EXPOSURE AND
FOCUS ON FORM
Until today, we do not understand how foreign
languages are learnt. There are three ways identified in which we learnt a
foreign language such as: acquisition,
interaction, focus on form, and learning style. First, learners acquire a
language when society provides useful opportunities (imitate adults’
pronunciation, adjust form of speech, communicate through expressions before
speaking) to pick up language. It is
the silent period in which learners
listen and look after start speaking. In addition, learners learnt a language
through interaction with more
advanced speakers like teachers and peers. For instance, teacher plan a group
work, students extent their concepts, use of chunks, use of slangs, and share new ideas. Interaction makes the
acquisition of grammatical structures
and lexicon. Moreover, focus on form refers to language form in general; in which learner first explore some
formal features (word order, spelling, grammatical structure, affixes). Here the teachers apply the
methodology Task-based language teaching which implies Presentation (teacher’
explanation), Practice (filling gaps, multiple choice, etc.) and Production
(role-plays). Finally, learning a language depend on our age, learning style and multiple
intelligence. For example, if learners are visual and kinesthetic, teacher will
apply real materials (pictures, maps, hand-made activities). It means that a
class is governed by student’s native ability. For this reason, Grammar Translation or Communicative
Approaches doesn’t work effectively.
Therefore,
as future teacher I will apply learning strategies and multiple intelligence
activities because students learn in many ways (listening, visualizing,
reasoning, acting, etc.). For example, use of illustrated text books, the paper
air plane activity, warm-ups and so on.
I
will share with you these links:
- http://www.nhlrc.ucla.edu/media/files/O'GRADY-First-Language-Acquistion-be-wfa.pdf?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1
- http://es.slideshare.net/jalomi112/l1-and-l2-acquisition
Good job Daisy!
ReplyDeleteYour blog shows that you have a deep understanding of this topic. Congratulations for that. I also agree with your strategy of using multiple intelligences in the class since they help to treat all students equally respecting their different ways of learning.Indeed, way we can promote exposure and focus on form by using a different learning style strategy.
Your comment about this unit is really clear, i like the way who you describe the use of this topic in the classroom with our students, I agree with you about the use of these elements in the EFL classroom. I found that your links have very useful information about this unit.
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