Humanising Language Teaching
Year 1; Issue 3; May 1999

WHOLE OR HOLE

Jane Arnold, editor of Affect in Language Learning

Page 2 of 3

To get a feel for the type of activity that went on in the experimental group, I'd like to compare two possible language teaching activities.

Activity 1 (a very slightly modified version of an activity in a well-known textbook).

In pairs prepare and present a dialogue for this situation:

A. You have just bought a goldfish and want to know how to take care of it (what and how much to feed it, how to clean the fishbowl, where to keep the bowl, etc.)

B. You are the shopkeeper and an expert on fish. Give A advice.

Activity 2 I am a person who...

In pairs A speaks for two minutes about him/herself, beginning each sentence with "I am a person who..." Then B repeats as closely as possible what A has said, beginning each sentence with "You are a person who..." Then if the class is very large, each pair makes a circle with 3 other pairs. Each person will tell the others something about the person he/she has worked with. (Adapted from Davis and Rinvolucri 1990:42-3)

If we analyze the two activities according to the four points outlined above, we can easily see that Activity 1 has little personal meaning unless one is of the very small minority that has goldfish. The students' emotional side is left untouched; it is a totally antiseptic exercise which neither engages the emotions nor provides aesthetic satisfaction nor involves creativity. There is nothing open, nothing deep. Even though two students are talking to each other, there is no real communication, and the student in the shopkeeper's role most probably doesn't have the information needed to answer the questions on goldfish correctly. And there has been nothing to promote a better functioning group.

Activity 2, however, stems very directly from personal meaning. It takes the emotional needs of students into account in several ways. For example, it reduces anxiety by not having students' speak in front of the whole class and promotes self-esteem by recognizing their experiences as a valid topic for an exercise in the classroom and by not giving them a mechanical, simplistic type of exercise. Since they are speaking about themselves as real people, not as goldfish sellers or buyers, they are truly interested in what their classmates say and so real communication is established. Finally, there is a broadening of the interpersonal contact in the activity and the opportunity for supportive connections among group members, which contributes to a positive atmosphere in the classroom.

In the experiment in order to keep language whole, a basically task-based orientation was given to the course. There was no "open your books to page 42... explain the grammar... do an exercise... correct the exercise", there was no PPP. There were very diverse activities in the class, most of them closely related to real communication. For the first half of the year a teacher-prepared booklet of readings and activities was used as the basis for much of the classroom work. Two main topics were focused on: first, personal development (including learning about learning, learning about the brain, multiple intelligences, speaking in public) and second, ecology and peace. For the second half of the year students themselves found texts they felt were interesting to include in the second booklet. In addition to the class activities, students kept a portfolio of their work and a learning journal in which they reflected upon their process of language learning. In the last part of the year they presented group projects.

Grammar was dealt with principally as it arose in context and from teacher observation of student needs according to their written work. As they were writing large quantities of English, the corrections on their work provided an effective source of feedback. Most topics needing review were simply discussed briefly with reference to the mistakes in their written work. A few were dealt with separately. For example, to clarify the question of adjective order the teacher put a large poster of Indiana Jones up and asked for adjectives to describe him. A selection from the most relevant categories was then chosen for students to order in the sentence Indiana Jones is a(n) ____ ____ _____ _____ ____ man. Then they are given the general rule - the more specific the adjective, the closer to the noun - and told to make any changes needed. The same process is repeated with other nouns that they chose, after giving them now the more specific rule of order: value, size, age, shape, colour, etc.

Some examples of how the four points were implemented are as follows:

1. Personal meaning. Multiple Intelligence exercises were used to help learners see how to take advantage of their strong points and develop the weaker ones.

2. Feelings and the body. A simple way to incorporate some movement into the class is to bring in a soft toy, start a group story with the first line, throw the toy to a student, who has to add a line and toss the toy to someone else.

3. Real communication. In a visualization exercise learners were asked to develop a dream they have, either for themselves or the world, to experience having that dream come true. Then in pairs they ask each other about their dreams.

4. Group dynamics. In very large groups such as these learners seldom have the change to get to know each other well and thus are less likely to take linguistic risks in the class. To improve this situation, for one activity learners were grouped according to their zodiac signs and asked to try to find out things they have in common, then given a text on their sign to work with together. Afterwards, they were assigned to prepare for the following class a short talk about anything that interested them to give in the same group of people they had been working with. One student commented in her journal: "The most interesting thing has been that though most of us find it difficult to talk in front of the whole class, it was rather easy to to it in a small group. Therefore, we could realize we are able to do it. I think it gave us self-confidence. It also let us know each other a bit more".