Professional Documents
Culture Documents
FACTORS
DEFINING A COMMUNICATIVE SITUATION: LISTENER, CODE, FUNCTIONALITY AND
CONTEXT .................................................................................................................................6
INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................................6
LANGUAGE............................................................................................................................6
FUNCTIONS...........................................................................................................................7
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE.......................................................................................7
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WRITING AND SPEECH..........................................................8
FACTORS DEFINING A COMMUNICATIVE ACT.................................................................9
"WHAT DOES COMMUNICATION IN THE CLASSROOM IMPLY ?".................................10
CONCLUSION......................................................................................................................11
LA LENGUA COMO COMUNICACIN: LENGUAJE ORAL Y LENGUAJE
ESCRITO.FACTORES QUE DEFINEN UNA SITUACIN COMUNICATIVA: EMISOR,
RECEPTOR FUNCIONALIDAD Y CONTEXTO......................................................................11
1.1. Language Definitions.................................................................................................12
1.2. Language Functions..................................................................................................13
1.3. Communicative competence......................................................................................13
2. SPOKEN AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE...........................................................................14
2.1. Spoken Language......................................................................................................14
2.2. Written language........................................................................................................15
2.3. Historical attitudes......................................................................................................16
2.4. Differences between writing and speech...................................................................16
3. COMMUNICATION THEORY..........................................................................................17
3.1. Definition....................................................................................................................17
3.2. Models........................................................................................................................17
3.3. Key factors.................................................................................................................18
4. BIBLIOGRAPHY...............................................................................................................20
LA LENGUA COMO COMUNICACIN: LENGUAJE ORAL Y LENGUAJE ESCRITO.
FACTORES QUE DEFINEN UNA SITUACIN COMUNICATIVA: EMISOR, RECEPTOR,
FUNCIONALIDAD Y CONTEXTO...........................................................................................21
1. INTRODUCTION..............................................................................................................21
2. ORAL LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION..................................................................21
2.1. ELEMENTS AND NORMS THAT RULE ORAL DISCOURSE..................................22
2.2. RULES.......................................................................................................................22
2.3. ROUTINES AND HABITUAL FORMULAE................................................................23
2.4. STRATEGIES SPECIFIC OF ORAL COMMUNICATION.........................................23
3.WRITTEN LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION............................................................23
3.1. STRUCTURE AND FORMAL ELEMENTS OF WRITTEN COMMUNICATION.......24
3.2. TYPES OF WRITTEN TEXTS: NORMS GOVERNING THEM, ROUTINES AND
FORMULAE......................................................................................................................24
4. THE COMMUNICATION PROCESS................................................................................26
5. FACTORS AND FUNCTIONS OF A COMMUNICATIVE SITUATION............................27
6. FUNCTIONALITY AND CONTEXT: THE NEGOTIATION OF MEANING.......................27
7. CONCLUSION..................................................................................................................28
8. BIBLIOGRAPHY...............................................................................................................28
UNIT 2: COMMUNICATION IN THE LANGUAGE LESSON. LINGUISTIC AND NONLINGUISTIC COMMUNICATION.............................................................................................29
1. COMMUNICATION ..........................................................................................................29
2. COMMUNICATION IN THE CLASSROOM.....................................................................29
3. COMMUNICATIVE LEARNING AND TEACHING ACTIVITIES......................................29
4. NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION..................................................................................29
5. EXTRALINGUISTIC STRATEGIES..................................................................................29
COMMUNICATION IN THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE CLASSROOM: VERBAL AND NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION. EXTRALINGUISTIC STRATEGIES: NON VERBAL
REACTIONS TO MESSAGES IN DIFERENT CONTEXTS....................................................30
INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................................30
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE.....................................................................................31
VERBAL COMMUNICATION:..............................................................................................31
NON VERBAL COMMUNICATION......................................................................................33
EXTRALINGUISTIC STRATEGIES: NON VERBAL REACTIONS TO MESSAGES IN
DIFFERENT CONTEXTS.-...................................................................................................33
CONCLUSION.-....................................................................................................................34
TOPIC 3: DEVELOPMENT OF THE FOUR BASIC LINGUISTIC SKILLS: LISTENING,
SPEAKING, READING AND WRITING. COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE IN ENGLISH. .35
0. INTRODUCTION..............................................................................................................35
1. DEVELOPMENT OF THE FOUR BASIC LINGUISTIC SKILLS: LISTENING,
SPEAKING, READING AND WRITING ...............................................................................35
1. Listening or learning to listen in order to hear and understand properly......................35
2. Speaking, or learning to speak in order to be understood............................................37
3. Learning to read and write............................................................................................38
2. THE COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE IN ENGLISH ..................................................39
3. CONCLUSION..................................................................................................................39
4. BIBLIOGRAPHY...............................................................................................................40
UNIT 4: FOREIGN LANGUAGE AS COMMUNICATION INSTRUMENT. INTERNATIONAL
AND MULTILINGUAL REALITIES. INTEREST FOR A NEW LANGUAGE AND CULTURE. 41
1. FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION...........................41
2. TEACHING LANGUAGE AND CULTURE.......................................................................41
3. CONTENTS......................................................................................................................41
THE SECOND LANGUAGE AS A MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AMONG PEOPLE AND
NATIONS. GENERATING AN INTEREST IN LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY THROUGH
ANOTHER LANGUAGE AND CULTURE ...............................................................................42
2.1. Language and communication......................................................................................42
2.2. Language and different cultures....................................................................................43
2.3. Language as an instrument of holistic learning.............................................................43
2.4. The importance of having materials in the resource room to achieve a good
intercultural atmosphere.......................................................................................................44
2.5. 'Immersion approach' to second language learning......................................................44
2.6. How to experience the culture of the English-speaking world in the classroom...........44
3. BIBLIOGRAPHY...............................................................................................................45
PART TWO: PRACTICAL DEVELOPMENT........................................................................45
TEMA 5: GEOGRAPHIC, HISTORIC AND CULTURAL FRAMEWORK OF THE ENGLISHSPEAKING CONUNTRIES. DIDACTIC APPLICATION OF THE MOST MEANINGFUL
GEOGRAPHIC, HISTORIC AND CULTURAL ASPECTS.......................................................47
1.- INTRODUCTION:............................................................................................................47
2.- GEOGRAPHIC, HISTORIC AND CULTURAL FRAMEWORK OF THE ENGLISHSPEAKING COUNTRIES.....................................................................................................47
2.1.- EXTENT AND SIGNIFICATION OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE...........................47
2.2.- ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE............................47
2.3.- GEOGRAPHIC, HISTORIC AND CULTURAL FRAMEWORK OF THE ENGLISHSPEAKING COUNTRIES.................................................................................................47
B.- THE REPUBLIC OF IRELAND....................................................................................48
C.- THE UNITED STATES................................................................................................48
D.- THE BRITISH EMPIRE...............................................................................................48
E.- THE COMMONWEALTH............................................................................................48
F.- PHILIPPINES...............................................................................................................48
G.- THE COMMON LAW..................................................................................................49
3.- DIDACTIC APPLICATION OF THE MOST MANINGFUL GEOGRAPHIC HISTORIC
AND CULTURAL ASPECTS................................................................................................49
3.1.- HOW CAN WE TEACH ENGLICH CIVILIZATION?.................................................49
INTRODUCTION
We must point out that language is not just a "subject" in the sense of a package of knowledge. It is not just a
set of information and insights. It is a fundamental part of being human. Traditional approaches used to treat a
language as if it were a free-standing package of knowledge by analysing and observing it. Many of us learnt a
language that way. But this process is a very abstract one and experience has shown that it does not appeal to
everyone. To learn to use a language at all well for ourselves rather than for textbook purposes, most of us have
to become involved in it as an experience. We have to make it a human event not just a set of information. We
do this by using it for real communication, for genuine giving and receiving of messages.
* Now that we have introduced this particular topic we are going to deal with the study of language as
Communication, its functions and the concept of communicative competence.
LANGUAGE
The word language has prompted many definitions. For example;
Sapir said that " language is a purely human and non instinctive method of commicating ideas, emotions and
desires by means of voluntarily produced symbols ".
Hall defined language as " the institution whereby humans communicate and interact with each other by means
of habitually used oral-auditory symbols "
As we can see with these two definitions it is difficult to make a precise and comprehensive statement about
formal and functional universal properties of language, so some linguists have tried to identify the various
properties that are thought to be its essential defining characteristics.
The most widely acknowledged comparative approach has been that proposed by Charles Hockett. This set of
13 design features of communication using spoken language are as follows:
1. Auditory-vocal channel: sound is used between mouth and ear.
2. Broadcast transmission and directional reception: a signal can be heard by any auditory system within
earshot and the source can be located using the ear's direction finding.
3. Rapid fading: auditory signals are transitory.
4. Interchangeability: speakers of a language can reproduce any linguistic message they can understand.
5. Total feedback: speakers hear and can reflect upon everything they say.
6. Specialization: the sound waves of speech have no other functions than to signal meaning.
7. Semanticity: the elements of the signal convey meaning through their stable association with real world
situations.
8. Arbitrariness: there is no depency between the element of the signal and the nature of the reality to which it
refers.
9. Discreetness: speech uses a small set of found elements that clearly contrast with each other.
10. Displacement: it is possible to talk about events remote in space or time from the situation of the speaker.
11. Productivity: there is an infinitive capacity to express and understand meaning, by using old sentence
elements to produce new elements.
12. Traditional transmission: language is transmitted from a generation to the next by a process of teaching and
learning.
13. Duality of patterning: the sounds of language have no intrinsic meaning, but combine in different ways to
form elements, such as words, that do convey meaning.
FUNCTIONS
* After having studied the main properties of language, and communication, we will now see how the learning of
a language involves a Social Process.
The most usual answer to the question of "why we use language" is to communicate our ideas, and this ability
to communicate or communicative competence will be studied in the next part. But it would be wrong to think of
communicating our ideas as the only aim for which language is used. Several other functions may be identified
where the communications of ideas has a marginal or irrelevant consideration.
One of the most common uses of language, the expressive or emotional one, is a means of getting rid of our
nervous energy when we are under stress, when we are angry, afraid, etc. We do not try to communicate
because we can use language in this way whether we are alone or not.
Malinowski termed the third use of language we are studying Phatic Communication. He used it to refer to the
social function of language, that is, to signal friendship or lack of enemity. Also, to maintain a comfortable
relationship between people.
The fourth function we may find is based on Phonetic Properties. The persuasive cadences of political
speechmaking, or the chants used by prisoners or soldiers have only one apparent reason: people take delight
in them.
They can only be explained by a universal desire to exploit the sonic potential of language.
The fifth function is the Performative one. A performative is an utterance that performs an act. This use occurs
in the naming of a ship at a launching ceremony, or when a priest baptises a child.
We can also find other functions such as:
- recording facts
- instrument of thought
- expression of regional, social, educational, sexual or occupational identity.
The British linguist Halliday grouped all these functions into three Metafunctions, which are the manifestations in
the linguistic system of the two unique manifestation purposes which underline all uses of language, combined
with the third component (textual) which breathes relevance into the other two.
1) The Idealistic Funtion: is to organise the speaker's or writer's experience of the real or imaginary world.
2) The Interpersonal Function: is to indicate, establish or maintain social relationships between people.
3) The Textual Function: which serves to create written or spoken texts which cohere within themselves and
which fit the particular situation in which they are used.
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
Now we shall study the function of communication or what is named Communicative Competence.
Chomsky defined language as a set of sentences, each finite in length and constructed out of a finite set of
elements. An able speaker has a subconcious knowledge of the grammer rules of his language which allows
him to make sentences in that language. However, Dell Hymes thought that Chomsky had missed out some
very important information:
The Rules Of Use. When a native speaks, he does not only utter grammatically correct forms, he also knows
where and when to use the sentences and to whom.
For Hymes the Communicative Competence had four aspects:
1) Systematic Potential:
This means that a native speaker possesses a system that has a potential for creating a lot of language. This is
similar to Chomsky's competence.
2) Appropriacy:
This means that the native speaker knows what language is appropriate in a given situation, according to:
setting, participants, purposes, channel and topic.
3) Occurence:
This means that the native speaker knows how often something is said in the language and acts accordingly.
4) Feasibility:
This means that a native speaker knows whether something is possible in the language.
These four categories have been adapted for teaching purposes. Thus, Real Decreto 1006/1991 of 14th June,
which establishes the teaching requirements for Primary Education nation-wide, sees communicative
competence as comprising five subcompetences:
1) Grammar Competence.
The ability to put into practice the system of grammar rules by which a language operates.
2) Sociolinguistic Competence.
The ability to produce appropriate utterances in different sociolinguistic contexts depending on contextual
factors such as status of participants, purpose of the interaction....
3) Sociocultural Competence.
This is understood to be the knowledge of the social and cultural context in which the language is used.
4) Discourse Competence.
The ability to produce unified written or spoken discourse that shows coherence and cohesion in different types
of texts.
5) Strategic Competence.
The ability to use verbal and non-verbal strategies to compensate for breakdowns in communication, or to
improve the effectiveness of communication, as for example, the use of paraphrase, tone of voices or gestures.
On the other hand, Canale defined Discourse Competence as the aspect of communicative competence which
describes the ability to produce unified written or spoken discourse that shows coherence and cohesion and
which conforms to the norms of different genres.
* Up to this point we have studied the concept of language as means of communication, amongst other
functions.
Now, let us move onto another important aspect of this unit, which deals with the main differences between
writing and speech.
The description and classification of speech sounds is the main aim of phonetics. Sounds may be identified with
reference to their production, their transmission and their reception. These three activities occur at the
physiological level, which implies the action of muscles and nerves. The motor nerves that link the speaker's
brain with his speech mechanism activate the corresponding muscles. The movements of the tongue, lips, vocal
chords, etc, constitute the articulatory stage of the speech chain, and the area of phonetics that deals with it is
articulatory phonetics.
The movement of the articulation produces disturbances in the air pressure called sound waves which are
physical manifestations. This is the acoustic stage of the chain, during which the sound waves travel towards
the listener's ear. These sound waves activate the listener's ear drum.
On the other hand we have written language which evolved independently at different times in several parts of
the world.
We can classify writing systems into two types:
1) Non-Phonological Systems.
These do not show a clear relationship between the symbols and the sounds of the language. They include the
pictographic, ideagraphic, uniform and Egyptian hieroglyphics and logographics.
2) Phonological Systems.
These do show a clear relationship between the symbols and the sounds of language. We can distinguish
between syllabic and alphabetic systems.
In a syllabic system each grapheme corresponds to a spoken syllable. Alphabetic writing establishes a direct
correspondance between graphemes and phonemes.
In a perfect regular system there is one grapheme for each morpheme. However, most alphabets in present day
use fail to meet this criteria. At one extreme we find such languages as Spanish, which has a very regular
system; at the other we find such cases as English and Gaelic where there is a marked tendency to irregularity.
Now let's study the main differences between writing and speech. The most obvious is the contrast in physical
form.
Speech uses phonic substance typically in the form of air-pressure movements, whereas writing uses graphic
substance, typically in the form of marks on a surface. As writing can only occasionally be thought of as an
interaction, we can establish the following points of contrast:
1) The permanence of writing allows repeated reading and close analysis. The spontaneity and rapidity of
speech minimises the chance of complex pre-planning, and promotes features that assisst speakers to think
standing up.
2) The participants in written interaction cannot usually see each other, so they cannot make clear what they
mean. However, in speech interactions feedback is possible.
3) The majority of graphic features presents a system of contrasts that has no speech equivalent. Many genres
of written language, such as tables, graphs and complex formulae, cannot be conveyed by reading aloud.
4) Some contructions may only be found in writing, others only occur in speech, such as in slang and swear
words.
5) Finally we can say that writing tends to be more formal and so it is more likely to provide the standard that
society values. Its performance provides it with a special status.
Despite these differences, the written and spoken language have mutually interacted in many respects. We
normally use the written language in order to improve our command of vocabulary, active or passive, spoken or
written.
Loan words may come into a country in a written form, and sometimes everything we know about a language is
from its written form eg: Latin. It is true that writing has derived from speech in an historical sense, but
nowadays their independance is mutual.
According to Ivor Armstrong Richards, "communication takes place when one mind so acts upon its
environment that another mind is influenced, and in that other mind an experience occurs which is like the
experience in the first mind, and is caused in part by that experience."
From this definition we can conclude that any communicative act necessarily happens among persons or
between a person who acts as a speaker and a listener or between various people who act as receivers.
Besides these people there are other elements in a communicative act:
* The Message
The content of information that the speaker sends to the listener.
* The Channel
The place through which the message flows.
* The Code
A limited and moderately wide group of signs which combine according to certain rules known by the speaker
and by the listener.
* The Context
The situation in which the speaker and the listener are in, which sometimes helps to interpret the message.
* As we have seen communication is the exchange of meanings through a common system of symbols. Now it
is time to ask ourselves:
on Saturday?", then he/she is using language about the real world that is part of the learner's direct experience.
This is a great opportunity for real communication in the English classroom through English. When speaking to
children in English, it is important, as it is when they are learning their first language, to support communication
through the use of gesture, facial expression and action because this gives children clues to the meaning of
what they hear and so draws their attention to and helps them to become familiar with the sounds, rhythm and
stress of the second language.
Strategies that parents use intuitively to draw children into the use of the first language must be used
deliberately by the teachers to draw children into using the second language. Research has shown that parents
generally speak more slowly, articulate more carefully, and use gesture, facial expression and tone when talking
to young children to aid their understanding and to encourage them to produce.
CONCLUSION
To conclude, we could bear in mind that an important aspect of interaction in the English classroom is that it
must be managed by the learners as well as by the teacher. That is to say that learners must be confident
enough to initiate communication in English, and not merely respond when they are addressed by the teacher.
A pupil that has something to say, an apology or a request to make, a question to ask, a greeting to give, should
be encouraged to express him/herself in English. If resources are not to be wanted and opportunities to be
missed, children must learn English in the same way they learnt their mother tongue, as a living language that
can be used for active communication as much as for establishing personal relationships.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The bibliography used for the elaboration of this topic is as follows:
* "Teaching the Spoken Language" by Gillian Brown and George Yule C.U.P. 1997.
* "Teaching English to Children" by Christopher Brumfit, Jayne Moon and Ray Tongue. Longman 1992.
* "Teaching English in the Primary Classroom" by Susan Halliwell. Longman 1992.
- Traditional transmissin: language is transmitted from one generation to the next primarily by a process of
teaching and learning.
- Duality of pottering: the sound of language have no intrinsic meaning, but combine in diferents ways to form
elements, such as words, than do convey meaning.
After having studied thje main properties of language (what is language?) we will now see its function (whats
language for?).
1.2. Language Functions.
The most usual answer to the question "why do we use language?" is "to communicate our ideas" and this
ability to communicate or communicative competence is studied in the next part. But it would be wrong to think
of communicating our ideas as the only way in which we use language (referential, ideational or propositional
function). Several other functions may be indentified where the communication of ideas is a marginal or
irrelevant consideration.
One of the commonest uses of languages, the expressive or emotional one, is a means of getting rid of our
nervous energy when we are under stress. We do not try to communicate ideas because we can use language
in this way whether we are alone or not. Swear words and obscenities are problably the most usual signals to
be used in this way, especially when we are angry. But there are also many emotive utterances of positive kind,
such as expressions of fear, affection, astonishment...
MALINOWSKY (1844-1942) termed the third use of language we are studying "phatic communication". He used
it to refere to the social function of language, which arises out of the basic human need to signal friendship, or,
at least, lack of enmity. If someone does not say hello to you when hi is supposed to, you may think hi is hostile.
In these cases the sole function of language is to maintain a comfortable relationship between people, to
provide a means of avoiding an embarrassing situation. Phatic communication, however, is far from universal,
some cultures prefer silence, eg, the Aritama of Colombia.
The fourth function we may find is based on phonetic properties. The rhythmical litanies of religious groups, the
presuasive cadences of political speechmaking, the dialogue chants used by prisoner or soldiers have only one
apparent reason: people take delight in them. They can only be explained by a universal desire to exploit the
sonic potential of language.
The fith function is the performative one. A performative sentence ins an utterance that performs an act. This
use occurs in the naming of a ship at a launching ceremony, or when a priest baptizes a child.
We may also finde other functions such as:
- recording facts.
- Instrument of thought
- Expression of regional, social, educational, sexual or occupational identity.
The British linguist HALLIDAY grouped all these functions into three metafunctions, shich are the manifestation
in the linguistic system of the two veryu general purposes shich underlie all uses of language combine whith the
rhird component (textual) shich brethes relevance into the other two.
1.- The ideational function is to organize the speaker's or writer's experience of the real or imaginary world, i.e.
language refers to real or imagined persons, things, actions, events, states,etc.
2.- The interpersonal function is to indicate, establish or mantain social relationships between people. It includes
forms of address, speech function, modality ...
3.- The third component is the textual function which serves to create written or spoken texts which cohere
within themselves and which fit the particular situation in which they are used.
1.3. Communicative competence
CHOMSKY (1957) defined language as `a set of sentences, each finite in length and constructed out of a finite
set of elements. A capable speaker has a subconscious knowledge of the grammar rules of his language which
allows him to make sentences in that language'. However, Dell HYMES thought that Chomsky had missed out
some very important information: the rules of the use. When a native speaker speaks, he does not onlu utter
grammatically correct forms, he also knows where and when to use these sentences and to whom. Hymes,
then, said that competence by itself is not enough to explain a native speaker's knowledge, and he replaced it
with his own concept of communicative competence.
The description and clasification of sounds is the main aim of phonetics. Sounds may be identified with
reference to their production, transmission and reception. These three activities occur at a physiological level,
which implies the action of nerves and muscles. The motor nerves that link the speaker's brain with his speech
mechanism activate the corresponding muscle. The movements of the tongue, lips, vocal folds, etc. Constitute
the articulatory stage of the speech chain, and the area of phonetics that deals with it is articulatory
phonetics.The movement of the articulators produces disturbances in the air pressure called sound waves,
which are physical manifestations. This is the acoustic stage of the chain, during which the sound waves travel
towards the listener's ear-drum. The study of speech sound waves correspons to acoustic phonetics. The
hearing process is the domain of auditory phonetics. This can be seen in the following table:
SPEECH BRAIN SPEECH SOUND EAR BRAIN
CHAIN MECHANISM WAVES
Activity psychological physiological physical physiological psychologicals stage linguistic production
transmission perception linguistic
Phonetics articulatory acoustic auditory
phonetics phonetics phonetics
In this table we can see how phonetics is the study of all possible speech sounds.
This is not the most important task for linguist, however. A linguist must study the way in which a language's
speakers systematically use a selection of theses sounds in order to express meaning. In this activity he is
helped by phonology. Phonology is continually loking beneath th surface of speech to determine its underlying
regularities. It is not interested in sounds but in phonemes, ie. Smallest contrastive phonological units which can
produce a difference in meaning. The study of speech is therefore, the field of both Phonetics and Phonology.
2.2. Written language.
Myths and legends of the supernatural shroud the early history of writing. One point, at least, is fairly clear. It
now seems most likely that writing systems evolved independently of each other at different times in several
parts of the world -in Mesopotamia, China... There is nothing to support a theory of common origin.
We can classify writting systems into two types:
- Non-phonological.
- Phonological.
Non-phonological systems do not show a clear relationship between the symbols and the sounds of the
language. They include the pictographic, ideographic, cuneiform and egyptian hieroglyphic and logographic.
In the pictographic system, the graphemes or pictographs or pictograms provide a recognizable picture of
entities as they exist in the world.
Ideograms or ideographs have an abstract or conventional meaning, no longer displaying a clear pictorial link
whith external reality.
The cuneiform method of writing dates from the 4th. Millennium BC, and was used to express both nonphonological and phonological writing systems. The name derives from the Latin, meaning 'wedge-shaped' and
refers to the technique used to make the symbols.
Egyptian hieroglyphic developed about 3000 BC. It is a mixture of ideograms, phonograms and determinative
symbols. It was called hieroglyphic because of its prominent use in temples ad tombs (Greek, 'sacred carving").
Logographic writing systems are those where the graphemes represent words. The best known case is Chinese
and Japanese kanji. The symbols are variously referred to as logographs, logograms or characters.
Phonological systems do show a clear relationship between the symbols and the sounds of language. We can
distinguish syllabic and alphabetic systems.
In a system of syllabic writing, each grapheme corresponds to a spoken syllable, usually a consonant-vowel
pair. This system can be seen in Japanese Kataka.
Alphabetic writing establishes a direct correspondence between graphemes and morphemes. This makes it the
most economic and adaptable of all the writing systems. In a perfectly regular sustem there is one grapheme for
each morpheme. However, most alphabets in present day use fail to meet this criterion. At one extreme we find
such languages as Spanish, which has a very regular system; at the other, we find such cases as English and
Gaelic, where there is a marked tendency to irregularity.
2.3. Historical attitudes.
Historically speaking, written language was considered tobe superior to spoken language for many centuries. It
was the medium of literature, and literature was considered a source of standards of linguistic excellence.
Witten records provide language with permanence and authority and so the rules of grammar were illustrated
exclusively from written texts.
On the other hand, spoken language was ignored as an object unworthy of study. Spoken language
demostrates such a lack of care and organization that cannot be studied scientifically; it was said to have no
rules, and speakers have thought that, in order to speak properly, it was necessary to follow the correct norm.
As this norm was based on written standards, it is clear that the prescriptive tradition rested supremacy of
writing over speech.
This viewpiont became widely criticized at the turn of our century. Leonard Bloomfield insisted that "writing is not
language but merely a way of recording language by means of visible marks". This approach pointed out
several factors, some of which we have already mentioned:
- Speech is many centuries older than writing
- It developes naturally in children
- Writing systems are mostly derivative, ie, they are based on the sounds of speech.
If speech is the primary medium of communication, it was also argued that it should be the main object of
linguistic study. Actually, the majority of the world's cultures' languages have never been written down and this
has nothing to do with their evolutionary degree. It is a fallacy to suppose that the languages of illiterate or socalled primitive peoples are less structured, less rich in vocabulary, and less efficient than the languages of
literate civilization. E. Sapir was one of the first linguistics to attack the myth that primitive peoples spoke
primitive languages. In one study he compared the grammatical equivalents of the sentence "he will give it to
you" in six Amerindian languages. Among many fascinating features of these complex grammatical forms, note
the level of abstraction introduced by the following example:
Southern Paiute
Maya-vaania-aka-anga-'mi= guve will visible-thing visible-creature thee
Many linguistics and ethnographerstherefore stressed the urgency of providing techniques for the analysis of
spoken language and because of this emphasis on the spoken language, it was now the turn of writing to fall
into disrepute. Many linguistics came to think of written language as a tool of secundary inportance. Writing
came to be excluded from the primary subject matter of linguistic science. Many grammarians presented an
account of speech alone.
Nowadays, there is no sense in the view that one medium of communication is untrinsically better. Writing
cannot substitute for speech, nor speech for writing. The functions of speech and writing are usually said to
complement each other.
On the other hand, there are many functional para llels which seem to be increase in modern society. We
cannot use recording devices to keep facts and communicate ideas. On the other hand writing is also taken the
social of phatic function typically associated with the immediacy of speech.
Despite these parallels we can obviously find striking differences.
2.4. Differences between writing and speech
Research has begun to investigate the nature and extent of the differences between them. Most obviously, they
contrast in physical form:
- Specch uses phonic substance typically in the form of air-pressure movements
- Writing uses graphic substance typically in the form of marks on a surface.
Differences of structure and use are the product of radically different communicative situations. Crystal (1987)
pointed that `speech is tme-bound, dynamic, transient, part of an interaction in which, typically, both participants
are present, and the speaker has a specific addressee in mind. Writing is space-bound, static, permanent, the
result of a situation in which, typically, the producer is distant from the recipient and, often, may not even know
who the recipient is. As writing can only occasionally be thought of as an interaction it is just normal that we can
establish the following points of contrast:
1.- The permanence of writing allows repeated reading and close analysis. The spontaneity and rapidity of
speech minimizes the chance of complex preplanning, and promotes features that assist to think standing up.
2.- The participants in written interaction cannot usually see each other, and they thus cannot rely on the context
to help make clear what they mean as they would when speaking. As a consequence, deictic expressions are
normally avoided. On the other hand, feedback is available in most speech interactions.
3.- The majority of graphic features present a system of contrast that has no speech equivalent. Many genres of
written language, such as tables, graphs, and complex formulae, cannot be conveyed by reading aloud.
4.- Some constructions may be found onluy in writing, such as the French simple past, and others only occur in
speech, such as `whatchamacallit, or slang expressions.
5.- Finally we can say that written language tends to be more formal and so it is more likely to provide the
standard that society values.
Despite these differences, there are many respects in which the written and the spoken language have mutually
interacted. We normally use the written language in order to improve our command of vocabulary, active or
passive, spoken or written. Loan words may come into a country in a written form, and sometimes, everything
we know about language is its writing.
3. COMMUNICATION THEORY.
3.1. Definition
Communication, the exchange of meanings between individuals through a common system of symbols,
concerned scholars since the time of ancient Greece. In 1928 the English literary critic and author Ivor Armtrong
Richards offered one of the first definitions of communication.
Since about 1920 the growth and apparent influence of communication technology have attracted the attention
of many specialists who have attempted to isolate communication as a specific facet of their particular interest.
In the1960s, Marshall McLuhan, drew the threads of interest in the field of communication into a view that
associated many contemporary psychological and sociological phenomena with the media employed in modern
culture. McLuhan's idea, `the medium is the message, stimulated numerous filmmakers, photographers, and
others, who adopted McLuhans view that contemporary society had moved from a print culture to a visual one.
By the late 20th century the main focus of interest in communication seemed to be drifting away from
McLuhanism and to be centring upon:
1.- The mass communication industries
2.- Persuasive communication and the use of technology to influence dispositions
3.- Processes of interpersonal communication as mediators of information
4.- Dynamics of verbal and non-verbal (and perhaps extrasensory) communication
5.- Perception of different kinds of communication
6.- Uses of communication technology for social and artistic purposes, including education
7.- Development of relevant critism for artistic endeavours employing modern communication technology.
In short, a communication expert may be oriented to any number of disciplines in a field of inquiry that has, as
yet, neither drawn for itself a conclusive roster of subject matter nor agreed upon specific methodologies of
analysis.
3.2. Models
Fragmentation and problems of interdisciplinarity outlook have generated a wide range of discussion concerning
the ways in which communication occurs and the processes it entails. Most communication theorists admit that
their main task is to answer the query originally posed by the U.S political scientist H. D. Lasswell, `Who says
what to whom with what effect?. Obviously all of the factors in this question may be interpreted differently by
scholars and writers in different disciplines. Scientists may make use of dynamic or linear models.
3.2.1. Dynamic models.
Dynamic models are used in describe cognitive, emotional, and artistic aspects of communication as they occur
in sociocultural contexts. These models do not try to be quantitative as linear ones. They often centre attention
upon different modes of communication and theorize that the messages they contain including messages of
emotional quality and artistic content, are communicated in various manners to and from different sorts of
people.
Many analysts of communication such as McLuhan assert that the channel actually dictates, or severely
influences, the message, both as sent and received. For them, the stability and function of channel or medium
are more variable and less mechanistically related to the process than they are for followers of Shannon and
Weaver.
3.2.2. Linear models: Shannon and Weaver's.
Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver's Mathematical Model of Communication is one of the most productive
schematic models of a communication systems that has ever been proposed. The simplicity, clarity, and surface
generally of their model proved attractive to many students of communication in a number of disciplines. As
originally conceived, the model contained five elements arranged in linear order:
- An information source
- A transmiter
- A channel of transmission
- A receiver
- A destination
This model was originally intended for electronic messages so, in time, the five elements of the model were
renamed so as to specify components for other types of communication transmitted in various manners. The
information source was split into its components to provide a wider range of applicability:
- a source
- an encoder
- a message
- a channel
- a decoder
- a receiver
Another concept, first called a `noise source but later associated with the notion of entropy was imposed upon
the communication model. Entropy diminishes the integrity of the message and distorts the message for the
receiver. Negative entropy may also occur in instances where incomplete or blurred messages are nevertheless
received intact, either because of the ability of the receiver to fill in missing details or to recognize, despite
distortion or paucity of information, both the intent and the content of the communication.
But not only negative entropy counteracts entropy. Redundancy, the repetition of elements within a message
that prevents the failure of communication of information, is the greatest antidote to entropy. Redundancy is
apparently involved in most human activities, and, because it helps to overcome the various forms of entropy
that tends to turn intelligible messages into unintelligible ones, it is an indispensable element for effective
communication.
We can see that the model, despite the introduction of entropy and redundancy, is conceptually static. To
correct this flaw, Norbert Wiener, the father of cybernetics, added the principle of feedback, ie, sources tend to
be responsive to their own behaviour and to the context of communication. Interaction between human beings in
conversation cannot function without the ability of the message sender to weigh and calculate the apparent
effect of this words on his listener.
We will now analyze each of these key factors.
3.3. Key factors
This unit title mentions some of the key factors affecting any communicative interaction such as the sender and
the receiver. After putting them in the broader framework of the Mathematical Model of Communication we will
analyze the intended effects of our communicative interactions (speech acts) and the environment in which they
are exchanged (social context).
The information source selects a desired message out of a possible set of messages. The transmitter changes
the message into a signal which is sent over the communication channel where it is received by the receiver
and changed back into a message which is sent to the destination. In the process of transmission certain
unwanted additions to the signal may occur which are not part of the message and these are referred to as
noise or entropy; negative entropy and redundancy counteract entropy. For somo communication systems the
components are simple to specify as, for instance:
- information source: a man on the telephone
- transmitter: the mouthpiece
- message and signal: the words the man speaks
- channel: the electrical wires
1. The parts of a piece of writing, speech, etc, that precede and follow a word or passage and contribute to its
full meaning.
2. The conditions and circumstances that are relevant to an event, fact, etc.
The first definition covers what we may call linguistic context, but as we can infer from the second definition,
linguistic context may not be enough to fully understand an utterance understood as a speech act. In fact,
linguistic elements in a text may refer not only to other parts of the text but also to the outside world, to the
context of situation.
The concept of context of situation was formulated by Malinowski in 1923. It has been worked over and
extended by a number of linguistics, specially Hymes and Halliday. Hymes categorizes the communicative
situation in terms of eight components while Halliday offers three headings for the analysis:
HYMES HALLIDAY
1. Form and content of text
2. Setting
3. Participants
4. Ends
5. Key
6. Medium
7. Genre
8. Interactional norms 1. field
2. mode
3. tenor
We will now analyze Hallidays more abstract interpretation as it practically subsumes Hymess one.
The field is the total event, in which the text is functioning, together with the purpose activity of the speaker or
writer; it thus includes the suject matter as one element in it.
The mode is the function of the text in the event, including therefore both the channel taken by the language,
and its genre or rethorical mode, as narrative, didactic, persuasive and so on.
The tenor refers to to the participants who are taking part in this communicative exchange, who they are and
what kind of relationship thay have to one another. It is clear that role relationships, ie, the relationship which
people have to each other in a act of communication, influences the way they speak to each other. One of the
speakers may have, for instance, a role which has a higher status than that of the other speaker or speakers.
4. BIBLIOGRAPHY.
- Collins English Dictionary. Collins. Glasgow, 1992.
- Crystal, D. The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language. CUP. Cambridge, 1987.
- Encyclopaedia Britannica. Enc. Brit. Inc. Chicago, 1990.
- Halliday, M. A. K. Spoken and written Language. Geelong, Vic. Deakin University Press, 1976.
- Halliday, M. A. K. Language as social semiotics. Arnold. London, 1978.
- Halliday, M. A. K. Functional grammar. Arnold. London, 1982.
- Halliday, M. A. K and Hasan, R. Cohesion in English. Longman. London, 1976.
- Richards, J. C, Platt, J., and Platt, H. Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics.
Longman. London, 1992.
- Materiales para la Reforma. Primaria. MEC. Madrid, 1992.
- Steinberg, D. D. Psycholinguistics. Longman. London.1982
Tema 1
As spontaneous speech is the main form of oral communication, and directly reflects real communication
processes with different demands and situations, and prepared speech does not allow for feedback and
monitoring, the analysis and study of oral communication should concentrate on spontaneous speech, where
the negotiation of meaning plays an important role for the communication purpose to be correctly achieved.
But because of its pervasive and everyday nature, its scientific study has proved particularly complex. It has
been difficult to obtain acoustically clear, natural samples of spontaneous conversation, especially of its more
informal varieties. When samples have been obtained, the variety of topics, participants, and social situations
which characterise conversation have made it difficult to determine which aspects of the behaviour are
systematic and rule-governed.
2.1. ELEMENTS AND NORMS THAT RULE ORAL DISCOURSE
Linguistic elements
STRESS When we talk we have to bare in mind there is a regular distribution of accents along words and
sentences. However, if we want to give special emphasis to a particular word or phrase, we change that regular
pattern of stress and accent in order to make more prominent what we want.
RHYTHM It is the relationship we make between accents (chunks of words) and silences. Rhythm can range
from very monotonous one (in quick or prepared speech) to rhythm with contrasts in order to give
expressiveness and sense to our speech. Pauses are also important, because sometimes are made to divide
grammatical units and other times are unpredictable and caused by hesitations.
INTONATION is the falling and rising of voice during speech. Any departure from what it is considered "normal"
intonation shows special effects and expresses emotions and attitudes. Normally, falling tones show conclusion
and certainty, whereas rising tones may show inconclusion or doubt (Ill do it / Ill do it... )
Paralinguistic elements
We cannot consider oral verbal communication without remembering that the whole body takes part. In fact,
many times, a person can express sympathy, hostility or incredulity by means of body and facial gestures. This
"body language" is normally culturally related & is learnt the same way as verbal behaviour is learnt, although it
allows for spontaneity and creativity: we use head, face, hands, arms, shoulders, fingers...
Other linguistic features that characterise conversational language are:
Speed of speech is relatively rapid; there are many assimilations & elisions of letters; compressions of auxiliary
sequences (gonna); it can be difficult to identify sentence boundaries in long loose passages; informal discourse
markers are common ( you know, I mean); great creativity in the vocabulary choice, ranging from unexpected
coinage (Be unsad) to use of vague words (thingummy).
2.2. RULES
When we use language, we do not only utter grammatically correct sentences, but we know where, when and to
whom we are addressing our utterances. This is the reason why a speaker needs to know not only the linguistic
and grammatical rules of a language (Chomskys linguistic competence) or rules of usage, but also how to put
into effect these rules in order to achieve effective communication, so that we also need to be familiar with rules
of use.
Rules of usage In order to produce and understand messages in a particular language we need to be familiar
with:
PHONOLOGY We need to know the organisation, characteristics and patterns of sounds to communicate.
MORPHOLOGY We need to know the word formation rules and types of combinations of bases & affixes.
SYNTAX We need to know how words are put together to form sentences and which are their relationships.
SEMANTICS We need to know how words can be combined to produce the meaning we want or to understand
the meaning expressed by others, even if it is nonliteral, methaporical or anomalous.
Rules of use To be communicatively efficient, we need to show our linguistic competence in real speech
through:
APPROPRIATENESS or knowledge of what type of language suits best in a given situation, taking into account
the context with its participants and their social relationships, the setting, the topic, the purpose..
COHERENCE or ability to organise our messages in a logical and comprehensible way to transmit meaning.
COHESION or capacity to organise and structure utterances to facilitate interpretation by means of endophoras
and exophoras ( references to linguistic & situational contexts), repetitions, ellipsis...
Most important of all, however, is that written and spoken language are counterparts: a writing system should be
capable of representing all the possible wordings of a persons thoughts. This implies that both systems could
be regarded as the two sides of the same coin.
From a psychological point of view, writing is a solitary activity, the interlocutor is not present, so we are
required to write on our own, without the interaction or the help of the feedback usually provided in oral
communication. That is why we have to compensate for the absence of some linguistic features which help to
keep communication going on in speech, such as prosody and paralinguisic devices such as gesturing,
intonation, etc. Our texts are interpreted by the reader alone, and we cannot monitor his or her reactions, unlike
the speaker: we have to sustain the whole process of communication and to stay in contact with our reader
through words alone, and this is why we must be very clear and explicit about our intentions when we write.
However, not all the acvantages are on the side of the oral communication: in writing, we normally have time to
think about what we are trying to express, so that we can revise it and re-write it, if need be, and the reader, to
understand a text, can also read and re-read it as many times as wanted.
3.1. STRUCTURE AND FORMAL ELEMENTS OF WRITTEN COMMUNICATION
There are some features characteristic of written language, but this should not be taken to imply that theres a
well-delimited dividing line between writing and speech. However, the extend to which each of them makes use
of different resources is directly related to the nature of the two channels: speech is the language of immediate
communication, and writing is a type of communication with a distance in between. This is the reason why
written texts present the following formal elements:
Linguistic features of written language A good writing system must be fixed, flexible, and adaptable at a time, so
that:
- it must provide a codified expression for the elements expressed by oral language: each idea = a written form
- it must provide means for creating expressions for elements not codified yet: neologisms, borrowings...
Syntactic features of written language The syntactic elements which make writing different from speech are:
- markers and rhetorical organisers for clauses relationships and clarity (written texts are more permanent)
- use of heavily pre-modified NPs , SVO ordering and use of passive constructions and subordinate phrases
Lexical features of written language In order to compensate the absence of paralinguistic devices and feedback:
- more accuracy in the use of vocabulary, avoiding redundancy and ambiguity (due to its permanent nature)
- use of anaphoras and cataphoras, repetitions, synonyms... to signal relationships between sentences
- there is more lexical density in writing than in speech (more lexical items than grammatical ones)
Graphological implications Texts can be presented in different ways, as our culture value many times more the
form than the content. To compensate for the absence of feedback and paralinguistic devices, written texts
need to be accurate in spelling, punctuation, capital letters to mark sentence boundaries, indentation of
paragraphs, different fonts to call attention (italics, bold...) and in poetry or texts to draw attention, exploitation of
resources such as order and choice of words, variations in spelling (Biba la kurtura).
In any case, what is most characteristic of written communication is that we see it (the organisation, length...).
3.2. TYPES OF WRITTEN TEXTS: NORMS GOVERNING THEM, ROUTINES AND FORMULAE
In writing, communication also takes place following system and ritual constraints: this is the reason why when
we look at a text we can distinguish and obtain information regarding different types of organisation, different
purposes and different lengths.
Traditionally, written texts were divided following the classification of genres. Then, linguists linked their
rhetorical mode to the syntactic structures, routines and formulae that characterised them, and established the
following classification:
Postcards Pieces of writing normally directed to friends or family when travelling ,and sometimes used for
congratulations and greetings. We just write on one side and the language used is colloquial.
Letters They can be formal (to enterprises or someone we are not closed to) and informal (to friends or family)
There are some routines to write letters: apart from the writers address on the top right-hand corner, the date,
the first line (dear + name/sir/madam/Mr/Mrs...), the closing (Yours...) and the signature, present in both types of
letters, each type of letter follows this structural organisation into paragraphs:
Formal: 1st = reason why writing, 2nd = what you want from addressee, 3rd = conclusion.
Informal: 1st = introduction, 2nd = reason, 3rd = additional info, 4th = conclusion.
There are also directive letters, to provoke some reaction on the reader, using imperatives & remarks.
Filling-in forms Consist of answering what you are asked, as briefly as possible, so no writing style is needed to
do so.
Curriculum vitae Consists of a clear summary to give the academic knowledge and experience someone has on
a certain matter, so it includes personal details, current occupation, academic qualification and professional
experience.
Summaries Brief rsums of articles, booklets and books that due to their special form of composition and
writing they allow the reader to gather the main information about the original work without reading it.
Reports They are used to present clearly and with details the summary of present and past facts or activities,
and sometimes of predictable future facts from checked data, sometimes containing the interpretation of the
writer but normally with the intention of stating the reality of an enterprise or institution without deformative
personal visions, and can be expositive, interpretative & demonstrative
Narrative texts The most universal of all the types of written texts, refer back to the story-telling traditions of
most cultures. In fact there seem to be some basic universal structure that governs this type of texts:
- Orientation (time, place and character identification to inform reader of the story world), Goal. Problem.
Resolution. Coda and sometimes a morale at the end.
For this characteristic structure, some of the routines and formulae used are presentatives (there is...), relatives,
adjuncts of place and time, flash-backs, different narrative p.o.v., narrative dialogues, etc...
Descriptive texts They are concerned with the location and characterisation of people and things in the space,
as well as providing background information which sets the stage for narration. This type of texts is very popular
in L2 teaching, and all types have the same pre-established organisation. Within descriptive texts we might find:
- External descriptions, presenting a holistic view of the object by an account of all its parts
- Functional descriptions, which deal with instruments and the tasks they may perform
- Psychological descriptions, which express the feelings that something produces in someone
Some of the most characteristic structures are presentatives (there...), adjuncts of location, stative verbs (look,
seem, be...), use of metaphors, comparisons, qualifying adjectives and relative sentences.
Expository texts They identify and characterise phenomena, including text forms such as definitions,
explanations, instructions, guidelines, summaries, etc...They may be subjective (an essay) and objective
(definitions, instructions), or even advice giving. They may be analytical, starting from a concept and then
characterising its parts, and ending with a conclusion.
Typical structures are stative verbs, "in order to", "so as to", imperatives, modals and verbs of quality.
Argumentative texts They are those whose purpose is to support or weaken another statement whose validity is
questionable.
The structures we find are very flexible, being this the reason for the existence of several types:
Classical/Pros & cons zigzag/One-sided arg/Ecclectic appro/Oppositions arg first/Other side questioned
There are sometimes when we choose how, when and why not to be creative with language to repeat what is
normally used in a given situation: we use linguistic routines and formulae. These are defined as fixed
utterances or sequences of utterances which must be considered as single units, because their meaning cannot
be derived of them unless considered as a whole.
In written texts we find different types of routines and formulaic expressions, which vary depending on the type
of text, as we have been previously seeing. Understanding them usually requires sharing cultural knowledge,
because they are genarally metaphorical in nature and must be interpreted at a non-linguistic level (for instance,
Dear in a letter does not always carry affective meaning).
All those phrases and sentences that, to some extend, have a prescriptive character, can be considered as
routines and formulaic expressions: to consider all the different existing routines would take too long, but some
examples are, in letters & postcards (Yours sincerely) in C.Vs, the organisation of info in different blocks, in
narration (Once upon a time) in descriptions (on the left, high above),etc...
All in all, we can say that they are sometimes very useful but often meaningless & depersonalise our
expressions & ideas.
encoder), or by feedback (the sender calculates and weights the effects on the receiver and acts accordingly);
and then we have the context, which covers the references to the linguistic aspects of the message or
endophora (anaphora and cataphora) and the external aspects of situation or exophora (such as the field, or
total event and purpose of the communication, the mode, or function of the text in the event, including channel
and genre, and the tenor, which refers to the participants and their relationships).
other signalling system (e.g. pictorial), or use (re)-formulation procedures (So what you say is... Now lets put it
straight..)
7. CONCLUSION
Communication is , therefore, the main purpose of a language, and the use and function that fulfils depends
greatly on the characteristics of the information or the form of the message. In any case, for a communication
process to be complete, it is necessary that both addresser and addressee negotiate the meaning of what is
being transmitted, overcoming any possible obstacles difficulting that process.
8. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Halliday, M. A. K. An Introduction to Functional Grammar Chapter 9 1985
Tannen, D. Conversational Style Chapter 8 1984
MacArthur, T. The Oxford Companion to the English Language OUP Oxford 1992
Hedge, T. Writing. OUP. Oxford. 1993
4. NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION
The communicative event is not based on the verbal component only. It also implies paralinguistic devices such
as gesture, facial expression, body language, sight. They are information and emotional sources.
These non-verbal acts are culturally related. Different cultures may use different gestures (hand using, head
movement, e.g.: nodding in Hungary is opposite to everywhere else)
There is also the silent language like the physical distance maintained between individuals, the sense of time
appropriate for communication under different conditions The sight directs very well communication. If we do
not like someone we put our eyes away, insecurity makes eyes go down or if we are very interested our eyes
are widely open to make the speaker go on.
5. EXTRALINGUISTIC STRATEGIES
The most common strategies of language learning are:
" Learning grammar rules and using them
COMMUNICATION IN THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE CLASSROOM: VERBAL AND NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION. EXTRALINGUISTIC STRATEGIES: NON VERBAL
REACTIONS TO MESSAGES IN DIFERENT CONTEXTS
INTRODUCTION
Communication is a key word for us as English teachers. Not only is it the essence of human interaction, it is the
centre of language learning.
Chomsky was one of the first language investigators to try to explain why a child learns language; he says that
the enfant begins to produce language by a process of deduction using the input received and with natural
resources construct an internal grammar.
But later, linguists such as Hymes, noted that a child doesnt know just a set of rules. He/she learns how and
when to use them, and to whom.He says that when a native person speaks, he or she takes into account factors
such as:
1. Systemic potential. Whether something (word, structure...) works grammatically or not if it fits into the
grammatical system.
2. Appropriacy. Whether a word or structure is suitable in the context according factors such as the relative
social class of the speakers, regional variations, age and status differences, the topic being discussed and so
on.
3. Feasability. Knowing whether a construction is possible or not. It may be possible grammatically but seem
ridiculous in real use such as the use of six adverbs together.
4. Occurence. A knowledge of how often something appears in the language (example: foreign learners of
English from latin countries often use more latin-sounding words than a typical native speakers).
Halliday considers that language is, indeed, learned in a functional context of use. To summarize all the above,
a communicative context governs language use, and language learning implies an acquisition of these rules of
use.
Grammar is not enough, as we can be grammatically correct and socioculturally incorrect or with ill-designed
strategies. And so communication breaks down.
Canale and Swain developed the idea of communicative competence, a design taken on by the M.E.C. as the
basis for objectives in the curricular design and as a guide for teaching methodology.
COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
This communicative competence consists of 5 subcompetences: grammatical, discourse, sociolinguistic,
strategic and sociocultural.
- GRAMMATICAL or the ability to use the rules of the language system. (example: the position of the adjective
in English).' systemic potential.
- DISCOURSE or the ability to use different types of speech o writing based on the situation and to do it
coherently and cohesively.
- SOCIOLINGUISTIC or the ability to adapt utterances to a particular social context (socialclass, regional
languages, registers).' appropiacy.
- STRATEGIC or the ability to influence the course of the communicative situation (body movement, intonation).
Related to redundancy. The aim is to mantein the channel of communication open or to improve the reception.
- SOCIOCULTURAL - being familiar with the social and cultural context, the background where the language is
spoken.(example:when we say "milkman" we understand all the contexts such as: Who is the milkman?, When
does the milkman deliver the milk? and so on).
This communicative competence and its subcompetences seeks to help children to provide opportunities for
gaining real language in real use.
Communication is the activity or process of giving information to other people or to other living things, usign
signals such as speech, body movements or radio signals.
Communication is then the basis of a foreign language class from the basic curricular design and aims to lesson
plans and methodology.
In the 20 th Century worl of international travel, commerce, culture, technology and news/information,
communication needs to be optimun and our pupils will want to, or need to have the four skills in language on
many occasions for communicative purposes.
We shall now look at what this means in terms of verbal and non verbal communication.
This is part of their preparation for life in general, and for their development as people.
VERBAL COMMUNICATION:
This consists of two skills, namely listening and speaking.
LISTENING precedes speaking. It consists of the decoding of sound according to acquired rules.It can be
defined as the process of discriminating the sounds of the English language through a process of hearing and
understanding them. Listening is related to PHONOLOGY' This science studies the phonemes, the relationship
between units of sounds and differences in meaning.
We need to remember that there are differences between the Spanish sounds and the English sounds. We
must allow the children to be clear on these differences, using accent, rhythm and entonation.
All material used in teaching sounds and meaning should be based on its usefulness in real communicative
interaction.
There are many ways of presenting material so that it can be a means of helping children in oralcomprehension. We may use flash-cards, real objects, pictures from magazines, gestures, mime, language
laboratory, radio, t.v., fims, tape-recorder and so on.
SPEAKING is the encoding of the acquired sounds, deduced by listening, into signals.The end of this is to
communicate something to someone and is related to PHONETICS ' The study of sounds: how they are
produced and how they are received.
Pupils need a lot of practise in comprehension (listening) in order to hold a conversation in English. Both skills
(listening and speaking) are linked in the learning process, since the people need to absorb the elements of a
message if they are going to contribute to a conversation.
This encoding and decoding is not only on a grammatical level, as Chomsky inferred at first, but as Guiraud
affirms a process which takes logic from phonology, semantics, etc, but also subjective experience and social
rules.
So, we will begin talking about oral-comprehension techniques. If we want to develop this ability in our children
we shall need to observe the processes used by the learner in listening comprehension.
At first, the pupil hears a series of noises and he/she cant tell what the difference is between them. After some
time, he/she begins to note that the sounds are in some sort of order, with regularity in the pauses and voice
pattern.
As he/she learns some simple expresions, he or she begins to see that there are recurring sounds, and he/she
associates them with meaning. So, he or she is starting to recognise familiar elements, but doesnt see all the
relationship. He/she does not really understand.
As he or she becomes more familiar with the language, he/she recognizes the different elements, but doesnt
remember what he/she recognized. This is because he/she is recognizing single elements and not the whole
message. The mind is eliminating information which it cant take at first; only a certain amount can be taken into
short-term memory.
The receptive system in the brain then takes these selected elements into long-term storage. But only a small
part of the total message will be remembered, this is why pupils seem to be able to understand very little at first.
They have to concentrate very well to be able to take in not only the sounds, but their meaning, the brain is not
able to do this too fast, and we must remember this.
Thats why we help our pupils by giving them short sequences of sounds so that they can get the meaning
easily and store it automatically. So, REPETITION is essential for acquiring this process
The LOGSE, in its 9 objectives of the curricular design, reflects the importance of proficiency in these skills.
No child can ever really communicate in English without some ability to listen and speak. In traditional
"Grammar Translation" these skills were often neglected.
The reason for this neglect was that some people consider speaking and listening to be primitive skills. They
saw that children acquired these abilities naturally and so it was felt that verbal communication was less
sofisticated than the written form of the language.
So, more importance was given to a study of the written language and for many years verbal communication
was nor considered to be worthy of study.
This is reflected in the approaches to teaching of languages wich followed a classical methodology imitating
latin and greek approaches which by their very nature center on reading and writing.
In this century however, and thanks to the contributions on social anthropologists and linguistics we have come
to understand that the spoken form of a language is a valuable communication tool full of sophisticated rules of
use and which is a vehicle for social interaction.
We can think of Vigotsky studies on ethnic groups where he demonstrates how complex the verbal
communication is within societies which some people consider to be primitive.
So, speaking and listening are complex skills and even though they are acquired in an apparently natural way
there is a process involved which is intricate.
As an example of this we can look at some of the features which are unique to verbal communication.
Goffman highlited some of these.
We could mention that in verbal communication there are signals which the adresser and adressee recognize
as open-close signals such as the word "well" or a cough to open and there are other non-verbal signalssuch as
hand movemet to open or close a conversation. We could also think of the fact that in verbal communication
there is an inmediate and constant response from the adressee which we dont have in written communication.
This leads to the possibility of the speaker using strategies to ensure the message is being received.
These strategies include back signals such as the hearer nodding his/her head or expressions such as "really"
or "umhm".
These demonstrate to the hearer that the message is being received.
If he or she feels that the adressee is having difficulty in receiving the message because he/she notes a lack of
interests,comprehension, etc, he/she may choose to use strategies such as raising the voice, repetition or
gestures to improve attention or understanding.
We can not do this in written communication because the adressee is not usually present and we cant judge
the receivers response and then react.
Further to this in verbal communication speakers and listeners pay attention to the norms of what is acceptable
in a given context as regards quantity, for example.We could imagine that a British conversation consists of
shorter exchanges than in an anaerobic context.There are also, of course, complex rules of what is socially and
culturally acceptable in specific contexts depending on the relative age, social class and regional origin and so
on of speaker and hearer. For example, the speaker is aware of taboo words or topics and of conventions which
are appropiate in a given situation.It would be inappropiate, for example, to use some swearwords in polite
company.
In written communication the writer does not always know who will read the message and cannot always select
suitable exppressions, topics and vocabulary.
Taking the above into account we can affirm that when a child begins to listen with understanding and to speak
with intelligibility he/she is acquiring very useful social skills for everyday use.
These skills are not primitive instruments but elaborate competences which society demands and values.
Within verbal communication we recognize that there are non verbal elements. We will now look at these
aspects of spoken communication.
CONCLUSION.In this topic we have attempted to demonstrate the nature of verbal communication.
The spoken language in each productive and receptive forms depends not only on the understanding of sounds
or the creation of these sounds.
The context of this communication includes many elements which are aids in the process and we should be
aware of how we can maximized verbal and non-verbal items to encouraged children to infer meaning and to
use all sorts of extralinguistic strategies to improve communication.
By means of meaningful, motivating activities which use aspects such as body-movement, gestures, artifacts,
the five senses, we can motivate our young learners of English to believe that communicating in the English
language is within their reach.
0. INTRODUCTION
In the society where we live, the possibilities of cultural interchanges studying abroad, watching TV, so on,
determines that, communication, at least one foreign language is a necessity.
- With our educational reform, according the GENERAL ORGANIC act 1/1990 of 3 of October of Educative
System, its are persuades THREE AIMS:
" A WIDER EDUCATION: compulsory and free education are extended up to the change of sixteen, which also
coincides with the labour ages.
" A BETTER EDUCATION: the number of teachers and school resources are increased; the teacher-in-service
training courses are promoted, school resources and vocational guidance programmes are improved.
" MORE USEFUL EDUCATION: a new model of vocational training with greater practice knowledge and with a
greater relation with the labour market are proposed, and the necessites of our present society.
In the General Organic Act 1/90 of 3rd of October of Educative System, we can find in the 2nd Chapter, article
13-b that, in Primary Education, among the capacities to develop in our pupils is " to understand and produce
easy messages in a foreign language".
" We also have in the RD 1344/91 of 6th of September about Teaching Requirements in the territory managed
by the old Ministry of Education and Culture, in the Art.4 that the objective a) is "understand and produce oral
and written messages in Spanish, language of the community and in a foreign language " and continuous "The
ability to communicate in a foreign language and the knowledge of this language give a good help for a better
comprehension and learning the own language".
So,for these reasons, compulsory education must attend to this social need and give pupils a communicative
competence in a foreign language.
Within this communicative competence, we as teachers have to develop the four main skills: listening, speaking,
reading and writing.
Thus, in this topic, I will talk about them in the following points:
1. DEVELOPMENT OF THE FOUR BASIC LINGUISTIC SKILLS: LISTENING, SPEAKING, READING AND
WRITING
2. COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE IN ENGLISH.
3. CONCLUSION
4. BIBLIOGRAPHY.
1. SCANNING or looking for specific details. It's better to say questions before the listening practice.
2. SKIMMING or to identify the principal ideas. F. instance, we want that our pupils ask themselves, what is this
text about?. And to guess the type text (poem, folk tale), settings (place, street), characters (formal, informal,
neuter), and key words.
3. RECONSTRUCTION OF ORAL DISCOURSE: after we refer to the first listening, the teacher can make a
conceptual map on the blackboard, considering a word or sentence as the listening key.
4. PREDICTION, pupils can predict what will be the next one that they are going to listen.
5. RECOGNIZING INTERNAL STRUCTURES AND CONNECTORS: this strategy gives us clues about the
content. F. example:
" FALL/RISE INTONATION, and the particle BUT indicate contrast expression
" SO + FALL INTONATION indicate "RESULT"
" FIRST, THEN, FINALLY, help us to identify and arrange sequences in different parts.
6. GUESSING FORM CONTEXT: is to find out the meaning of unknown words. We can use gestures,
pictures and, the two last ones are
7. EXTENSIVE and INTENSIVE LISTENING
EXTENSIVE LISTENING will be a focused or general feature of the styles of discourse. The language level in
this kind of listening is, inside the student's capacity, and they listen for pleasure and interest. This strategy, can
be used for the representation of already known material in a new environment and it can also serve the
function of introducing new language.
INTENSIVE LISTENING is closer to ear training, and it's the most widely used for listening practice in
classroom. Students are asked to listen a passage, with the aim of collecting and organizing the information it
contains. This strategy, can be used for the focus of language items as part of language teaching programme,
and for general comprehension and understanding.
- And, finally, in this point, I will talk about PLANNING CONSIDERATIONS. First of all, these are a number of
steps that we have to bear in mind when planning the listening work for our class:
1. choose the listening text.
2. check that the activities are suitable
3. adjust the difficulty level of the activities, if we need to
4. consider, whether the listening work you are planning will fit the time available or not
5. think about visual aids
6. decide whether any special equipment will be needed
7. make up our mind about what procedure you will adopt for the listening session
8. if you are planning, to present the listening text "live" practice reading it aloud
-Once we have taken these steps, we must teach our children to develop skills, and according to Harmer, we
can divide these skills into TWO TYPES: GENERAL UNDERSTANDING and SPECIFIC UNDERSTANDING:
a. GENERAL UNDERSTANDING is concerned with the treatment of a text as a whole, and includes the
following microskills:
PREDICTION: because it is useful to encourage children to predict what they think might come next in a spoken
message. This means that they then listen to checks whether their expectation matches the reality of what they
hear.
EXTRACTING SPECIFIC INFORMATION and GETTING THE GENERAL PICTURE of an activity of listening
and,
b. SPECIFIC UNDERSTANDING, which involve a detailed comprehension of the text. They also include the
following microskills:
- INFERRING OPINION and ATTITUDE because an awareness of stress, intonation and body language, such
as facial expressions or gestures, will help the children work out meaning, specially in dialogues or story- telling.
- DEDUCING MEANING FROM CONTEXT because although the teacher might like to gloss new words before
the children listen to something, she also needs to encourage them to use pictures and their general knowledge
about a topic to work out the meaning of unfamiliar words.
-And RECONGNIZING DISCOURSE PATTERNS and MARKERS: words such as first, then, finally, or but, so,
give important signals about what is coming next in a spoken text. This is especially important when listening to
a sequence of events, such as in a story or a set of instructions.
-About LISTENING ACTIVITIES,, we make sure the children are clear about why they are listening. This means
spelling out which part of the message they need to focus on and what they are going to do before listening,
while listening or after listening. So, to develop these skills, are commonly divided into THREE CATEGORIES:
PRE-LISTENING, WHILE and POST- LISTENING.
o PRE-LISTENING ACTIVITIES have as a main aim to arouse our pupils' interest and include MAKING LIST
OF IDEAS or LABELLING.
o In WHILE LISTENING ACTIVITIES we have TRUE/FALSE or SPOTTING MISTAKER and
o POST- LISTENING ACTIVITIES include SUMMARIZING or DICTATION.
An activity type could be for instance:
-Listen and perform actions/ follow instructions: this kind of activity is used with action songs, rhymes or games
such as " What's the time Mr. Wolf?"
-Purpose: listening for enjoyment and to improve memory and concentration span.
-Materials: instructions for games.
According the book "The Primary English Teacher's Guide " by Brewster, Ellis and Girard, existing methods and
materials for primary school English contain recorded phrases for use in the initial classes.
However, it is primarily the teacher who, by conducting the class in English, will provide the opportunity for the
pupils continually to improve their listening ability in as natural a manner as possible.
There are other simple ways of training pupils to listen effectively such as the teaching of numbers and letters
with dictations, or visuals aids, such as pictures of plants, animals or people, can also be used by the pupils to
respond to dictations involving the names of objects.
2. Speaking, or learning to speak in order to be understood
-First, I will say several GENERAL PRINCIPLES in SPEAKING SKILL:
1. The beginning of oral expression will start when the pupil can understand the meaning of language's first
elements.
2. Thus, we will use short dialogues and its will attack attention of them, both the topic and the attractive form to
present it.
3. In relation with the first syntactic structures (which we can present in first or second cycle), they are principally
GESTALTS or PREFABRICATED LANGUAGE, for instance a greeting like 'how are you'.
4. Before preparing our activities we have to consider several aspects as COMPETENCE level, if our pupils
ARE GOING TO USE A BOOK, AGE, CONTENTS.
- An oral lesson is often divided into STAGES commonly known as PRESENTATION STAGE, PRACTICE
STAGE and PRODUCTION STAGE:
" PRESENTATION STAGE has as a main aim to give our pupils the opportunities to realize the usefulness and
relevance of the new language and their need to learn it.
In the initial stages, first lessons often focus on teaching simple greetings and introductions, f.ex: "hello",
"What's your name?", "My name is".
In the early stages of learning, not much spontaneous speech can be expected from pupils.
Such speech (language) consists of:
-Simple greetings: hello, how are you
-Social English: have a nice weekend?
-Routines: what's the date?
-Classroom language: listen, repeat, sit down, good
-Asking permission: Can I go to the toilet?
We have to bear in mind that once we have chosen a context for the presentation, we must decide on a
procedure, which includes points in this order:
a) First, build up the situational context by means of pictures and tapes
b) Elicit the new language.
c) Focus our pupils' attention on the model sentence, and (to) get the repetition both chorally or individually.
d) And, check students' understanding.
The teacher's main role during this stage is as INFORMANT
" In PRACTICE STAGE our pupils assimilate and memorizes the new language by means of activities such as
repetitions.
The teacher's role is mainly those as CONDUCTOR and CORRECTOR and
" In PRODUCTION STAGE, the main aims are to give learners the opportunities to integrate the new learnt
language into previously learnt language in an unpredictable linguistic context, and to provide both, teachers
and pupils, with feedback about the learning and teaching process.
The teacher's role is as FACILITATOR.
According to Brewster the main thing is to be understood without the listener being obliged to go through a
series of mental gymnastics in order to discover what the pupil was most probably trying to say.
From a psychological point of view, it's a good idea not to force things and to let each pupil start to contribute
when they feel ready.
-Some speaking activities that we can use are REPETITION activities like "Chinese whispers (the teacher
whisper a word a sentence in the pupils' ear and this message will be transmitted in the same form to whole
class. The last pupils has to repeat aloud what he has just listened or ASKING AND GIVING INFORMATION it
can consists of the repetition of certain structures with minimums changes which have been practised previously
in class to complete a questionnaire, posters, etc
For instance, an activity type could be:
Look, listen and repeat: the teacher shows a picture, says the word and pupils repeat: look! An elephant.
Repeat.
When the teacher is satisfied with her pupil's pronunciation she can move another word.
Once several new items have been introduced, the teacher can check by showing a picture and asking, what's
this? And pupils reply.
Purpose: to introduce new vocabulary or structures.
Materials: picture cards, for example animals. Food, colours, actions
1. First, FAMILIARIZATION AND CONTROLLED WRITING: at the beginning, words and expressions won't be
presented isolated, but with a lot of contextual aids, wallcharts, flashcards. We can use activities such as FILLIG
CROSSWORDS, PUTTING UNDER PICTURES the right sentences (with routines expressions)
2. The second stage is GUIDING WRITING and we use pre-communicative activities to reach out the free
composition of short texts. We have for instance, INFORMATION TRANSFER STRATEGY: with excursion
photographies which give us material to produce texts (they have to write about what they see) and
3. The third stage is FREE COMPOSITION that can be introduced when the previous ones have been filled and
with activities such as FILLING CHRISTMAS or BITHDAY CARDS
+ According to Matthew, writing skills can be divided on:
1. GRAPHIC SKILLS which include aspects such as PUNCTUATION or SPELLING
2. STYLISTIC SKILLS refer to our pupils' ability to express precise meaning in a variety of styles and
registers( to say "hello" sad or happy
3. ORGANIZATIONAL SKILLS which involve the sequencing of ideas (by using connectors such as "first",
"finally"
4. GRAMATICAL SKILLS refer to our pupils' ability to use successfully a variety of sentence patterns and
construction and (negatives or affirmative sentences)
5. RHETORICAL SKILLS refer to pupils' ability to use cohesion devices in order to link part of a text into
logically related sequences (more or less as organizational)
An activity type could be: Snap:
Materials: 24 playing cards with common words written on them. The words need to be grouped into families
which have two or three letters in common, for example: at, hat, mat, cat; the, other, mother, another.
Method: the cards are divided equally between two players. Each player places the card face down in the usual
way. When a player says "snap", she/ he has to say why the two cards are linked. No single letter matching is
allowed. The winner is the first player to collect all the cards.
And with that I finish the first main point in this topic.
Now, I will talk about the other main point.
3. CONCLUSION
3. CONCLUSION of this topic, to say that the integrated education of the four main skills, beside to permit us
the use of material for practising different linguistics activities, it answer to natural phenomenon in our everyday
life: sometimes we talk (orally way) not only what we see, listen, but we also talk about something that we have
just read, or, we write about something that we have heard or read.
Any practice, thus, about a determined linguistic skills, must be completed and rested on the other ones.
4. BIBLIOGRAPHY
" The royal decree 1006/91 of 14th of June about teaching requirements for Primary Education.
" "The Primary English Teacher's Guide" by Brewster. Ed. Penguin. English 1992
" "The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Language" by Crystal. Ed. Cambridge. University Press 1987
" "The Practice of English Language Teaching" by Harmer. Ed. Longman. London. 1983
3. CONTENTS
Sociocultural expressions are shown mostly in traditional material (e.g.: songs: "I love sixpence", "Teapot")
Traditional games and sports also help.
Establishing differences and contrasts in:
" Some jobs (e.g.: milkman)
" Social politeness (Mr., Mrs., Miss, Excuse me, please)
" Everyday activities (meals, time, school timetable)
" Weather (clothes, seasons)
" Sociocultural distinctions (driving on the left)
" Celebrations (Halloween)
Daniel Coste writes, "As far as we are concerned, 'learning to communicate' does not involve learning
something totally new: all language learners are communicators already; what foreign language learning
involves is learning to communicate differently and to communicate with a different set of people." Coste holds
that different ways of communicating have to be learned (and not just linguistic ones). Furthermore, it is his
belief that in order to learn to communicate with a different set of people, one must also learn about them.
Hence, communication is inseparable from a cultural context. The learning process itself becomes one of
learning to communicate: "For adults, adolescents and children alike, learning is a process which, however
slightly, involves and changes the whole individual as a person and social agent; when it comes to learning a
different language to communicate differently with a different set of people, it is a fair assumption that the
changes and the involvement will be all marked (34)."
In the author's opinion, second language learning not only stimulates better human understanding, but it also
leads to greater independence and self-steem. By learning another language, learners care more both for
themselves and others.
Caleb Gattegno believed in "the spirit of language." He felt hat by learning another language one absorbs the
culture and history of the language users. Human beings incorporate into their languages conscious or
unconscious collective aims, passions, and vision, which are taken on by the learner. He suggested that
languages are reflections of the various modes of thought of a people: "The spirit of each language seems to act
as a container for the melody and the structure of the language and most users are unconscious of it (1978:
19)".
2.4. The importance of having materials in the resource room to achieve a good intercultural
atmosphere
Brumfit and Finocchiaro suggest that acquiring a language also implies acquiring "enough knowledge about the
culture of the target community to participate fully in a conversation at the beginning of a stay in a foreign
country". Additionally, they hold that EFL teaching should provide "the implicit and explicit learning of culture
and language varieties through a multi-media approach and an active methodology based on creative use of
language (1985: 26)". In order to achieve this they suggest using the following resources: radio broadcasts,
television, tapes, cassettes, documentary, recreational films, pictures, and short dialogs dealing with everyday
situations. Furthermore, paralinguistic features need to be considered as well as gestures and facial
expressions. The authors insist that learners cultural insights are a must in EFL learning.
2.6. How to experience the culture of the English-speaking world in the classroom
Finally, to develop cultural insights, Finocchiaro suggests the classroom should "reflect the culture of the
English-speaking world (1974: 94)". She submits that the following aspects be incorporated into EFL teaching:
maps and posters, a bulletin board with newspaper and magazine clipping, including comic strips, proverbs and
pictures; a table or shelf with objects such as stamps, money, artifacts, and a library corner. She also
recommends the carrying out of "projects related to English-speaking culture which will then serve for class
reporting and discussion (95)". Such projects might include the following: preparation of maps, travel itineraries,
floor plans, menus, calendars indicating holidays, scrapbook, flimstrips or pictures, play readings, a book fair.
Additionally, culture may be experienced through songs, festivals, poems, multimedia resource material. She
also suggests, "A pen pal project should be initiated very soon after the students learn to write (97)".
3. BIBLIOGRAPHY
FINOCCHIARO, M.: (1974). English as a second language: from theory to practice. Reprint ed. New York:
Regents.
FINOCCHIARO M. And BRUMFIT, C.: (1985). The functional-notional approach: from theory to practice. Reprint
ed. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
GATTEGNO, C.: (1978). Teaching foreign languages in schools: the silent way. 2nd ed. New York: Educational
Solutions.
LA FORGE, P. G.: (1983). Counseling and Culture in Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Pergamon Press.
MOSKOWITZ, G.: (1978). Caring and sharing in the foreign language class: A sourcebook on humanistic
techniques. Rowley, Massachusetts: Newbury House.
PORCHER, L.: (1980). Reflections on language needs in the school. Strasbourg: Council for Cultural
Cooperation of the Council of Europe.
STERN, H. H.: (1984). Fundamental concepts of languge teaching. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
STEVICK, E.W.:(1980). Teaching languages: a way and ways. Rowley, Massachusetts: Newbury House.
TRIM, J. L. M., project adviser: (1981). Modern languages programme 1971-1981. Strasbourg: Council for
Cultural Co-Operation of the Council of Europe.
VILKES, B.: (1994). Fanfare. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
TEMA 5: GEOGRAPHIC, HISTORIC AND CULTURAL FRAMEWORK OF THE ENGLISHSPEAKING CONUNTRIES. DIDACTIC APPLICATION OF THE MOST MEANINGFUL
GEOGRAPHIC, HISTORIC AND CULTURAL ASPECTS.
1.- INTRODUCTION:
English is spoken in all continents. English is the most widespread language on earth.
English speaking is established in the British Isles, North America, Australia and North Africa. The English
speaking is uncertain in Africa, Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. We will draw a geographical, historical
and cultural outline of the most important English-speaking countries.
We will study the importance of sociocultural competence to the acquisition of communicative, and list activities
to reach it.
In full the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Is made up of England, Wales, Scotland and
Northern Ireland.
It's a member of the Commonwealth and European Community. The capital is London. The currency is sterling
pound.
It is a constitutional monarchy, with two houses: House of Lords and House of Commons. The chief of state is
the sovereign, and the head of government is the prime minister.
Its geographic situation has marked its history, characterized by its independence to the continent. Nowadays
this distance has disappeared with the building of the channel tunnel.
Industry has always been the main economic source, here the industrial revolution took place. Commerce has
also been the basic for their prosperity. The UK dominated the maritime routes. The British monarchy was
founded in 1066 by William the Conqueror, it has been a system, with a small break of ten years corresponding
to the republican government imposed by Oliver Cromwell.
At the present moment, the monarch is Elisabeth II; she is also the head of the Anglican Church.
There are two big political parties: the conservative party and the labour party.
The principal river is the Thames. The highest point in UK is Ben Nevis (1343) in Scotland. The population grew
in 1950 with the arrival of Commonwealth emigrants. They came from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
B.- THE REPUBLIC OF IRELAND.
This nation occupies the largest part of an island situated west of Great Britain. The national language is Irish,
but the official one is English. The major religion is Catholicism. Its capital is Dublin.
Ireland is an unitary multiparty republic, with two houses: senate and the house of representative. The chief of
state is the president and the head of government is the prime minister. Currency is Irish pound. The highest
point is carrantuchill; the major river is the Shannon. Ireland belongs to the European Community. Ireland
obtains the independence from Great Britain in 1921.
The Irish economy is based on the agriculture. It has not got important mineral resources.
The religious conflict: Catholics and Protestants, The majority of the population in England is Anglican, the main
features of the Anglican Church are the subordination to the Queen and its positives rejection of the Pope
authority.
In Northern Ireland, most of the population is Catholic. In Belfast, the capital, Catholics and Protestants cause
almost daily victims. The IRA, Irish Republican Army, commits terrorist attacks. The IRA wants the Protestants
to abandon Northern Ireland. They want to get the self-government for the Ulster.
C.- THE UNITED STATES.
English language is an universal language because it has been established in many countries. This export
began in 17th century with the birth of the colonies in North America. The main reason of the status of English is
the great number or inhabitants in USA and the massive emigrations on the 19th and 20th century.
The USA is a federal republic formed by 50 states.
Two legislatives houses: senate and the house of representative. The head of state and government is the
president.
Its capital is Washington. The first river is Mississippi river. The currency is American dollar.
Religion: there isn't a principal religion. Protestantism is, perhaps, the most practised.
It is a nation of groups, where the minorities try to get equal rights and opportunities. The language is English,
but there are minorities such as Spanish or Asians, trying to keep alive their language.
It is a very rich country, with important metallic and energy sources. The USA obtains the independence from
Great Britain in 1783. From more than half a century ago the USA is the 1st world power. Its history is a long
and constant territorial progress, with a great political and military development.
D.- THE BRITISH EMPIRE
The Victorian Era (1837-1901) was a period of prestige for Great Britain.
In the 16th century Great Britain developed its commercial capacity, by conquering every strategic point along
the mercantile routes. During the 18th and 19th centuries, they became a great empire.
All these territories were controlled by generators who imposed their language, their culture and laws. Most of
these territories were colonies for the exploitation, which originated the British richness and splendour. The
population was formed by emigrant who wanted to start a new life.
The different territories got their independence, but some of them were not prepared for self-governing and have
became 3rd world countries ruled by dictators.
E.- THE COMMONWEALTH.
It was founded in 1931 to carry out the dissolution of the British Empire. It is formed by 32 independent nations,
they maintain the English crown as their Head of State.
The reason for this institution is the economic interest of the countries that belong to it.
States members: UK, Canada, Trinity and Tobago, Kenya, Nigeria, Zambia, Australia, New Zealand, etc.
F.- PHILIPPINES.
The republic of Philippines is an independent state since 1946.
seems to be a natural order of acquisition of morphemes. It seems that the suffix -ing is the earliest inflectional
morpheme acquired. Eventually all the other inflections are added, along with the syntactic rules, and finally the
child's utterances sound like those spoken by adults.
Younger acquirers tend to attain higher levels of proficiency in second languages than adults in the long run due
to a lower affective filter.
IMPLICATIONS FOR SECOND LANGUAGE TEACHING
The five hypothesis about L2 acquisition predict that any successful L2 teaching program must have the
following characteristics;
a) It must supply input in the L2 that is:
- Comprehensible.
- Interesting and relevant to students.
The goal is, thus, to transmit messages, not to practice grammar.
b) It must not force students to speak before they are ready and must be tolerant of errors in early speech. We
improve in grammatical accuracy by obtaining more input, not by error correction.
c) It must put grammar in its proper place. Some adults, and very few children, are able to use conscious
grammar rules to increase the grammatical accuracy of their output; and even for these people, very strict
conditions (time, focus on form, and knowledge of the rule) need to be fulfilled before the conscious knowledge
of grammar can be applied, given the monitor hypothesis presented above.
ROLE OF THE FIRST LANGUAGE IN SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION
CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS HYPOTHESIS
The first language has long been considered the major cause of a learner's problems with the new language. It
"interferes" with the learner's acquisition of his of her L2.
If a structure in L1 differs from that of L2, errors that reflect the structure on the L1 will be produced. This
process has been labelled interference or negative transfer.
Spanish structure: adj + noun: La casa grande
Interference with English: *The house big
If a structure in both languages is the same, there will be positive transfer or zero interference, and there will be
no errors in L2 performance.
Spanish plural marker "-s": libros
English plural marker "-s": books
The contrastive Analysis treatment of errors was popular up through the 1960's. A large part of the rationale for
the Contrastive Analysis hypothesis was drawn from principles of behaviourist psychology.
There are two central concepts in transfer:
a) the automatic and not conscious use of the old behaviour (habits) in new learning situations (behaviourist
view);
b) the use of past knowledge and experience in new situations (other educational and psychological views).
In recent years there have been enough data accumulated to place the L2 learner's first language in a
"respectable" role. Present research results suggest that the major impact the L1 has on L2 acquisition may
have to do with accent, not with grammar.
b) it indicates to teachers and curriculum developers, which part of the target language students have most
difficulty to produce correctly and which error types detract most from a learner's ability to communicate
effectively.
INTERLANGUAGE
Interlanguage is the linguistic system that a learner constructs on his way to the mastery of a target language.
Methodologically, interlanguage may be said to incorporate the assumption of both Contrastive Analysis and
Error Analysis. While Contrastive Analysis contrasts the learner's native language and the target language, and
conventional Error Analysis involves contrast between the learner's performance and the target language,
interlanguage take all three elements into account, explicitly incorporating the contrastive analysis of the
learner's interlanguage with both his native and the target language.
Tema-6
Applied Linguistics has to do with all those theories that analyse how they can be useful LT and then proceed
with their pedagological application.
This knowledge is use to build grammars, to do comparative analysis between two or more languages, to carry
out research on the illiteracy rates of the population and to study languages and their regional varieties.
The most interesting field of study deals with second L learning and acquisition. Applied Linguistics uses these
findings from other sciences and applies them to LL.
We are going to consider some sciences on which the concept of FLT is based. The most important theories are
Structuralism and Generative Grammar.These theories are example of how research in Applied Linguistics can
be helpful in explaining the process of mother tongue acquisition and second LL.
Structuralism first appeared with Saussure in the 19th century. This theory defends that language is a social
phenomenon which is useful because it works in a community. This approach implies a psychological
perspective, its study is centred on speech and not on grammatical structures. He made a distinction between
language ( the system ) and speech ( the individual of the system ). They begin with an active study of all
speeches, arriving at the general rules. All these structuralistic principles have in commonthe assumption that
grammar does not consist of a system of rules that govern the isolated elements of language, but of a set of
structures that have to be taught, especially those that are different in the learners' first language.
The application of structuralism in LT was developed after the 2nd World War. Linguistics examined and
classified the structure of the first L and the second L being studied. They analysed which structures were
similar to that language and which offered interference, they made drills.
Structuralism is based on "behaviourist psycology stimulus answer response", and its attitude towards teaching
is based on the premise that 2nd L acquisition is the result of habit and condidional reflexes, we learn by
imitation and repetition.
Against this theory appeared Chomsky with his "Generative Grammar" Theory. Chomsky observed that
structuralism did not explain how the child was able to produce sentences that he had never produced before.
Chomsky's generativist theory postulated the existence of a specific ability in the child, an ability that allowed
him to generate an infinitive number of rules. A creative person who can create an unlimited number of
sentences with just a few linguistic elements. The child hears his first L and is able to develop a series of
increasingly global and correct hypothesis about that language system.
Before Chomsky students were given correct grammatical examples, nowadays students can compare
sentences with and without errors, and they are allowed to make mistakes because that is understood as an
important step in an autonomous process of learning. This theory gives special importance to free expression
and creativity.
Chomsky establishes a distinction between competence (the knowledge that the person has about his mother
tongue) and performance, that is the effective use of this knowledge in his normal speech.
We should point out here an essential aspect of the research of applied linguistics, that is, to what extent can
the process of first L acquisition be equivalent to the process of 2nd L learning. Thus it can be seen that the
process is the same, 2nd Language learners draw hypothesis about the L system, apply the rules and modify
them according to the feedback they receive. A 2nd L learner learns from his effort to communicate. If what the
learner wants to communicate lies within the possibilities of his system, he will have no problems. The problem
arises when he wants to communicate something that is not in his system. Therefore, he can choose to follow
other paths, such as using gestures, or transfering the limits he knows, in other words, he will take a risk.
We could conclude from the above that errors that students make reveal the state of development of his system.
We must give him enough information on the success or failure of his communicative attempt. He requires input
to contrast his production. The student then learns through the process of communicating; he who takes a risk
will be the one who learns most.
We should also mention the studies of some linguists, like Firth and Martinowsky. They spoke about the concept
of situational context, that is the meaning of an utterance is a consequence of the cultural and situational
context where it takes place.
In the Eighties many programs in ELT were developed. All of them were based on the consideration of a L as an
instrument of communication. The threshold level, for instance, whose author is Wilkins, established a program
model for a European adult student of foreign L in terms of his communicative needs. It was intended to
create a program based on the areas of his interests.
In Europe L teaching was slowly changing. Linguistics were mainly concerned with oral language as a means of
communication. Learners were taught to comprehend and then to speak. The interferance of the first L had to
be avoided. Conversation was the main focus of the class.
The process of LT goes parallel to the learning process. In the 70s special attention waspaid to this learning
process. The concept of interferance, introduced by Corder, refers to the problems of interferance caused by the
mother tongue on the learning of a foreign language.
Now, we shall study the contributions of other sciences to the process of foreign LT.
On the one hand, we find Pedagogy whose contribution to the teaching of foreign L and to the concept of
modern education is the following: that the educational principles are flexible, and should be adapted to every
social change. An individualised teaching is required, as well as the formation of an integral person with special
attention to his creative ability. Group work, collaboration and the participation of students in all the educational
process should also be considered.
On the other hand, we find he science of Psycology. Some important studies are the following: in the teaching of
foreign L motivation is very important. Apart from motivation a deep knowledge of the pupil's psychological
characteristics is required; we need to know the student's abilities and rhythm of learning to better adopt the
structure of the subject to his structure of knowledge. So the teacher will be able to allow pupils to learn more
depending on their own needs and rhythm.
Summarising, we could say that the most important contribution of Pedagogy and Pedagogy to foreign L
teaching is that the teaching must be centred on the pupils' needs and personality; creativity whilst imagination
should be developed through motivation.
Similarites and differences between the acquisition of the mother tongue and the learning of a
foreign L.
After having dealt with some of the contributions of Linguistics and other sciences to FLT, we shall analyse the
process of L learning and the similarites and differences between the acquisition of the mother tongue and the
learning of a foreign L.
The starting point of the theoretical basis of the conception of 2nd L learning is found in the Curriculum: " The
foreign L acquisition process can be characterised as a creative construction process during which the student,
relying on a set of natural strategies, based on the input received, formulates hypotheses in order to make up
the internal representation of the new L system."
Knowing a L implies knowing its sociolinguistic, discourse and strategic aspects. The sociolinguistic aspect
implies the knowlwdge of the rules related to a given sociolnguistic context; the discourse aspect organises
cohesion and coherence in different spoken and written statements; the strategic aspect is responsible for
completing the interaction when taking into account the objective of
communication.
The Contructive Model proposed by the Curriculum is based on the following aspects:
1- The student is considered the centred of the teaching process;
2- The student has a certain knowledge that adds to the new information
and combines them to produce significant learning.
Another important aspect of the contructive model is that of learning through discovery. L functions as regards
rules are learned by a process of discovery. The students generates hypotheses himself and check that they
match the established rules.
Before moving on to study some of the theories on the L learning process, let us focus on the differences
between the acquisition and learning.
Krashen in his book Language Acquisition Hypothesis makes a clear distinction between acquisition and
learning. According to him, the acquisition is a natural process whereas learning is conscious formal process.
Acquisition implies an implicit knowledge of rules in contrast with learning which implies the explicit knowledge
of rules.
Acquisition is the way a child acquires his mother tongue, whereas learning is the way students learn a foreign
language.
After having looked into the differences between acquisition and learnig, we are going to study some of the
theories on the acquisition and learning of a second language.
Vigotsky establishes three main stages in language acquisition. The first one is when language is only a means
of external communication in a child, both in form and function. The third one is when language is interiorised
and becomes verbal thought and then guides cognitive development.
Today it is believed that the first statements of children are due to their individual system, independent from that
of adults; language is built or rebuilt by the child who gradually makea a system of rules, an implicit grammar
and a set of communication rules with which he interprets what he receives.Thus, the child produces statements
correctly but these are mere repetitive routine. The interesting aspect is that the child makes incorrect
statements which shows that he is trying to create a language using his own linguistic mechanism, according to
certain opearating rules that he himself has generated, it is an internal implicit grammar.
The second language acquisition process goes through three different phases:
1.- Cognitive elaboration: the learner centres his attention on types of models presented to him in the 2nd L. He
has an attitude towards comprehending or remembering the different aspects of the models presented.
2.- Associate phase: the child begins to form hypotheses about the input received, as well as its organisation
and arrangement, contrasting them with his knowledge and exemplifying them with the production of such
models in similar contexts.
3.- Autonomy phase: the child can use what he has learned spontaneously.In order for this phase to take place,
a great amount of previous practice is required.
Another important aspect of the constructive model is that the student has an active role in which he will have to
implement certain strategies similar to those used in first L acquisition to adapt, generalise, correct rules and so
on.
Lastly an assumption in the previous model is that in any learning process there is a semantic motivation. There
is a natural predisposition for producing meaning, which is motivating when learning a 2nd L.
Moving on, another section of this topic concerns the basic differences and similarities between the acquisition
of a mother tongue and the learning of a foreign L.
Firstly, we will examine the similarities. They are three:
-the interlingual development,
-the subconcious mental process and
-the variation.
We are going to explain now what we undertand by the interlingual development process. When a language is
learned, the learner is not ready to use it for some years. Interlingual development is the process a learner must
go through before is able to speak fluently or as well as a native speaker.
The second similarity is the subconcious mental process; the brain organises the input received to allow the
mechanisms to speak.
The third similarity is the variation. Not all language learners follow the same path. There are individual
variations which make some students learn slower than others. Phychological personality and others also come
into play here.
Now, let us consider the differences. There are three important differences between the acquisition of the
mother tongue and the learning of a FL. These are:
-the age,
-the phenomenon of fossilitation and
-the transference.
According to many authors, age is a factor that determines the success or failure in 2nd LL. Today there is
absolute unanimity in the fact that is approximality in puberty
when the ability to acquire L under natural conditions is lost.
Another difference is the phenomenon of fossilitation. Many 2nd L learners never quite learn the L correctly.
Thie causes may be due to the type of teaching is given, the problems of motivation or the students personal
characteristics.
The third difference is the transference. When we speak a 2nd L, it is almost impossible not to make mistakes
influenced by our native L.
As we have explained, a basic difference between the acquisition of a mother tongue and the learning of a FL is
that the first one is a natural process which does not need a methodology, whereas the 2nd one does; the FLL
happens in a classroom and not in social life.
In mother tongue acquisition there is a continuos linguistic information, and a direct contact between the L and
its cultural envirinment; the correction of errors appears after training and effort. On the contrary, we find that
FLL involves planning with special objectives and a specific didactic method.
We should finally point out some suggestions to overcome problems in the 2nd LL process.
Firstly, we should not change the natural order of the interlingual process.
Secondly, pupils must receive a high input. We must respect a silent period and allow children to express
themselves in a spontaneous and natural way.
Finally, regarding how to overcome the fossilitation phenomenon, we find different opinions by different authors.
Some of then think that pupils should be push to produce, and grammar should be taught. Others state that
grammar should be taught in an inductive way, without forcing pupils to use it correctly.
Summarising, we can point out the following. In this unit we have presented some of the most important
contributions to FLT; especially the principles of Linguistics, Structuralism and Generative Grammar. After that,
we have looked into the most important differences and similarities between the acquisition of the mother
tongue
and the learning of a FL.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
1- The Teaching of English as an International Language by Abbot, G and Wingard, P. Collins, 1981.
2- Approches and Methods in Second Language Learning by Garner, R.C. and Lambert.
Rowley Press Newbury.
3- Linguistics in Language Teaching by Wilking, D. Edward Arnold, 1972.
UNIT 6
Before that, the methodology used in the language teaching processes in the 17th and 18th was GrammarTranslation Method whose techniques were based on the model of Latin teaching, when this was already a
dead language. This model was, in fact,unsuitable to teach living languages,as it was a mere adaptation of
techniques belonging to a prestigious discipline.
However, just from the second half of the 19th century the first applied linguists appeared, looking for some
theoretical basis on which they could support the language teaching processes. To do so, they observed the
childrens acquisition mechanisms of their first language, the importance of oral communication, and the first
steps done in the studies of Phonetics.
Although these first principles had less impact at the moment, they served as an influence on later works. Thus,
they are very related with the second researching line, the Reform Movement which supported, on the one
hand, the adoption of an inductive approach in which oral production was considered more important than
written production, and on the other hand, a deep study of Phonetics in order to introduce more efficient
exercises to improve pronunciation.
In the 19th century appeared the Direct Method, based on the model of the first language acquisition. According
to this approach, the best way to learn the second language was the practice of oral production just since the
beginning with the help of non-verbal strategies to explain the meaning of some of the words or phrases which
were likely to appear.
In the 20th century, the works of Applied Linguistics on the field of language teaching point out to their
application on academic contexts, and they require the adoption of teaching techniques which take into account
the classroom reality.
At the end of the World War II, the American Army had to organize intensive language courses in order to
prepare the military staff to work as translators or interpreters in the occupied countries because the Reading
Method which was most used, did not guarantee enough fluency in oral comprehension and production, they
appealed to the structuralist linguists experiences such as Bloomfield.
After the World War II, the Audiolingual Method appeared, partially based on the Army courses. In this method
there is a relationship between Structuralism (Bloomfield) and Psychological Behaviourism (Skinner), whose
stimulus-response-reinforcement theories would have a great influence on the layout of the mechanic exercises
which are characteristical of the Audiolingual Method. For this method, oral production is more important than
written and the order for practising the skill is: aural comprehension (listening), oral production (speaking),
written comprehension (reading), and written production (writing).
In Great Britain another linguistic school appeared, which worked independently from the Audiolingual. It
developed a very similar method of teaching foreign languages: The Situational Language Teaching. It is based
on Structuralism but much more formal in their linguistic references.It gives more importance to the situational
context and to a selection of vocabulary. Nevertheless, the exercises of both methods do not prepare the
students for real situations of communication.
In the Sixties, a new approach appeared in Great Britain: The Communicative Language Teaching in which the
situational component of the Situational Language Teaching is the frame for communicative interactions and not
only for the practice of structures. In this approach, the term communicative competence was coined by
American linguist D.Hymes to refer to the ability of using the linguistic system in an efficient way to
communicate in society.
From the decade of the 60s,other approaches have appeared which have contributed to development of Applied
Linguistics. These methods are interested in the cognitive processes and in the affective and contextual
conditions which must take place for the learning or acquisition of the foreign language.
The first one is the Total Physical Response, based on J.Ashers methodological criteria. One of the main
principles of this new approach is that pupils remember more easily those utterances which they can relate with
actions made by themselves. Thus the comprehension of meaning the orders that the teacher asks the pupils to
do lead them to produce no-verbal responses such as getting up,opening the door,drawing,etc.
Following the same line, the Natural Approach, based on S Krashen and T.Terrell works, propose the possibility
of acquiring a second language in an academic context if the conditions which are similar to those which can be
found in the process of acquiring the first language by young children are fulfilled. Language learning as a
conscient process lead children to acquire some knowledge which will help them to correct their mistakes, what
is called Monitor Theory.
Finally, it is important to quote some approaches, such as The Silent Way, which looks for the learners hard
concentration on the utterances; Suggestopaedia, which uses relaxation and suggestion as helpers for
language learning; and the Community Language Learning, based on group therapy and which uses the target
language as a means of expressing feeling.
" The maxim of Quantity, which says: Make your contribution as informative as it is required.
" The maxim of Quality, which says: Make your contribution true; be sincere.
" The maxim of Relation, saying: Make your contribution relevant; do not be unconnected.
" The maxim of Manner: Avoid obscurity, ambiguity; give order to your speech.
Normally, speakers fulfill these four maxims in their speech acts. However, when one or more of them are
broken up intencionally, this fact gives place to what Grice calls a conversational implicature, that is, an
implication made by the speaker who intends to say something, in an indirect way, to the listener.
It is important to say that, to speak a language, we have to know both the vocabulary and grammar of that
language, and that children lean on their own intelligence to establish the rules which will help them to make
suitable speech acts. During the whole learning process these rules are continuously revised.
On the other hand, if we want to learn a second language, it is necessary to mention the importance of the
teaching process, which is of less relevance in the process of acquisition.
FACTORS.
When learning a second language, people have different purposes and the achieve different result. This fact
make us suppose that there exist different factors which make influence on this process. Several studies have
given place to some conclusions and they set up three main factors which are of great importance in the second
language learning process.
1. Motivation.
Motivation seems to be the most interesting factors of all three, because it does not make any influence on the
L1 learning processes. The L1 acquisition allows children to get into relation with their environment and to
satisfy their needs. As they get to master the use of their first language, they discover the possibilities they have
to cover up other necessities and functions which may appear.
If the L2 is learnt when older, the concepts belonging to the L1 language are already settled up and they are
used by adults in their L2 learning process. If there is an interest in learning the L2, this teaching-learning
process will be followed in a very efficient way because knowing another language implies knowing another
culture.
At a glance, it seems that if the learner stays in the host country of the language s/he is studying. S/he will find it
easier to learn that language. However, this is only true if the learner is actually interested in participating in
social contacts with native speakers. His/her wishes to control the environment are more important here than
the teaching aspects.
When speaking about motivation, it is not only important to appeal reward, in the behaviouristic sense of the
word, but we must also include human psychological needs. Among them we can find essential ones, such as
hanger o fear; and some others dealing with personal security, feeling of belonging to a community, selfconfidence and relation with the other members of the community we belong to. Apart from the motivation in
satisfying these psychological needs, every individual is more encouraged as his/her objectives are more
important for him/her, as for example, those referring to cultural interest, family well-being, etc.
Researches have shown that there are two types of motivation:
" Integrative motivation, referring to the studentsfeeling of belonging to the community of native speakers of the
language they are learning and of participating in their cultural environment.
" Instrumental motivation, dealing with the learnersneed to learn the second language to apply for a job or to
study abroad.
This second type of motivation is very common in Primary Education, and as teachers, our role is to encourage
in our students the integrative motivation. To do so, there are a series of techniques: bringing to the classroom
material (pictures,brochures,leaflets,...) about the country; organizing competitions on sports characteristical of
the country; or accompanying the students to shows (films,plays,concerts,...) in the foreign language.
On the other hand, teachers must have in mind that children are better receivers of these kinds of activities than
adults, and that they are easily encouraged to participate in tasks where they can play an active role
(dramatizations,games,mural making,..).
Language aptitude.
It has been shown that there are some people who can learn a language more easily than other people,who, in
turn, find it rather difficult to get enough competence in that new language. A lot of research has been made in
this sense to find the relationship between our own aptitude or inner ability and the results achieved in our
learning process. Thus, it has been shown that there is no direct connection between our intelligence and our
aptitude for language learning. On the contrary, it seems to exist a dependence on series of factors, such as the
brain ability to record and memorize certain phonetical material; our own faculty to tackle grammatical
information; our capacity to remember new words; and our ability to discover or infer, without help, linguistic
forms and rules.
The Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT) is used to measure these abilities, although it is only based on
linguistic elements. Besides, it seems that this test only gives us 50 per cent of certainly, and that is the reason
why the Language Aptitude Battery (LAB) was also used to measure language aptitude, but including other
extralinguistic elements such as motivation. According to the results given by this test, the students who get
satisfactory results in the other subjects usually get good qualifications in foreign language. Indeed, this is
usually true, but there are other students as well who are very good at foreign language, but not at rest of the
subjects. In conclusion, there does not exist definitive criteria for us to base on when dealing with this matter.
However, the fact that intelligence does not make great influence over foreign language acquisition does not
mean that teacher leave it aside. On the contrary, it is important to take intelligence into consideration when
choose the appropiate methodology in class. Thus, for less intelligent students, the most useful method seems
to be that of repetition, whereas a methodology based on explanation of what they are learning seems to suit
better to cleverer pupils.
Age.
Here, the question is, "which is the appropiate age to start learning a second language?". According to some
studies the best age to foreign language learning is between four and eight years, because the child
experiments an intensive process of evolution characterised by his/her ability to learn through mere exposition
to data. Nevertheless, there some teachers who think that children should not start learning a second language
until they have enough fluency on their first language. They even say that an early start in L2 learning can
prevent children from acquiring their L1 efficiently.
All these opinions leads us to analyse the advantages and disadvantages of foreign language learning early
start. In order to do that, we can have a look at those cases of emigrantschildren who get competence in a L2.
As opposed to them, those children who learn a foreign language at school do not usually achieve that degree
of perfection.
For all this, one of the main reasons to introduce L2 learning in Primary Education is the better assimilation of
phonetical elements that children have at this age. Besides, children usually are less reticent to participate
actively in class, just as they do not have the adultssense of ridiculous, although adults normally have less
dificulty on getting concentrated. All these age factors, however, should not interfere on the teaching-learning
process, and we should think that, wether younger or older, the human being has mechanisms of every type to
acquire foreign languages if they are motivated to do so.
What, in fact, should worry us is the fact that the little success which the student may have in Primary School is,
unfortunately, due not to the factors of age, aptitude or motivation, but the teachers low level of preparation in
relation with how to let the students into a foreign language.
related to language acquisition because those people who are not relatively clever have been succesful in
acquire their native language.
Within the whole process of mother tongue acquisition, there exist some steps followed by children:
" Prelinguistic stage: From birth to the age of eight months, children acquire spontaneously the use of auditory
mechanisms. It is the stage when they produce non-symbolic sounds.
" First word production: When they are 11 months old, children produce a voice sound which is somehow
symbolic for them. This is the stage in which they give names to people or objects placed around them.
" Second year: Childrens messy vocalic structures begin to get shape and they begin to participate into
communicative exchanges. Their parentsrole gets more and more important. However, it is not a matter of
repetition of what they say, but beyond that, children create by themselves sounds which they regard as correct
or wrong depending on the adultsreactions. These criteria of validation help the child to take or opt out the
different strings of language they are giving birth to. Those strings which s/he considers to be correct are the
same that the ones produced by adults and are reinforced by means of continuous repetition.
" Between 3 and 4 years old: The process of acquisition keeps on developing. This a period of great creativity
and less difficulty for auditory discrimination, and for imitation. The essential aspects of the process of
acquisition are developed in full. The following grammatical system children build on are very similar to those
which respond to the adultsgrammatical rules.
" Entering school: The school substitutes their parents in the acquisition process and provides them with written
code. It is just in this moment when the process of learning behings, and it will all their lives.
INTRODUCTION
Children's literature has certain particular features which, apart from the author's inspiration, are what make it
more attractive and interesting for children, namely: it is a free and happy activity, contains imaginative
elements, reflects inner grievances suffered by the child, uses argumentative techniques and language suited to
children, has a most intuitive presentation, appeals to feelings, affectivity, transmits moral values, conveys
serenity and balance on the part of the author, has expository clarity and is interesting.
In children's literature, children's folklore can also be included, which is a form of literature that has been passed
on by word of mouth. Carmen BravoVillasante states that an aesthetic education using folklore enhances
sensitivity. Children who are not taught by means of songs, stories or poetry are children with poorness of spirit.
Children's literature is an inexhaustible fountain of resources for programming all sorts of language activities.
In fantastic literature, any adventure story aims to plunge the reader into uncertainty; the most dramatic episode
is generally saved for the end, thus giving the enigma its own charm.
Fantastic works are usually stories: a ballad, novel, tale or short story. The short story is the literary form that is
best adapted to fantastic literature, chiefly due to its origins; it deals with extremely interesting "extraordinary
stories" and their episodes predispose the reader to sense that fatality that is inherent in every fantastic
adventure. These adventures do not occur at random and come to nothing, for the entire intrigue is conceived
on the basis of the denouement; the victim-hero of a fantastic adventure generally finds himself alone under
some kind of spell of which he is very well aware.
The classic fantastic story derives not from stories but from popular legends. The difference between a story
and a legend is owed to the Grimm brothers; in their opinion, a story is more poetic and a legend is more
historical. A story tells adventures that take place in an indefinite past, in an unspecified place; a legend relates
notable events that took place on a given date, in a given place, to a given person. A difference in function
determines these differences in structure: a story aims to amuse, a legend aims to express and transmit beliefs.
The title of a story is often the hero's name; the presence of this character alone guarantees the unity of an
account consisting of several episodes: the hero sets off on an adventure with an open mind and a light heart,
facing all sorts of dangers without fear.
Louis Vax states that "a fantastic story" generally deals with men who are faced with the inexplicable.
The story always begins with a stable situation and certain features remain intact throughout the development of
the action. Every story, therefore, contains two types of episodes:
- Those that describe a stage of balance or imbalance.
- Those that describe the passage from one to another.
The former are contrary to the latter. Sometimes the reader identifies with the character; then, in turn, he
withdraws from reality.
A misadventure of some kind is the main type of plot. These misadventures can be of different sorts; by and
large, towards the end, evil is transformed into good. The hero continually feels the contradiction between both
worlds: the world of reality and the world of fantasy; and he is overwhelmed by the extraordinary things that
surround him.
As a general rule, a new person is introduced and the action enters a new phase. Vladimir Propp sees it as an
operation of relative rationalization of a myth and the struggle against it, and its deep unity and great appeal lie
beyond its generalized use as children's stories.
Important writers, in the English language, of fantastic literature of travels and adventure:
In the Tudor era:
Sir Philip Sydney. He was born in 1554 and died in 1586. He wrote "The Arcadia", a long fantastic story about
aristocrats castaways on an island; it contains the grandest principles, the most chivalrous manners and the
most beautiful ladies.
Nashe, with his "The Unfortunate Traveller", tells a horrifying story full of dialogues, amazing descriptions and
the strangest adventures.
In the Elizabethan era:
Daniel Defoe. He is one of the most important authors of this era in English literature. His most famous book
("Robinson Crusoe") is known all around the world and has been translated into many languages. Many studies
have been done on it: man's isolation, self-sufficiency, utopia,...
Tobias Smollet was born in 1721 and died in 1771. His main adventure and fantastic stories are "Roderick
Random" and "Humphrey Clinker".
Laurence Steine is a contemporary of the aforementioned author. He was born in 1713 and died in 1768; his
most important adventure story is "Sentimental Journey".
All the works of this era are not about fantastic stories but about adventures, save for the work of Jonathan Swift
(with "Gulliver's Travels"). This book hides satire in such a deft manner that children still read it as a fairy tale.
The book starts off laughing about mankind; when Gulliver finds himself in Lilliput, he is a giant compared to
inhabitants there. In the second part of the book, he goes to a land inhabited by giants and the author criticizes
all men thinkers. He then goes to Laputa, which is a flying island, and Swift examines and criticizes human
institutions. At the end there are horses with rational minds. This book still today is a masterpiece, a children's
fairy tale and a serious book for adults, and it has never lost its attractive nor allusive value.
1.3. ANALYSIS OF LITERARY LANGUAGE THROUGH RELEVANT WORKS.
The work of Walter de la Mare is one of the best works of short fantastic stories. "Out of the Deep" is perhaps
his most original and exciting short story. Here is a passage from it:
"All that I have to say, he muttered, is just this: I have Mrs. Thripps. I haven't absolutely out of the wire. I wish to
be alone. But I'm not asking, do you see? In time I may able to know what I want. But what is important now is
that no more than that accused Pig were your primrose "real", my dear. You see, things must be real".
The title of the novel means a number of things: the depths of the house in which the servants live, the depths of
memory, from which remembrances ascend, and the depths of the misfortunes of the wretch who is seeking
help.
The literary language of the above text is bright and eloquent, neither dull nor slow.
The protagonist is Jimmie, who is characterized by his desire to surprise and his liking for black humour. This
passage contains his regards for a girl. He is a timorous boy who shows Soame's cautious sadism and plays
bad jokes on the lackeys.
When he is talking to the girl, he realizes that he was forbidden to talk to the lackeys ("...you might pull real
bells: to pull dubiously genuine pigtails seemed now a feele jest"). The word "pigtail" here may infer "pig", which
corresponds to the beast that appears on the stairs. The gesture of pulling a rope is similar to that of pulling
from a pig.
The word "primrose" (spring) naturally suggests the line from a famous verse by Wordsworth: "A primrose by a
river's brimm". The thought of spring may have suggested Lord Beaconsfield, whom Jimmie refers to: "All of
which is only to say, dear madam, as Beaconsfield remarked to Old Vic, that I'm thanking you now".
In the text he refers to what the girl says, but then he gives it less importance and highlights what it is really
important. The style is loose and clear, with lots of imagination. The vocabulary is simple, although some words
have several meanings, like "primrose". The verb "to ask" means to call on someone; the author uses it to mean
"Do you understand?". The same occurs with "in time" which means sooner or later.
We will now look at some texts by the writer Beatrix Potter:
"Peter was dreadfully frightened; he rushed all over the garden, for he had forgotten the way back to the gate.
He lost one of his shoes among the cabbages, and the other shoes amongst the potatoes".
This text is from the book "Peter Rabbit".
"As there was no money, Ginger and Pickles were obliged to eat their own goods. Pickles ate biscuits and
Ginger ate a dried haddock. They ate them by candlelight after the shop was closed".
This other text is from "Ginger Pickles".
"Moppet and Pittens have found up into very good ratcatchers. They go out cat-catching in the village, and they
find plenty of employment. They charge so much a dozen and earn their living very comfortably".
This last text belongs to "The Poly-Poly Pudding".
The style is clear and bright. Repetition is avoided, which es why in the first text, in the last line, "amongst" is
used instead of "among", which was used in the previous line. The language is simple, easy to read, so the
words need not be explained. The author avoids allipsis, by writing "He had forgotten" instead of "He'd
forgotten", so that children can clearly understand the text. Another characteristic of this writer, which is more
clearly seen in the first two texts, is her use of many verbs in the past tense. She does not use description very
much.
An incentive for speaking and writing. Experiencing a story can give rise to the production of written or spoken
answers. It is natural to express our likes and dislikes, exchange ideas and associations about the stories we
have just heard. In this manner, stories should be a part of a set related activities.
Communication. Reading, writing and aswering questions about stories through writing, speaking, acting and
making art develop certain feelings for listening, sharing and collaborating. Learning a language is useless if we
are not able to communicate, in other words, to use language skills. A story serves to share the construction of
a crucial sense of attention for others.
General curriculum. Most stories can be used to develop attention, analysis and expression, and to relate them
to other subjects in the curriculum, such as geography, history, social and cultural aspects, mathematics and
science.
b) COMPREHENSION TECHNIQUES.
Helping children to predict the contents of a story by telling them beforehand in their native language, by
showing them pictures, or by introducing key vocabulary from that story.
While they are being told a story, show them pictures, draw on the board, act and mime, use words that are
similar in meaning in both the first and second languages.
Tell the story more than once. Interrupt the story often and repeat the idea in a differente manner to make sure
that the children do not get lost.
Study the story beforehand and simplify some of the vocabulary, if necessary: words, expressions, verb tenses,
word order and complex sentences.
c) HOW SHOULD READING HABITS BE INTRODUCED AND CHILDREN BE TAUGHT TO APPRECIATE
THE POETIC FUNCTION OF LANGUAGE?
First of all, the stories, in other words, the literary language at this level with children, must essentially be a
source of joy and must meet their interests. If the teacher uses stories or literary texts merely to teach, the
children may reject this and lose their good, natural disposition for stories, which is an enormous potential.
Reading habits can be developed and the poetic function of language can be taught by telling and reading the
children stories that are suitable for them. This implies a set of advantages:
Advantages of reading stories to the children:
1. If the teacher's language foreign language competence is low.
2. Showing the children pictures that go with the stories.
3. Letting the children read what the teachers have read to them previously.
4. Allowing the children to realize that books are a source of pleasure and interest.
Advantages of telling stories to the children:
1. It can help the children to understand by repeating the story, pointing out important features, miming, acting,
drawing pictures on the board.
2. By having the children in front of him, the teacher can make any special adaptations at any time.
3. Allowing the children to discover through their experience the magic sense of listening to a story being told by
someone.
d) WHICH CHILDREN'S LITERATURE BOOKS TO CHOOSE?
When choosing them, we must ask ourselves the following:
1. Is the first impression about a book valid for us and for our pupils?
2. Does the book meet the pupil's interests and hold their attention?
3. Do we accept the values expressed in the book?
4. Can the children understand the story enough to gain something valuable outside of it?
5. Is the story easy to understand irrespective of their knowledge of its vocabulary?
6. The story should be the source of activities, such as drama, story writing, letter writing from one protagonist to
another, or activities relating to a theme.
e) WHERE CAN THESE BOOKS BE OBTAINED FOR OUR STUDENTS?
There are many types of story books. Each one has its advantages and disadvantages.
1. Readers.
Advantages: the language has been simplified to make the reading easier. Easily obtainable.
Disadavantages: they are not authentic books, original works by their author. They do not introduce the
language used by present-day native English-speaking children.
2. Books published by native English-speaking children.
Advantages: the stories may be more interesting. The language is authentic.
Disadvantages: the children might find it difficult to understand most of the language on their own.
3. Books in the pupil's native language.
Advantages: within everybody's reach.
Disadvantages: it is up to the teacher to translate them.
4. Traditional and personal stories in the native language.
Advantages: the children are probably familiar with them and enjoy recognizing them when they are read to
them in English.
Disadvantages: the teacher may feel that his English is not good enough to translate them.
5. Stories invented by the teacher and the pupils.
BIBLIOGRAFA
ELLIS AND BREWSTER: The Story telling handbook for Primary Teachers. Penguin.
GARVIE: Story as a vehicle. Multilingual matters.
PERRY: Into books: 101 literature activities for the classroom. Oxford University Press. Madrid.
MORGAN and RINVOLUCRI: Once upon a time. Cambridge University Press.
ROSEN: Shapers and Polishers. Teachers as Storytellers. Mary Glasgow.
WRIGHT: Why stories. Oxford University Press. Madrid.
UNIT 17: THE SONG AS A POETIC VEHICLE AND AS A LITERARY CREATION IN THE
ENGLISH CLASS. TIPPOLOGY OF SONGS. TECHNIQUES OF USING SONGS IN
THE PHONETIC, LEXICAL AND CULTURAL LEARNING.
1.INTRODUCTION
In the pedagogy of second language acquisition, the introduction of authentic documents, such as songs, was
introduced as a key to something alive, as the indication of a developing reality.
The great advantage of songs is the possibility of "being remembered".
But it is necessary the use of carefully selected songs or composed especially for the class, in order to avoid
those containing lexical mistakes that students would fix irremediably in their minds.
Advantages:
- Apart from being a very relaxing activity for the vast majority of students, singing a song contributes to
encourage their interest to study in depth that language.
- The activity of singing establishes a warm atmosphere and a sense of Cupertino among students. The feeling
of making a fool of themselves can be overcome easily if we succeed in enthusiasting them with the activity of
singing songs in that language. On the whole, what completely justifies the use of songs in the foreign language
classroom is the possibility of practices that language.
1.1 The song as a poetic vehicle and as a literary creation in the English class.
The song constitutes an element that belongs to the daily environment of the students.
Unlike the textbook or other resources means from which it is presumed that the student had a major
knowledge, the song, the video and the television allow the creation, in the class, of a different pedagogic
relation, egalitarian and constructive.
Sometimes the song is transformed into a vehicle to transmit knowledge from the teacher to the student.
1.2 The socialisation of songs.
Songs should respect these rules:
- Accurate grammatical contents, and without going beyond the limitation of the knowledge already acquired for
the students.
- Lexical contents useful and easily memorise, without excess of new elements for the student.
- Rhythmic guidelines, which need to be "normal" so the musical rhythm matches the natural one of the lyrics:
there should not be tonic stress on the syllables that would not normally have them.
There are songs already graded. Socialisation is, without any doubt, the main function of songs in the English
class.
From a psychological point of view, the song is a resource that should be used in any moment where we
perceive a fall in the interest or attention of our students.
Before introducing a song in the classroom, the teacher should introduce a brief explanation about the song in
order to facilitate a better and general comprehension of what it will be heard.
It is a mistake to expect students to understand perfectly the meaning of all the words and expressions
appearing in the song. What it really appeals to them from a song is, not necessarily the lyrics, but the melody.
Above all, children enjoy immensely singing songs, although in many cases they do not have a clear idea of he
meaning of some words used in them.
1.3 The song as a starting point.
An activity considered highly enriching from the human and linguistic point of view is the exploitation of play
back, or the preparation of a show in which the students perform the vision of English music. This is an activity
where the students, on one hand, have the possibility to work harmoniously the oral and non oral aspects
(gestures) of communication and, therefore, the opportunity to choose singers or characters they want to
represent, as well as the way adopted by this recreation.
1.3.1 The material, a problem
The most serious problem in this field are, on one hand, the lack of information sources which could allow the
teacher to be up to date in the evolution of he music in the country whose language s/he teaches; and on the
other hand the need of sonorous and audio-visual materials such as cassettes, videos, etc.
3. TECHNIQUES IN THE USE OF THE SONG FOR PHONETIC, LEXICAL AND CULTURAL
LEARNING.
3.1 Techniques in the use of phonetic learning.
The majority of teachers, when introduce a song in their English class, do it with he idea that students would try
to imitate as closely as possible the melody and he lyrics they heard. He attainment of this purpose is, without
any doubts, something very important for he learning of pronunciation (sound, stress and rhythm).
Pronunciation must be he aspect in which we should insist on when we teach a song. The first contact of
students with he song needs to be always oral, through he sense of hearing. In he first audition of a song he
teacher indicates he rhythm of each sentence so that he students realise, from he beginning, of which words or
syllables are bearing stress. It is only after this previous training that he class will be in condition to start singing
a song they have listened to before.
Nevertheless, it is clear that not all the songs are equally useful to practice pronunciation. The teacher should
be sure that the students would not have many difficulties to catch the sounds and the rhythm of the song.
There are songs composed to be accompanied with actions or movements of the body while they are sung.
They are called action songs.
These songs are particularly useful for small children as they allow practising orally different formal aspects of
the language and, at the same time, they teach the meaning of the words or the sentences of the text used in
the song through different gestures. (Head, and shoulders...).
3.2 Techniques for lexical and cultural learning.
a) Oral answer to questions about the text of the song.
This is one of the easiest ways to check he comprehensive capacity of the student before any text.
The teacher should prepare a number of questions about the text of the song. Before listening to the song, the
teacher delivers a list with he questions s/the has prepared. After the students have analysed those questions
during a couple of minutes, the teacher plays the cassette twice or three times. While they listen to he song,
they should try to find out the answer to the questions delivered before.
b) Arranging words.
Before listening to certain song, we should deliver a sheet of paper with a list of words situated in a different
order from where they appear in the song.
The students have to arrange the words according to the order in the song.
c) Complete the text of a song.
The teacher hands a copy of the song to each student; there are gaps in some places that correspond to certain
words or phrases. While the listening takes place, each student attempts to write the words or sentences that
were omitted in he copy. They also practice the written expression.
d) Reconstruction of a song.
The teacher cuts off all the lines from a song and places them in an envelope. Then the groups open their
envelopes with he corresponding lines from he song they are going to rebuild among the whole class. The
different groups should place the sentences in the same order they appear in he song. It could be repeated
twice or three times.
e) Finding stress in the sentence.
The teacher invites the students to listen carefully to certain song and pay attention to the words pronounced
with major intensity. After that, he gives a copy of the song that has already listened to.
While they listen to the song for he second time, they have to mark over the copy of the song those words or
syllable which stand out before the others.
f) Correction of an inaccurate version of a song.
The teacher hands to each student a copy of a song where some of the original words or sentences have been
changed for others that are not the ones appearing in the song but have some likeness.
As they listen to the song, the students will have to find out where are the mistakes and correct them in he
handed copy.
g) Identifying phrases.
The teacher delivers to each student from the class one, two or three lines that have been cut from the song.
Each student when hearing the text corresponding to the lines s/he has should rise his/her hand.
h) Classifications of words.
While listening to a song, the students should make a list in which collect a certain kind of grammatical elements
(verbs, prepositions, colours...) introduced in the song.
i) Words with opposite meaning.
Children have a list with some words; they will have to provide one or two antonyms for each word. After a few
minutes of discussion in the groups, the teacher will play the cassette and encourage the students to guess if in
the text of the song there are any of the antonym words they have found previously.
j) Searching words that rhyme.
In this case the attention of the students is focused mainly on the phonetic element.
Before listening to the song, a copy, with some blanks, is handed to the students. They have to fill them with
words that rhyme with the corresponding verse. After that, the teacher plays the cassette so they can check if
he words they have found are really in he song.
k) Translating a song.
Once the song is learned by heart, a song may be exploited through translation into the student's mother
tongue. Even though this is difficult task for the students, the effort requires its compensation in a deep study of
the meaning of the song.
1. Introduction.
As way of introduction we can say that children enjoy singing very much. Songs and rhymes provide an
enjoyable change of the routine in the classroom.
Songs and Rhymes provide relaxation and variety, but we have to be careful because an excessive use of them
can make children to get bored.
Taking this fact into account, we can say that songs are a good resource to teach vocabulary, practise the
language orally, improve pronunciation and intonation and also help children to know the culture of the foreign
language.
3. Types of songs.
It is essential to select carefully the songs we are going to work with in class.
What we must bear in mind are the features of the students we are working with at that specific moment: their
age, interests, likes and dislikes, and of course, their knowledge of the foreign language.
We already know that the foreign language is introduced in the second cycle of Primary Education, that is,
children from 8 years to 12.
- 2nd Cycle of Primary (8 to 10).
It is the first time the foreign language is introduced in class. It is one of the best didactic moments because
children are very receptive and interested in everything.
- 3rd Cycle of Primary (10 to 12).
At this age their interests begin to change. So that, teachers have to take these changes into account and adjust
the teaching practice to the new needs and interests of the students.
The majority of the students think that songs are childish; they feel shy singing and so that, it is difficult to make
them sing aloud in class.
However, they enjoy music very much but their interests are different. So that, we have to find songs that they
enjoy and are suitable for our purposes too.
We as teachers must select the most suitable songs depending on the level of our students, on their interests
and their needs.
The following are some examples of types of songs we can use in class at these stages.
3.1. Songs for occasions.
Songs that make reference to anything that happens to them in daily life: "Happy birthday" or "Auld Lang Syne"
(New Year's Eve).
3.2. Topic songs.
Songs that deal with a specific topic. We must bear in mind that the topic the song deals with must be
interesting for the children. For example: Colours- "The colours" or animals- "Old Mc Donald"
3.3. Songs with actions.
Songs that are related to the old technique of representing what we are saying: "total physical response"
(James Asher): "If you're happy" or "These is the way".
3.4. Round songs.
A round is a circular song. One group begins singing, then the second group begins the song when the first
group gets to the end of the first line. The third group begins when the second group gets to the end of the first
line and so on. When the singers get to the end of the last line they continue singing from the beginning again,
so the song becomes circular. For example: "Three blind mice" or "I hear thunder".
3.5. Dialogues songs.
This type of songs is very useful. They are very easy to sing and at the same time they require more attention
on the part of the children. For example: "I spy" or "I am a music man".
3.6. Traditional songs.
These songs will not probably known by the students, but they must learn them because they belong to the new
culture they are studying. For example: "Oh, Susanna", "London Bridge" or "Yankee Doodle".
Furthermore, there are songs that we sing at a specific time of the year like Christmas Carols: "Merry
Christmas" or "Jingle Bells".
3.7. Other songs.
There are other songs for children which are more difficult but which are also good to work with them in class.
For example songs in all Walt Disney's films. A good idea to develop them is to watch the film at the same time
we sing the song. For example: "Hakuna Matata" or "Fly, fly" (Peter Pann).
5. Conclusion.
There are many activities that we can do in class with songs. However, it is going to depend on our students'
interests, needs and, of course, linguistic level. It is up to us to select the work and ht songs we are going to
work with.
The possibilities of the songs are directed to develop the four linguistic skills: oral and written comprehension
and oral and written expression. But, we may say that the most basic ability to use songs in class is oral
comprehension.
Los alumnos trabajan de dos en dos formando un tndem frente al resto de las otras parejas, o hacindose
preguntas uno a otro sobre su vida, trabajo, familia, actividad, descripcin de un documento visual, etc. La
finalidad de esta actividad es obtener la informacin ms completa en un tiempo fijado de antemano. El
profesor acta de monitor y supervisa la expresin, pronunciacin, etc., de las parejas.
1.2.3. - Actividad en grupos.
Se divide la clase en grupos de trabajo de cuatro o cinco alumnos. Suelen ser los juegos ms atractivos, pues,
al igual que en las parejas, se incrementa el nmero de alumnos hablando al mismo tiempo y dinamizan mucho
ms la clase, desarrollando el sentido de cooperacin entre ellos.
Se corre el riesgo de que hablen espaol, si el profesor no supervisa todos los grupos, pero una forma de
resolverlo es nombrar un moderador en cada grupo que se encargue de evitarlo.
Dentro de este apartado podemos incluir la divisin de la clase en dos o ms equipos contrincantes. Esto dara
ms emocin al juego o actividad, al introducir el sentido de competicin.
1.3. - El material.
Entramos en un campo interminable. Todo depende de la dedicacin, imaginacin o conocimiento prctico de
cada profesor.
Existen muchsimos juegos que no necesitan material especial para su puesta en prctica. No obstante, se
suele aconsejar, por ser muy socorrido, fabricarse juegos de cartas plastificadas, con dibujos alusivos a varios
temas, tales como: alimentos, bebidas, ropa, animales, plantas, objetos, mobiliario, medios de comunicacin,
das de la semana, meses del ao, estaciones, las grandes ciudades (Nueva York, Londres, Sydney,...), los
oficios y sus correspondientes herramientas, cartas con dibujos y otras con los nombres que corresponden a
cada dibujo, etc.
Pero no todos los profesores tienen la habilidad o el tiempo para hacerse sus propias cartas. Para esto
podemos recurrir a los alumnos, o solicitar la ayuda del profesor de dibujo. Las cartas sern hechas en
cartulina del mismo color y tendrn todas el mismo tamao.
Si se cuenta con un retroproyector en clase, el profesor puede llevar dibujos esquemticos, tarjetas postales,
fotografas, etc. Entonces la mitad de los alumnos se sientan mirando a la proyeccin y la otra mitad de
espaldas. Se juega por parejas: un alumno describe lo que ve, mientras el otro va dibujando a partir de la
informacin que recibe. Cuanto ms rico sea el vocabulario y las expresiones gramaticales del que describe,
ms completo ser el dibujo del compaero. En este caso un solo dibujo sirve para toda la clase.
Insistimos, sin embargo, en que es muy prctico contar con un buen nmero de cartas plastificadas, pues
sirven para muchos juegos. En la formacin de familias puede haber muchas variantes.
1.4. - El lenguaje.
Antes de lanzarse a organizar juegos, el profesor debe familiarizar a los alumnos con una serie de estructuras
bsicas que permiten agilizar el comienzo y el final de los juegos. Estas estructuras pueden ser:
1.4.1. - Para empezar el juego.
Listen! These are the rules.
Be quiet. Stay on your seat.
Form a circle / groups of four /pairs.
Sit down. Stand up.
Do the same as myself.
Give the cards, one each.
Ready? Go ahead!
Close your eyes.
Count up to four ...
You win.
You start.
Look at your partner.
1.4.2. - Para mantener el juego.
Organizacin: Los alumnos, de forma individual o en parejas, leen la primera de las series de palabras que
aparecen en su hoja. El primero o la primera pareja que encuentra la palabra que no pertenece a la serie
levanta la mano, lee la palabra en voz alta y explica por qu ha elegido sa precisamente; si est bien, gana; si
no, se pasa el turno al otro.
2.1.8. - Falta una palabra, cul?
Objetivo: Revisin del vocabulario.
Destrezas: Comprensin y expresin escritas.
Nivel: Elemental e intermedio (dependiendo de la cadena de oposiciones).
Material: Encerado.
Agrupacin: Individual o en parejas.
Organizacin: El profesor escribe en la pizarra una lista de cinco o siete palabras en la que existe una cadena
de oposiciones. El alumno, individualmente o en parejas, debe adivinar la que falta y explicar por qu la ha
elegido.
Ejemplos:
- black, white; true, false; big......
- father, mother; man, woman; brother......
- on, off; upstairs, downstairs; in......
Alternativa: Cada pareja puede hacer su propia lista y leerla en voz alta, para que otra pareja encuentre la
oposicin. Si la palabra es adivinada, el acertante gana un punto. Si la palabra no es adivinada, o se da una
respuesta incorrecta, el que ha hecho la lista, gana.
2.1.9. - Palabras y dibujos.
Objetivos: Revisin y fijacin de vocabulario.
Destrezas: Comprensin y expresin escritas.
Nivel: Elemental.
Agrupacin: Individual o en parejas.
Organizacin: el profesor reparte una fotocopia a cada alumno o pareja donde aparece un dibujo. En un tiempo
dado (tres minutos) los alumnos tienen que escribir los nombres de los dibujos que estn numerados. Por
ejemplo:
Number 1: A hen.
Number 2: A knife.
Number 3: A fork.
As hasta que terminen. Luego tendrn que agruparlos por categoras, de tres en tres. Por ejemplo:
The dog, the cat, the hen are animals.
Podemos ayudar a los alumnos dndoles las siguientes frases:
- ............................................................... are things to eat.
- .............................................................. are used to travel.
- .............................................................. are clothes.
La pareja que termine antes y cuyas respuestas sean correctas, gana.
2.2. - Juegos de estructuras gramaticales.
Estos juegos pueden ser orales o escritos y ayudan a fijar unas estructuras gramaticales especficas, ya
conocidas por el alumno. Hay que tener la habilidad de presentrselos como una actividad recreativa, sin hacer
alusin a la estructura. Si el alumno se equivoca, debemos animarle a que encuentre la alternativa correcta, sin
corregirle formalmente, pues ya hemos indicado que lo ms importante del juego es la comunicacin.
2.2.1.- Juego de trotamundos.
Objetivo: Prctica del presente.
Destrezas: Comprensin y expresin orales.
alumno. Mostrando una a los dems, el primer alumno dice: "I have got some flour, and you?". El alumno que
tenga un nombre o dibujo que pueda ser asociado con "harina" saldr corriendo del crculo y dir, por ejemplo:
"I haven't got any flour, but I have got some bread". Y coloca la carta al lado de "harina". Luego aade (dejando
la carta en el pupitre): "And I have got some cigarrettes too", parque otro alumno venga y diga: "I haven't got
any cigarrettes, but I have got a lighter, and some milk, too". Y as sucesivamente. Los alumnos debern
reaccionar muy deprisa, porque puede haber varias asociaciones. El jugador que se quede con las cartas en la
mano, pierde.
2.2.5. - Juego de las adivinanzas.
Objetivos: Prctica del presente simple, de la interrogacin y de los adjetivos.
Destrezas: Comprensin y expresin orales.
Nivel: Intermedio.
Material: Cartas con dibujos, o papel con el nombre de objetos fciles de describir.
Agrupacin: Dos grandes grupos.
Organizacin: Se divide la clase en dos equipos, y el profesor designa el mismo nmero de cartas para cada
uno. El tiempo de participacin de cada equipo es de dos minutos. Un alumno del equipo A sale a "escena". El
profesor le da una carta del montn que le corresponde y el alumno tiene que describir el objeto para que sus
compaeros lo adivinen. Tiene que haber una pausa entre frase y frase para que los compaeros tengan
tiempo de pensarlo. Si un grupo se "atasca" en un objeto, puede dejarlo y pasar a otro. Entonces el que
describe entrega la carta al profesor y otro compaero sale a intentar describir un objeto nuevo. Gana el equipo
que en los dos minutos haya conseguido adivinar ms objetos.
2.2.6. - La ruta de Ana.
Objetivos: Prctica de las instrucciones y la descripcin de lugares.
Destreza: Comprensin oral.
Nivel: Intermedio y avanzado.
Material: Un dibujo o plano.
Agrupacin: Individual o en parejas.
Organizacin: El profesor entrega un dibujo a cada alumno o pareja, representando un plano con una ruta que
va a coger Ana. Luego lee un texto y explica el vocabulario desconocido, hasta estar seguro de que los
alumnos lo han entendido. Los alumnos han de marcar en el dibujo el camino seguido por Ana y hacer una cruz
en los sitios donde se detiene.
Alternativa (sin dibujo): Para complicar el juego, en niveles avanzados, el profesor lee un texto descriptivo de
un lugar, y los alumnos tienen que imaginarlo y dibujarlo. Luego se comparan los dibujos y se discuten las
diferencias hasta conseguir e que parezca ms correcto a todos.
2.3. - Juegos de creatividad.
Son ms abiertos que los del apartado anterior. Los llamamos as porque el alumno puede crear un lenguaje
ms imaginativo, ms amplio. Son eminentemente comunicativos, por lo que el profesor deber vigilar un uso
"adecuado" de la lengua sin insistir demasiado en la perfeccin de la forma.
2.3.1. - La historia tonta.
Objetivo: Prctica del pasado.
Destrezas: Comprensin y expresin escritas.
Nivel: Elemental, intermedio y avanzado.
Material: Hojas de papel.
Agrupacin: Grupos de ocho alumnos.
Organizacin: El profesor explica que la finalidad del juego es encontrar las consecuencias de una serie de
acciones. Se divide la clase en grupos de ocho alumnos. Cada grupo empieza a escribir una historia
respondiendo a las siguientes preguntas:
- Who? : el nombre de un hombre o de una mujer clebres.
- Where?: se desarrolla la accin.
- When? : fecha, poca, estacin del ao.
- What are they wearing?
- What did they do?
- What did X say?
- What did Z say?
1. First of all, we should consider that the foreign language area curricular purpose is not to teach a foreign
language but rather to teach how to communicate using it. Therefore Royal Decree 1006/1991 of the 14th June,
which establishes the teaching requirements for Primary education, sees communicative competence as
comprising five sub-competencies:
- Grammar competence: the ability to implement rules and lexical items from the language system.
- Discourse competence: which refers to the ability to produce different types of discourse organising them
according to the communicative situation and the interlocutors.
- Sociolinguistic competence: refers to the ability to adapt statements to different contexts observing the usage
of a given linguistic community.
- Strategic competence: implies being able to use verbal and non-verbal strategies to compensate for
breakdowns in communication.
- Sociocultural competence: refers to the student's knowledge of the cultural aspects of the countries where the
foreign language is spoken.
All these elements are part of the language, as language is not something abstract, but a tool for effective
communication.
2. Communicative competence acquisition is seen as a creative construction process. Our pupils using their
general cognitive strategies and linguistic input they receive establish hypothesis to form the new rules about
the foreign language system.
3. This new system is gradually contrasted and improved as new input is presented. Therefore error is seen as
an integral part of the learning process, as it is the manifestation of the effort our pupils are making to acquire
the new system.
4. This acquisition process may be fostered, especially at first, in ways that do not require a linguistic response
by using Total Physical Response techniques.
5. Receptive skills (listening and reading) are very important at this stage, specially listening, since oral
communication is the most direct form of communication among human beings.
6. We will try to familiarise the children not only with the target language from a functional point of view, but also
as a means of cultural and social transmission.
7. We should organise contents around topics connected to the students' interest.
8. The four linguistic skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) should be integrated through meaningful
communicative activities.
Then, the General objectives of the foreign language area are designed according to the principles we have just
mentioned. As we will see, these objectives refer to the development of the four linguistic skills (listening,
speaking, reading and writing), and also to the use of linguistic and extralinguistic strategies and the knowledge
of sociocultural aspects, in order to get communicative competence in the foreign language.
There are nine general objectives, expressed in form of interrelated abilities:
1. To understand simple and oral written texts about known objects, situations and events, using general and
specific information taken from those texts for specific purposes.
2. To use the foreign language orally to communicate with the teacher and students in common class activities
and in communicative situations created for this purpose, observing the basic rules of interpersonal
communication, and adopting a respectful attitude towards the contribution of others.
3. To produce short simple texts about topics that the students are familiar with observing the basic writing
rules.
4. To read and understand short simple texts related to class activities, to their knowledge of the world and to
their experiences and interests, with the purpose of obtaining general and specific information as desired.
5. To recognise and appreciate the communicative value of foreign languages and their ability to learn them,
showing understanding and respectful attitude towards other languages, their speakers and their culture.
6. To understand and use the linguistic and non-linguistic conventions used by the foreign language speakers in
common situations (greetings, farewells, introductions, congratulations...) in order to make communication
easier.
7. To use in foreign language learning, previous knowledge and experience with other languages, developing
autonomous learning strategies.
8. To establish relationships between meaning, pronunciation and graphic representation of simple words and
sentences in the foreign language, as well as recognising the characteristic aspects of sound, rhythm and
intonation in that foreign language.
9. To use non-linguistic expressive resources (gestures, body language, sounds, pictures) to understand and be
understood when using a foreign language.
In order to develop the abilities expressed in these objectives, we should work on CONTENTS that in our
curriculum are classified into:
- Concepts
- Procedures
- Attitudes
Conceptual contents refer to facts, events, rules and principles.
Procedural contents refer to the strategies, abilities, techniques and skills necessary in the learning process.
Attitudinal contents are concerned with behaviour and values.
These three kinds of contents are set in blocks:
- Oral communication uses and forms.
- Written communication uses and forms.
- Sociocultural aspects.
The CONTENTS OF THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE AREA are also designed around communicative needs and
situations. We have summarised the three blocks of contents, which appear in the RD 1344/91 of the 6th of
September, as follows:
a. ORAL COMMUNICATION USES AND FORMS:
a.1) Concepts:
Basic communicative needs and situations in the spoken form: greeting, identifying oneself, giving and asking
for information expressing needs and requests...
Characteristics of communicative situations:
" Number and type of interlocutors.
" Moment and place.
" Formal or informal communication.
Vocabulary and structures needed to express basic communicative needs in the spoken form.
Topics related to the interests of the students and wide notions:
" Colours, numbers, time, daily life, food, animals, time, sports
a.2) Procedures.:
Recognising sounds, rhythm and intonation patterns of the foreign language.
General comprehension of spoken messages (face to face or recorded) about familiar topics.
Specific comprehension of spoken messages (face to face or recorded) in contextualised situations.
Producing oral messages to satisfy common communicative needs.
Participating in linguistic exchanges for specific play purposes (simulations, role-play).
Recognising and using basic common strategies (linguistic and non-linguistic) to overcome communicative
difficulties.
Recognising grammatical forms to ask questions, state, deny, express possession, gender and number,
quantify, express facts in present, past, future and using them effectively for communication.
a.3) Attitudes:
Awareness of the importance of oral communication in a foreign languages
Willingness to speak a foreign language by participating in group activities (games, group work, role, play).
b. WRITTEN COMMUNICATION USES AND FORMS:
b.1) Concepts:
Basic communicative needs and situations in the written form.
Characteristics of communicative situations.
Topics of general use and wide notions
The names of the letters in the foreign language and their correspondence with their written form.
Relationship between meaning, of the vocabulary studied its pronunciation and its graphic representation.
b.2) Procedures:
General comprehension of written messages related to class activities, and common communicative needs.
Specific comprehension of simple authentic material.
Recognising in written texts grammatical structures used to request, state, deny, express possession, gender
and number, state, deny, using them effectively for communication.
Producing short simple written texts in response to oral or written stimulus aimed at different readers.
b.3) Attitudes:
Appreciating the importance of knowing how to read and write in the foreign language.
c. SOCIOCULTURAL ASPECTS:
c.1) Concepts:
Social and cultural aspects of the countries where the foreign language is spoken which may be interesting for
our pupils such as:
" Expression and gestures that go with speaking, such as: polite gestures, tone of voice, symbols
" Aspects of every-day life: schedules, habits of children of this age, food.
" Games, popular songs, favourite meeting places and sports in the countries whose language is studied
" Presence in Spain of the foreign language studied by means of: products,
labels, songs, films, TV programs...
c.2) Procedures:
Using rules of behaviour and habits of the foreign language speakers in context.
Comparing the most relevant aspects of everyday life in those countries with the corresponding aspects of the
students' native country.
Using authentic materials from different sources close to the learners' in order to obtain specific information.
c.3) Attitudes:
Curiosity and respect for the most relevant aspects of everyday life in theses countries.
Appreciation of the sociolinguistic behaviour as a means to improve communication.
Interest in getting to know people from other countries.
After the contents which should be taken into account to develop the abilities expressed in the general
objectives, the Royal Decree 1344/1991, presents nine ASSESSMENT CRITERIA, which should be understood
as a tool to check if students have got the abilities expressed in the General Objectives. These assessment
criteria refer to abilities, but also make a little reference to contents as well as a brief explanation.
According to the R.D. 1344/91, the attainment of the general objectives of the foreign language area, will be
assessed in relation to the following criteria:
1.- To recognise and reproduce characteristic phonemes of the foreign language as well as rhythm and
intonation patterns in words and sentences used in real language situations.
This criterion tries to check if students are familiar with the sounds, rhythm and intonation of the foreign
language in listening and speaking. The texts they should listen to or produce must make sense and be in
context.
2.- .-To grasp the overall meaning of oral texts emitted in face to face communicative situations supported by
gestures, and miming and any necessary repetitions in which combinations of previously studied elements
appears and which deal with topics that the learners are familiar with.
This criterion considers the ability of students to understand the global meaning of oral text in the best
conditions, which imply: direct communication, contextual support and topics related to their previous
knowledge.
3.- To extract specific information, which has been previously studied, from oral texts with a simple structure and
vocabulary, which deal with topics that, are interesting and familiar to the students.
This criterion checks the student's ability to understand, not only the global message, but also specific details
from simple oral texts, which deal with topics that are familiar to them.
4.- To participate in short oral exchanges related to common classroom activities, producing comprehensible
discourse adapted to the characteristics of the situation and to the communicative aim.
This criterion refers to the student's ability to express basic communicative needs in the context of the class
such as: asking something, asking for something, asking for permission to do something, asking for help,
greeting... These messages should be expressed correctly enough to be understood. (for example, they should
use the correct expression to ask for permission such as: "Can I go to the toilet, please?, or Can I open the
window/door?, Can I borrow your pen, please?
5.- To participate in simulated communicative situations, which have been previously studied in class using
common social formulas correctly in the foreign language.
This criterion checks the student's ability to communicate orally in the most basic situations of daily life using
social relation formulas, especially those which are typical of children of this age, such as: "How are you? Fine,
thanks".
"Happy birthday!"
'At the end of the second cycle pupils will be able to understand the general meaning of simple oral texts
emitted by the teacher with a simple structure and vocabulary, in familiar contexts, and with the help of
gestures, mime and any necessary repetition'
1. Regarding the SEQUENCE OF CONTENTS, the best way to promote the development of communicative
abilities is organising them around procedures. If we decide to do it in this way, we should consider several
criteria, to follow a logical progression in the difficulty of such procedures. These criteria are defined according
to:
- The type of oral or written texts
- The channel
- The type of comprehension
- The interlocutor
- The level of correction
Now, we are going to explain these criteria in detail.:
- The type of oral or written texts
Here we must consider the length, vocabulary, the linguistic structures, and organisation of the oral or written
texts that we are going to use in class. Obviously, we must go from short simple texts to more complex ones.
- The channel
As far as channel is concerned we should consider if the oral or written messages that our students should
understand or produce are going to be transmitted in a face to face communicative situation, or by means of a
cassette recording or a written text. In this sense, we should start from face to face communication, because
mime, gestures and expressions help pupils to understand.
- The type of comprehension
The type of comprehension refers to the information we ask them to extract from an oral or written message.
This comprehension may be global ( if they should get the general sense of the message) or specific (if they
have to extract specific details). The most logical progression goes from global to specific comprehension.
- The interlocutor
Regarding the interlocutor we should take into account if he/she is known or unknown for the student, if he/she
belongs to the school context or not. At the beginning we should work with close interlocutors such as the
teacher and the classmates.
- The level of correction
The level of correction deals with the demands about correction in the oral and written production of students.
Obviously such demands increase along the cycles. At the beginning, they should produce language correctly
enough to be understood.
3 .- Then, if we have decided to organise contents around procedures, we should not forget that the three types
of contents (concepts, procedures and attitudes) must be considered in an interrelated way. Then we should
relate them as in the following example:
"Recognising the characteristic sounds, rhythm and intonation patterns of the foreign language, realising the
importance of being able to communicate in a foreign language
To see this relation more clear, the Resolution of the 5th of March suggests that we can display them in a chart,
as follows
SECOND CYCLE:
According to the Resolution of the 5th of March, which establishes some principles for the sequence of
objectives, contents and evaluation criteria, during the 2nd cycle we must consider that:
Listening is still the most important skill, and we must help children to:
Understand the global meaning of simple oral messages and extract specific information previously required in
contextualised situations.
- The oral messages they have to understand should present a simple structure and vocabulary and deal with
topics related to children's interests and needs (such as school, home, family, games, sports...)
As far as the development of speaking is concerned, pupils in the 2nd cycle must learn simple linguistic
structures, which can be applied to a great number of communicative situations. These situations could be:
*Habitual communicative situations in the classroom such as: greeting, identifying oneself, asking for
permission, and asking for help.
* Situations created by the teacher to promote learning, such as: Identifying and placing objects, people or
places, expressing quantity, expressing likes and dislikes, giving simple instructions... In these situations
teachers should promote pupils interest in oral communication by means of group activities (simulations, games,
and role-plays) where language is used with a communicative aim
In spite of the importance given to oral language, the written code is also present in the 2nd cycle from the first
day. As far as reading is concerned, we should help students to develop their reading abilities in the foreign
language, working on words, short sentences, class instructions, simple descriptions and very short stories,
supported by pictures.
Children must start just identifying the written form of words and sentences that they already know in the oral
form. Then, matching written words and sentences with pictures is the typical reading activity at the beginning of
the second cycle.
As far as writing is concerned, we must consider that at this age ( 8 to 10 years old) the communicative needs
related to writing are still very limited, even in their native language. This implies that written texts in this cycle
should consist of:
" Very short descriptions
" Lists to perform tasks ( such as the list of things they need for a party, or a shopping list)
" Short messages between classmates (for example short orders in games: go to the door, dance, stand on your
chair, go to the left/right...)
" Birthday cards, and invitations, Christmas cards...
Finally, socio-cultural contents in the 2nd cycle should refer to the daily life of children in the English-speaking
countries, including aspects such as: schedules, celebrations and festivals, shops, traditional tales and songs.
IN THE THIRD CYCLE:
We must help students to go from comprehension to production. The development of oral language is still the
main objective. The oral texts they must understand in this cycle will be more complex and longer than in the
previous one, as children are already familiar with the sounds of the foreign language, and they are able to use
communicative strategies to understand such as: listening for specific information or just to get the general
meaning of an oral text, predicting what they think may come next, inferring opinion and attitude from the
intonation of the speakers or deducing the meaning of new words from context
The oral texts we must offer them must be also related to their interests and needs. For example:
" Descriptions of places or people.
" Conversations between children about their daily life, hobbies, or opinions.
" Fantastic situations based on traditional tales.
Regarding the oral productive skill (speaking) pupils in the third cycle are able to:
" Use verbal and non verbal strategies to be understood (Verbal strategies could be: using a word instead of
another, replacing an specific word they dont know for a more general one or explaining the meaning of a word
they dont know;
Non verbal strategies are: making gestures or sounds, drawing, or pointing to objects, to solve communicative
problems)
" Use social relation formulas and expressions, which are used to satisfy basic communicative needs such as
greeting, congratulating, thanking, apologising, introducing oneself.... In this cycle most children know what
expression they should use according to the communicative situation.
Then, by means to these abilities, they are able to participate in oral exchanges to express their basic
communicative needs in the context of the classroom or in real or simulated contexts related to their daily life
(dealing with topics such as: home, food, animals, sports, holidays...) correctly enough to be understood.
Regarding WRITTEN COMMUNICATION, in the third cycle we must consider:
" The development of intensive and extensive reading:
Intensive reading refers to understand every word of short texts (short descriptions or stories, personal letters,
advertisements or labels). Extensive reading refers to get the global sense of longer texts, such as: tales,
comics or simple books for children with redundant visual support. To read this kind of texts children can resort
to the help of the teacher or the dictionary. The most important thing in extensive reading is enjoying the texts.
" Writing in this cycle will focus on the production of short simple texts in response to oral or written stimulus,
aimed at different readers and adapted to the different communicative situations. These written texts will
include: short personal letters, descriptions and stories.
Finally socio- cultural contents in this cycle will deal with aspects related to daily life in the English-speaking
countries and also with other socio-cultural aspects of those countries related to the students interests, for
instance: cars, sport, famous people on pop stars, cinema, environment, cities, famous buildings, sports...
Now, we are going to deal with the last decisions we must take in the curricular project: the sequence of
assessment criteria and the methodological options.
2. - The sequence of assessment criteria, depends on the sequence of objectives and contents, since they
establish the abilities that children should acquire at the end of the Primary stage related to the contents they
need to develop such abilities. Then, according to the principles established for the sequence of objectives and
contents, an example of sequence of an evaluation criterion, taken from the curricular materials known as Red
Boxes ( Lenguas Extranjeras. Mec. 1992)
SECOND CYCLE THIRD CYCLE
3.- To identify simple details, previously required from oral texts related to topics which have been studied in
class, and perform simple instructions given by the teacher in the context of the classroom. 3.-- To extract
specific information previously required from oral texts, with a simple structure and vocabulary, which deal with
topics which are interesting and familiar for students ( daily life, likes and dislikes, opinions and personal
experiences...)
Finally, THE LAST ELEMENT OF THE CURRICULAR PROJECT, that we are going to consider, is the definition
of the General Methodological Options we are going to take into account . To define such options we must
follow the recommendations of the Royal decree 1344/1991, 6th September, which establishes the basic
requirements for Primary Education, and also the methodological principles established for the Primary Stage in
general, and particularly those principles established for the foreign language area . As we have seen when
talking about the different curricular elements, the main aim of teaching a foreign language in Primary Education
will be getting students to communicate in such foreign language.
" Then, grouping, space and time must be understood in a flexible way to allow students to participate in real
communicative interactions.
" As far as materials is concerned, they should promote activity on the part of students as well as being visual,
attractive and as authentic as possible.
" We also should pay attention to diversity, designing activities in which everyone could participate according to
his/her abilities.
" And finally, according to this kind of methodology, assessment should be used as a tool to improve the
learning-teaching process.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
- Ley Orgnica 1/1990, de 3 de octubre de Ordenacin General del Sistema Educativo.
- RD 1344/1991 de 6 de septiembre, por el que se establece el currculo de la Educacin Primaria.
- RD 82/1996, de 26 de enero que establece el Reglamento Orgnico de las Escuelas de Educacin infantil y
colegios de Educacin primaria.
- Resolucin de 5 de marzo de 1992, de la Secretaria de Estado para la Educacin, que regula la elaboracin
de proyectos curriculares y establece orientaciones para la distribucin de objetivos, contenidos y criterios de
evaluacin.
- Orden del 30 de agosto de 2000, por la que se establece y regula la imparticin de la lengua extranjera en el
primer ciclo de Educacin primaria, en el mbito de la Comunidad Autnoma de Extremadura.
- MEC: Materiales para la Reforma, area de lengua extranjera. Madrid. Servicio de publicaciones del MEC.
1991.
- MEC. Proyecto Curricular. Materiales para la reforma. Madrid. Servicio de publicaciones del MEC, 1991.
- Brewster, Ellis and Girard. The primary English Teacher's Guide. London. Penguin. 1992.
0. INTRODUCTION
+Language is a complex human activity that fulfils many functions,among them we can name two basic
functions: communication and representation. These functions do not exclude each other, but they are
interrelated within the linguistic activity. Representing, either linguistically or not, is the most important aim of
communication. Communication at the same time contributes to represent the physical and social reality.
Learning and education must serve this double function of communicating and representing.
Human beings communicate through different means and systems: gestures, music, symbols, numbers, etc.
Verbal language, the most universal means of communication, Iet us receive and transmit different types of
information and influence other people, as welI as they may exert their influence on us. Therefore,
communication plays an essential role within society.
+But language is not only an instrument of communication amongst persons. It is also a means to represent the
world, although the representation of the world around us may be done through other non-linguistic means.
+In this topic, we will analize the general objectives of the foreign language area, the contents and the
evaluation criteria. Finally, we will analyze the School Educational Project and the School Curricular Project.
+The ability to communicate in a foreign language is an actual need nowadays. It is something fundamental
wtthin the frame of the European Union not only because of the comings and goings of people throughout
Europe, either to work abroad or to visit different countries, but also because of the world of telecommunications
and technique etc.
+However, the aims and functions of this area in compulsory education are not exclusvely determined by these
social expectancies. There are also deeply educative reasons, derived from the importance of this area in the
general educative objectives. +The ability to communicate in a foreign language and the knowledge of the same
provide a great help to understand and control our own language and behaviour. To contact other cultures
through the channel of the language favours comprehension and respect towards other ways of thinking and
acting. In a multilingual country as Spain is, learning a foreign language is highly interesting since languages are
not competitive amongst them, but they fulfil the same functions and contribute to the same cognitive
development.
Communicating and representing through language are simoultaneous and interrelated functions within the
linguistic activity. In the social exchange, language helps us to transmit and receive information of very diverse
nature, and therefore, to influence other people, controlling and directing their activity, at the same time they are
influencing ours.
+But, language is a priviledged instrument of communication, thanks to its capacity to represent reality in a way
that is shared by all the members of the community. Hence, when we learn a language we are learning a
system of signs, but also the cultural meaning these signs have, that is, dlfferent ways to interpret reality.
Together with these functional considerations, we must take into account the structural features of language.
From this point of view, language is defined as a system of interrelated signs. When we describe the units of
language we say that all of them have a meaning, because they are in relation to the whole system. For that
reason, we must forget that the discourse is the concretion of language, since the use of the rules in the three
levels (phonetic-phonological, morphosyntactic and semantic) depends on the communicative function we want
to fulfill, and on the concrete situation of production and reception of the message. Therefore, a study of the
language must comprise not only the sentence but the whole text and the context as well.
+It is important to say tnat the aim of this curricular area is not to teach a language, but to teach how to
communicate through the use of it. This requires an approach based upon communication and aimed to acquire
communicative competence. At the same time, communicative competence comprises:
-Grammatical competence or ability to put into practice the units and rules of the system of the language.
-Discursive competence, or ability to use different types of discourse and to organize them according to the
communicative functions.
-Sociolinguistic competence or ability to make language suitable in a concrete context.
-Strategic competence or ability to define, correct, or make adjustments according to the communicative
situation.
-Socio-cultural competence or the ability to attain a certain degree of familiarity with the social and cultural
context in which language is used.
+Summarizing, the development of the communicative competence implies to be able to use a certain amount
of "subcompetences" of different nature. "To say something" and "To use language for something" are key
elements in the teaching of foreign languages. That is, communicative competence is taught through practice.
+The process of acquisition of a foreign language may be considered as a creative construction in which the
student makes hypotheses to conform the rules, which constitute the new system. This process Iet him organize
language comprehensively, with the aim of producing messages in the different communicative situations.
Although this process is common to all languages, we must underline some special features in the case of a
foreign language.
+The learning of a foreign language is not linear, but global. The chiId progressively enriches the global idea of
the new system. Therefore, the mistakes he does, cannot be treated as mistakes, but as the evidence of the
progressive control over this new communicative system that he is acquiring.
We must say that the ways to process information also work when the student is not buiIding messages. The
usual periods of silence that exist, when the student is beginning to Iearn a foreign Ianguage, must not be
understood as "siIence", but as
periods in which an intense activity that cannot be observed is being carried out. Through the receptive activities
we may contribute to develop the concrete competences of comprehension, but also the general communicative
competence.
+The development of the linguistic skiIls (reading, writing, Iistening and speaking) must be understood as, a
process of integration. In real life, the majority of activities contribute to develop different skiIIs. Threfore, they
must not be studied separately. However, students must be taught to create and consolidate these skiIIs in
order to be able to produce written and spoken messages.
+But, the Iearning of a foreign language, must go beyond a functional approach. The members of a linguistic
community share, by means of the language, some specific cultural meanings. Therefore, the teaching of a
language must introduce, the students into the most relevant features of the social and cultural context.
In this way, the educative function of the foreign language becomes meaningful, because it allows students to
understand reality, to enrich their cultural world and to favour the development of tolerant attitudes.
+AIthough the idea that children learn languages faster than adults cannot be proved, there is enough evidence
to show that Iearning must be done as soon as possible, because, in no way this Iearning interferes the Iearning
of the own mother tongue, but it consolidates it.
Learning a foreign language in primary school contributes to overcome the typical egocentrism and localism of
the children.
+We must take into account that this stage is a period in which we make the student "feel" this foreign language.
The first contact must be carefully done, because it is the warranty for a positive Iearning. It is important to use
the most interesting fields for these children, as well as the games as the maximum expression of what they
already control in their own mother tongue.
In the second cycle of primary education the students already have a fundamental basis: the knowledge of their
own language and of many expressions and words of the foreign one, especiaIly learnt from the mass media.
Besides, they have a vague idea of the country where this language is spoken.
+If, as we have already said, the Iearning of a foreign language is a process of creative construction from the
received language, the receptive activities become considerably important in this stage. Messages will
fundamentally refer to contents that are very close to the students to stimulate them. Besides, they must include
the aspects of the new language that are subject to be used in a wide variety of situations. However, we must
not forget written language. Students already know the importance of the written code and its graphic
representation. The fact that they are Iearning to read and write at the same time is a good way of integrating
the written and oral skills in primary education.
1.1. GENERAL OBJECTIVES
+The teaching of the English language in Primary Education wiII have as main objectives the following ones:
1. To understand oral and written texts. To understand simple oral and written texts related to known objects,
situations and events close to the students, using the general and specific information transmitted by these texts
with specific purposes.
2. To use the foreign language oralIy. To use the foreign language orally to communicate with the teacher and
the other students in the usual classroom activities and in the communication situations created to lead to that
aim, paying attention to the basic rules of interpersonal communication and adopting a respectful attitude
towards the others' views.
3. To produce short and simple written texts. To produce short and simple written texts about topics which are
familiar to the students, respecting the basic rules of the written code.
4. To read in a comprehensive way short and simple texts. Read in a comprehensive way short and simple text
related to classroom activities, using their knowledge of the world, and their experiences and interests with the
aim of obtaining the necessary and specific information.
5. To recognize the value of foreign languages. To recognize and to appreciate the communicative value of
foreign languages and the ability to learn to use them, showing an understanding and respectful attitude
towards other languages, their speakers, and their culture.
6. To understand and to use linguistic and non-linguistic conventions. To understand and to use the linguistic
and non-linguistic conventions used by the foreign language speakers in everyday situations (greetings,
farewells, introductions, congratulations, etc.) with the aim of making conversation easier and more fluent.
7. To use the previous knowledge and experiences with other languages. To use, in the foreign language
learning process, the previous knowledge and experiences with other languages and to develop progressively
learning strategies.
8. To establish relations among the meaning, the pronunciation, and the graphic representation of words and
sentences. To establish relations among the meaning, the pronunciation and the graphic representation of some
words and simple sentences in the foreign language, apart from recognizing phonetic, rhythm and intonation
aspects of the foreign language.
9. To use non-linguistic and expressive devices. To use the non-linguistic expressive devices (gestures, body
position, diverse sounds, drawings, etc) to try to understand and be understood by using the foreign language.
1.2. CONTENTS
a) USES AND FORMS OF THE ORAL LANGUAGE
CONCEPTS
- Most habitual needs and situations to use the spoken language. Communicative functions and characteristics
of these situations:
*Communicative intentions: Greetings, identifications, asking and giving information, identification and location
of objects, descriptions, narrations, expressing needs and wishes, etc.
*Characteristics of the communicative situation: number and type of listeners, moment and place of
communication, more or less formal situation, etc.
- Vocabulary and linguistic structures required to express, orally, the basic needs of
communication
*Communicative intentions: greetings, identification, giving and asking for information, identification and location
of objects, descriptions, narrations, needs and wishes, etc.
*General topics: Colours, numbers, weather, time, house, family, friends, class, food, likes and dislikes, daily
routine, animals, human body, sports, spare time, holidays, health, etc.
PROCEDURES
- To recognize and make familiar the sounds of the foreign language and its rythm and intonation.
- To understand oral messages of different nature and from different sources (teacher, other students, video,
tapes):
*Global comprehension of oral messages about familiar topics.
*Specific comprehension of concrete simple messages in contextualized situations.
-To react either linguistically and non-linguistically to different oral messages and communicative situations:
*Production of common expressions aimed to satisfy simple needs of communication (greetings, identification,
asking and giving information, identification of objects, decriptions, etc).
*Use of basic messages previously learnt (polite expressions, etc.) adjusting them to the specific features of the
situation.
*Active participation in oral exchanges in order to express the most immediate communicative needs within the
class and in contexts closer to the student.
*Participation in the linguistic exchanges with the aim of having fun (simulations, performances, etc.).
*Non-linguistic answers to oral messages (follow instructions, etc.).
-To recognize the grammatical formulas that help them to make questions, to assert, to reject, to express
possession, to quantify, to describe, to narrate, etc... and to use them in order to achieve efficient
communication.
-To recognize and use the basic strategies of communication, both linguistic (use one word instead of another,
etc.) or extralinguistic (gestures, drawings, etc.) which help to overcome communicative problems.
- To use the native language's strategies of communication, which let us take advantage of the limited
knowledge of the foreign language.
ATTITUDES
-Awareness of the importance of oral communication in a foreign language.
-Awareness of the reality of a different culture, reflected in the language.
-Receptive and respectful attitude towards the persons who speak a foreign language
- Wish to express themselves in a foreign language, participating in the activities (games, songs, etc.).
-Awareness of the corrections done when they interprete or produce a text.
- Positive and optimist attitude towards their own ability to speak in a foreign
language.
-Tendency to use imaginatively and creatively, oral messages previously learnt, in different communicative
situations.
b) USES AND FORMS OF THE WRITTEN LANGUAGE
CONCEPTS
- Most habitual needs and communicative situations to use the written language. Communicative intentions and
characteristics of these situations.
*Communicative intentions: greetings, identification and location of objects, expressing needs and wishes, etc.
*Characteristics of the communicative situation: type of Iisteners, more or less formal situation, etc.
- Vocabulary and Iinguistic structures required to express the basic communicative needs by writing.
*Communicative intentions: greetings, identification, giving and asking for information, identification and location
of objects, descriptions, narrations, etc.
*General topics: colours, numbers, time, house, family, class, food, likes and dislikes, sports, etc.
- Names of the letters in a foreign language and their correspondence within the writing system.
- Relations between the meaning of the words, their pronunciation and graphical representation.
PROCEDURES
- Production of written texts adjusted to the features of the reader and of the communicative situation.
- Understanding of the written messages of different nature.
*Global comprehension of written messages related the activities done in class.
*Global comprehension of brief written messages related to the most immediate needs of communication and to
the interests of the speakers.
*Global comprehension of easy authentic materials, with visual backing about daily-life topics.
*Awareness of the specific elements, previously learnt, in texts which have unkown words and expressions,
such as invitations for a birthday party, cards, magazines, etc.
- Use of the grapho-phonic correspondences to spell, for instance, the name and the surname, etc.
- Production of written texts directed to different readers, answering oral and written stimuli.
- Solution of games which require the knowledge of the vocabulary and the ortography used in class.
- Awareness of grammatical structures in written texts.
- Awareness of some sociocultural aspects which differentiate the foreign language from the mother tongue.
ATTITUDES
- lnterest and curiosity towards the written texts and appraisal of the role they play in order to satisfy
communicatlve needs.
-Awareness and appraisal of the importance of reading and writing in a foreign language.
- Appraisal for the correct interpretation of easy written texts.
- Interest to know the vocabulary and the basic linguistic structures required to express the essential
communicative needs in different situations.
- Disposition to overcome the difficulties that the use of a foreign language creates, by paying attention to the
communicative strategies of the mother tongue.
c) SOCIOCULTURAL ASPECTS
CONCEPTS
- Social and cultural aspects of the countries where the foreign language studied is spoken.
*Expressions and gestures which go together with the oral expressions: tone, gestures, etc.
*Daily-life aspects: Timetables, habits, images of that culture, etc.
*Spare time: games, songs, sports, places, etc.
d) Presence in Spain of the foreign language learnt: labels, songs, films, etc.
PROCEDURES
-Awareness of some aspects of the countries where the foreign language is spoken.
- Contextualized use in habitual situations of some rules and habits of the countries where this language is
spoken.
- Comparison of the most relevant aspects of daily life in the countries where the foreign language is spoken,
and our own country.
- Use of authentic materials with the aim of getting the desired information.
A TTITUDES
- Curiosity and respect for the most relevant aspects of daily life and for other sociocultural aspects of the
countries where this language is spoken.
- Appraisal of the sociolinguistic behaviours which help cohabitation.
- Interest to know people from other countries.
1.3. EVALUATION CRITERIA
1. To recognize and reproduce the characteristic phonemes of the foreign language. To recognize and
reproduce the characteristic phonemes of the foreign language as well as the basic models of rhythm and
intonation, in words and sentences which appear in the context of real use of the language.
2. To grasp the general meaning of oral texts. To grasp the general meaning of oral texts uttered in face to face
communication situations, with the help of gestures and mime and the necessary repetitions, in which there will
appear combinations of elements previously learnt and which deal with familiar topics, known by the student.
3. To extract specific information. To extract specific information, previous required, from oral texts with a simple
structure and vocabulary which deal with familiar topics that interest the student (daily life, likes, preferences,
opinions and personal experiences).
4. To participate in short oral exchanges. To participate in short oral exchanges related to usual classroom
activities producing an understandable discourse adapted to the characteristics of the situation and the
communicative purpose.
5.To participate in simulated communication situations. To participate in simulated communication situations
which have been previously practised in the classroom, using properly the most usual social interaction
formulae in the foreign language.
6.To extract the general meaning and some specific information. To extract the general meaning and some
specific information from short written texts with a lineal development, simple structures and vocabulary, which
deal with familiar topics that interest the student.
7.To read simple children's books. To read with the help of the teacher or, the dictionary simple children's books
written in the foreign language with visual backup and show comprehension by means of a specific task.
8.To produce short written texts. To produce short written texts, comprehensible and adapted to the
characteristics of the situation and the communicative purpose, in which those contents that have been worked
in the class can be seen.
9.To recognize, some sociocultural aspects. To recognize, some sociocultural aspects typical of the foreign
language speaking community which are implicit in the linguistic samples worked on in the classroom.
"The cycle is the temporal curricular unit of programme and evaluation in the Primary Education(...)."According
to what has been previously established, the same teachers wiII work with the same group of students
throughout the whole cycle, if they are working in the same centre"(...)."The projects wilI comprise at least, the
contents provided for an educative cycle, and they wilI have to be related to the general plan of the
corresponding stage".
+It is necessary to establish some previsions about the internal sequences of the cycle, according to the
following criteria:
- Coherence of the evolutive development and the previous learning of the student.
- Coherence of the learning.
- Contents as the basis of the sequence.
- Limited basic ideas.
- Continuity and proggression.
- Balance (the abilities developed in the objectives must be balanced).
- Interrelation (the different types of contents, concepts, procedures and attitudes must be conveniently related
amongst them).
- Cross-curricular/Transversal themes (very important in Primary education).
- Didactic strategies that will be used throughout the stage
2.2.3.EVALUATION
+We wiII evaluate.
- The students' Iearning,
- The process of teaching and our own teaching practice, with relation to the achievement of the educative
objectives of the curriculum.
- We will also evaluate the curricular project itself, the teaching programme and the actual development of the
curriculum.
+In order to evaluate the Iearning process we have to take some decisions regarding the situations, strategies
and instruments of evaluation. The requisites that the procedures of evaluation must fulfill are:
- To be varied.
- To give concrete information.
- To use different codes.
- To be applicable to more or Iess structured situations of the learning activity.
- To evaluale the transference of the Iearning to different contexts.
+The evaluation is determined in the Curricular Project and, therefore, it must also be decided how to
communicate its contents to parents, students, and the rest of the teachers.
+In conclusion ,in the Curricular Project we must also concrete when, how and what we have to evaluate.These
aspects must follow three basic lines:
-Initial evaluation: Through this, the teacher knows the actual and previous knowledge his students have in
order to develop the didactic unit with the best results. Previous knowledge is what the students already know
both regarding the conceptual aspects, and the procedures and the attitudes that are going to be involved in the
development of the unit. However, through the activities, the knowledge of the students in these three aspects
must be checked. This helps the teacher to readjust his teaching to the reality of his students in order to make
them capable to relate the new information with that they already have and therefore, to achieve a significant
learning.
-Formative evaluation: The different activities the unit has, constitute by themselves a procedure of formative
evaluation. Throughout the whole didactic unit the students have the chance of analyzing their own progress,
since every activity includes a moment to reflect, comment or contrast, their achievements and learning
problems. The teacher also readjusts the following settings depending on the results they get.
-Summative evaluation: It is the evaluation of the learning that the students have achieved throughout the unit.
The activities designed to evaluate, follow the same patterns of the activities done throughout the whole unit.
This make possible that the teacher judges their work according to the same criteria established to achieve the
objectives proposed in the development of the unit.
+In the Curricular Project, we must as weIl include the criteria to promote the students to the next cycle:
"In the context of the process of continuous evaluation when the progress of a student does not globally
respond to the programmed objectives, the teachers wiIl adopt the suitable measures of educative
reinforcement and of curricular adjustment".
2.2.4. OTHER DECISIONS
2.We should favour functional learning. This means that the students should be able to use the language in
communicative situations.
3.We should promote meaningful learning. This entails that the learners will build up their own linguistic
competence by using learning strategies and by making hypotheses about me way in which language works
starting from the linguistic input.
4.English teaching should provide students with both a new linguistic experience and a human/social
experience. In this light, we will develop attitudes such as cooperation and respect to the others and contribute
to develop the learners' socialization skills by promoting social relations through pair work and group work.
5.The four linguistic skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) must be developed in an interrelated way,,
since in real life we cope with communicative situations which require different skills.
However, at this stage receptive skills (especially listening) are more important than productive skills.
6.Variety.Variety involves using a wide range of materials and activities In the classroom.
We should introduce variety for three reasons:
"The students motivation will be better.
"Our pupils' attention span is short and they thus need to do different things.
"Lessons will be more enjoyable.
7.The language items should be presented in context. Give that any language is a system of interrelated signs,
the linguistic elements should appear in discourse where their meaning depends on the communicative function
and communicative situation.
Besides, the new language must be sensitive to being used in a wide range of communicative situations.
8.Foreign language teaching must introduce the most relevant sociocultural features of the foreign culture, since
any language reflects a way of understanding and constructing reality.
9.It is important to teach contents and plan activities which meet the students' interests and needs in order to
develop a positive attitude towards English learning. In this way the pupils will be more likely to succeed.
10.We should take into account the students' previous knowledge about the foreign language (foreign sounds
and words) and the foreign culture (famous people, films, songs,...).This will reinforce the meaningful character
of learning contents, since the pupils will be able to link what they already know with what they are learning,
thus increasing their motivation to learn English.
3. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Materiales para la Reforma. Primaria. MEC. Madrid, 1992.
M.E.C. : L.O.G.S.E. Madrid. 1991.
Pozuelo, M.L. & Rodriguez, M.A. Proyecto curricular del rea de ingles. Escuela
Espaola. Madrid. 1994.
Propuesta de Secuencia. Lenguas Extranjeras. MEC-Escuela Espaola. Madrid, 1992.