The aims of this topics is language teaching methodology, which has to do with methods, techniques, and procedures for teaching and learning in the class room. Methodology fits into the large picture of curriculum development. There are three sub-components to curriculum development: syllabus design, methodology, and evaluation. All of these components should be in harmony with one another: methodology should be tailored to the syllabus, and evaluation/assessment should be focused on what has been taught.
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| Language Teaching methodology |
According to Rhicard et al (1987) in Nunan (2015: 6), methodology is “the study of the practices and procedures used in teaching, and the principles and beliefs that underline them”. Unlike syllabus design, which focuses on content, methodology focused on class room techniques and procedures and principles for sequencing these. And assessment (Nunan: 2016: 6) is concerned with how well our learners have done, while evaluation is much broader and is concerned with how well our program or course has served the learners.
The implementation of the learning process is always tied to the existence of three important elements that are mutually sustainable with each other, namely the approach, method, and technique. These three aspects have a fundamental relationship in the implementation of the learning process that will be carried out by a teacher as explained by Edward Anthony (in Brown, 2000: 14) said:
“An approach was a set of assumptions dealing with the nature of language, learning, and teaching. Method was described as an overall plan for systematic presentation of language based upon a selected approach. Techniques were the specific activities manifested in the classroom that were consistent with a method and therefore were harmony with an approach as well”.
The same explanation come from Richard & Rodgers (2001: 19) stated that:
“Approach is the level at which assumption and beliefs about language and language learning are specified; method is the level at which theory is put into practice and at which choices are made about the particular skills to be taught, the content to be taught, and the order in which the content will be presented; technique is the level at which classroom procedures are described”
And Brown (2000: 14):
"An approach defines assumptions, beliefs, and theories about the nature of language and language learning. Design specify the relationship of those theories to classroom materials and activities. Procedures are the techniques and practices that are derived from one’s approach and design”.
Based on description above, it can be understood that the approach is a series of theories that underlie language and language teaching which is then poured into the form of method. This is because the method is understood as a procedure from one or several theories that form the basis for learning process in the class room. While technique is understood as a tool used to get goals faster. So it is concluded that form both terms the approach is the core of learning, in which the chosen approach will influence the methods and techniques used in language teaching.
In language teaching theory, a distinction is often made between teaching approaches and teaching methodologies. For ease of understanding, I will summarize to all the following as methods.
1. Luccy Polard (2008: 19-24)
a. Grammar translation method
This method was prevalent in schools throughout the beginning of the 20th century; its use continued long afterwards and many cultures still expect language to be taught using this method. The method consists of studying written texts, translating them into the students’ own language and carrying out a study of grammar. There is little attention given to the use of the spoken language. I learnt French through this method and whilst I was able to read and translate complicated texts, I was unable to buy a loaf of bread when I went on holiday to France. It has been replaced by methods that focus on spoken language and I advise you to familiarize yourself with these newer methods and to use them. However, if you’re going to teach in a traditional culture that values the grammar-translation method, you could do the occasional activity of that type just out of respect for students’ preferences.
b. Audio-lingual method
This method grew out of behaviorist psychology. It involves providing a stimulus to which students respond; if the response is correct, the students are praised in order to reinforce the correct use of language and ultimately to reinforce learning. Language is presented in a very controlled way; i.e. one language point at a time is studied and worked on. Grammar explanations are kept to a minimum and progress is made through repetition.
In a typical lesson, the teacher might show pictures of people in various situations: for example 3 people with their possessions; one woman has got a big house, a beautiful car, etc; one man has a small house and an old car and one man has nothing.
The assumption is that the students know the words: house, car, some and any. The teacher shows a picture and says “she’s got a big house”, the teacher repeats the phrase and invites students to repeat. Students are praised if they get it correct. If they get it wrong, the teacher repeats and asks students to say it again. The teacher then moves onto the next picture and says, “ he’s got an old car” this is repeated by the teacher and then students are asked to repeat. The teacher continues with the third person and the phrase “he hasn’t got any money”. The teacher continues until all forms have been presented and practiced. The teacher might then show pictures randomly (known as a prompt) and invite students to say what possessions the characters have
got.
Oral prompts can also be given and students are invited to make sentences with the
prompts. For example:
Teacher (T) says: she / big house
Students (Ss) say: she’s got a big house
T: he / old car
Ss: he’s got an old car
T: she / old car
Ss: she hasn’t got an old car
Such exercises are known as drills and are used to encourage automatic use of language; i.e. students respond automatically without stopping to think about what they’re saying. When students have mastered the structure (in the same lesson or in the following lesson) the teacher might present the question form by showing the picture of the woman and saying “big house; has she got a big house?”. The lesson will continue in the same way as above. This description of a lesson has been adapted from the course book “Streamlines”.
Lessons in this approach are very predictable but at lower levels they provide a familiar environment where students at least get the chance to produce the phrase orally and correctly. This method has been criticized for not being communicative; i.e. there is no real communication; there is no need to say ‘she’s got a big house; everybody can see she has!
c. Communicative approach
This approach developed out of a need to have students communicating for real. It is based on the theory that children acquire language rules by using language rather than through the study of grammar. It involves creating situations where the students have a genuine need to say something, just as children do. I’ll illustrate this by describing two approaches to the same activity.
Let’s say you’ve set up an activity where your students are planning a dinner party. They’ve decided what food to cook and serve and have the recipes as well as ingredients and quantities required. They’re about to go shopping and are writing up their shopping lists. You could give each student the list of ingredients and quantities and tell them to perform the following dialogue:
Ingredients and quantities:
1kg lamb
1 kg potatoes
500g tin of tomatoes
50g butter
500g apricots
1 pot of yoghurt
Conversation:
How much lamb do we need to buy?
1 kilo will be enough.
Do we need any butter?
Yes, 50g will be enough.
This will provide speaking practice but will not create a real need for communication; students already know what they need to buy from the shops because they all have the list.
If you prepare 2 lists – each contains all the ingredients needed but on one list the quantities for some items are noted and the other list contains the quantities needed for the remaining items. Thus:
List A List B
1kg lamb lamb
1 kg potatoes potatoes
500g tin of tomatoes tomatoes
Butter 50g butter
Apricots 500g apricots
Yoghurt 1 pot of yoghurt
You can now give list A to one student and list B to another student and instruct them to carry out the dialogue below in pairs:
How much lamb do we need to buy?
1 kilo will be enough.
Do we need any butter?
Yes, 50g will be enough.
There will be a real need for communication because the student with list A doesn’t know how much butter is required. Similarly, the student with list B doesn’t know how much lamb is needed. Such activities are called information gaps because there is a gap between the various bits of information the students have.
The communicative approach often refers to speaking activities, however the other skills can also be practiced in a communicative way. The essential element is to ensure that there is a reason for carrying out the task other than just practicing language.
d. PPP
PPP stands for presentation, practice, and production. It is a fairly traditional way to structure a lesson that was popular throughout the 1980’s. It proved to be beneficial at lower levels and is still widely used today.
Presentation involves, as the name suggests, presenting a language point. This is usually done by the teacher. Presentation might be similar to the audio-lingual approach through the use of pictures and focused learning. It can also be achieved through explanation and demonstration (for definitions, see Chapter 3). Practice refers to controlled practice (see Chapter 1); it involves students using the target language in a controlled way. This might involve drills, controlled written and speaking activities, and repetition. Production refers to freer practice; students use the target language in sentences of their own. They might also combine it with other language they know. It is not the same as free speaking practice. For example, after studying “have you ever” question forms to talk about experiences (e.g. have you ever been to Mexico? Have you ever eaten snails?) students work in pairs to ask each other about their own experiences. The structure “have you ever” will be the same throughout, but the vocabulary will vary. This is known as freer practice.
e. Task-based learning
In a task-based lesson, the teacher sets a task for students to do that involves the use of language not yet studied in class or language studied previously that the teacher wishes to revise. The language point chosen is known as target language. The task might be an activity from the course book that was intended as practice of a language point or an activity from a supplementary source. The teacher sets up the task and observes students as they get on with it. The teacher pays particular attention to the students’ performance with the target language. The teacher should note down errors but not correct them during the activity. For example in an exercise to check students’ knowledge of prepositions of time, the teacher might set up an activity which involves students deciding when and where to meet. While students are speaking, the teacher might note the use of prepositions (both good and poor use): on Monday, in the afternoon, at 5pm, etc.
Depending on how well (or how badly) students performed, the teacher will decide whether to conduct thorough presentation and practice of the language or whether to revise and practice it briefly. The decision is made according to performance on the task. This can then be followed up with a repetition of the original activity or one that is similar. You and your students can compare performance on the original and final task.
I am outlining the structure of a task-based lesson but I do not advise its use if you are very new to teaching. It requires thorough knowledge of the language point and an ability to handle unexpected questions about the language. You will need to know about it because some course books (e.g. Cutting Edge) follow this format. You can experiment with this approach when you are more experienced and with a language item you know well.
f. ESA
ESA stands for engage – study – activate. Let’s take a look at each individual component. Engage involves getting the students’ attention or interest, getting them involved. You could achieve this through the use of a personal story told by the teacher, a picture that stimulates discussion or anything else that awakens students’ interest. The idea is that if students are involved or engaged, they are more open to the learning process.
Study as the name suggests involves focus on a language point. This could be grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation or how a written text is organised. The possibilities are endless. It can involve the teacher explaining or students working out the rules for themselves using examples as a basis. Activating involves having students use the language, preferably in a realistic context that is as close to real life as possible. Try to incorporate activities that have students using any language they know and not just focused on one structure (controlled language use).
You can use all three ESA stages in one lesson but not necessarily in that order. You could engage the students, then activate language through a speaking activity and then study language difficulties arising from the activity. You might also have a lesson devoted wholly to the skill of speaking; in which case students would be engaged and language activated. Language study could take place in the previous lesson. I particularly like this method because it highlights the necessity of engaging students in what they are doing.
g. Humanistic
The involvement of the whole person in the learning experience is central to the humanistic approach. A supportive atmosphere is encouraged in the classroom where students are listened to, their comments accepted without judgement and they are encouraged to share their feelings and experiences. Activities are used that involve students talking about their feelings and experiences. Students may be involved in fixing the aims for the course or for one lesson. A teacher may enter the classroom with no plan and just ask students what they want to do that day and the teacher goes with the flow (maybe not an approach to be adopted by a very new teacher).
Speaking as a Psychology graduate, I think care is needed in this type of approach; some people or some cultures might be uncomfortable unveiling their feelings in front of people they might not know well. However, I fully agree with the advantages of creating a supportive, non-judgmental learning environment.
h. Lexical approach
The underlying principle of this method is that grammar and vocabulary cannot be strictly divided as is often the case in traditional teaching methods. A further notion is that language is made up of lexical items using grammar to support them rather than being made up of grammatical structures incorporating lexis. Lexical items are words or chunks of words, which have their own meaning. For example, the following combinations of words have different meanings to the individual elements that make them up: by the way, look into, video recorder. Longer structures are also considered to be lexical items, e.g. I just wanted to say that.
The theory is that we learn a language by learning lexical items and not by learning grammar. Accordingly, the main focus of the work is lexical items rather than syntax or grammatical rules. Critics have said that it difficult to know in which order lexical items should be taught. Proponents of this method counter this by saying that the syllabus is organized according to collocation. Collocation refers to words that are frequently used together, e.g. make a phone call, make an appointment, heavy rain, by accident.
A further principle of this method is to teach through: observation, hypothesis and
experimentation. The observe phase involves being exposed to language, for example a text to be read. Students are encouraged to deduce the meaning of unknown language.
i. A final word on teaching methods
Of course there are other approaches to teaching, however, the above are the main ones you should be aware of. I suggest you look at any course book you’re about to use and see whether it favors one of the approaches above. You will find that after some time teaching, you will have a preference for one (or more) approach over the others. You might also find that different approaches work well with different students and with different levels. Don’t worry too much about methodology at the beginning; just do what feels right to you and what you see produces results in your classes.
2. Rhicard & Rodger
a. The Grammar-Translation Method
Rhicard & Rodger (1986: 3), As the names of some of its leading exponents suggest (Johann Seidenstiicker, Karl Plotz, H. S. Ollendorf, and Johann Meidinger), Grammar Translation was the offspring of German scholarship, the object of which, according to one of its less charitable critics, was "to know everything about something rather than the thing itself" (W. H. D. Rouse, quoted in Kelly 1969: 53). Grammar Translation was in fact first known in the United States as the Prussian Method. (A book by B. Sears, an American classics teacher, published in 1845 was entitled The Ciceronian or the Prussian Method of Teaching the Elements of the Latin Language [Kelly 1969J.) The principal characteristics of the Grammar-Translation Method were these:
1). The goal of foreign language study is to learn a language in order to read its literature or in order to benefit from the mental discipline and intellectual development that result from foreign-language study. Grammar translation is a way of studying a language that approaches the language first through detailed analysis of its grammar rules, followed by application of this knowledge to the task of translating sentences and texts into and out of the target language. It hence views language learning as consisting of little more than memorizing rules and facts in order to understand and manipulate the morphology and syntax of the foreign language. "The first language is maintained as the reference system in the acquisition of the second language" (Stern 1983: 455).
2). Reading and writing are the major focus; little or no systematic attention is paid to speaking or listening.
3). Vocabulary selection is based solely on the text reading texts used, and words are taught through bilingual word lists, dictionary study, and memorization. In a typical Grammar-Translations text, the grammar rules are presented and illustrated, a list of vocabulary items are presented with their translation equivalents, and translation exercises are prescribed.
4). The sentence is the basic unit of teaching and language practice. Much of the lesson is devoted to translating sentences into and out of the target language, and it is this focus on the sentence that is a distinctive feature of the method. Earlier approach to foreign language study used grammar as an aid to the study of texts in a foreign language, But this was thought to be too difficult for students in secondary schools, and the focus on the sentence was an attempt to make language learning easier (see Howatt 1984: 131).
5). Accuracy is emphasized. Students are expected to attain high standards in translation, because of "the high priority attached to meticulous standards of accuracy which, as well as having an intrinsic moral value, was a prerequisite for passing the increasing number of formal written examinations that grew up during the century" (Howatt 1984: 132).
6). Grammar is taught deductively that is, by presentation and study of grammar rules, which are then practiced through translation exercises. In most Grammar-Translation texts, a syllabus was followed for the sequencing of grammar points throughout a text, and there was an attempt to teach grammar in 3n organized and systematic way.
7). The student’s native language is the medium o f instruction. It is used to explain new items and to enable comparisons to be made between the foreign
language and the student's native language.
References
Brown, H. D. (2000). Teaching by principles: an interactive approach to language pedagogy. New York: Longman.
David Nunan. (2015). Teaching english to speakers of other languages; an introduction. New York: Routledge.
Luccy Polard. (2008). Lucy pollard’s guide to teaching english: A book to help you through your first two years in teaching.
Rhicard & Rodger . (1986). Approaches and methods in language teaching. UK: Cambridge University Press.
Richard, J. C. & Rodgers, T. S. (2001). Approaches and methods in language teaching. New York: Cambridge university press.
