English Language Teaching in its Social Context

COMPREHENSION AND PRODUCTION STRATEGIES 81opportunity to practise speech in languages where morphology plays a more prominent rolemay be all the more important.To develop discourse skillsThe previous arguments for the importance of output have not challenged the view thatlanguage learning is essentially the development of a sentence-based interlanguage system.But it has been claimed (Brown and Yule 1983) that much ELT work focuses excessively on‘short turns’, and that as a result learners’ capacities to take part in extended discourse arenot stretched. Certainly, current developments in discourse analysis suggest that there is alot to be learned if one is to become an effective communicator. Discourse management(Bygate 1987), turn-taking skills, and a range of similar capacities which underlie thenegotiation of meaning in ongoing discourse (Cook 1989), can only be achieved by actuallyparticipating in discourse. If meaning-making is a jointly collaborative activity, then wecannot read about these skills, or even acquire them passively, but instead have to take partin discourse and realize how our resources are put to work to build conversations andnegotiate meaning. Extensive speaking practice is therefore unavoidable.To develop a personal voiceA learner who is completely dependent on what others say, is unlikely to be able to developa personal manner of speaking. Such a learner will be dependent on the sorts of meaningsthat he or she has been exposed to, and will not be able to exert an influence on conversationaltopics. This implies a strange, passive view of what language is used for, and how personalconcerns are manifested by it. It seems inevitable that if one wants to say things that areimportant, one must have, during language learning, the opportunity to steer conversationsalong routes of interest to the speaker, and to find ways of expressing individual meanings.A role for output here seems unavoidable.The importance of outputThese six reasons for the importance of output provide yet another argument against thesufficiency of a comprehension-based approach. They detail the inadequacy of simplylistening, and show that output too is a necessary condition for successful language learning.But the next question is to consider whether output, in turn, is sufficient and efficient as acondition for language.The six roles for output listed above might suggcst that it is.The first such use, obtainingbetter input (see p. 79), will not be pursued here since it is only a more sensitive form ofKrashcn’s views. The last two roles, acquiring discourse skills and developing a personalvoice (see above), are more concerned with the construct of communicative competence.The central roles for output in promoting interlanguage development are forcing syntacticprocessing, testing hypotheses, and developing automaticity. The first two of these centralroles focus on form while the third is more concerned with performance and fluency.The contrast implied here between attention to form and attention to performance,suggests a question which is susceptible to empirical investigation. We need to devise studieswhich can establish whether actual output favours form or emphasizes fluency at the expenseof form. Although output may generally be a good thing, the roles it serve3 in specificsituations may not be so beneficial. It then becomes important to establish, through research,the conditions and constraints under which output promotes a focus on form.