qualitative ap-proaches, the present qualitativestudy involved some limitations ondata collection and data analysis.Thus, one should be cautious in inter-preting the results. One concern is thatthe subjects in this study may nothave reported their disposition to-ward authentic input accurately to theauthor. According to Bacon (1992a), inusing interview data, there is alwaysthe danger that subjects will respondin the manner that they think the re-searcher expects. The author's dualroles as an instructor and an inter-viewer might also have influenced thestudents' inaccurate responses if any.Despite this limitation, this qualitativestudy permitted a deeper insight intostudents' general English learning andattitudes toward authentic input. In

0202/

addition, it drew productive sugges-tions from students for better Englisheducation in Korea.

CONCLUSIONThe present study has under-

taken a more in-depth look at KoreanEFL university students' attitudes to-ward authentic input and to examinetheir changes in attitude and profi-ciency after instruction using authen-tic input in EFL classrooms. Results ofthe study showed that the majority ofstudents in the experimental groupreported that their attitudes towardauthentic input were changed posi-tively, and they believed that theirEnglish proficiency improved over thesemester. Therefore, the use of au-thentic input should be conducive tothe eventual improvement of foreignlanguage learners' language profi-ciency. In addition, authentic inputappears to be a factor in creating anoptimal affective state for foreign lan-guage learners. The contents of au-thentic input usually involve currentand intriguing topics that may arousestudents' interest. Thus, foreign lan-guage learners will be released from aself-conscious and stressful situationby learning this kind of input. Au-thentic input may also play an impor-tant role in developing foreign lan-guage learners' positive attitudes to-ward foreign language learning sothat they will practice language skillsto enhance their language proficiencyoutside as well as inside class.

In conclusion, although someforeign/ second language theoristsstill question the use of authentic in-put in L2 classrooms (Ur, 1984; Vande


Berg, 1993), the results of this studysupport the positive aspects of usingauthentic input in the foreign lan-guage classroom. Therefore, foreignlanguage teachers should consider us-ing authentic input in order to im-prove their students' foreign languageproficiency. Finally, in order to drawsolid conclusions on this issue, furtherempirical studies are needed, espe-cially in those contexts where little re-search has been done.

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Bacon, S. (1992a). Authentic listeningin Spanish. How learners adjusttheir strategies to the difficultyof the input. Hispania, 75, 398-411.

Bacon, S. (1992b). Phases of listeningto authentic input in Spanish: Adescriptive study. Foreign Lan-guage Annals, 25, 317-333.

Bacon, S., & Finnemann, M. (1990). Astudy of attitudes, motives, andstrategies of university foreignlanguage and their dispositionto authentic oral and writteninput. Modern Language Journal,74, 459-473.

Bragger, J. (1985). Materials develop-ment for the proficiency-oriented classroom. In J.

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Chaudron, C., & Richards, J. (1986).The effect of discourse markerson the comprehension of lec-tures. Applied Linguistics, 7, 113-127.

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Coffey, A., & Atkinson, P. (1996). Mak-ing sense of qualitative data.Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Pub-lications.

Derwing, T. (1989). Information typeand its relation to nonnativespeaker comprehension. Lan-guage Learning, 39, 157-172.

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Garza, T. (1990). What you see is whatyou get... Or is it? Bring cul-tural literacy into the foreignlanguage classroom throughvideo. In J. Alatis (Ed.), George-town University round table onlanguages and linguistics 1990:Linguistics, language teaching,and language acquisition: The in-ter-dependence of theory, practice,and research (pp. 285-292).Washington, DC: GeorgetownUniversity Press.

Glisan, E. (1988). A plan for teachinglistening comprehension: Ad-aptation of an instructional

reading model. Foreign Lan-guage Annals, 21, 9-19.

Herron, C., & Seay, I. (1991). The ef-fects of authentic oral texts onstudent listening comprehen-sion in the foreign languageclassroom. Foreign LanguageAnnals, 24, 487-495.

Jacobs, G., Chuawanlee, W., Itoga, B.,Sakumoto, D., Saka, S., Mehan,K. (1988). The effect of pausing onlistening comprehension. Paper,Second Language Research Fo-rum, Honolulu, HI, March.

Kelch, K. (1985). Modified input as anaid to comprehension. Studiesin Second Language Acquisition,7, 81-89.

Krashen, S. (1981). Second language ac-quisition and second languagelearning. Oxford: Pergamon.

Lee, W. (1995). Authenticity revisited:Text authenticity and learnerauthenticity. ELT Journal, 49,323-328.

Lincoln, Y., & Guba, E. (1985). Natural-istic inquiry. Newbury Park,CA: Sage Publications.

Omaggio, A. (1993). Teaching languagein context (2nd ed.). Boston,MA: Heinle & Heinle.

Oxford, R. (1993). Research update onteaching L2 listening. System,21, 205-211.

Secules, T., Herron, C., & Tomasello,M. (1992). The effect of videocontext on foreign languagelearning. Modern LanguageJournal, 76, 480-490.

Ur, P. (1984). Teaching listening compre-hension. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.

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Vande Berg, C. (1993). Turning downthe fire hose: Some techniquesfor using SCOLA broadcasts atthe intermediate level. FrenchReview, 66, 769-776.

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APPENDIXINTERVIEW GUIDE

Warm-up QuestionsCould you introduce yourself?What is your major?How do you like your program?What are your future plans?

Questions concerning General English LearningHow long have you studied English?What is your main reason that for studying English?What do you perceive to be your strengths and weaknesses in the study of

English?What do you perceive to be your difficulties in listening comprehension?Which language skills do you think are the most important and the least

important?In what ways did you study English before you entered college?Were you satisfied with your English learning in classes before this semester?

If you weren't, please tell me the reason.How do you study English today?

Questions concerning Authentic InputDo you have access to the AFKN (American Forces Korean Network) or

Hong Kong Star TV programs at home?Have you ever listened to those programs before? If you have, how long have

you listened to them?Have you ever attempted to listen to those programs intending to study Eng-

lish before?Do you listen to those programs these days? If you do, how long do you listen

to them?How much of those programs do you understand?What do you think the level of difficulties of those input (AFKN or Hong

Kong Star TV programs) compared to other traditional listening materials,such as English conversation cassette tapes, the TOEFL, or TOEIC?

What was your emotional state when you took the pretest of the TEAT? Did

you feel that the test was too difficult, or did you feel any depressionwhile taking the test? How did you feel about your comprehension of the

TEAI?How was your emotional state when taking the pretest different from your

emotional state when taking the posttest of the TEAI? How did you feelabout your comprehension of the input?

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What do you think about learning English through newscasts in class? Whatdo you perceive as the strengths and weaknesses of learning Englishthrough the use of those input? Which inputnewscasts or traditionalsourcesdo you think are more conducive to improving one's ultimate orsubstantial English proficiency?

Do you have a plan to listen to newscasts in the future?

Closing QuestionsAre there any other important issues that have not been addressed but you

would like to discuss? Tell me if you have any.Is it okay to e-mail you or contact you if I have any additional questions or

need to clarify your responses?

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An Exploration of Pre-Service Teacher Perceptions of SecondLanguage Learners in the Mainstream Classroom

SHERRY MARX, The University of Texas at Austin

This qualitative study explores the perceptions of a group of White and Hispanicpre-service teachers toward the English language learners they tutored over thecourse of a semester. Nine White participants and five Hispanic participants wereinterviewed. Comparisons of interview data reveal that White participants andHispanic participants chose to identify with their tutees in different ways, had dif-fering expectations for their tutees, and offered different suggestions for interven-tion on behalf of their tutees. The bilingualism and life experiences of Hispanicparticipants enabled them to assess and work with the language and academicskills of their tutees more effectively than their White, monolingual, "monocul-tural" counterparts. The impacts of life experience and university training arediscussed in this paper.

INTRODUCTIONWhile the student population of American schools becomes more multi-

cultural, the faces of American teachers become more homogeneous. Indeed, aswe enter the 21st century, it is estimated that nearly 90% of the teacher. workforceis White [1], while more than 42% of the public school population is made up ofpeople of color (Delpit, 1995; Ladson-Billings, 1999; Lara, 1994). Included amongthis growing number of children of color is the growing population of Englishlanguage learners. In 1991, for example, 2.3 million K12 students were classifiedas English as a second language (ESL) students (Clair, 1995). In the year 2000, it isestimated that the "ESL student population will be increasing at two and a halftimes the rate of the general student population" (U.S. Congressional Record, 1989,as cited by Clair, 1995, p. 189).

Because these numbers were generated more than a decade ago, it is likelythat they under-represent the size and growth rate of the current ESL population.All of these numbers the number of students of color, the number of ESL stu-dents, and the number of White teachers have continued to increase steadily(Clair, 1997; Delpit, 1995; Ladson-Billings, 1999). Teacher preparation programsreflect this discrepancy between students and teachers, as White women makeup the majority of teacher education students (Ladson-Billings, 1999). Indeed, asa Teaching Assistant (TA) and Assistant Instructor (AI) in the Education De-partment of a large university, I have found myself working almost exclusivelywith idealistic young White women.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEMThe fact that nearly 90 percent of the teacher population is White may not initially

appear to be a problem in education today. Some White teachers, of

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course, are able to reach children of colorin loving and exemplary ways (see Lad-son-Billings, 1995). However, many otherWhite teachers believe that they are meet-ing the needs of their students of color,when, in fact, they are not (see Spindler &Spindler, 1989 and Shultz, 1997 for excel-lent examples of this phenomenon). Oth-ers honestly express that, despite theirlove for their students and their desires tobecome highly effective teachers, theynever really know how well they arereaching their children of color (see Paley,1979).

A White teacher's membershipin the dominant American cultureadds another layer of complexity tothis picture because most White peo-ple tend to view themselves and theirexperiences as "normal" and "neu-tral," rather than as affected by race(Alba, 1990; Chennault 1998; Franken-berg, 1993; Hartigan, 1999; McIntosh,1988). Moreover, the literature onteacher beliefs about themselves andtheir students indicates that teacherbeliefs are long held and exceedinglytenacious. A teacher education stu-dent's own school experience, hercommunity, and her family life allwork to construct these beliefs over alifetime (Butt, Raymond, & Town-send, 1990; Doyle, 1997; Lortie, 1975;Paine, 1989). Brown, Collins, andDuguid (1989, as cited in Tiezzi &Cross, 1997), add that beliefs aboutwhat makes for a good teacher arehighly context specific and personal.That is, the schools a teacher attendedas a child and the teachers she lovedmay remain her favored models forsuccessful education no matter whereand whom she ends up teaching.

Thus, a teacher from an all-White suburban or rural school maynot know how to adjust her expecta-tions and beliefs when she is placed ina school district where the cultural,racial, economic, and language con-texts of the students are quite differentfrom those she experienced growingup (Tiezzi & Cross, 1997). With theunderstanding that the White experi-ence is generally considered normal inthe United States, the problems thatcan emerge because 90 percent ofteachers are White and nearly 50 per-cent of their students are not Whitebegin to materialize.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDYThe purpose of the study was

to explore the beliefs, attitudes, andperceptions a group of White teachereducation students held regarding theESL students they tutored over thecourse of one semester. The class inwhich they were enrolled, SecondLanguage Acquisition, was a courserequired of elementary education ma-jors who had not taken a foreign lan-guage. At the time of this study, I wasthe TA for this course. Each semester,the professor and I arranged for ourstudents to tutor in local schools withlarge ESL populations. However, wedid not require any reflective assign-ments from our students concerningthis experience and we rarely talkedabout tutoring during class time. Con-sequently, I became concerned thatstudents might be having rewardingexperiences the class was not tappinginto, and even more concerned thatstudents might be having negative

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Teacher Perceptions of Language Learners 209

experiences that may have reinforcedany stereotypes and prejudices theyfelt (an issue raised by Haberman andPost, 1992). Thus, I conducted thisstudy to find out just what the stu-dents were making of the tutoring ex-perience and how the professor and Icould improve the field assignment.

LIMITATIONSBecause of its exploratory na-

ture, this study has certain limitations.First, the study involves relative fewparticipants. The reason for this is thatmy priority in purposive samplingwas quality rather than quantity. In-stead of canvassing a large populationfor cursory opinions, I turned to asmall number of highly motivatedvolunteers who were eager to discusstheir experience in depth. My goalwas to "re-present" their experience intheir own words and stories (Abu-Lughold, 1991). Such richness andvividness of detail, I felt, would en-able the readers of this study to dis-cover parallels with their own experi-ence.

Second, for various reasons, theportraits that emerge in this study areuneven in amount of detail. One rea-son for this difference is that my rela-tionships with some participantsevolved differently from those withothers. Carol, for example, was sodedicated to the "volunteer experi-ence" that we met several times to talkabout her previous experiences and toshare advice. I therefore had time toget to know her better than most otherparticipants. Moreover, some partici-pants simply made a stronger impres-sion on me. Caro la and Elina, for ex-

ample, shared such interesting, reveal-ing stories that I met with each ofthem several times. On the otherhand, the interviews with Ginny, Ka-tie, and Irma were narrowly focused,and I met with each of them onlyonce. A third reason for the differencein detail is my experimentation withthe best format for data gathering. Ontwo occasions, I met with smallgroups of students; however, the dy-namics of these group discussions in-terfered with my getting to know theparticipants well, and I went back toindividual interviews.

The third limitation of this ex-ploratory study is that its methodol-ogy provides only two main tech-niques for ensuring internal validity(or "credibility," as preferred by Gubaand Lincoln, 1985). The first is pro-longed engagement. As the TA for theclass for several semesters, I had agood understanding of the class objec-tives and the general characteristics ofthe students. In addition, I got toknow the students during many in-class discussions and during the in-terviews. The second technique forensuring internal validity was feed-back from member checks. After eachinterview, I e-mailed the participant asummary of our conversation andasked for comments and corrections.All students approved these summa-ries with little or no corrections. Thesemeasures are good indicators ofcredibility, but the credibility couldhave been bolstered even more withtriangulation of methodology, datacollection, theory, or multiple analysts(Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Patton, 1990).For example, as compelling as the sto-

21 0


ries seem, they would have been morepowerful had I observed actual tutor-ing sessions and collected reflectivejournals from the participants. I won-der now how the White participantswould have reacted had the findingsof this study been shared with them.An analysis of their reactions to thefindings would have given readersand researchers alike insight into thedepth and tenaciousness of the beliefsthese young women expressed.

This paper is an initial explora-tion of the strongly held beliefs andprejudices many White teachers bringwith them into their relationshipswith second language learners ofcolor. The pain these beliefs andprejudices cause English languagelearners is certainly evident in the sto-ries shared by the Hispanic [2] par-ticipants. It is my hope that this studywill be seen as a first step towards abetter understanding of these preju-dices and the struggles and pain theycause in order to draw more attentionto the impact mainstream teachershave in the education of English lan-guage learners of color.

METHODOLOGYAt the beginning of the semes-

ter this study was conducted, I ap-pealed to the Second Language Ac-quisition class for participants whowould like to talk to me about theirtutoring experience. 14 students vol-unteered for this study, 13 of whomwere female. Nine of the females de-scribed themselves as White and 4 de-scribed themselves as Hispanic. Thelone male participant was Hispanic.All White participants were monolin-

21

gual and had never resided outsidethe United States. Moreover, all weremembers of the middle class. Four ofthe five Hispanic participants were ofMexican origin and had grown up inSpanish-speaking areas of Texas; allfour grew up speaking both Englishand Spanish with their families andfriends. The fifth Hispanic participantwas originally from Costa Rica, buthad moved to the United States as ateenager. Two of the Hispanic partici-pants had always resided in the mid-dle class, while the other 3 grew up aspart of the working or farming class.Participants ranged in age from 20 to45. All participants; except for two,tutored Spanish-speaking children.Most of these children were of Mexi-can descent.

Most interviews were tape-recorded, transcribed, and summa-rized. In the few instances where thetape recorder made a participantnervous, I took notes while we talked,and summarized them immediatelyafter our meetings (Foley, 1990, 1995).When all interviews with a participantwere complete, I e-mailed him or her asummary of our interview and askedfor comments, clarification, and cor-rections if necessary (Lather, 1986).

FINDINGSThrough our conversations, I

found that Hispanic and White par-ticipants had clear differences in theways they sought to identify withtheir tutees, the expectations theyformed for the futures of their tutees,and the suggestions they made for in-tervening on behalf of their tutees.


Ways of Identifying with Tutees forWhite Participants

Many participants brought upthe need to "break the ice" and "try tobond" with their tutees. They did thisby seeking to identify with their tuteeson some basic level. White partici-pants tried to identify with theirtutees through shared personalitytraits or experiences that they per-ceived as "normal" aspects of growingup. For example, Talia explained thatshe preferred to work with "kids whoresemble me;" particularly kids whowere shy, like her. Carol found a con-nection to the little girl she was tutor-ing in her "kindness" and "loving na-ture." Similarly, Ginny told me thatshe really liked one of her tutees be-cause "he's so considerate and nice."However, when I asked her "Do youever see yourself in this little boy," sheanswered with a firm "No."

In discussing how she tried torelate to her tutee, Irma illustratedhow difficult it could be for a middleclass, White, 27-year-old to relate toan impoverished child of color withlimited English proficiency. Irma em-phasized that the little girl was"really, really shy," a characteristicwith which she could not relate.Throughout our discussion, it wasclear that Irma could not identify withthe child through either personality orexperience. A segment from our inter-view richly illustrates Irma's frustra-tion:

Irma: And when I ask her what she didover the weekend, she didn't doanything. So, it's like . . . youknow that there's a mother, but I

Sherry(Inter-viewer):

Irma:

don't think that they have a TV.They don't-

Why do you think that?

Oh, I've asked her. When I triedto find out-you know, you try toget close to her-what did you dothis weekend? Nothing. Well, didyou watch something on TV? No,we don't have one. Well, did yougo to a movie? No. You know, soyou kind of get the picture.

Sherry: I wonder if you could ask herother things that don't requiremoney, like "What did you do?"

Irma: Well, I said, did you go to thepark? Uhm, she said no, that shestayed home and helped hermom clean. And so I said, well,you know, what else did you do.You know, I tried to prompt her,and she said, I read a book. Great,I said, what book was it? I don'tknow? Well, what was it about? Idon't know? [mimics valley girl-type intonation] So, uhm, yeah, soyou learn to ask the right things,especially. So I learned shedoesn't have a TV, they don't doanything. You know, or theydon't go out to the movies, youknow like the other boy does.You just kind of learn what toask. And it's just kind of sad be-cause you want to take her andgo do something with her. She'sreally sweet, but . . . .

Throughout her dialogue with L, Irmawas trying to find an interest pointthat she and L shared; however, shefocused only on activities that werefun for her: going to the park, watch-ing TV, and going to the movies. Irmadid not take into account cultural dif-

212BEST COPY AVAILABLE


ferences she and the child might havehad or differences in their life experi-ences; not everyone considers going tothe movies a typical aspect of child-hood. Instead, Irma concluded that Land her family did nothing and thatL's life was not as rich and full as herown. In order to help the girl, shewanted "to take her and go do some-thing with her."

Irma felt that L desperatelyneeded someone like herself, a nativeEnglish speaker, middle class, andWhite, to help her lead a "normal life"like that of "this other kid that I have.He's been going off to Sea World andhe's been dressing fine. Doing okay."In other words, this second child wasmuch more like Irma.

Ways of Identifying with Tutees forHispanic Participants

Rather than seeking to identifywith their tutees through shared per-sonality traits, Hispanic participantsidentified with the "struggles" theirtutees were going through in schooland in life. Thus, they found it veryeasy to relate to the life experiences oftheir tutees. Every Hispanic partici-pant told me that they "know howhard it is" to get through school whenone has limited English skills, comesfrom a marginalized culture, anddeals with discrimination. Caro la, forexample, was keenly aware of the dif-ficulties Hispanic students faced inschool. She told me she wanted to bean educator because, "Knowing mydeficiencies, knowing my difficultiesand struggles... struggling through,through society as a Hispanic womanis [sic] why I want to help other chil-

dren what [sic] have the same difficul-ties what [sic] I have."

Elina, too, identified with thestruggles of her tutees. One of hertutees, J, was immersed in an English-only kindergarten classroom althoughshe had very limited English skills.Halfway through the semester, J wastransferred to a bilingual classroomwhere she was no longer the onlychild who spoke Spanish. Elina hadthis to say about her experience andJ's:

I'm positive, now that I thinkback on like my childhood andmy school years, is that whatwas about to happen to J hap-pened to me. I mean, I'm liketotally convinced that thathappened . . . I remember be-ing in second grade and stillstruggling with reading which,you know, maybe if I had beenwhere I should have been, itwouldn't have been that toughfor me. Maybe I slippedthrough the cracks somehowtoo . . . . I know how tough it isto come into a school, youknow, and pick up anotherlanguage. I know all of that;I've been through it.

Similarly, Daniel shared howmuch it hurt him to see his tuteestruggling with schoolwork. "I saw iton his face," he said to me when heexplained the difficulties his tutee washaving. In order to help E get throughschool and go on to college, he ex-plained, "I personally want him tolearn English." English was the mostbasic skill that Daniel believed wouldlead E to a successful life.

3


Katie, a 23 year old from aTexas border town where both herparents were teachers, explained thatthe Hispanic child she worked with, S,was really smart and very good insome areas, but not so good in others.His math skills were strong, but hisEnglish skills were weak. She relatedher tutee's experiences to her ownwhen she explained,

What I learned is that it's reallyeasy uhm to - when I wasstraight out of high school I'vealways been like, you know, onthe honors track and what I re-alize is, that it's really easy tobe honors and not exactly be inan honors class. It's justwhether you do the work,whether you read, whetheryou keep up with everything,to be actually considered intel-ligent. Because it's like if Idon't read, then I can fail quiz-zes like that [snaps her fin-gers], you know. It's like easyto get an A or to just youknow, bomb something. [De-pends on whether you] takethe time or not.

Like Daniel, Elina, and Caro la,but unlike her White classmates, Katiepinned her tutee's troubles on his lan-guage skills, not his inability to learn,nor his deficient home life. Katie as-tutely recognized how important itwas to be considered intelligent by theteachers and counselors who directedthe "honors" children toward collegeand the "regular" children towardwork. She knew that she had to actu-ally be in the honors classes and rec-ognized by her teachers in order touse the teachers and counselors to her

own advantage. In this way, she knewhow to avoid being thought of by herteachers in terms of deficits.

White Participant Expectations ofTutees

When I asked Carol what kindof future she envisioned for A, shesaid she "hopes for the best," but thenabruptly changed the topic. Rockingback and forth in the chair across frommine, she averted her eyes and saidpositive things about A's teachers andthe school neighborhood. After someanalysis of the administrative end,Carol slumped in her chair, stoppedrocking, and pointedly stated that shewas "avoiding the question of whatthe future holds." As she finally dis-cussed the question, her voice gotvery quiet. Finally, she looked mestraight in the eye and said, "I don'twant to have doubts." A proudly lib-eral, idealistic young woman, it visi-bly hurt her to believe that not every-one could become successful. Withgreat sadness, she said that A's read-ing level was so low, she might nevercatch up to her English-speakingpeers. With a sigh, she added, "Shedoesn't even have glasses." By the endof this conversation, Carol had sunkdown into her chair, her body asdrawn and depressed as her thoughts.Her student, little A, was in the sec-ond grade at the time of her analysis.

Similarly, in discussing hertutee's future, Irma explained that,

214

I could picture someone like[L] dropping out of school . . .

because, you know, if youaren't trying hard enough oryou're not succeeding, if they


hold you back a year, you'regoing to feel really bad. . . . Idon't know, if she doesn't getthe help she needs, I don't seeher going to school that muchlonger.

Through her words, it is apparent thatIrma did see some structural influ-ences on L's predicament (i.e., "if theyhold you back..."). However, she alsoblamed the child for not trying hardenough and being overwhelmed byher inability to succeed. With this as-sessment, she was at a loss to see howL would one day succeed. Like Carol,Irma appeared to feel guilty about herassessment of her tutee. During ourinterview, she pulled herself into herchair and drew away from me as shewhispered what she seemed to feelwere terrible confessions. These futureteachers, nearly all of who openly dis-cussed the importance of having highexpectations for all children in class,did not know what to make of theselow expectations. One eventual as-sessment a few of them offered wasthat their own ideas of success andachievement must be very differentfrom those of their students'.

Ginny was a case in point.When I asked her what kind of futureshe saw unfolding for the child shewas working with, she said,

I worry - I don't know. Mystandards are so different. Mystandards are so different fromother people's standards and Ican't try to impose mine onhim, but, uhm, like he - he justseems so, you know how peo-ple just sort of follow in theways of their parents? Naïve ina sense. I think he's real naive.

She explained that his naivete musthave come from his father, who wasfrom Mexico. His father did not puthis money in the bank because hefeared that someone might steal it.Ginny, who worked in a bank part-time, saw this naiveté as a weaknessthat could not be overcome by thechild. Even though she had talked atlength about how "smart" A was,Ginny expressed that he was too un-knowledgeable about the world to"make it."

Over the course of the semes-ter, Carol updated me weekly on herwork with A. One day toward the endof the semester, she happily told methat one of the teachers at A's schoolhad found a pair of glasses for A. Afew weeks later, she pulled me asideto let me know that for her final paperon her tutoring experience she wasgoing to write about how her idea ofsuccess and A's were completely dif-ferent. The notion that A could reachsome kind of success, such as havingchildren or becoming a devoted wife,gave her peace. Still wearing a some-what guilty look, this notion neverthe-less buoyed her.

Of all the White participants Iinterviewed, only two expressed be-liefs that their tutees could go to col-lege and succeed to the degree they,themselves, had. One of these partici-pants was Veronica. Veronica tutoreda Chinese boy whose parents had cho-sen to immerse him in a school withno language support services. Veron-ica admired this child's ability to learnEnglish and assimilate into Americanculture rapidly; she professed to have

215

leacher Perceptions of Language Learners 215

no worries regarding his future. Theonly other White participant who hadhigh hopes for her students was Talia,who worked with nine Trinidadiansiblings. Only later, when I was com-piling the data for this paper, did I re-alize Talia's students were not Englishlanguage learners. They all spokeTrinidad's official language, English,and were concentrating more on refin-ing their accents and adjusting toAmerican culture, not acquiring a sec-ond language. Consequently, none ofthe White participants who tutoredSpanish-speaking children of LatinAmerican descent believed the chil-dren would be successful by their ownstandards. The White participants, allof who were monolingual and mono-cultural in that they had never lived ina culture other than the US (Fuller,1994), had trouble setting high expec-tations for their Hispanic tutees. Theirtutees' lack of English proficiencycoupled with their non-mainstreamAmerican cultures confused the Whiteparticipants. Moreover, Hispanictutees were generally very poor, andtheir families were rarely actively as-similating into mainstream culture. Inher study, Sleeter (1993) found thatWhite teachers resented a student'slack of assimilation. While I did notgather a feeling of resentment amongmy participants, I certainly discerneda sense of bewilderment coupled withpity for the children they believedwould not be living the AmericanDream.

Hispanic Participant Expectations ofTutees

Hispanic participants had notrouble separating language skill andcultural knowledge from a child'sability to succeed in school. Moreover,all Hispanic participants expressedthe expectations that their tutees couldsucceed at the same levels they had.Compared to their White counter-parts, Hispanic participants had amore sophisticated understanding ofwhat it took to acquire this kind ofsuccess. For example, Katie had this tosay about the little boy she tutored,

I'm sure he'll make it. I justwonder how long it's going totake him to catch up to level.Because, uhm, he seems likehe's putting effort. He's notthere like ah he doesn't want todo his work. No he finishes, it'sjust that it's all in Spanish andthe majority of the class is all inEnglish.

I see success as goingto college so he can have a joband make a living, you know.'Cause now, they pretty muchhave to go to college to get ajob.

Her insight that the child's developingEnglish ability was influencing hisgrade level achievement put every-thing else into perspective for Katie.Her own Spanish fluency enabled herto see that he was performing at ahigh level in Spanish; thus, she wasconfident in his intellectual ability.Knowing that his first language skillswould eventually transfer to his sec-ond language (Collier, 1995), Katiewas not worried that her tutee wouldbe below grade level for long.

Similarly, Carola said this ofher three tutees:

216


For me, all of them can make it.Okay, to me, making it is, gee,that's kind of hard because mystandards for myself are abovewhat I am right now. I keepreaching for something higherthan this. I keep on thinkingthat some day I may own myown company and have myown employees. Have my ownfarm maybe, some things likethat.

Unlike Ginny, who expressed that hertutee could never achieve the samesuccess she had because of his familyand his naivete, Caro la emphasizedthat her tutees could succeed at higherlevels than herself at this point in herlife. She was confident her studentscould go on to college, one perhapsbecoming a lawyer, another an inte-rior decorator.

Suggestions for Intervention Offeredby White Participants

When I asked White partici-pants what kind of intervention theywould suggest in order to help theirstudents succeed, those working withHispanic students unanimously rec-ommended outside help for theirchildren's families. For example, whenI asked Ginny what could be done tohelp her tutee succeed according toher standards, she offered this:

I guess having somebody thereto teach you about the world. Iguess 'cause his dad was com-ing from Mexico . . . I guesswhen you're growing up in acertain area, you have to - like itwould be good for him to havea mentor to just take him outand show him places and ex-

plain why things are - and fig-ure why this is this and that isthat.

In addition to confusing knowledgeabout the world with knowledgeabout the U.S., Ginny disregarded theknowledge her tutee's mother mayhave been able to give her child. Bornin Laredo, Texas, this tutee's motherwas an American. What Ginnyseemed to really mean in her discus-sion of the world was the importanceof learning about, and assimilatinginto, the dominant American culture.

Similarly, when I asked Irma toimagine what could be done to helpher tutee, L, she said,

Well, definitely have someoneEnglish-speaking in her family. . . I really think that when shegoes home, she's only speakingin Spanish. Ah, and I thinkthat's a big factor for her learn-ing to read and stuff. I'm think-ing that she reads at home inSpanish also. So, uhm, I'd defi-nitely have someone there whowould give her some moreEnglish speaking practice.Maybe have like a Big Sister orsomethingone of thosegroupscome and do stuffwith her.

Irma held a particularly strong beliefin the deficiencies of L's home life.Her desire to help the child succeed inschool was blurred with her desire tohelp the child become assimilated intomainstream culture. Both Ginny's andIrma's suggestions for intervention,that someone - someone like them -go to the children's homes to "men-tor" them and take them out of it, and

6 1 7


to "see some things the other kids areseeing," were pinned to the ethnocen-trism of Whiteness [3]. Ginny sug-gested that only an American could"teach you about the world." LikeIrma, Ginny articulated the need for Ato be taken out of his home and to be"shown things" children of the domi-nant culture readily see, like a movie,or in A's case, a bank. Though theymay think they are being encouraging,by expecting their students to holddear the same cultural values and lifestyle they do, teachers such as theseyoung women express their dissatis-faction with children of color throughintonation, body language, and theways they talk about the children withwhom they work (Hall & Hall, 1987).

Suggestions for Intervention Offeredby Hispanic Participants

In our last interviews, I point-edly asked two Hispanic participantswhat they thought of the recommen-dations for intervention offered byWhite participants in the study. BeforeI could finish asking Carola this ques-tion, she furiously nodded her headand then cut me off. "No," she stated.With a sigh, Carola collected herself,smiled, and spoke to me patiently, asif she were teaching a lesson to a smallchild. She told me that when she gavebirth to her daughter, she and thebaby were the "only Hispanic peoplein the hospital." Out of what she con-sidered to be good intentions, but, infact, racism and ignorance, her doctorrecommended that a team of Whitenurses visit her to make sure sheknew how to care for her baby. Carolapolitely hosted the nurses in her

home; however, she kept her babylocked in another room so they couldnot "take her away." When the nursesdecided she was as capable as a"normal" (read White) woman, theyleft her. This notion that the dominantsociety "comes in" and "takes out"was not the least bit new to Carola.She was exasperated by it. When Iasked Elsa the same question, she an-grily protested, "No! You take yourchild and show your child the thingshe needs to know." Like Carola, it wasclear that she had heard this sugges-tion before. Hispanic participants allemphasized that supportive teachers,friends, and family were the best in-tervention for struggling Hispanicstudents. Indeed, of the Hispanic stu-dents who participated in this study,only Katie had been academicallysupported by her parents (both teach-ers), school, and community.

CONCLUSIONSThe most important finding of

this study is that the Hispanic pre-service teachers I spoke with all heldmuch higher expectations for theirHispanic tutees than their Whitecounterparts. Moreover, they held amuch more sophisticated understand-ing of their tutees' academic, social,and language situations. Hispanicparticipants, all of whom were bilin-gual, were able to tease apart the dif-ferences between second languageskill and intellectual ability; they werealso able to relate their own strugglesin school to those facing their tutees.All Hispanic participants tried toteach their tutees explicit learningstrategies and cultural information

218


that would help them succeed inschool.

White participants, on the otherhand, had great difficulty separatinglanguage skill from intellectual andacademic ability. Though they allcharacterized their tutees as "bright,"none of the White participants whoworked with Spanish-speaking chil-dren thought their tutees wouldgraduate from high school. The workof Haberman and Post (1998) and theliterature on teacher beliefs (e.g., Butt& Townsend, 1990; Doyle, 1997; Lor-tie, 1975; Paine, 1989; Tiezzi Sr Cross,1997) explains these low expectations.It seemed that those participants whocould already relate to their tutees,due to their own life experiences, re-lied on that knowledge to successfullywork with their students withoutmuch help from the Second LanguageAcquisition class. However, becauseWhite, monolingual, monoculturalparticipants did not gather a lot of ex-plicit methodology from our class,they relied on life experiences that didnot match that of their students. Ourclass put these students, and theirtutees, at a serious disadvantage.

Furthermore, while Hispanicparticipants tried to teach their tuteesspecific success strategies, the privi-leged social status of the White par-ticipants masked for them the specificstrategies necessary to succeed aca-demically (Delpit, 1995; McIntosh,1988). That is, the attainment of suc-cess in the eyes of White participantsnecessitated assimilation into abstractconcepts such as having American-centered knowledge about the world,watching movies, visiting amusement

parks, and ultimately having a familythat spoke English. In the eyes ofWhite participants, immersion in theAmerican Way seemed a necessaryprerequisite for success in America.Although they would be surprised tohear it, the young White women inthis study, all of who believed theirintentions were good, actively em-braced deficit thinking (Valencia,1997) to make sense of their tutees.That is, they believed that the successof their tutees was inhibited by theirHispanic culture.

The words of Banks are par-ticularly relevant here. He writes thatteachers are "human beings whobring their prejudices, stereotypes,and misconceptions to the classroom"(Banks, 1991, p. 139). Inevitably,teacher prejudices come to light in ateacher's dealings with, and discus-sions about, children of color. At thesame time, those teachers who havestruggled through the same barriersthey see their students strugglethrough often times cannot help butsupport them in the struggle.

That leaves the question,"Where do we go from here?" Itseems that the challenge for teachereducators is to improve teacher educa-tion so that it can better reach the stu-dents who are less likely to have ashared background with the childrenthey teach. Integrative field experi-ences where White, monocultural,monolingual teacher education stu-dents work intimately with Englishlanguage learning children of colormight be the key to improving theeducation of White teachers and theirstudents as well. However, as this

219


study indicates, field experience aloneis not enough. To be successful, fieldexperiences must be scaffolded by car-ing instructors who challenge theprejudices, beliefs, and prevalent mis-conceptions of their students. In-depthreflection and safe environments thatencourage frank discussion are neces-sary features of this kind of thought-provoking, belief-challenging field-work (see Titone, 1998). While theWhite participants in this study ad-mitted, and sometimes embraced, ra-cism and deficit thinking, they alsoprofessed to care deeply about chil-dren and to love teaching. It is myhope that improving teacher educa-tion and further delving into the areasof teacher beliefs and prejudices willenable these passionate, idealisticyoung teacher education students toachieve their dreams of becoming lov-ing, successful teachers to all children.At the same time, further studies inthis area need to be methodologicallybulletproof so that issues like thoseraised in this study will be taken seri-ously.

NOTES[1] In this paper, the term "White" re-

fers to people of Anglo-Europeandescent.

[2] I realize that the term "Hispanic" isan essentializing term that does notadequately express the cultural andgeographic differences betweenSpanish-speaking peoples; however,I chose this label, whileacknowledging its limitations,because it is the word my Spanish-speaking students most frequentlyused to label their own ethnic iden-tity.

[3] Hartigan (1999) defines Whiteness"as a concept that reveals and ex-plains the racial interests of Whitepeople, linking them collectively toa position of social dominance" (p.16). He goes on to explain that"Whiteness effectively names prac-tices pursued by Whites in thecourse of maintaining a position ofsocial privilege and political domi-nance in this country" (p. 16).

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222

BOOK REVIEW

The Non-Native Teacher. Peter

Medgyes. London: Macmillan, 1994.Pp. x, 127. 3.50, paper.

Review by JEONG-YEON KIM

This book explores major differ-ences in teaching attitudes between na-tive-speaking teachers of English

(NESTs) and non-native-speaking teach-

ers of English (non-NESTs). The author is

himself a Hungarian EFL professor with

15 years' experience as a schoolteacher.The book is arranged in three parts. Part I

places the issue of the native/non-native

speaker in a macro sociolinguistic frame-

work beyond ELT and attempts to clarify

ambiguities inherent in the distinction be-

tween the native and the non-native

speaker.

Part II, "Being a Non-NativeTeacher," carries the central messages of

the book. Based on his own surveys toexamine the native/non-native dichotomy

within the framework of ELT, he scruti-

nizes the negative and positive aspects of

being a non-NEST. The "dark side of be-

ing a non-native" includes major problems

related to non-NESTs' "linguistic deficit"

(p. 33) and attitudes and "schizophrenia

and inferiority complex" (p. 38). The next

section, however, highlights the advan-tages of being non-NESTs. For example,

they are more able to provide the learners

with a good learner model for imitation, to

teach them effective language learningstrategies, to supply them with informa-tion about the English language, and, most

of all, to benefit from the shared mother

tongue. The author rounds off the debate

by responding to the question: "Who'sworth more: the native or the non-native?"

His balanced response is reflected in hisargument that "the concept of the idealteacher should no longer be reserved forNESTs" (p. 82).

Part III is essentially a collectionof practical ideas and activities about how

non-NESTs can improve their English-language proficiency in their professional

lives as well as their leisure time.

One of the outstanding features of

this book is its encouragement to all ELT

teachers. It is encouraging in that it is the

teacher, not the learner, who is the focus

of discussion. As the author states in the

conclusion, he intends this book to be on

the teachers' side, a rare stance when one

considers all the literature focusing onlearner-centered classrooms. In his sug-gestions of possible types of organizedcollaboration between NESTs and non-NESTs, both types of teachers can findsome insight for their own teaching prac-

tice; however, this book is most encourag-

ing to non-NESTs. As a non-NEST him-

self, the author has a good understanding

of the special problems and difficultiesnon-NESTs face. He gives voice to thepsychological dilemmas of non-native

29 3


teachers by drawing from surveys he con-

ducted, and he does so in such a way that

he convinces the reader that there is in-deed a bright side to being a non-native

teacher.

The way the author stages theproblems that non-native teachers face isanother appealing feature of the book. A

variety of short anecdotal examples in the

classroom situation are included in each

chapter, which are very interesting anduseful. This story-telling technique rein-forces the friendly tone of the book, pro-

vides pleasant introductions to topics; and

leads the reader to engage with the topics

further.

Even though this book has appeal

to native teachers as well as non-native

teachers, it has several weaknesses. When

describing the non-NESTs' linguistic defi-

ciencies in the areas of vocabulary andspeaking skills, he focuses on each lin-

guistic area and overemphasizes the prob-

lems that can arise from a general lack of

knowledge about how to appropriately use

English. In addition, the results from the

surveys are also specific to Hungarian

non-NESTs, and this narrow range of re-

spondents may weaken generalizability to

other non-NESTs, for example, ELT

teachers in Asia. Moreover, the non-NESTs the author discusses are inconsis-

tent in their linguistic proficiency. For ex-

ample, the non-NESTs in Chapter 6, The

Bright Side of Being a Non-Native, seem

to have much better proficiency and inge-

nuity than those in Chapter 5, The DarkSide of Being a Non-Native. This discrep-

ancy, even though the author is attempting

to emphasize the positive aspects of being

a non-NEST, can nevertheless make it dif-

ficult to compare non-NESTs with their

NEST counterparts.

Despite these few limitations, The

Non-Native Teacher is an invaluable re-

source for non-native English teachers.

Aside from guiding them to improve their

proficiency, the realities addressed in this

book suggest many fascinating researchtopics, an exploration of which will ulti-

mately contribute to better understanding

and collaboration between native and non-

native teachers.

Announcements 225

Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2001

Registration Information & Call for Papers

Sponsored by the Foreign Language Education Students' AssociationUniversity of Texas @ Austin

March 23 & 24, 2001

Registration Information (Early Registration Deadline: February 15, 2000)You may register by completing a registration form and mailing it with your registration fee to theaddress found at the bottom of this page. The form can be found online at:http: / /www.utexas.edu /students /flesa /texflec/tex2001.htm. Early registration is $15 for students,$20 for public school teachers, and $25 for all other attendees. On-site rates are $35 for non-students and $25 for students. The early registration deadline is (postmarked no later than)February 15, 2001. Please send a check or money order. Make checks payable to:FLESA/Foreign Language Education Student Association

Call for Papers (Submission Deadline: January 15, 2000)Proposals for presentations of papers are invited in the following areas: foreign languagepedagogy, assessment & evaluation, language & culture, language & technology, secondlanguage acquisition, literacy, and bilingual education. Our theme, "Bridging the Gap: Theory& Practice in the Language Classroom" is a charge to examine the dichotomy that existsbetween theory and practiceacademia and the public school system. Papers should explorethe complementary perspectives provided by examining both theory and practice. The coregoal of the conference is to encourage dialog. We hope to provide a bridge betweenresearchers and teachers so that we can come together to paint a picture that more closelyresembles the realities of classroom life.

An ideal proposal will consider one of the topic areas above while demonstrating application oftheory in the foreign language classroom. It should be noted that both quantitative andqualitative research are appreciated as long as the research is compatible to conferencethemes and guidelines. Furthermore, both traditional and non-traditional modes of inquiry(e.g. arts-based research & action research) are acceptable. Preference will be given tocreative and innovative presentations.

Plenary SpeakerWe are pleased to announce the keynote speaker for the second annual Texas ForeignLanguage Education Conference as Dr. Robert C. Gardner of the University of Western Ontario.Professor Gardner's major interests are: personality with individual differences and theirrelation to behaviors associated with ethnic relations, the acquisition of second (or foreign)languages, and the tendency to adopt ethnic stereotypes. In addition, his research inmeasurement is concerned with applied issues in the measurement of such variables asattitudes, motivation and language anxiety and with statistical issues in measurement.

For more information: Email: [email protected]: http://www.utexas.edu/students/flesa/texflec

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Texas Foreign Language Education Conference 2001

Registration Form

Bridging the Gap: Theory & Practice in the Language Classroom

You may register by completing this form and mailing it with your registration fee to the addressfound at the end of this document. Early registration is $15 for students, $20 for public schoolteachers, and $25 for all other attendees. On-site rates are $35 for non-students and $25 forstudents. The early registration deadline is (postmarked no later than) February 15, 2001. Pleasesend a check or money order. DO NOT SEND CASH. Make checks payable to: FLESA/ForeignLanguage Education Student Association. Unfortunately, we cannot accept credit cards.Therefore, online registration is not possible.

Name

Email:

Mailing Address:

Phone:

Fax:

Affiliation

Please identify your top three areas of interest.

Assessment & Evaluation Bilingual EducationLanguage & Culture Language and TechnologyForeign Language Pedagogy Second Language AcquisitionLiteracy

Do you have any special needs about which you would like to inform us?

How did you hear about this year's conference?

,6

Announcements 227

Confirmation of receipt of this registration form will be sent electronically.If you do not have access to e-mail, please include a stamped self-addressed envelope along with this proposal sheet.

Our Contact Information

TexFlec 2001Foreign Language EducationD6500 SZB 528University of Texas at AustinAustin, TX 78712

Telephone: +1 512-471-4078Fax: +1 512-471-8460Email: [email protected]: http://www.utexas.edu/students/flesaitexflec

Thank you for registering! We look forward to seeing you at theconference.Leah Graham, Maria Petron, & Sarah ShonoTexFlec 2001 Co-chairs

This form is found online at: http://www.utexas.edu/students/flesa/texflec/texregi.htm

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Conference co-chairs- Leah Graham, Mary Petron, Sarah Shono & Terri WellsTexFlec 2001 I Foreign Language Education I ID65P9 ,Z11.4528 I UT Austin I Austin, TX I 78712

a.

Editorial PolicyTPFLE is devoted to the promotion of pedagogical and theoretical issues in thefields of Foreign/ Second Language Education, Teaching of English as aForeign/Second Language, and Applied Linguistics related to language learningand teaching. Manuscripts submitted for publication undergo blind evaluationby two referees selected from the members of an editorial board. The editor hasthe right to make editorial changes in any manuscript accepted for publication.

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