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Communicative Language Teaching in Vocabulary Teaching and Learning in a Swedish Comprehensive Class

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Communicative Language Teaching in Vocabulary Teaching and Learning in a Swedish Comprehensive Class Communicative Language Teaching in Vocabulary Teaching and Learning in a Swedish Comprehensive Class Jue Xia Kristianstad University The School of Teacher Education English Ⅳ, Spring 2010 D-essay in English Didactics Tutor: Jane Mattisson Table of Contents 1. Introduction……………………………..................................................................1 1.1 Aim……………………………………………………………………….…….…2 1.2 Material………………………………………………………………….…….…..2 1.3 Method……………………………………………………………………….……3 1.3.1 Discussing with the Teacher before the Lesson………………………….…...…3 1.3.2 Teaching Program……………………………………………………………….3 1.3.3 An Interview with the Pupils’ English Teacher……….…………..…………….7 2. Theoretical Background…………...…...……………………………….…….…..8 2.1 Two Perspectives in Second Language Acquisition Research…….………………8 2.2. The Theory of Vocabulary Teaching and Learning………………………...……10 2.3 The Theory of Communicative Language Teaching………………………..……16 3. Analysis and Discussion…………………...…………………………………......23 3.1 Strategies in Vocabulary Teaching……………………………………………….23 3.1.1 Basic Skills.……………………………………….…………………………....23 3.1.2 Contextualization…………….………………………………...…….…...…....28 3.1.3 Role-play……………………………………………………………...…......…30 3.1.4 Summary of Strategies in Vocabulary Teaching………..……..……................32 3.2 Interaction in the Classroom…………………………………………………..…32 3.2.1Teacher-Learner Interaction …………………………..………………….….…32 3.2.2 Learner-Leaner Interaction…………………………………………………….34 3.3 Teacher’s Roles…………………………………………………………………..35 3.4 Learners’ Roles………………………...…….………………………………......38 3.5 Feedback of Dictation……………………………………………………………39 3.6 Evaluation of the Lesson…………………………………………………………40 4. Conclusion……….…………..…………………………………………………....42 References Appendix 1. Introduction A long period of time grammar was viewed as the main task in second language teaching. Mastery of grammatical structures was the main goal in second language acquisition. The Grammar--Translation Method dominated second language teaching. On the contrary, vocabulary teaching and acquisition were of relatively minor importance. Vocabulary development was approached as some kind of auxiliary activity and, often through memorizing decontextualised word lists. The relatively minor importance attached to lexical knowledge and context was visible in the scant attention paid to it by second language researchers and teachers in the last decade. Vocabulary, which is the basic material of the language, is, of course, of crucial importance in expressing ideas and thoughts when communicating. The following statement about the relationship between grammar and vocabulary demonstrated by the British linguist Wilkins in 1976 argues that “[w]ithout grammar, there are few things we can express; while without vocabulary, there is nothing we can express.” Wilkins verifies the importance of vocabulary in communication. Insufficient vocabulary or vocabulary difficulties will result in communicational barriers or failures. Without the mediation of vocabulary, no amount of grammatical or other types of linguistic knowledge can be employed in second language communication or discourse. Since the 1960s, many new ideas and approaches to the study of vocabulary acquisition in a second language have emerged through many English linguists’ efforts and research. Among them, Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) pedagogy which originated from the changes in the British Situational Language Teaching approach dating from the late 1960s deserves to be mentioned. Stemming from the socio-cognitive perspective of the socio-linguistic theory, with an emphasis on meaning and communication, and a goal to develop learners’ communicative competence, CLT evolved as a prominent language teaching method and gradually 1 replaced the previous Grammar-Translation Method. In the last twenty years, Communicative Language Teaching was introduced in China. English teachers in eastern and southern areas are recommended by the Ministry of Education to use this kind of approach in English teaching. Practice has showed that CLT, which has many advantages compared with the Grammar--Translation Method, has been a remarkable success and made great contributions to English teaching and learning in eastern and southern areas. Nowadays CLT is very popular in English language fields in that area. 1.1 Aim This study aims to investigate and evaluate the effectiveness of Communicative Language Teaching in vocabulary teaching and learning by means of observing an English lesson in a comprehensive class in Kristianstad in southern Sweden. The essay will offer a detailed analysis and discussion of the English lesson from various aspects. The evaluation of the lesson will be presented on the basis of the class observation, results of the dictation exercise and an interview with the pupils’ English teacher. 1.2 Material The participants in the present study consist of twenty Grade—7 pupils (6 girls, 14 boys) in a nine-year comprehensive school in Kristianstad in southern Sweden and an English teacher from China. Besides having acquiried their first language-Swedish, these pupils aged from year 12 to 14, who should have reached intermediate cognitive maturity and metalinguistic awareness, have studied their second language--English for seven years. They have English lessons twice each week. The teacher who had an English lesson for these pupils is a Chinese. She has a strong 2 passion for English education and a good command of educational theories and student psychology. Holding a bachelor’s degree, majoring in English Education and having teaching experience of over five years, she is capable of using Communicative Language Teaching to teach vocabulary. The pupils’ English teacher---a fifty-year-old Swedish lady is also invited to observe the English lesson and to be interviewed after the lesson. 1.3 Method In order to investigate and evaluate the effectiveness of Communicative Language Teaching in vocabulary teaching, observations on one English lesson, a dictation exercise after the lesson and an interview with the pupils’ English teacher are applied as the research methods. 1.3.1 Discussing with the Chinese Teacher before the Lesson Before the lesson, the writer exchanged ideas about the teaching purpose and aim with the Chinese teacher. The teacher told the writer that the main aim of the lesson was to memorize seventeen new words by applying Communicative Teaching Method and develop the pupils’ communicative competence. The lesson was Cross my palm with silver! in Unit Seven on P.72 of their textbooks which was considered suitable to use CLT. This unit was easy to design authentic communicative activities which would reflect and embody the features and principles of CLT. The seventeen new words of this unit were divided into the following categories: four concrete nouns, five abstract nouns, one verb and five adjectives describing people’s hand shapes and two adjectives describing people’s personality. She used different skills to teach them different contexts. The teacher also mentioned before the lesson that it seemed easier in Sweden to practise CLT due to smaller numbers compared with in China. 1.3.2 Teaching Program 3 Teaching Aim: Investigation on how well Communicative Language Teaching is in English vocabulary teaching and leaning Teaching Content: Mastery of seventeen new words in Unit 7: palm, inkpad, thumb, nail, conic, elementary, active, philosophic, psychic, bad-tempered, impulsive, trade, rule, fate, regulation, tool, analyse and the development of communicative ability Time: From 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. on 5th of May, 2010 Location: Teaching Building on the first floor Teaching Material: Unit 7 Lift off Textbook 4 Wendy Bradbrook Kurt Soderlund Level of Pupils: 20 pupils in Grade--7 The Teacher: A young Chinese lady Observers: The writer and the pupils’ English teacher Observation of Main Steps in the Lesson: 1) Introduction Firstly, the English teacher from China made a brief introduction about herself to the pupils, their English teacher and the writer. Then she greeted several pupils with a smile in order to relax the atmosphere in the classroom because the pupils saw her for the first time and were unfamiliar with her. Some of pupils’ facial expressions were a bit nervous. It only took about two minutes. 2) Presentation 1 Then the lesson began by presenting the class with Unit Seven in which four new words appear, ranging from palm to nail. She used some basic skills to impart new knowledge by showing the concrete objects and demonstrating her own body parts. She clearly pronounced each word. She offered comprehension checks to make sure 4 whether these young learners had understood or not. She also made requests to clarify something that had not been understood in the process of teaching. When some pupils had the wrong pronunciation sometimes, the teacher made corrective feedback patiently to help them master these words. It took about seven minutes. 3) Pair work At this stage, the teacher created an authentic communicative activity for the pupils—they should describe their own hand shapes to their partners. The purpose of designing the authentic communicative activity was to master five adjectives: philosophic, psychic, active, elementary and conic. All of them were used to describe the shapes of hands. She gave the pupils appropriate explanations as to how these new words were actually used in communicative situations. Then the pupils were divided into several groups to perform this authentic communicative activity for fifteen minutes or so.
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