First presentation was made by Elaine Tarone. She focused on the following questions that are not covered in Selinker's (1972) Interlanguage paper:
- How different adult SLA from child SLA? - Do adults' interlanguage fossilize? - What is the relationship between focus on form and that on meaning?
She stated, "As linguists or teachers, we should look at learner system rather than randomness."
It was a instructive and interesting presentation. Since Tarone was Selinker's student at Edinburgh University, she clearly described the process how Selinker went through while he was writing the Interlanguage paper and creating the Interlanguage hypothesis!
While Tarone was talking about her SLA graduate classes, she confessed that her students couldn't grasp much to apply their knowledge into teaching until 2009 because the syllabus was based on theories and case studies rather than questions her students form and debates. Since 2009, she has been observing the differences in their teaching implications.
The second presentation of the day was by Terence Odlin. His talk was about Rediscovering Prediction in Interlanguage. He focused on the predictions in light of some empirical work of transfer showing different outcomes for different L1 groups, such as English, Finnish, Swedish, Dutch, French, Chichewa, Guajarati, Ngoni, Vietnamese and Urdu.
An example is as follows:
“A woman walked in the street and she was hungry… A man walked in the street and the woman run towards him… The police man was in the street and the man knocked him with a stick. Then a man and a woman escaped” (F9B14).
Odlin stated that the excerpt above endorses Selinker’s assertion that “every sentence of the Interlanguage (IL) is to be regarded as idiosyncratic until shown to be otherwise” (1992, p. 159).
At the end of his presentation, I posed the following question:
“In cases of learner errors, we, as teachers, consider L1 and interlanguage interference, psychological aspects, and cognitive development of learners. When it comes to diagnose learner errors, I find it less challenging to diagnose group variables/ errors because I can have more data to compare and contrast. However, it is quite challenging to discover the roots of individual errors. Although individual learner errors may stem from more than one particular reason, what do you think how teachers, as observers, can diagnose errors resulted from L1 interference in individual learners in order to treat those errors?”
Odlin suggested me to ask individual students why they think they have done a particular error. I queried if he meant “Contrastive Analysis” by asking the reason of their errors. Without saying Yes or No, he iterated, “Ask simply why an individual learner made the error.”
My notes: A beginner level ESL student may fail to express himself due to their L2 language proficiency.
In terms of Contrastive Analysis, are ESL teachers proficient in our students’ L1s to contrast the language forms of English and that of their students' L1s?
3 comments:
First presentation was made by Elaine Tarone. She focused on the following questions that are not covered in Selinker's (1972) Interlanguage paper:
- How different adult SLA from child SLA?
- Do adults' interlanguage fossilize?
- What is the relationship between focus on form and that on meaning?
She stated, "As linguists or teachers, we should look at learner system rather than randomness."
It was a instructive and interesting presentation. Since Tarone was Selinker's student at Edinburgh University, she clearly described the process how Selinker went through while he was writing the Interlanguage paper and creating the Interlanguage hypothesis!
While Tarone was talking about her SLA graduate classes, she confessed that her students couldn't grasp much to apply their knowledge into teaching until 2009 because the syllabus was based on theories and case studies rather than questions her students form and debates. Since 2009, she has been observing the differences in their teaching implications.
The second presentation of the day was by Terence Odlin. His talk was about Rediscovering Prediction in Interlanguage. He focused on the predictions in light of some empirical work of transfer showing different outcomes for different L1 groups, such as English, Finnish, Swedish, Dutch, French, Chichewa, Guajarati, Ngoni, Vietnamese and Urdu.
An example is as follows:
“A woman walked in the street and she was hungry… A man walked in the street and the woman run towards him… The police man was in the street and the man knocked him with a stick. Then a man and a woman escaped” (F9B14).
Odlin stated that the excerpt above endorses Selinker’s assertion that “every sentence of the Interlanguage (IL) is to be regarded as idiosyncratic until shown to be otherwise” (1992, p. 159).
At the end of his presentation, I posed the following question:
“In cases of learner errors, we, as teachers, consider L1 and interlanguage interference, psychological aspects, and cognitive development of learners. When it comes to diagnose learner errors, I find it less challenging to diagnose group variables/ errors because I can have more data to compare and contrast. However, it is quite challenging to discover the roots of individual errors. Although individual learner errors may stem from more than one particular reason, what do you think how teachers, as observers, can diagnose errors resulted from L1 interference in individual learners in order to treat those errors?”
Odlin suggested me to ask individual students why they think they have done a particular error. I queried if he meant “Contrastive Analysis” by asking the reason of their errors. Without saying Yes or No, he iterated, “Ask simply why an individual learner made the error.”
My notes:
A beginner level ESL student may fail to express himself due to their L2 language proficiency.
In terms of Contrastive Analysis, are ESL teachers proficient in our students’ L1s to contrast the language forms of English and that of their students' L1s?
Post a Comment