Title: Shooting for the Sky Or Accelerated Language Acquisition Through Cooperative Learning

Title: Shooting for the Sky or Accelerated Language Acquisition through Cooperative Learning

Andreea Roscaa & Yvonne Baker de Altamiranob

a Facultad de Filología, Traducción y Comunicación, Universidad de Valencia, (Rumanía) [email protected] bCentro Universitario de la Defensa, Universidad de Zaragoza (Reino Unido) [email protected]

Whereas most SLA research investigates the effects of either form or meaning-based instruction in English as a Second Language (ESL) or English as a Foreign Language (EFL), only a few studies have been concerned with the use of such teaching approaches in English for Specific Purposes (ESP) contexts (e.g. Lynch and McLean, 2000; Chan, 2013; Evans, 2013). In an attempt to fill this research gap, our study examines how combined form and meaning-based instruction in the context of war movies and war accounts impacts on the English linguistic performance (grammar, vocabulary, and oral production) of a 3rd-year group of Spanish cadets in the CUD (Centro Universitario de la Defensa) over the course of one semester. For their instruction we have mainly combined two teaching methods: cooperative learning and task-based language teaching (TBLT), which would seem to foment the same values rooted in the training of Spanish Army Officers, such as team spirit, solidarity, and commitment to get the job done.

Method The students were divided into two groups: the experimental group plus a control group, who did not participate in these activities, with both groups being tested before and after the experiment. They both followed the same basic linguistic syllabus, with the experimental group receiving supplementary material that was closely connected to the general topics of the course (e.g. personality, first aid, crime, weather, etc.). Such activities were also vocationally oriented in an environment more conducive to natural language learning in that they focused on the task itself rather than a specific structure or lexical item. The cooperative learning activities included problem- solving tasks using realia, such as maps, weather reports and extracts from war novels. An attempt was made to reduce the variables as far as possible by having the same teacher for both classes since she would use the same approach. However, this made it impossible to have two groups of the same level. Nevertheless, it was assumed that the lower level students were more likely to show tangible signs of improvement than the more advanced class.

Results The battery of tests consisted of a grammar test, a vocabulary test and a 10-minute oral interview. The pre-test and post-test were exactly the same. Both the vocabulary and grammar test consisted of 25 questions each and we tried to measure the productive knowledge of vocabulary and grammar. The graph below compares the average scores obtained by the experimental group and the control group in the pre-test and the post-test. Although we can see that the experimental group improved in all three areas, the most noticeable gains are in terms of grammar. This means that students gained more in accuracy than in fluency. It is also interesting to see that the experimental group actually outperformed the control group in the grammar test. Figure 1: Pre-test and post-test levels of achievement Experimental group vs. control group 100% 80% 57,31 58,46 64,58 64,09 60% 58,77 75,54 66,18 73,50 40% 20% 53,08 60,62 61,09 67,67 0% Pre test Post test Pre tests Post test Experimental Experimental Control Control

Vocab Grammar Oral interview

Discussion Several explanations can be put forward to account for our results. First, the collaborative tasks requiring the use of certain grammatical structures (conditionals, future time clauses, etc.) were possibly responsible for the significant improvement in grammar in the experimental group whereas the vocabulary items in the test were not so salient. The second explanation relates to the task performance options. Students in the experimental group were given unlimited time to perform the tasks. Previous studies (cf. Yuan and Ellis, 2003) showed that allowing students to perform a narrative task in their own time resulted in more complex and more accurate language in comparison to a control group that performed the same task under time pressure. Also, in the post- task phase the teacher reviewed the most conspicuous errors that were made by learners during the performance of the tasks.

Keywords: language acquisition, linguistic achievement, cooperative learning, war movies.

References Chan, C. (2013). Investigating tasks in the context of business English: Sources of difficulty and motivation from the learner’s perspective. LSP Journal, 4(2), 38-63.

Gillies, R. M. (2007). Cooperative learning: Integrating theory and practice. Los Angeles: Sage.

Evans, S. (2013). Designing tasks for the business English classroom. ELT Journal, 67(3), 281-293.

Lynch, T., & MacLean, J. (2000). Exploring the benefits of task repetition and recycling for classroom language learning. Language Teaching Research, 4, 221-250.

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Kagan, S. and Kagan, M. (2009) Kagan Cooperative Learning. San Clemente, CA: Kagan Publishing.

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