Humanising Language Teaching
Year 2; Issue 5; September 2000

"Our language can be seen as an ancient city: a maze of little streets and squares, of old and new houses, and of houses with additions from various periods; and this surrounded by a multitude of new boroughs with straight regular streets and uniform houses." Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, § 18

For the teacher:

Words have history wrapped up in them. Knowing a word's history can help you and your students understand its present, and more easily see the links between the word in English and similar words in other languages. It can also be fun.

For the classroom:

1. On a large blank sheet of paper, ask your students to draw a map of the route they take from home to work or from home to school. But they mustn't put any words on the map.

2. Now ask them to write words along the route wherever they feel like it. But the words cannot be nouns. Then ask them to explain their words to their partner. Why did they put each word where it is? Are there any more words they could add? How do the nouns fit in now?

3. Ask your students to write the words they have used on pieces of card. Give your students, in groups, access to a good dictionary (i.e. one which includes the date when a word was first used, and the language of its origin).

4. Ask your students to find out how many languages they can find referred to in the dictionary (i.e. how many languages has English borrowed words from?). What is the first recorded use of a word in the dictionary (i.e. can they find the oldest usage?)

5. Ask your students to write on each of their cards the date the word was first used in English and the language it came from or it is related to. For example, next to the word 'dark', they could write "originally from German", "used at least from 1598"; next to 'complicated', they could write "from Latin", "first used 1626".

6. Together, you are going to make a historical map of their maps using their own words. On the white board (or on the floor if you'd rather), get your students to build a city with their words. Perhaps this could be done along the lines described above by Wittgenstein - with the oldest words in the middle and the newer words in the suburbs. Alternatively, your students might want to group the words according to the language they've come from or are related to. Or perhaps the common words could be the main streets, and the rarer words could be the back streets. It's up to you and your students to decide. For example, is there a Latin Quarter in your city?