DOGMAS AND DELUSIONS IN CURRENT EFL METHODOLOGY
Robert O'Neill May 1999
'Anyone who claims that second language instruction must be arranged in a particular way on the evidence available from linguistics or neurophysiology or any other science, displays a fair amount of naivety if nor presumption.'
Wolfgang Klein 'Second language acquisition' CUP 1986.
The Structure of this talk
- A Central Proposition
- A very brief statement of three further propositions
- A development of each proposition and the arguments which I believe support it
A Central Proposition
A theory, method or set of beliefs does not have to be completely wrong in order to become a dogma and then a dangerous delusion. All that is necessary for this to happen is that people accept theories, statements or sets of beliefs as if they were literally true, and then become intolerant of dissent and debate.
Three Further Propositions
- There is 'bad' teacher-talk but there is also 'good' teacher-talk. 'Good' teacher-talk is an essential aid to language learning, especially in the early stages.
- 'Student-centred' methods may work well-enough in some circumstances but will work badly or not at all in others. Good teachers need to know how to vary their styles for different circumstances and different kinds of learners.
- 'Authentic' materials are not authentic if they have been adapted or changed for classroom use. Although there are many arguments for encouraging learners to read and listen to a wide variety of materials outside the classroom, specially-written or adapted materials are usually if not always more suitable for many if not all uses with many if not all classes and groups of learners inside the classroom. ? especially in early and intermediate stages.
A brief return to the central proposition
The danger that a theory, a method or a set of beliefs will develop into a dogma and then a delusion is especially acute in a field like EFL, where there is little or no 'hard evidence' to substantiate or disprove what we happen to believe. What kind of 'hard evidence' is there, for example, for beliefs that are frequently advanced as if they were scientific truths by many if not all teacher-trainers? I am thinking of such beliefs as 'teacher-talk is bad', 'Student-centred methods are better than teacher-centred styles of teaching' or 'Authentic materials are better than materials specially written for language-learners'. Do we believe these things for the same reasons that chemists have for their beliefs about the nature of organic and inorganic substances? We at least have good 'inter-subjective' evidence for believing that 'Have you been seeing that woman again?' is a very different kind of question from 'Have you seen that woman again?'. Do we have anything like this kind of evidence for our beliefs about what is and what is not 'good teaching' or the efficacy of certain methods? Have we, for example, tried to learn foreign languages ourselves through the same methods that we advocate in EFL? Have we talked about the results of those methods with other learners, and compared our feelings about the results of those methods with the beliefs and feelings of other learners?
|
打印本页
