“Language variation is pervasive
in all different communities of use.”
Marianne Celce-Murica’s words covering English as a lingua franca best exemplify how I view language and language learning. I believe that language is used for a variety of purposes. It can be used to express knowledge, beliefs, thoughts and opinions. Language is sound and meaning, it can be used to convey the speaker’s intentions either directly or indirectly. Language is systematic in nature, relying on sets of grammatical rules that occur cross-linguistically. It can be rigid, not allowing for certain deviations, yet language is also messy. It can produce a multitude of non-grammatical outputs by a speaker and still be understood by other speakers of that language.
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I believe that providing learners with opportunities to practice the language they are learning is important, as it gives them more confidence in their growing abilities. I want my classroom to be a welcoming environment for learners to both learn and practice the language. By providing multiple opportunities through different types of activities and assignments, learners can use the language in different contexts.
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Students need to be able to use the language, and make mistakes. Moreover, I think students should feel comfortable enough to make mistakes. I have found that learners who have a good rapport with each other and the teacher tend to feel more comfortable with making mistakes. Simple ice breaker activities where students engage with each other can be effective if they are repeated throughout the first few weeks of the class. Ice breakers such as these allows the individual to engage with their fellow classmates by learning and recalling specific things about them.
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From small factoids like ‘where are you from?’ to more personal preferences such as ‘my favorite color is red’; this gives the class more unity as they begin to learn more complex material. By setting the foundation for the group dynamic, I think it better ensures a good learning environment as it is not just the teacher who influences how well a student learns.
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Communicative Teaching Approach
I also think it is important for the teacher to understand the learners’ expectations and tailor teaching as needed. If a teacher is too rigid in their teaching style, the students will be too scared to try to work with the language. I have found, from personal experience, that teachers who were too strict and rigid did not create a comfortable learning environment. It became difficult to learn because students were too scared to make mistakes. Opening a dialogue that gives the learners a sense of agency can be powerful in its effectiveness. For example, giving students an opportunity to decide on different activities or offering a mid-course survey allows the teacher to gauge whether they should try different learning strategies.
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With this in mind, I prefer communicative approaches to teaching, where the emphasis is on being able to communicate in real-world contexts. The learner should be able to express their needs and desires. If we focus too much on studying grammatical concepts, we hinder productive learning. For example, knowing the grammatical structures for passives in Turkish does not help the learner if they are not in a situation that requires knowledge of such features.
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Enacting a communicative approach in my classroom would involve a lot of variations on group work. I like when students can engage with each other in different contexts. For reading comprehension on a given topic, I would use a variety of paired work, small groups and full class activities. Doing this gives students a chance to work together in different contexts and allows me to see student dynamics when they are working on a task; and I can pair students accordingly.
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Using content-focused approaches helps students narrow their focus. Learning terminology through categorization, for example, can help students link vocabulary terms in a similar pattern to their first language. Another content-focused approach such as focusing on an overall theme can help students learn content from outside classes. Environmentalism, for example, is a current relevant issue, globally. Teaching this in a classroom can engage students in more critical thinking while also testing reading comprehension, and implicit knowledge of vocabulary words. I like this approach because the student is less focused on learning proper forms, and more on the material itself.
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By allowing more language variation in the classroom, I can provide students with more meaningful opportunities to practice their skills. With more practice time, I hope to increase students’ self-confidence and interest in the language they are learning.
