English Language Teaching in its Social Context
English Language Teaching in its Social Context
English Language Teaching in its Social Context
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THE SOCIAL CONTEXT FOR LANGUAGE LEARNING 125learn<strong>in</strong>g outcomes, or to expla<strong>in</strong> possible relationships between strategic behaviourand language learn<strong>in</strong>g, then we need to locate these relationships sonally. How and whylearners do what they do will be strongly <strong>in</strong>fluenced by their situation, who they are with,and by their perceptions of both.4Given that we wish to understand how the external social situation of a classroom relatesto the <strong>in</strong>ternal psychological states of the learncr, the metaphor of the classroom as providerof optimal <strong>in</strong>put or re<strong>in</strong>forcer of good strategies is <strong>in</strong>adequate. It reduces the act or experienceof learn<strong>in</strong>g a language to l<strong>in</strong>guistic or behavioural condition<strong>in</strong>g somehow <strong>in</strong>dependentof the learner’s social reality. Not only is SLA research currently offer<strong>in</strong>g us a delimitedaccount of language learn<strong>in</strong>g, reduc<strong>in</strong>g active cognition to passive <strong>in</strong>ternalisation andreduc<strong>in</strong>g language to very specific grammatical performance, the ma<strong>in</strong>stream of SLAresearch is also asocial. It neglects the social significance of even those variables which the<strong>in</strong>vestigators regard as central. The priority given to l<strong>in</strong>guistic and mentalistic variables<strong>in</strong> terms of the efficient process<strong>in</strong>g of knowledge as <strong>in</strong>put leads <strong>in</strong>evitably to a partialaccount of the language learn<strong>in</strong>g process.The social context of learn<strong>in</strong>g and the social forceswith<strong>in</strong> it will always shape what is made available to be lcarned and the <strong>in</strong>teraction of<strong>in</strong>dividual m<strong>in</strong>d with external l<strong>in</strong>guistic or communicative knowledge. Even Wundt, thefirst experimental psychologist, bclicvcd that he could not study higher mental processessuch as reason<strong>in</strong>g, belief, thought, and language <strong>in</strong> a laboratory precisely because suchprocesses were rootcd with<strong>in</strong> authentic social activity.’ A more recent research tradition -an offspr<strong>in</strong>g of work <strong>in</strong> SLA - does address <strong>in</strong>terven<strong>in</strong>g social variables. This traditionprovides my second metaphor.The classroom as discourseRecent classroom-bascd or classroom-oriented research explicitly seeks to describe whatactually happens <strong>in</strong> a rather special social situation. This research relies upon methods ofconversational and sociol<strong>in</strong>guistic data collection and analysis, thereby seek<strong>in</strong>g to offer aricher and less prcscriptive account of classroom language lcarn<strong>in</strong>g than earlier <strong>in</strong>vestigationsof the comparative effects of different teach<strong>in</strong>g methodologies.6 Classroom-orientedresearch focuses primarily upon the discourse of classroom communication. It sees teacherand learners as active participants <strong>in</strong> the generation of the discoursc of lessons. Here, theresearcher explores the classroom as a text which reveals such phenomena as variableparticipation by learners, various error treatments by teachers, and specific features ofclassroom talk such as teacher evaluation, teacher-learner negotiation, and prevalent<strong>in</strong>structional speech acts <strong>in</strong>clud<strong>in</strong>g display questions, formulation or explanation, andmessage adjustment. Although much of this research seems to avoid be<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong>tentionallyexplanatory <strong>in</strong> terms of the possible effects of classroom discourse upon language learn<strong>in</strong>g,some <strong>in</strong>vestigators seek to correlate selected features of classroom talk with certa<strong>in</strong> learn<strong>in</strong>gbehaviours or learned outcomes. Classroom-oriented rcscarch rests on the assumptionthat the discourse of a language class will reveal what is special and important about thatlanguage learn<strong>in</strong>g situation. It <strong>in</strong>tends no practical implications for the teacher, althoughsome of the more overtly correlational studies may encouragc thc teacher to assume thathe must endeavour to orchestrate his own and the learners’ contributions to the discourseaccord<strong>in</strong>g to Conversational moves or speech acts which exemplify “good” <strong>in</strong>struction and“good” learner participation.Clearly, this focus upon the actual discourse of classroom communication providesa valid location if we wish to beg<strong>in</strong> to understand the experience of learn<strong>in</strong>g a language <strong>in</strong>