Importance of Pedagogical Practice from the Foreign Language Acquisition Process For

Real Communication

Adriana Marcela Arboleda Hurtado

Unidad Central del Valle del Cauca

Faculty of Education Sciences

Bachelor of Basic Education with Emphasis in Foreign Languages

Tuluá – Valle

2017
Importance of Pedagogical Practice from the Foreign Language Acquisition Process For

Real Communication

Final article of pedagogical practice II

Adriana Marcela Arboleda Hurtado

Unidad Central del Valle del Cauca

Faculty of Education Sciences

Bachelor of Basic Education with Emphasis in Foreign Languages

Tuluá – Valle

2017
 Importance of Pedagogical Practice from the Foreign Language Acquisition Process

For Real Communication

As it is well known, the process of learning a second language is progressively

increasing in mass, from students in schools to institutes specialized in the subject, since

with the new globalization and the rapid exchange of information and benefits among all

countries, it becomes easier to communicate with foreign people and even travel to interact

with them. For this, it is necessary to comply with a series of processes aimed at learning a

second language significantly, from the grammatical rules for their linguistic

comprehension, to the simulation of real communication contexts. This is how it is

necessary to be guided by experts and interested in the subject, who play the role of tutors,

or teachers to ensure an effective and functional learning. There is no doubt that a second

language speaker is able to handle the language well and know all the relevant concepts to

give indications or recommendations on information necessary to deal abroad, but even so,

his mere knowledge is not enough to ensure that an apprentice learns effectively and can

easily develop himself in the target language. On the other hand, the learning of a second

language requires a fully trained tutor with knowledge and skills of the language, as well as

different experienced and infallible strategies and methodologies for the assessment of the

learning process. The above can be attributed to teachers, who with their exhaustive studies

and awareness of learning, are the apt to guide these processes and ensure a full

understanding of the language, where it is learned to be used and not only internalize

grammar rules without no sense of adaptation to real contexts.

Regarding the case, second language acquisition theories (SLA) investigate the

methods by which a second language comes to be learned. For example, in the 1990s the
Monitor Model had a great influence, (Krashen, 1995) which refers to the relationship

between acquisition and learning. For Krashen, the monitor will only go into action if two

basic conditions are present: the speaker needs to correct himself and must know the rules.

For Krashen, the acquisition system is the stated indicator and the learning system is the

monitor, the role of the monitor is or should be of minor importance, it is only used to

correct deviations from speech and to give a more fluid speech.

The previous hypothesis, proposed by Krashen, is based on five hypotheses, being

the most relevant to support the process that is done in a classroom: The hypothesis of

'acquisition-learning', which differentiates the conscious task of learning product of

instruction of the unconscious process of acquisition, similar to that which takes place when

the mother tongue is acquired. The objective is that students perform a process of

acquisition, not only of learning about the language, which is transformed into knowledge

that incorporates the structures of the language in an automated way to consciousness,

where precisely, the knowledge that the teacher can teach, be useful to perform

communicative functions. On the other hand, there is the hypothesis of the 'affective filter',

which establishes the need to carry out the acquisition process when a feeling of confidence

and firmness is achieved in oneself and the feeling that one is in a position to start

producing. The idea is to create a tension-free situation in the classroom and in which the

student does not feel pressured to produce results according to a forced rhythm. (Krashen S.

, 1983) This condition is given by the relevance of the strategies that the teacher has studied

to handle in the classroom, emphasizing that it is a process that takes place since the teacher

diagnoses both the level of knowledge of their students, as the environment that is managed

in the rhythm of their learning. Likewise, the "input hypothesis" is taken into account,
where Krashen argues that the states of acquisition of vocabulary occur only when the

learner is more focused on the meaning and not so much on the form, therefore, the theory

falls back on the objectives that arise in a class or a project of pedagogical practice, which

may include focusing students on the development of their skills rather than their linguistic

form. Finally, (Krashen S. , 1981) proposes that the acquisition of a language is a similar

process, if not identical, to the way children develop their ability in their mother tongue.

Therefore, the accompaniment of a person with teacher training is essential to support and

guide these processes.

Taking into account the above, the teaching work and the great preparation it must

have to guide the teaching and learning process of a foreign language is emphasized. It is

there, where people enter to study everything that entails such preparation and the

necessary requirements to guarantee a premise that ensures the quality of said professional.

Knowing that the preliminary studies and titles obtained are complements of the profession

as such, since all those who have passed through a classroom, being the ones in charge of it,

will agree that being a teacher is done in practice, through experience and confrontation

with real teaching scenarios. Thus, the teacher forms himself from the reflection of his

pedagogical practice, which is determined by the social, historical and institutional context.

Similarly, in the process of training as teachers, often arise various unknowns about

the role in the teaching, but in the personal case, to be an excellent teacher must have good

foundation in terms of pedagogical knowledge provided by the University. However, not

only is this enough, but, again, being a teacher in itself, is formed within a classroom, based

on their pedagogical practice in real interaction with students. Therefore, from the most

important conceptions of the teaching practice, which is, in the present case, the social
activity that aspiring students exercise when teaching a class, and due to their condition as a

student with little expertise in the practice, several parallels are obtained, such as, in the

first case, the teacher is the center of the teaching, the one who teaches, and the student is

the one who receives; In the second case, on the contrary, from the constructivist thought,

the teacher is a reflective professional who performs a mediation between knowledge and

learning, in a process of construction towards the search for knowledge and meaningful

learning. From there, teachers learn to develop spontaneous solutions, pedagogical

functions and a social scenario that works around learning.

Mentioning the above, the importance of including within the university education,

the pedagogical practice for the improvement of the teaching quality of the future teachers

is emphasized. Well, as Professor (Consuegra, 2012) states, "pedagogical practice should

not contribute to the professional being trained to be accountable for the result of

knowledge, but so that he can think about the processes that led to that knowledge or the

results of a knowledge; it must allow students to locate themselves intellectually in

contemporary scientific thought, to learn to think the basic concepts of construction, to

elaborate critical positions and possible solutions to the problems of the natural and social

environment that surround the accounting exercise ". (Translated by the writer)

In the same order of ideas, the pedagogical practice must comply with the

professional development of teachers, starting from the transformation of the own practice

in the production of a valid knowledge that is based on the scientific, cultural and

educational knowledge; accompanied by individual and collective processes of rational

reconstruction of thought and theory, making use of the rational action of the new

generations. Thus, the pedagogical practice is important because through it, the teacher can
demonstrate their skills, attitudes and competence for the direction, control and evaluation

of learning at different levels of the educational system, in addition to facing their

pedagogical knowledge of discourse of the theories of science, and the instrument used for

this is the appropriate teaching method of the pedagogical approaches and models learned.

In the present case, my pedagogical practice was focused on the development of

English writing and speaking skills, perceived as the main component to be leveled, based

on the diagnostic evaluation carried out in the first teaching practice and in the experience

of the teaching to the ninth grade students of the General Carlos Julio Gil Colorado Military

Academy of the city of Tulua. The diagnosis was only the first step, from there arose the

approach of a problem to be investigated and a justification that served certain objectives,

the main one being: to get the students to increase their competence in the communication

skills of English, especially writing and speaking. For this, different strategies were

implemented to help meet this objective, including: The methodology for teaching and

learning, based on Ausubel's theory of meaningful learning, cooperative or team learning,

the sociocultural theory of Vygotsky and the constructivism, where the student is guided by

the teacher, making himself going to build his convictions according to information

provided by the tutor.

At the beginning of the year, it was found that the students were not at the level

indicated for their degree and for what was proposed by the Ministry of National

Education, since previously they had been taught English in a very mechanical way, where

they were qualified to carry the dictionary and memorize large lists of conjugated verbs.

This practice had conditioned the students that English was learned only by writing, even
learning songs to expand vocabulary without establishing an objective regarding the topic

to be implemented.

As a result of this, the skills chosen to work were also taken from the point that the

first phase of language acquisition is speech, as the young student receives from the

community, the verbal influence of the language. So it was proposed to make the similarity

between these unconscious processes of learning productive vocabulary for them. Likewise,

it was obtained that not only the vocabulary of the students should be enriched through the

word; but the student must use the word in the verbal construction of sentences, to begin to

develop his understanding, and then there, to work from the ability of writing is chosen.

One of the tools to enable the development of the named skills, is the

communication method or communicative teaching of the language, this is an approach on

language teaching in which maximum importance is given to interaction as a means and as

a final goal in the learning of a language. In this method, students are the actors in their

learning and gain the ability to learn to learn, through communication and learning

strategies, facilitating socialization among them during the teaching-learning process and

enabling motivation and communication between students and teachers. “El enfoque

comunicativo es un enfoque en la enseñanza de idiomas en el que se da máxima

importancia a la interacción como medio y como objetivo final en el aprendizaje de una

lengua.” (Ecured.cu, n.d)

The communicative method is characterized as a general teaching approach and not

a teaching method with clearly defined class practices. As such, it is often defined by

means of a list of general principles or characteristics. One of the best-known lists is that of
the five characteristics of the communicative method, elaborated by David Nunan (1996):

1. It emphasizes communication in the foreign language through interaction, 2. It

introduces real texts in the learning situation, 3. It offers students opportunities to think

about the learning process and not only in the language, 4. It gives importance to the

personal experiences of the students as elements that contribute to the learning of the

classroom and 5. Tries to relate the language learned in the classroom with activities carried

out outside of it.

Formerly, the choice of said teaching method was totally opportune, because the

students had little or no knowledge of English vocabulary useful for their context and a

shortage of opportunities to put into practice what they learned in the classroom. The

communicative approach, understood from the skills of writing and speaking, also

enhanced the skills of listening and reading, as activities such as role-playing games,

interviews, the exchange of information distributed among students, the dialogues, the work

in pairs and the group work, were the gap for the students to carry out communicative

situations making use of all the skills.

Consequently, thanks to the notion that has been noted about the importance of

pedagogical preparation to guide language learning processes, the beginning of a project

aimed at developing specific communication skills with real intentions of use in the context

has been completed. Since, as it was mentioned from the beginning, globalization and

rapid interactive growth among all countries are demanding that current and future

generations establish close communication and information exchange relations and for this,

a good handling of the foreign language is required, mainly of the English, being this the

universal language par excellence of the present time.

 References

Consuegra, H. (Junio de 2012). Practicas pedagógicas . From

http://practicaspedagogicas06.blogspot.com.co/2012/06/practicas-pedagogicas.html

Ecured.cu. (n.d). Método del enfoque comunicativo. From

https://www.ecured.cu/M%C3%A9todo_del_enfoque_comunicativo

Krashen, S. (1981). Second Language acquisition and second language learning.

Pergamon: Oxford.

Krashen, S. (1983). The Natural approach: Language acquisition in the classroom.

Michigan.

Krashen, S. (1995). Principles and practice in second language acquisition . Phoenix.