Second Language Learning and Language Teaching

Box 6.2 Transcript of students doing an information gap
exercise
M is a stranger asking the way round Oxford; W is the local providing help from
a map.
1 W: I want to go er I am en smallest street called Merton Street and I want
to visit the Rege Readerculf er ca Camera.
2 M: You are in?
3 W: Yes please.
4 M: Merton College, you said?
5 W: Yeah called Merton Street.
6 M: Merton Street.
7 W: Yes please.
8 M: And you are going to?
9 W: To visit the Redcliff Camera.
10 M: The?
11 W: Camera yeah.
12 M: Can you spell it?
13 W: R A D C L I Double F E Camera.
14 M: Radcliffe yes, Radcliffe camera, it’s number 4. And you are?
15 W: In um a small street called Merton Street.
16 M: Called Merton.
17 W: Yeah Merton Street.
18 M: You are here. Merton Street.
19 W: Yes.
20 M: Yes. And er Radcliffe camera is I can’t say (Long pause). Sorry. You must
to ask another people.
21 W: It doesn’t matter.
22 M: ‘Cos I don’t know.
With the exception of dictionary use, most of the communication strategies
that have been listed can be safely ignored by the teacher. They are there if the
students need them, but they need not form the teaching point of an exercise.
One danger with teaching activities that make the students communicate sponta-
neously is that sheer lack of vocabulary forces the students back onto these strate-
gies, as we see in the transcript in Box 6.2. Hence the teacher should keep the
likely vocabulary load of non-teacher-controlled activities within certain limits,
ensuring that students already know enough of the vocabulary not to be forced
back onto compensatory strategies for too much of the time. Alternatively, the

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Strategies for communicating and learning