What follows is not exactly the assignment given in our blog prompt,
however, it was a valuable lesson for me as an English tutor, and might help
other tutors/teachers.
Depending on where you are teaching English, abroad or in the USA, the affective filter can play a significant role in one’s ability to learn a second language. If one has difficulty speaking in their own language, or is perhaps even just a quiet person, or shy, to what extent will this inhibit their ability to learn how to both speak and write in a second language? For this reason, authentic language instruction should be paired with real-world experiences, in order to maximize learning potential for ESL students. I view code-switching as being essential to learning a language because of the potential it has in encouraging real, unlimited, unfettered conversation. Who wants to talk in a second language if they think they are going to be corrected, or held to grammar technicalities that even some native-speakers can’t master? I love the book, If you can say it, you can write it, but this circles back to my point that practice in freethinking oral skills, including the use of code-switching, will serve as a good foundation for learning to write in a second language. Even native-tongue transfer errors can benefit from this.
Depending on where you are teaching English, abroad or in the USA, the affective filter can play a significant role in one’s ability to learn a second language. If one has difficulty speaking in their own language, or is perhaps even just a quiet person, or shy, to what extent will this inhibit their ability to learn how to both speak and write in a second language? For this reason, authentic language instruction should be paired with real-world experiences, in order to maximize learning potential for ESL students. I view code-switching as being essential to learning a language because of the potential it has in encouraging real, unlimited, unfettered conversation. Who wants to talk in a second language if they think they are going to be corrected, or held to grammar technicalities that even some native-speakers can’t master? I love the book, If you can say it, you can write it, but this circles back to my point that practice in freethinking oral skills, including the use of code-switching, will serve as a good foundation for learning to write in a second language. Even native-tongue transfer errors can benefit from this.
But I digress, I
really just wanted to share an example of how I learned the value of “freespeaking.” While tutoring as part of a class assignment,
I was required to complete some background information about my tutee. Hu (name
changed) was a Japanese student going through the ACLP program before he could
begin working on his MA in Business. I
instantly raised his affective filter when I corrected his grammar within
the first five minutes of our conversation.
What was I doing? I was supposed
to be getting background information about him in order to help him. And, he really wanted help with his oral speaking skills! It took me about 5 minutes of
making fun of myself before I could get him to relax again. While I don’t remember this conversation with
him exactly, this is a fairly close rendition of it:
Me: What is a hobby that
you enjoy in Japan?
Hu: Hobby? What is hobby?
Me: You know, it’s like,
something you do for fun, but you do it often.
Hu: Oh, I like swim.
Me: You like to swim.
Hu: Yes, I like swim.
Me: No, No. You like TO swim. You need to put the preposition ‘to’ in front
of swim.
Hu: Oh. I like to swim.
Me: Awesome, me too. Where do you swim?
Hu: I go to swim at parks and
gyms
Me: A better way to say that would be to use
the gerund form of swim. I go swimming
at parks and gyms, see?
Hu: Ah, yes, I see.
Me: Okay, now you try it.
Hu: Do we still have to talk
about swimming?
Me: I’m sorry (name). Let’s begin again – this time I am not going
to correct you, but I may make some
notes, okay?
Hu: Okay. I get nervous when I think my language will
be wrong.
Me: Believe me, I get
it. Let’s just talk.
Hu: Okay.
We went on to have a great conversation. I didn’t take notes, but I did record us
speaking. We later used the recording
together to analyze some of his speech problems. This was helpful to him and he stopped
worrying about making mistakes.
Hi Tammy
ReplyDeleteI wondered how much more nervous he got if you were to tell him that the conversation would be recorded or if you were taking notes. I would figure that he would be pretty self aware if he were to see you taking notes about him because I came across the same scenario when I did my tutoring assignment. My student keep asking me what I was writing and I had to assure her that I was only time notes for my assignment. She also asked me if I would be mentioning her name when I made my report. I had to assure her that this was only for the teacher to see and that my instructor will only us it to evaluate my work and it was not meant to inspect you background in anyway.
I really think that using the recording was much more benefiting to you and him because yes he'll probably be nervous at first but that seems like a natural process for anyone being recorded. This way once the conversation gets going and the two of you are comfortable with each other in speech I would think his anxiety about being recorded would drop. The reason is that he'll like forget that he's being observed at times unlike the note taking process where he will be reminded every few turns of his speaking abilities in English.
Furthermore, code-switching I think would greatly lower his affective filter it provides sort of a safety net where he knows that if he runs into some trouble he can always refer back to his native language. I don't know if you have any knowledge of Hu's language Tammy but if you don't I think that is also one reason where his affective filter raises because he's not speaking with someone that can understand he native tongue which would take the code-switching ability away from him.
I like that you paired code-switching and authentic language with real situation. They seems like an obvious fit. It's interesting that he should say "I get nervous when I think my language will be wrong" because he doesn't seem like he can separate academic English from casual English, which is what your conservation is doing. I would like to know what you were telling him to get his affective filter, that seems to be most interesting thing about what you've written.
Viet