Describing Learning and Teaching

By Jeremy Harmer

Language and the Brain

The human brain is divided into two identical parts: Right and Left Hemispheres. The two sides of the brain exercise contralateral control of the body. The outer layer of the brain is called the cortex

 The major visible parts of the brain, each with left and right equivalents are: a. b. c. d. Temporal lobes Frontal lobes Occipital lobes Parietal lobes

Language Centers
The left hemisphere is more involved in language than the right, except for left handers. 88% of the population as a whole tends to be lefthemisphere dominant for language.

 Two areas of the languagedominant hemisphere of the brain are known to be particularly involved in language processing: a. Brocas area: It is on the language dominant frontal lobe above the forward part of the temporal lobe.

b. Wernickes area is on the language dominant hemisphere in the area where the upper temporal lobe joins the parietal lobe.

Types of Evidence for Language Centers of the Brain

Hemisphere dominance for language and the particular functions of the language centers are revealed in three ways: a. Aphasias b. Clinical Procedures c. Dichotic listening

 From birth babies tend to favor their right ear for speech sounds whereas they favor their left for other types of sounds. (contralateral control) At the outset of first language learning, both hemispheres of the brain are equally engaged in the learning task until the person turns 4 years old. This would be when kids get to master their fist language.

 Contrary to babies, second language acquisition starts in most of our typical classrooms when the left hemisphere of the brain has complete dominance of it.

Theories on Human Learning

Ivan Pavlov (1938): Father of Classical Behaviorism. He carried out experiments with dogs. He came out with a theory based on stimulusresponse.

B.F Skinner (1938)

Operant Conditioning: He says that sometimes we do not know what stimulates an organism to react in such a way, but we can definetily focus on the consequences. Reinforces follow the response.

 Skinner agues that the best method of extinction is the absence of any reinforcement.
The Audio-lingual method was born under the principles of Behaviorism.

David Ausubel (1965) Cognitive Psychologist

Subsumption theory: Ausubel claims that learning implies a lot more than mere stimulusresponse processes. Human beings are far more complex than mere predictable machines.

 Ausubel claims that learning takes place in the human organism through a meaningful process of relating new events or items to already existing cognitive concepts or propositions. Rote vs. Meaningful Learning Theory: Rote learning means to acquire material in isolation.

 Meaningful learning is a process of relating and anchoring new material to relevant established entities in cognitive structure. Any learning situation can be meaningful if learners have a meaningful learning set and if the learning task is potentially meaningful to the learners

Carl Rodgers (1951) Constructivism

Theory of Humanistic Psychology: He has a tremendous impact on our present view of education and understanding of human learning. Other important names are: Paolo Freire (La Pedagoga del Oprimido) and L. Vygotsky.

 Constructivism: a. Students discover things by themselves. b. He proposes the Transformative Pedagogy. He pays more attention to learning over teaching c. Intructors are facilitarors of knowledge.

Howard Gardner (1999)

He challenges the former, traditional concepts of intelligence by measuring the individuals IQ. The traditional approaches to intelligence discriminate individuals against and assume a passive role of intelligence that denies development.

Theory on Multiple Intelligences

Linguistic Logical-mathematical Musical Spatial Bodily Kinesthetic Naturalist Interpersonal Intrapersonal

Stephen Krashen (1997)

Input Hypothesis: a. Acquisition vs. Learning hypothesis. Adults have two means for internalizing the target language. Acquisition is subconscious and Learning is conscious.

b. Monitor Hypothesis: conscious learning is important to help students to monitor their production. c. Natural order hypothesis: We acquire rules in a predictable and natural order. d. For Krashen, comprehensible input (reading or listening) is the only cause of second language acquistion. He states his I+1 Hypothesis.

 Affective filter hypothesis: Krashen thinks that in order for acquistion to take place the students must be free from anxieties so the affective filter is as low as possible. He defines intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to help affective filter go down.