Teaching Grammar in a Task-based Framework: What Cognitive Semantics Can Offer

N. P. Sudharshana, India

N. P. Sudharshana teaches English at Indian Instititute of Technology, Kanpur, India. His research interests primarily include studying acquisition and teaching of English as a second language in the broad framework of cognitive linguistics. He has served as a member on textbook development boards at elementary levels. He also conducts workshops for teachers and teacher-educators. Email: sudh@iitk.ac.in

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Introduction
Applying cognitive semantics to language pedagogy
Task-based language teaching
Form-focused tasks and cognitive semantics
Sample tasks
Interpretation task
CR tasks
Task sequence
Concluding remarks
References

Introduction

Of late, Cognitive semantics (CS), an umbrella term that encompasses of theories of Cognitive grammar (e.g. Langacker, 2008a), Conceptual metaphor (e.g. Lakoff & Johnson), and Categorisation (e.g. Lakoff, 1987), has been extensively applied to language pedagogy extensively. In particular, four principles about language - which are related with one another - have been found to be most relevant. The first one is that grammar is meaningful (see Langacker, 2008a and 2008b among others). Grammatical structures and categories have a semantic dimension just like vocabulary items. This meaning is in the form of ‘conceptualization’ and is built on the basis of actual instances of language use. For instance, the meaning of the preposition on in the example (1a) can be described as in (1b):

(1)

1. A book is on the table
2. A smaller object in contact with and supported by a larger horizontal surface

The second principle is that language is usage-based in nature. All linguistic elements are observed in discourse contexts (both spoken and written), and are interpreted in context (which includes knowledge of syntax and semantics, details of physical setting, information about interlocutors, and shared socio-cultural knowledge among others). This forms conceptualization behind every lingusitic element and guides the use of that particular element in similar contexts in future (Langacker, 2008a).

The third one, which is a corollary to the second, is that when a speaker reports an event, how it is done is guided by the available linguistic choices. Thus, every reported event is ‘a construal’ (see e.g. Radden & Dirven, 2007, ch 2 for details). In many cases, there may be multiple ways of referring to the same event and the words chosen and structures used indicate how the speaker has construed that particular event at a particular moment in a particular context. For instance, the event of a group of soldiers marching from one end of a field to the other can be reported in at least two ways as in (2a-b):

(2)

1. The soldiers marched across the field (conceptualization: the field had little or no grass)
2. The soldiers marched through the field (conceptualization: the field had tall and hick grass)

The fourth and final principal is that human beings form categories represented by vocabulary items and grammatical structures and extensions are made from these ‘prototypical categories’. Therefore, linguistic phenomena such as polysemy and expressions can be explained in terms of propositional, image-schematic, metaphoric or metonymic extensions (Lakoff, 1987).

For instance, prepositions in, on and at have very close spatial uses and their extended uses are also linked with one another. These English prepositions are prototypically used in contexts of three-dimensional container, two-dimensional surface and point-like places as in (3a-c) respectively:

3.

1. A book in the bag
2. A cup on the table
3. Traffic signals at an intersection

From these usages, the following image-schematic extensions into the temporal domain are made respectively in (4a-c):

4.

1. A concert in January (longer periods=containers)
2. A leap year starting on Wednesday (medium length periods=surfaces)
3. The flight at 6.30 am (short period=points)

Some metaphoric extensions of the preposition on are illustrated below:

5.

1. “No, don’t pay. The bill is on me” (Notion of support → metaphorical burden borne by the speaker)
2. The actor revealed in a talk show that a younger co-star was hitting on her during the shooting (Notion of contact → metaphorical forceful contact with the speaker)

(see e.g. Lindstromberg, 2010 for more details)

Drawing on some of these principles, researchers have proposed methods to meaningfully teach some aspects of language such as prepositions and idiomatic expressions, which have been traditionally thought of as ‘meaningless’ and hence ‘unexplainable’. See the next section for a brief review of such studies. Going a step further, this paper proposes a framework that brings together cognitive-semantics based meaning explanations and task-based language teaching. The paper also illustrates how this framework can work with examples in the subsequent sections.

Applying cognitive semantics to language pedagogy

There have been many attempts, primarily by cognitive linguists, to offer meaning explanations for grammatical phenomena. An area that has been extensively studied is prepositions. Perhaps, in one of the earliest studies, Lindstromberg (1996) presents a case study of the preposition on. She argues for a pedagogic framework where prepositions can be taught using schematic pictures, or icons. In the model, the target preposition is not dealt with in isolation; instead, a comparison is made with semantically-related prepositions and differences in conceptualization are highlighted. Also, the links between metaphorical extensions and the prototypical use are identified thereby learners can relate these extensions - which are typically learnt later - to the ones learned earlier. A more detailed account of prepositions can be found in studies such as Tyler & Evans (2004) and Lindstromberg (2010). Another area of interest has been metaphor awareness and vocabulary expansion (see Boers & Demecheleer, 1998; Boers 2004 among others). See Boers & Lindstromberg, 2006 among others for a comprehensive review of such studies.

However, the challenge has been to integrate insights from CS into grammar teaching, yet maintain the focus on meaning-making and not slide towards discrete exercises and heavy metalinguistic explanations. Here is an attempt in this paper to address this issue. The aim of the paper is two-fold: first show that we can design more effective form-focused tasks drawing on research in CS and then propose a task sequence integrating such tasks so that they do not remain as discrete metalinguistic exercises.

Task-based language teaching

One of the challenges teachers usually face is how to teach grammar in a task-based teaching framework. There have been several attempts to integrate meaning focus and form focus in the ESL contexts. For instance, Loschky & Bley-Vroman (1990) propose ‘structure-based communication tasks’ in which learners have to necessarily negotiate with specific language forms to complete the task. Ellis (1995, 1997, 2003) proposes form focused tasks where the focus on grammar is explicit but the approach followed is inductive. Learners are presented with data and are encouraged to detect patterns and hypothesize about usage of specific elements.

Form-focused tasks and cognitive semantics

Ellis (1995, 1997, 2003) proposes two kinds of form-focused activities - interpretation tasks and Consciousness-raising (CR) tasks. In an interpretation task, as the name itself suggests, the focus is on interpretation or ‘understanding’ rather than production. Learners are presented with an oral or a written text for comprehension and then they do one or more tasks which involve no or very little language production. The tasks largely include non-verbal responses such as drawing pictures or ticking the box or saying true/ false. Such tasks help build implicit knowledge of the target elements. In CR tasks, the focus is on production. Learners are given a text (mostly an authentic written text) and are asked to ‘notice’ a particular structure and then hypothesize about the usage of that target element. Once the learners form hypotheses, they may be presented with additional data to verify the hypotheses to confirm or discard them. The goal here is to build explicit knowledge about the target elements.

CS based explanations can be used to design these tasks more effectively to cover a wider range of language features. The question is – how to design such tasks. The process starts with identifying language feature to focus on. This choice is usually governed by several factors such as syllabus guidelines, learner needs, learnability issues, etc. A discussion on these factors, however, is beyond the scope of this paper. Whatever the selection may be, one of the advantages of relying on CS is that meaning explanations are available for most of the grammatical phenomena (See e.g. Radden & Dirven, 2007). It is highly advisable to select a cluster of language features (e.g. definite and indefinite articles together) rather than a single item. In CS, a particular structure, category or a word can only be understood in relation to other competing elements which could possibly occur in similar contexts. This is because, every utterance is a construal and contrasting with other available choices helps explain why a particular structure is chosen over others. The next step, and a crucial one, is translating CS accounts of grammar into pedagogic grammar that is easily accessible to learners. Teachers might replace technica terms with those their learners are familiar with. For instance, in one of my classes with elementary level learners I have observed that descriptive explanations (e.g. ‘Action word’, ‘Describing word’, ‘Person who is moving/ doing some action’) are more easily understood than traditional technical terms (here, ‘verb’, ‘Adjective’, ‘Figure’ respectively). Finally, teachers need to find appropriate texts to instantiate the use of target language element. Recall here that CS focuses on the usage-based nature of language: every grammatical feature or a vocabulary item has its meaning derived from the context. Of course, a single text may not be sufficient to explain the whole gamut of uses of a particular element and a collection of texts - or as Willis & Willis (2007) call it ‘a pedagogic corpus’ - may be more effective.

Sample tasks

We illustrate a few sample tasks in this section. The target elements are participles. Both present and past participles are derived from verbs and can be used as adjectives - both as attributive and predicative - as shown below:

6.

1. Three interesting SUVs were unveiled at the car show (present participle – attributive)
2. The teachers are trying to make science lessons more interesting (present participle - predicative)
3. All interested parties have been summoned by the court (past participle – attributive)
4. The crowd did not seem interested in what the actor was saying (past participle - predicative)

The usage of these participles can always be challenging for ESL learners. Learners often confuse the uses of present and past particples. Also, they do not distinguish between the use of participles as an adjective (e.g. The car is broken) and in other contexts such as a passive structure (e.g. The car is built in the workshop).

A CS analysis starts with where these forms are derived from. These participle forms are obviously derived from verbs. However, they differ from verbs in the fact that while verbs focus on a process in a time-sequence manner (hence, we have present and past tenses with aspectual distinctions), participles focus on just one segment of the process. Present participle has an ‘immediate scope’ and focuses on ‘onstage region’ of an action (Langacker 2008a: 120). Extending on this, present participle is also used in contexts with focus on an ongoing action or the actor initiating the action, as in progressive tenses (e.g. John was cooking while Mary was setting the table) and subordinate conjoining clauses (e.g. Walking on the street, John ran into his old friend).

Past participle, on the other hand, focuses on the ‘end of the verbal process’ (Langacker ibid.: 121). Therefore, Past participles are used in contexts where focus is on the end result or the recipient, as in perfective tenses (e.g. John has already submitted his resignation), passives (e.g. The book was stolen last night), and relative clauses (e.g. I opened the parcel delivered by the courier boy). This distinction is clear in constructions such as ‘Having completed their homework, the children went out to play’ where a completed action in a subordinate clause is conjoined with the main clause using present participial form of the auxiliary verb ‘have’ which is usually used in perfective tenses with past participle forms.

Let’s look at uses of participles as adjectives with the help of an example:

7.

1. Mary is boring.
2. Mary is bored.

Though these forms occur in similar contexts, the interpretation is different. In (7a), the present participle refers to the doer of an action whereas the past participle in (7b) focuses on the receiver of the action. We have seen above that present participle adjective focuses on an ongoing action and as a propositional extension on the doer. The past participle focuses on the end-result of a process and thus as a propositional link on the receiver of that process. Therefore, it is ‘Mary’ in (7a) who ‘creates’ boredom in people around her while in (7b) Mary is at the ‘receiving end’ of boredom created by people around her.

As noted above, both these participial adjectives can be used in attributive and predicative positions. However, there is a difference between them:

8.

1. Cheating players vs players cheating (for a reason)
2. Disabled veterans vs veterans disabled (in a war)

CS analysis shows that the pre-nominal modification (as in ‘cheating players’) denotes more permanent condition/ attribute and hence uses such as ‘disabled person’ might sound offensive. The post-nominal modification (as in ‘players cheating’) denotes a relatively temporary state and sometimes in a specific condition and hence might be less offensive. This explains socially more acceptable uses such as ‘persons with disabilities’ (Radden & Dirven 2007). Such an analysis based on CS could be a way to develop critical language awareness.

Now, the tasks we design need to focus on these aspects of participles. We also need, by default, a communicative context for a task. In this paper, we propose that the context could be choosing professions for self, based on one’s personality.

Interpretation task

For an interpretation task, it is important to personalize the context. Hence, an effective way would be to ask learners to talk about their ‘dream job’.

This task focuses on present particles as adjectives. Teachers may help learners with some vocabulary. Teachers might later have a discussion on learner responses. Note that the aim of an interpretation task is mainly to focus on comprehension. In order to facilitate discussion, teachers might take a reading text/ listening text about unusual professions such as ‘ghost hunter’, ‘storm chaser’, etc. Once learners list professions under each of those adjectives, teachers might ask them to reason out their choices. This can be done in pairs.

Now the second task focuses on past participles. This is a questionnaire to explore personality of learners.

Task 2

Answer the questionnaire. Put a tick in the most appropriate box.

This is a sample questionnaire. Teachers may modify it according to learners’ requirements. This could be followed by matching their personality types with descriptions they gave for each profession.

Now the third and final task will consolidate the uses of both the kinds of participles.

Note here that this conversation is just a sample. Teachers may find authentic conversations online or ask some of their friends talk about their jobs and record it. Though this kind of task involves minimal verbal response, learners are forced to make a choice between close options and this may help notice differences between them. This distinction is explored further in a CR task in the following section.

CR tasks

CR tasks focus on explicit knowledge. Here we propose three CR tasks.

A discussion after the task could lead to tentative hypotheses about the distribution of two types of participles.

Teachers may follow it up with additional texts - written or spoken - and help learners confirm their hypotheses or modify them.

Here learners list contexts where these participles are used and try to establish connections across different uses of participles. This shows their participial uses are well-motivated and not random or meaningless. These are largely linguistic/ schematic extensions. The next task focuses on building critical language awareness. Since every structure or a word is a construal, it has been shown that the choices made indicate the attitude of the author/ speaker towards the subject (see e.g. Hart, 2011). By focusing on the conceptualization behind structures, CS can help learners develop such kind of language awareness and avoid offensive language.

Task sequence

In the previous sections, we have illustrated how CS explanations can be incorporated into teaching tasks maintaining focus on communication. As a next step, teachers can design a task sequence in such a way that these interpretation and CR tasks do not stand alone, but become a part of larger teaching plan. In a classroom, teachers could start with interpretation tasks which introduce present and past participial adjectives. This could be followed by a single or multiple reading texts which include the target elements. These need to be authentic. Teachers could design comprehension questions which contain target elements. Learners can be asked to identify and list target elements from the text(s) and hypothesize about their uses. This could be followed by CR tasks which help in formulating rules for themselves. Once learners understand the motivations for the uses of participles, they can be asked to do a controlled production task (such as gap filling) and then a free-production task (e.g. Learners choose a profession most suitable for them/ most liked by them and give reasons; read career related queries in newspapers and answer them). Of course, this is just one possible way and teachers can adapt this according to their needs.

Concluding remarks

CS can change how grammar is taught in classroom. The greatest advantage would be emphasis on meaningfulness of grammar. This would discourage rote learning and in the long run may even dispel apprehensions associated with teaching and learning of grammar. At this point, it is also necessary to be cautious about some issues regarding applying CS (cognitive semantics) into an ESL classroom. One of the most prominent challenges is arriving at clear and lucid meaning explanations for some linguistic elements. In some cases, they may be highly abstract and not be easily accessible to teachers and learners. Hopefully, with the advances in research, this would be possible soon.

References

Boers, F. 2004. Expanding learners’ vocabulary through metaphor awareness: What expansion, what learners, what vocabulary? In M. Achard and S. Niemeier (eds.), Cognitive Linguistics, second language acquisition, and foreign language teaching (pp.211-232). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter

Boers, F. & Demecheleer, M. 1998. A cognitive semantic approach to teaching Prepositions. ELT Journal 52/3: 197-204.

Boers, F. & Lindstromberg, S. 2006. Cognitive linguistic applications in second or foreign language instruction: Rationale, proposals and evaluation. In G. Kristiansen, M. Achard, R. Dirven & F. J. R. Ibanez (eds.), Cognitive linguistics: Current applications and future perspectives (pp. 305-355). Berlin/ New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Ellis, R. 1995. ‘Interpretation tasks for grammar teaching’. TESOL Quarterly, 29/1: 87-105.

Ellis, R. 1997. SLA research and language teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ellis, R. 2003. Task-based language learning and teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hart, C. 2011. Force-interactive patterns in immigration discourse: A Cognitive Linguistic approach to CDA. Discourse & Society, 22(3), 269–286.

Langacker, R. W. 2008a. Cognitive Grammar: A Basic Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Langacker, R. W. 2008b. Cognitive grammar as a basis for language instruction. In P. Robinson & N. C. Ellis (eds.), Handbook of cognitive linguistics and second language acquisition (pp.66-88). New York/ London: Routledge.

Lakoff, G. 1987. Women, fire and dangerous things: What categories reveal about mind. Chicago/ London: The University of Chicago Press.

Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live by. Chicago/ London: University of Chicago Press.

Lindstromberg, S. 1996. Prepositions: Meaning and method. ELT Journal, 50/3: 225-236.

Lindstromberg, S. 2010. English prepositions explained. Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Loschky, L. & Bley-Vroman, R. 1990. Creating structure-based communication tasks for second language development. University of Hawai'i Working Papers in ESL, 9 (1), 161-212.

Radden, G. and Dirven, R. 2007. Cognitive English grammar. Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Tyler, A. and Evans, V. 2004. Applying cognitive linguistics to pedagogical grammar: The case of over. In M. Achard & S. Niemeier. (eds.) In M. Achard and S. Niemeier (eds.), Cognitive Linguistics, second language acquisition, and foreign language teaching (pp.257-280). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Willis, D. and Willis, J. 2007. Doing task-based language teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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