TESOL METHODS: CHANGING TRACKS, CHALLENGING TRENDS

KUMARAVADIVELU (2006)

This study traces the major trends in TESOL methods from 1991 to 2006 in terms of three perceptible shifts:

a) from communicative language teaching to task-based language teaching

b) from method-based pedagogy to postmethod pedagogy

c) from systemic discovery to critical discourse

The paper focuses on the nature and scope of the

transition from awareness to awakening, along with the

contributions and consequences associated with it.

Before 1990 Period of awareness

After 1990 Period of awakening

What is method?Method in general refers to what theorists

propose and to what teachers practice.

Method in this study is defined based on Mackey’s (1965) view.

Mackey’s (1965) view of method

Mackey (1965) made a distinction between method analysis and teaching analysis:

Method analysis refers to an analysis of methods conceptualized and constructed by experts by reviewing the relevant literature.

Teaching analysis refers to an analysis of what practicing teachers actually do in the classroom by the study of classroom input and interaction.

This article Method analysis

FROM CLT TBLT

COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING

TASK-BASED LANGUAGE TEACHING

CLT As a response to the failure of the audiolingual

method, CLT was sought to move classroom teaching away from structural orientation toward a communicative orientation.

They also introduced innovative classroom activities (such as games, role plays, and scenarios) aimed at creating and sustaining learner motivation.

The focus on the learner and the emphasis on communication made CLT highly popular among ESL teachers.

Theoretical principles of CLT

It views competence in terms of social interaction based on:

Austin’s (1962) speech act theory: explains how language users perform speech acts

Halliday’s (1973) functional perspective: highlights meaning potential

Hymes’ (1972) theory of communicative competence: incorporates interactional and sociocultural norms

Major problems with CLT

Authenticity: Do CLT classrooms reflect authentic communication in real world?

Acceptability: Does CLT mark a revolutionary step in language teaching?

Adaptability: Are the principles and practices of CLT adaptable to various contexts across the world and across time?

Authenticity

Data-based, classroom-oriented investigations conducted in various contexts reveal that the so-called communicative classrooms were anything but communicative.

In these classes form was more prominent than function, and grammatical accuracy activities dominated communicative fluency one.

In communicative class, interactions may, in fact, not be very communicative after all.

Acceptability

Several scholars have observed that CLT does not represent any radical departure in language teaching.

CLT adhered to the same fundamental concepts as the audiolingual method: the linear and additive view of language learning, and the presentation- practice-production vision of language teaching.

The claims of its distinctiveness are based more on communicative activities

Adaptability

The idea of adaptability has been repeatedly called into question by reports of uneasiness from different parts of the world.

These reports suggest that CLT offers a classic case of a center- based pedagogy that is out of sync with local linguistic, educational, social, cultural, and political exigencies.

TBLT The problems with CLT paved way for an interest in

task-based language teaching (TBLT), which, according to some, is just CLT by another name.

The trend away from CLT and toward TBLT is illustrated in part by the fact that communicative has been gradually replaced by task .

In spite of the increasing number of publications, there is no consensus on the definition of task.

What is a task?

Breen (1987) defined task as “a range of workplans which have the overall purpose of facilitating language learning”—from a simple exercise type to problem-solving.

Ellis (2003): A task is a workplan that requires learners to process language pragmatically in order to achieve an outcome that can be evaluated in terms of whether the correct or appropriate propositional content has been conveyed. A task is intended to result in language use that bears a resemblance, direct or indirect, to the way language is used in the real world.

Different task types

language-centered tasks focus on the linguistic forms.

learner-centered tasks focus on both form and function.

learning-centered tasks focus on negotiation, interpretation, and expression of meaning, without any explicit focus on form.

TBLT and transition to postmethod

Since different methods can be employed to carry out language learning tasks, TBLT is not linked to any one particular method and it has blurred the boundaries of major methods.

This shows that the development of language teaching theory has arrived at a postmethod condition.

From Method to Postmethod

Pennycook method reflects a particular view of the world”, and it “has diminished rather than enhanced our understanding of language teaching.”

Prabhu there is no best method and what really matters is the need for teachers to learn “to operate with some personal conceptualization of how their teaching leads to desired learning

Kumar method has only a limited and limiting impact on language learning and teaching, and that what is needed is not an alternative method but an alternative to method.

Allwrightmethod is dead

Postmethod Perspectives

a) Three-Dimensional Framework (Stern,1992)

b) Exploratory Practice Framework (Allwright,

1997, 2000)

c) Macrostrategic Framework

(Kumaravadivelu, 1992, 2003)

Three-Dimensional Framework

Stern’s framework consists of strategies and techniques.

Strategies operate at the policy level, and techniques at the procedural level.

His framework has three dimensions. Each dimension consists of two strategies plotted at two ends of a continuum.

Three Dimensional Framework (Stern, 1992)

Intralingual-Crosslingual strategies

Code-Communication dilemma

Explicit/Implicit dimension

Dimensions of Stern’s Framework

1) The L1-L2 connection, concerning the use of the first language in learning the second.

2) The code-communication dilemma, concerning the structure-message relationship.

3) The explicit- implicit option, concerning the basic approach to language learning.

First dimension of Stern’s framework

Intralingual-crosslingual strategies that remain within the target language and target culture as the frame of reference for teaching.

The intralingual strategy relates to coordinate bilingualism, where the two language systems are kept completely separate from each other.

Crosslingual strategy believes in compound bilingualism, where the L2 is acquired and known through the use of the L1.

Second & Third dimensions

Second dimension: explicit focus on the formal properties of language ( from grammar to communicative properties).

Third dimension: the key issue of whether learning an L2 is a conscious intellectual exercise or an unconscious intuitive one.

Allwright’s Exploratory Practice Framework

Allwright’s framework gives more priority to understanding the quality of classroom life, as a social matter, rather than the instructional efficiency.

Based on such a philosophy, he derives some broad principles of language teaching, which inform specific practices.

EP involves a series of basic steps and the central focus of EP is local practice.

EP’s Principles of Language Teaching

①Put quality of life first,

②Work primarily to understand classroom life,

③Involve everybody,

④Work to bring people together,

⑤Work also for mutual development,

⑥Integrate the work for understanding into classroom practice, and

⑦make the work a continuous enterprise.

Macrostrategic Framework

His framework is shaped by three operating principles of particularity, practicality, and possibility.

Based on these principles, he suggests a network of ten macrostrategies.

Using these macrostrategies as guidelines, practicing teachers can design their own microstrategies or classroom activities.

Principles of Macrostrategic Framework

Particularity

Practicality

Possibility

Particularity: facilitates the advancement of a context-sensitive, location-specific pedagogy based on a true understanding of local, social, cultural, and political particularities.

Practicality: enables teachers to theorize from their practice and to practice what they theorize.

Possibility: seeks to tap the sociopolitical consciousness that students bring with them so that it can function as a catalyst for identity formation and social transformation.

Macrostrategies

① Maximize learning opportunities, ② Facilitate negotiated interaction, ③ Minimize perceptual mismatches, ④ Activate intuitive heuristics, ⑤ Foster language awareness, ⑥ Contextualize linguistic input, ⑦ Integrate language skills, ⑧ Promote learner autonomy, ⑨ Ensure social relevance, and⑩ Raise cultural consciousness.

Postmethod pedagogies

The frameworks discussed here seek to lay the foundation for the construction of postmethod pedagogies.

They merely offer certain operating principles pointing the way.

Any actual postmethod pedagogy has to be constructed by teachers themselves by taking into consideration linguistic, social, cultural, and political particularities.

FROM SYSTEMIC DISCOVERY TO CRITICAL DISCOURSE

Criticality is about:

Connecting the word with the world

Viewing language as ideology, not just a system

Extending the educational space to the social, cultural, and political dynamics of language use

Considering learner identity, teacher beliefs, teaching values, and local knowledge.

Chances and challenges of Transition

The transition is still unfolding and the three major shifts have created new chances and challenges:

CLT TBLT

Method Postmethod

CLT TBLT: Chances & Challenges

Chances

CLT has become more sociolinguistically oriented , TBLT is more psycholinguistically oriented

Challenges

Relationship between form & meaning and its attendant issue of how the learner’s attention resources are allocated is not clear.

Context refers to linguistic and pragmatic features of language and language use, not the broader social, cultural, political, and historical particularities.

Method Postmethod

Chances

Emphasizing the role of local knowledge & local teachers

Valuing the experiences, values, & beliefs of learners and teachers

Transformative teacher education program*

Challenges

It’s argued that postmethod is a method itself, not an alternative to method.

It’s claimed that by deconstructing methods, postmethod pedagogy has tended to cut teachers off from their sense of plausibility, their passion and involvement.

Skepticism towards critical pedagogy

It’s criticized for rejecting traditional applied linguistics as an enterprise which has never been neutral.

It’s argued than since everybody supports social justice, there’s no need to give it the label ‘critical’ and put it into controversy.

Research methods in critical pedagogy are also criticized for not being rigorous and critical.

We have awakened to…. The necessity of making methods-based pedagogies more

sensitive to local exigencies

The opportunity afforded by postmethod pedagogies to help practicing teachers develop their own theory of practice

The multiplicity of learner identities

The complexity of teacher beliefs

The vitality of macrostructures—social, cultural, political, and historical—that shape and reshape the micro- structures of our pedagogic enterprise.

Related sources

1. Rosenberg, Sheila K. 2007. A Critical History of ESOL in the UK 1870–2006. Leicester: NIACE.

2. Howatt, A. P. R. 1984. A History of English Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

3. Harasawa, M.H. 2015. A Critical Survey of English Language Teaching in Japan: A Personal View

4. Cheung, Wing Fai, 2014. A critical analysis of English language teaching in Hong Kong mainstream primary schools: the interplay between curriculum development, assessment and classroom practices

5. Barry, C. 2011. English Language Teaching in Brunei: A View Through a Critical Lens