Second Language Learning and Language Teaching

Box 6.7 Learning strategies and language teaching
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Exploit the GLL strategies that are useful to the students.
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Develop the students’ independence from the teacher with learner training
or directed learning.
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Make students aware of the range of strategies they can adopt.
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Provide specific training in particular strategies.
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Remember the similarities and differences between learning a second lan-
guage and learning other school subjects.
Discussion topics
1
Choose a type of learning strategy and decide how you would teach it.
2
How important is the idea of strategies to language teaching?

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3
How do you think it is possible to test whether students have learnt effective
communication and learning strategies?
4
What differences are there between strategies used by beginners and
advanced learners?
5
How might strategies teaching best be incorporated into textbooks?
6
Are compensatory strategies the same or different from learning strategies?
7
How can we combine the students’ right to choose strategies with the
teacher’s duty to direct their learning?
Further reading
One perspective on communication strategies can be found in Bialystok (1990)
Communication Strategies. The Nijmegen communication strategies are best
described in Poulisse (1990) The Use of Compensatory Strategies by Dutch Learners of
English. A useful collection is Kasper and Kellerman (1997) Communication
Strategies: Psycholinguistic and Sociolinguistic Perspectives. The starting point for learn-
ing strategies is Oxford (1990) Language Learning Strategies: What Every Teacher
Should Know. The leading current work is reflected in Macaro (2003) Teaching and
Learning a Second Language: A Guide to Recent Research.