Language Learning Essays

Language Learning Essays Language Learning Essay Language Learning Essay Throughout time there have been many different ways of teaching foreign languages. Some of these methods work better than others, depending on the language Itself and the student learning it. There are ten different styles of teaching foreign languages which will be described In detail. After the ten styles are Caesar EAI D , tender will De a snort entry on wanly ones are most popular today. Humanly three different learning strategies will be described. Learning Methods The Grammar Translation Method The Grammar Translation Method utilizes the student memorizing different grammar, vocabulary, and phrases. This method focuses on grammatical rules. This is also considered the Classical Method. The Grammar Translation Method was invented when the western world wanted to learn Latin and Greek. The Grammar Translation Method depends a lot on reading texts. Through reading texts, the student will slowly memorize common phrases and run into uncommon words which they will then memorize. When reading the texts, the students begin a direct translation method. This method focuses very little on ever being able to speak the language, Just how to translate. Today, this method is only used for reading dead engages and is considered impractical by most foreign language teachers. [l] The Direct Method The Direct Method is also known as the Natural Method. This method ignores the language that the learner presently knows and only depends on the language which they will be learning. This method was first established in Germany and France. The concept of this method is that one will learn the language Just like how one learned their first language. [2] The Direct Method focuses more on getting correct speech then correct writing. The Direct Method puts most of its emphasis on the pronunciation of the vocabulary. Do to this fact, being learned like the students first language, text is kept away from the student as long as possible, since one cannot read at that young of an age. As a series of progression first comes orally learning, then reading text, then learning how to write the text. [3] The Audio-Lingual Method There are two other names for this method, Army Method (Due to its use in armies, when language is needed to be learned quickly) and New Key. This is a very behaviorism method of teaching. This method depends on a system of reinforcements in order to learn a language. This method is very similar to the Direct Method. This method also does not use the students previously known languages. In this method, the teacher says a phrase and the students repeat it. For example the teacher says, Put your pen on the desk. Students repeat the same thing. Then the teacher says, Pencil. Then the students say Put your pencil on the desk and so on. This method is not taught in schools because of its focus only on speech, and no writing or reading. 4] However, because of the focus on speech and the lack of reading and writing, speech is learned at a faster rate. A good example which this method would e beneficial for is if someone is traveling for business or leisure; due to quick learning AT speech Ana to no Touch on writing or rearing Communicative Language Teaching The Communicative Language Teaching style puts its emphasis on interaction within the language. The Communicative Lang uage Teaching style makes the student understand the language. This differs from Just teaching them how to speak and hear it. When something is read or heard, there is full comprehension of the concepts. This style wants the student to be able to perfectly communicate in all ways. This includes being competent in society. This style differs from others because it is not Just specific to speech, reading, writing, or translating. This style focuses on all of those factors in order to fully understand the language. A few examples of activities used in teaching this way are role play, games, work with a partner, and learning by teaching (see topic below). In schools, there is also regular quizzing and testing done by the teacher. 5] Language Immersion Language Immersion first occurred in Canada when English speaking families wanted their children to learn French. [6] The concept of Language Immersion is elated to the concept, If one puts someone in the middle of a pool, they will eventually learn to swim. If one puts a person in a community who speaks a certain language, the language will be learned. There are five different types of Language Immersion. The first is a full immersion. This is when the students class time is completely spent in the foreign language, with none of the original language is spoken. In this method, students slowly pick up the language, but then accelerate quickly. Next is the partial immersion. This is when half of the class time is spent in the foreign language. The students will try to understand and speak as much of the foreign language as possible, but will revert back to their native language if something is unclear. Third is two-way immersion. This is also known as dual or bilingual immersion. This is in a classroom with people who have many different language backgrounds. There is the target language, the one which is wanted to be learned, and the native language, the one which is spoke to most in the area. Then it turns into partial where half the class is the target language and the other half is the language which is mostly spoke in the area. Fourth is content-based foreign language in elementary schools. Due to the long name it is shortened to FLEES. Only 5% to 15% of the class is done speaking the foreign language. The rest of the class is learning the language. Learning consists of listening, speaking, writing, and reading the target language. Fifth and finally is FLEX or the foreign language experience. This is a method which does not really deal with physically learning the language but with how to learn a language. The student learns how to pick up common words and phrases. The student also learns to develop listening skills and cultural awareness. Walt all AT tense met noose ten earlier ten student Is exposed to Taster ten student wall pick up a language. This makes the language more native to the student if the student were to learn it when they were in elementary school rather to college or even out of college for a business venture. Minimal This method is used for teaching people English as a foreign language. The focus of this is what exactly what the name says, to teach the learner the minimal. Students learn how to say common phrases, ask basic questions, answers, and anything else which is needed to communicated in the most minimal sense. The only reading which takes place is the most basic possible, like childrens books. Blended learning is used in this method too. Such as an online class or computer programs helping the student to learn. Directed Practice Direct practice is one of the most basic learning methods. All that is done is the students memorizing common phrases. This is the absolute bare minimum to get around in a country which the persons native language is not spoken. This method is used by the US for diplomatic trips. Learning is very quick, but the resulting knowledge is limited. Learning by Teaching Learning by teaching was first used in Germany. The student trades places with the teacher, making the student teach the class. Students tend to learn quickly due to the stress put on them. This method is solely used by itself but is more likely to be used in combination with any of the previous methods. Silent Way In the sasss, known for his great innovation in teaching styles, Caleb Gotten, invented the silent way. The silent way is known as the most humanistic approach to teaching. It is called the silent way because the teacher participates as little as possible, even leaving the room at points for the students to experiment using the language on their own terms. It is associated with color word charts, where each phoneme is a different color. [7] See Appendix A for a wall chart example. Other Methods One of the most up-and-coming ways of learning is through sources outside of a class room. This is not book. This is audio and video learning. Recently there has an outburst of audio learning collections, video learning collections, and even computer programs. One of the most popular audio learning series is the Pimples Language Learning system. Plusher was a world renowned expert In linguistic. I Nils serious contains many different languages for the student to choose from. The audio sets are divided up into several different thirty minuet lessons. There is a strong focus on core vocabulary. This method involves much listening, repeating, and recall. This method uses a gradual recall method making the recall time of words and phrases from seconds to minutes to hours to days to months to years. [8] Another up and coming way of learning is the Michel Thomas Method. Michel Thomas has been hired by many Hollywood stars to teach them how to speak a certain language for a movie. This method is used both in class room and with an audio compact disk set. Students translate English sentences into the target engage, starting with simple phrases and progressing to complex sentences. A well known exercise in this program is when the student is asked to give an answer to a question in the foreign language, and then the teacher repeats the whole answer with correct pronunciation. If the student was wrong, the teacher helps the student to make the mistake and corrects it. This CD set breaks grammar into smaller sections that most others. The final miscellaneous way of learning is over a computer program, or audio/ visual. The most popular up-and-coming version is the Rosetta Stone. Besides being available on CD-ROOM, Rosetta Stone also offers online courses for sale by monthly periods. Rosetta Stone boasts software sets of 30 different languages. The concept Rosetta Stone uses is a Dynamic Immersion Method. This is comparable to the Immersion Methods described above. Many different lessons are covered including lessons on colors, letters, numbers, verbs, money, and many more. In every lesson there is listening, reading, and speaking. The program even has speech recognition technology, to see if what the student is saying is correct. Rosetta Stone has earned many awards including best CD-Rooms Used in School, Best CD-ROOM for Language earning and Best Software in Second Language. [9] Most schools will use a combination of multiple styles in order to achieve the optimum level of learning. However three are the most popular, these are: Communicative Language Teaching, the Direct Method, and Language Immersion. The first two are usually used in class rooms and the third is usually used when a new language is needed to be learned at a young age. Finally, the most effective up- and-coming program is the Rosetta Stone software. Rosetta Stone complies the most effective ways of learning into one, creating the ultimate learning program, until omen invents a new one of course. Learning Strategies There are three different learning strategies which are proven to help improve ones ability to learn a language. These strategies include code switching, blending learning, and private tutoring. Owe selecting Code switching is when the speaker is speaking the foreign language but reverts back to their native language at a point. This happens because they are not fluent in the foreign language. This encourages the speaker to become more fluent in the language being learned. People who speak English are more common to fall into a ode switch, due to English popularity in the world. Most people in the world will understand simple phrases in English. This still allows the speaker to attempt to speak fluently, and the listener to understand everything which is being said, even though it is not all in the target language. 10] Blending Learning Blended learning consists of combining class time with an outside program, such as Rosetta Stone. It can also consist of an online class, where the class meets a certain amount of times though out the program. The class can meet at the end of chapters, lessons, or whatever the teacher desires. The meetings can consist of more learning, student questions, or quizzes and tests. This learning strategy provides learners who wish to have class time, but do not necessarily have the time to meet multiple times a week. It also combines the best of both world, being in class learning and the audio/visual learning though a computer or video. [11] Private Tutoring Private tutoring is always an effective way to learn anything. With a private tutor, the students gets a teacher devoted to Just themselves not an entire class. In the sense of a private tutor teaching a foreign language, a person who is native to the entry/language is preferred. Besides them Just being able to teach how to read, write, and speak a language, they will also teach the student about the society in that country on a personal account. The downfall to private tutoring is the price. Pricing for a private class is always much higher than taking a class on the language. However, the learner is paying a price for a specialized lesson based on the learners learning style. Conclusion As seen, there are many different ways which styles can be taught, and different strategies which will help with perfection. The style chosen is dependent on the dents learning style, and how in depth they want to learn the language. Do they wish to Just learn the language, or learn the culture behind it too?