Why
I Read This Book
This book
was recommended as supplemental reading on the Distance Delta (W) course
that I am currently doing. Furthermore a
friend and colleague who had already completed the Delta course recommended this
book as being particularly useful for the exam.
The
Review
Despite
the very dry-sounding title, this is a very readable and very engaging
book.
Larsen-Freeman
is a writer with a talent for expressing ideas easily and simply, and writes
very readable prose.
The
readability of the book is also helped by the narrative format it uses. For each language teaching method,
Larsen-Freeman describes a sample class of that method. The descriptions are clear enough so that you
often feel as if you are right in the classroom.
For
example, here’s an excerpt from the chapter on Desuggestopedia:
“The teacher puts on some music. It is
Mozart’s Violin Concerto in A. After a couple of minutes, in a quiet voice, she
begins to read the text. Her reading appears to be molded by the music as she
varies her intonation and keeps rhythm with it. The students follow along with
the voice of the teacher, who allows them enough time to silently read the
translation of the dialog in their native language. They are encouraged to highlight and take
notes during the session. The teacher
pauses from time to time to allow the students to listen to the music, and for
two or three minutes at a time, the whole group stands and repeats after the
teacher, joining their voices to the music.” (p. 75)
The
clear narrative description of each teaching method is followed up by an
equally clear listing of observations about the method and the underlying
principles behind those observations. This is further followed up by a section
answering and answering questions about each language method: (In order for
easy comparison, the same questions are asked for each method: 1. What are the goals of the teachers who
use this method? 2. What is the role of the teacher? Etc.)
Again,
it sounds boring, but it’s actually alright.
These constant lists of observations and principles certainly have the
potential to be boring, but Larsen-Freeman’s clear and readable prose saves the
day, and, contrary to all my expectations, I actually found myself engaged by
the lists of principles.
I
wouldn’t go so far as to recommend this book for pleasure reading (no one who’s
not an English teacher need ever pick up this book), but I will say
it was one of the few books I’ve read for professional development during which
I didn’t find my eyes glazing over. I
could read it easily, and I found the ideas engaging.
Overview
The
purpose of Larsen-Freeman’s book is to examine several different methods of
language teaching, and compare them with each other.
The
purpose is not, as Larsen-Freeman says clearly in the introduction, to determine
which methods are good and which methods are bad. Nor is the purpose to prescribe a method for
teachers. Rather, the purpose is to
examine what are the underlying principles behind each method in order to
encourage teachers to think about what principles underline their own language
teaching.
Throughout
the book, Larsen-Freeman encourages the reader to keep an open mind about all
the methodologies, and try to “put on the
eyeglasses of another person—to adopt his or her perspective—to see the method
as the originator saw it. Further … [to adopt] a willingness to explore what is new” (Elbow quoted in
Larsen-Freeman, p. 6)
At
the end of the book, the reader is not forced to choose one exclusive method
from the various options, but simply to take what they like from any of
them. In other words, a thorough
knowledge of this book is not meant to limit your teaching options to one
narrow methodology, but to expand your options to all of them.
Of
course there may be some limits to how much you can mix and match these
methods, because some methods, if taken in their purest forms, are contradictory. (Or perhaps more accurately, the ideologies
behind the methods are contradictory.)
As Larsen-Freeman writes “For
instance, notice that the use of the students’ native language in the Direct
Method and Comprehension Approach … is proscribed, whereas in the
Grammar-Translation Method and Community Language Learning, it is prescribed. Witness the divergent views regarding the
level of input in the Audio-Lingual Method, to less controlled in the Natural
Approach, to virtually uncontrolled in task-based, content based, and
participatory approaches. Contrast the
views regarding what to do with learners’ errors, which range from doing
everything to prevent them in the first place (Audio-Lingual Method) to
ignoring them when they are made under the assumption that they will work
themselves out at some future point (for example, TPR). ” (p. 180-181)
However,
even these contradictions need only be a problem for the methodology in its
purest, most restrictive forms. As
Larsen-Freeman emphasizes in her book, it is still possible to take activities
from these methods even if you don’t fully agree with their ideologies.
For
example, the Audio-Lingual Method is influenced by the ideas of verbal behavior
expressed by B.F. Skinner in the 1950s—that language learning is a matter of
good habit formation. Since Chomsky’s critique of Skinner, the ideas of
learning-language-by-habit-formation have (mostly) fallen out of favor. However, when reading Larsen-Freeman’s
description of the highly controlled language drilling in the Audio-Lingual
Method, I found nothing objectionable about it.
Even if you incline towards a more Chomskyian view of language
acquisition, you can still use sentence drills and habit formations as a
supplement. (It would, after all, simply
be more language exposure.) As
Larsen-Freeman writes, “even if you do
not agree [with the Audio-Lingual Method in its entirety] there may be techniques described below that
you are already using or can adapt to your approach” (p. 47)
Personal
Response
As
Larsen-Freeman mentions in her introduction, each new method introduced will
often evoke a “doubting game and a believing game”
in the reader. Part of you immediately
doubts everything that is new and unusual.
Part of you starts to see the appeal of it.
So
it was with me.
With
each new method described, I found myself having a lot of doubts (mainly on
grounds of practicality—how feasible it would be to implement that particular
method in my teaching context).
But
with each new method described, I also found myself attracted to it. In the end, I am having a hard time deciding
which method I liked the most.
Since
one of the goals of Larsen-Freeman’s book is to encourage her readers to try to
see what is good in each methodology, I suppose it is a measure of the book’s
success that, on some level, I liked them all.
Or it could be indicative of my lack of critical thinking. Either way, as I have just now finished the
book, I’ll need some time to digest it first before deciding what activities I’ll
take from it.
However,
practicality is naturally the biggest concern.
All
the time I was reading the book, I kept thinking to myself, “Well, that’s good in theory. But my young teenage learners would never do
that without a struggle.” Or “That’s
all well and good, but I have a pre-set curriculum, and a pre-set textbook from
my school that I’m stuck with.”
For
example, I might be attracted to some of these methods which de-emphasize
grammatical accuracy, were it not for the fact that in my school the students
must take a grammar test at the end of every term.
Or
I might be attracted to some of the methods which emphasize communicative
activities, were it not for the fact that many of my young teenage learners
have low motivation to communicate, and many communicative activities I try to
set up simply degenerate into the students talking in their native language
instead of in English.
I
was, therefore, glad to find that at the end of the book Larsen-Freeman acknowledges
these difficulties:
“Finally, it is true that many decisions are
outside the control of teachers. They must teach for a test, for instance. Or they may have a class where students come
with negative attitudes toward the study of language. Fanselow (1987) observes that perhaps as
little as two percent of the variance that contributes to learning may be
controlled by the teacher. And yet as he
says, ‘But so what? If learning equals one hundred percent, and the lack of
learning means anything less than one hundred percent, the two percent we are
responsible for makes the difference between learning and not learning.’”
(p. 184)
In
other words, Larson-Freeman encourages the teacher to use their own ideas about
language learning and methods to influence the two percent of the situation
they have control over, even if they have no control over the other 98%.
And
I suppose that’s fair enough—even if, during the middle of the book, I did
often feel as if the practical difficulties were being glazed over.
My
Own Methods
I suppose
this is as good as place as any to write down what my own current ideas and
methods are. (Although as I wrote in a previous post, my ideas about language learning are constantly changing, and
what I write here now may not be what I believe six months from now.)
My own experience in the Japanese public schools has taught me that the
Grammar-Translation Method is inadequate to enable students to learn to
communicate in a language. (Despite the
fact that many things in the Grammar-Translation Method appeal to my
personality. When I am learning
languages, I like looking at written language so I can more easily analyze it,
and I like the safeness and predictability of a clear and explicit focus on set
grammar rules.)
My own experience in conversation schools in Japan has convinced me
that communication activities by themselves are not enough for the students to
learn grammatical forms.
I
also tend to believe that when someone is learning a language, a lot of it is
happening subconsciously. So I’m
attracted to Krashen’s* ideas that acquisition will take place if the learner
is fed enough comprehensible input.
However, I believe that a large amount of language can be acquired this
way, but not all of it. In contrast to
Krashen, I believe that some explicit focus on grammatical form is necessary.
I
also believe that this explicit focus on grammatical form is most beneficial if
it is presented as a clarification of an already familiar form instead of as an
introduction of a totally new form.
Ideally any grammar point that I focus on in the lesson is something
that the students have already encountered many times in the input, and are hopefully
at least already receptively familiar with.
So,
in a given lesson, I try to spend two-thirds of the time focusing on comprehensible
input activities (graded readers, songs, et cetera), vocab activities
and (in classes where the students are co-operative) communication
activities. I try to spend only one-third
of the time on explicit grammar focus.
My
current teaching doesn’t match exactly any of the methods described by
Larsen-Freeman, but I suppose, of all of them, it is most similar to the Direct
Method.
* I
hope I’m not mischaracterizing Krashen.
I’m only familiar with his ideas through the writings of his
critics. One of these days I’m going to
have to read his books myself, but in the meantime, someone let me know if I’m getting
him wrong.
What
Does the Research Show?
I hope I’m
remembering this right (and if I’m not, someone please correct me), but one of
the things I think I remember from my master’s degree is that in the 1970s
there was a big effort in second language learning research to compare
different methods of teaching, and determine which one was actually the most
effective for learning. Huge research
projects were launched on this objective, but they all fell apart because there
were too many variables that couldn’t be controlled for. It was impossible to completely standardize
all the teachers, the teachers’ personalities were different, the language
background of the students were different, the motivation of the students were
different, the cultures were different, the class times were different, the
length of study was different, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
As
a result of the collapse of these projects, we never did get a definitive
answer to the question: which methods work best?
Larsen-Freeman
decides to avoid the whole controversy all together, a decision she makes
explicit in both her introduction and conclusion.
From
the introduction: “Readers of the first
edition have told me that they wished that I had concluded with a more explicit
evaluation and comparison of the methods. I chose not to do so in the first
edition of this book, as I am not of the opinion that the purpose of learning
about methods is so one can adopt the right one, or that I could choose for
others which one that would be.” (.xii)
And
from the conclusion: “What makes a method
successful for some teachers is their investment in it. This is one reason why
the research based on methodological comparisons has often been so
inconclusive. It sought to reduce teaching to the faithful following of
pedagogic prescriptions—but teaching is more than this.” (p. 182)
Still
for all that, I (and apparently many other readers from the first edition)
would have liked to hear what the research had to say about these teaching
methods. As flawed and as inconclusive
as all the research is, I was still curious to know it and to see if it shed
any light on the effectiveness of the various methods that Larsen-Freeman
details. I thought it would have made an
interesting little addendum to this book, but apparently it’s outside the scope
of what Larsen-Freeman wanted to write about.
Other
Notes
* I think I’ve linked to it before,
but this is probably a good place to throw in another link to Noam Chomsky’s
famous 1957 review of Skinner [LINK HERE].
* The edition of this book I read was the
second edition published in 2000. Since
then, there has been a 3rd edition of this book published in 2010. But this was the version available
at the teacher’s resource center at my school, so this was the version I read.
Link of the Day
The Politics of Red Lines: Putin's takeover of Crimea scares U.S. leaders because it challenges America's global dominance
Also from Cracked.com, a very interesting article that goes a long ways to explaining all the textbooks I used to read during my scholastic days: 6 Disturbing Things I Learned Writing Your Textbooks
Update: January 3, 2018
Video Review HERE
Also from Cracked.com, a very interesting article that goes a long ways to explaining all the textbooks I used to read during my scholastic days: 6 Disturbing Things I Learned Writing Your Textbooks
Update: January 3, 2018
Video Review HERE
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