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Impact of the introduction of

pluralistic approaches based upon unknown languages

on the didactic system at lower secondary school

Synthesis of the research and presentation of its main results

Rebecca DAHM

This doctoral research work is embedded in the field of language didactics but is also based on the linguistics and cognitive theoretical fields. Its main goal is to study the introduction of pluralistic approaches based upon unknown languages (PAUL) within the English class, at lower secondary school. It seeks to understand the impact of such a change of knowledge (which has become multilingual) on both the actors of the pedagogical relationship (student and teacher) and the axes of the didactic system.

1. Methodology

So as to be able to study the impact of PAUL sessions on both the teacher and the students, I set up a double design (in 2011-2012): an action-research was led with nine teachers who were to implement the sessions in their ESL class, sessions which were embedded in a quasi-experiment. The teachers met four times during the school year: they were led to analyse the PAUL sessions that had already been implemented and gradually took over the conception of the following ones. The corpus is composed of the videos of these meetings (and the transcripts of the relevant parts), four questionnaires and the discussions on a forum. These data were analysed both qualitatively and quantitatively.

After the first session of the action-research, the quasi-experiment was launched in five year-7 and four year-9 forms (n = 88 students). Students, in groups of four, were successively confronted to three unknown languages: the first language is Dutch (chosen because of its typological proximity with English) and the second one is Italian (close to French). The last language is Finnish, an agglutinative language that presents no immediate similarity with any language they know. The quasi-experiment included, for each language, three successive sessions of metasemantic, metasyntactic and finally metaphonological problem-solving activities. The sessions followed the same model so as to confer a certain systematicity to the regular exercise and to allow the comparison of the results. They took place on a monthly basis. Again the methodology used for the analysis was mixed, and enabled me to lead both a quantitative and qualitative analysis. For the design to be quasi-experimental, a pre- and post-test were submitted to a control group (composed of n=86 students of similar age and background) as well as to the experimental group.

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2. Results

The data were analysed1 so as to explore the impact of the PAUL sessions on both the poles and the axes of the didactic triangle (Chevallard, 1985) (see figure 1 below):

The implementation of the PAUL sessions have shown a significant impact on both the teaching and learning of languages. However, before considering the systemic impact, it seems important to take into account the actors of the didactic triangle.

2.1. Impact on the poles of the didactic triangle

The three poles of the didactic triangle are Knowledge, Teacher and Student. Knowledge was modified, since it now fits inside a multilingual context. Despite the didactic transposition, knowledge is still carrying values: it vehicles not only values of openness and tolerance, but also values centred on the development of the individual. In addition, knowledge is addressed differently: when during the teaching of ESL it is a learning object, in the PAUL sessions it becomes an object of explicit reflection.

The modification of the presented knowledge first affects the teacher. The implementation of the PAUL sessions allowed the teacher to change the way they considered students. In addition, their attitude towards foreign languages has changed: the teachers have progressively become less biased towards the difficulty of access to the unknown language (Ln) and perform more personal attempts to try and understand the unknown language so as to be able to design and to implement the sessions.

This new teaching approach has also had an impact on the students. They have developed their self-esteem and changed their attitude towards the language-object. Working on unknown languages enabled them to understand the importance of distanciation which develops the necessary awareness and mobilizes the resources to solve

1 For reasons of brevity, only the final results are presented here, without giving any feedback

regarding statistics or qualitative data. Please, report to the PhD for this kind of information (from p. 221 to 361).

Knowledge

Teacher Student

Figure 1. The didactic triangle (Chevallard, 1985)

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the problems they are confronted to. They have developed their curiosity and their desire to learn how to learn: students report having used the methodology developed during the PAUL sessions in another context. They also want to discover a large number of additional languages (a total of twenty-four).

The implementation of this teaching approach has not only impacted the actors themselves; it has also changed the relationships governing the didactic system.

2.2. Effects on the didactic system

To understand the effects on the didactic system, it is necessary to consider the relationship between Knowledge and Teacher, Teacher and Student and finally, between Knowledge and Student.

When looking into the effects of PAUL on the Knowledge-Teacher relationship, I observed that they enabled teachers to better apprehend concepts such as problem-solving, conceptualisation, learning strategies and competence. The didactic transposition is hence modified: teachers have gradually been led to develop teaching sequences with the highest standards giving more space to the student. The study of the Teacher-Student relationship highlights a change in practice, mainly due to the implementation of group work. The role of the teacher is then revised: he becomes a facilitator of the socially mobilized learning that is led collaboratively within the group. Finally, the analysis of the Knowledge-Student relationship underlines the necessary awareness that leads to the development of multilingual competences through the implementation of learning strategies which appear to be transferable to the study of L2.

2.3. Specific added value of Pluralistic Approaches Based upon Unknown Languages

The study of the above-mentioned phenomena may suggest that the effects are induced only by the change in the didactic approach which relies on a problem-solving approach. Certainly, this is an inherent feature of the implemented PAUL sessions. Nevertheless, I would like to highlight the added value of a number of characteristics solely due to the pluralistic approach envisaged.

First, focusing away from the learning object seems necessary and indispensable to trigger reflection and collaboration within the group. The confrontation to unknown languages is a real problem-solving situation as lack of direct access to meaning allows the involvement of the entire group so as “to find the key” to access the language. This enables the learner to consolidate his previous learning in L1 (French) and L2 (English) by reinforcing his metalinguistic knowledge. To “decode” a new linguistic system, in an unknown language, he will have to build on his multilingual repertoire (L1 and L2). It is therefore possible to assume that students will be able to develop their multilingual competence.

This distanciation required by PAUL, focusing on the awareness of knowledge and know-how, also allows to give more meaning to grammatical concepts. Very often, the

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learner stores information related to the functioning of his L1 in his declarative memory but it is only through the implementation of explicit processes that this knowledge will actually become acquired.

2.4. Effects on the teaching/learning of English as a second language

As stated before, the introduction of PAUL sessions in the English class has many effects on the teaching/learning of languages in general. However, one can wonder if they impact the teaching/learning of English as a second language, which is the underlying question in this research.

The results of the pre- and post-tests analysis helped highlight the students’ autonomous use of learning strategies, when the intervention of the teacher was limited. In addition, the study of the metasyntactic activities demonstrated the effective mobilization of resources, which tends to prove the development of the metalinguistic competence, a component of the linguistic competence.

However, I have no hard evidence regarding the improvement of the linguistic competence in English (L2). Such a competence is difficult to measure, since it means studying the implicit knowledge of a speaker-listener: there is no direct interface between the effects of metalinguistic reflection and the acquisition of a linguistic competence. I furthermore consider that the acquisition of metalinguistic knowledge is related to a conscious approach of language whereas the development of the linguistic competence is not. Therefore, it is possible to assert that the metalinguistic competence was developed by the confrontation to the unknown languages and the proposed activities. However, we cannot prove the impact on language proficiency.