Teaching English as a Foreign Language, Second Edition
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Selection and grading
In common with every other subject of the curriculum, English language teaching requires that decisions are made about what is to be taught: the process of selection; and about the breaking down of that body of knowledge or skills into teachable units: the process of grading. Whilst decisions of this kind are usually made for the teacher by textbook writers and syllabus designers, his teaching is inevitably structured and controlled by the underlying theories. Language teaching presupposes a theory of language, and this is supplied by applied linguistics. The traditional view that the English language consisted of a battery of grammatical rules and a vocabulary book produced a teaching method which selected the major grammar rules with their exceptions and taught them in a certain sequence. This was the grammar-translation method whose rules with examples, its paradigms (like those in the classroom of Chapter 2) and related exercises have for so many years produced generations of non-communicators. The later structural theory of language described the syntax of English as a limited number of patterns into which the lexis or vocabulary could be fitted. Selection and grading them consisted of identifying the major structural patterns and teaching them in a suitable sequence. In its extreme form, the structural approach enabled many learners to use ‘language- like behaviour’, reflecting a one-dimensional, and essentially non-communicative, view of the nature of language. Such approaches to language teaching are about as practical as driving lessons in an immobilised car. Language, as a form of human social behaviour, functions within a context of situation. Recognition of this second dimension, Basic Principles 40 and the fact that it is difficult to divorce linguistic forms from their setting, gave rise to situationalised language teaching, or the situational approach. Here, the processes of selection and grading are applied not only to syntax and lexis, but identify a series of appropriate settings: in the classroom, at home, in the shop, at the railway station and so on. Clearly, however, whilst selection from a finite set of rules or structures is possible, it is more difficult to select from an infinite range of situations. The third dimension of language, which has most recently received the attention of linguists, is that of linguistic functions and notions. The argument is that linguistic forms—sounds, words and structures—are used in situations to express functions and notions. It is possible to identify a wide range of notions: of time, number, length and quantity; of agreement and disagreement, of seeking and giving information, suasion, and concession, to name a few; and thereafter select and grade them into a teaching sequence of communicative goals. The sociolinguistic developments which have in recent years made language teachers more conscious of the functional dimension of language usage have had a number of other effects. At one level, they have given the death-blow to the naive assumption that a particular linguistic form is identifiable with a particular function. As Widdowson (1971) points out: One might imagine, for example, that the imperative mood is an unequivocal indicator of the act of commanding. But Figure 4 Basic Principles 41 consider these instances of the imperative: ‘Bake the pie in a slow oven’, ‘Come for dinner tomorrow’, ‘Take up his offer’, ‘Forgive us our trespasses’. An instruction, an invitation, advice and prayer are all different acts, yet the imperative serves them all. At another level, acknowledgment of the functional dimension has given greater complexity to the basic principle of grading and selection. If these processes are equally applicable to all the three dimensions of Figure 4, which is to have primacy? All must be represented in language courses, but in our present state of knowledge it is the language dimension that is the most completely understood system. The result is that for most non-specialised English teaching in the world today, the principle of grading and selection are applied to the prime dimension of linguistic structure, before those of situation and function. Download 0.82 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
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