|
|
Post by Ricardo de Souza on Sept 5, 2016 9:53:16 GMT
In chapter 6 of Grosjean (2010) you were introduced to the concept of language control in bilingualism. In a nutshell, language control takes place when a bilingual decides -- either deliberately or subconsciously -- to inhibit one of the languages he or she knows so as to speak or write monolinguals.
Many foreign language teaching methods encourage teachers to guide their students to attempt language control from a very early state of L2 ability, thus asking students to inhibit their L1 and start "thinking in the L2" from the earliest possible learning stages.
Based on what you read so far, in this forum we'd like you to share with us your point of view about the advantages and possible pitfalls of such pedagogical approach, and also about the challenges it can impose for both teachers and students.
As a complement, for a contrastive perspective on language mixing -- which we are not claiming to be necessarily better or more useful in L2 education -- check the TED Talk below:
We look forward to hearing from you!
Ricardo and Marisa
|
|
Dayse Lucide Sacramento
Guest
|
Post by Dayse Lucide Sacramento on Sept 6, 2016 20:30:46 GMT
Hello everybody!
As a student, because I´m not teacher, my point of view about Inhibit L1 and start "thinking in the L2" from the earliest possible learning stages is:
- The advantages of such pedagogical approach - I´ll talk about it taking my own experience when I was studying abroad, I was prohibited to talk in portugues even with my brazilians friends in any circunstances. This politic was taken for all foreign students to help us inhibit our mother tongue, giving space to learn the second language, english. I think it worked well at least with me because most of my english comprehension came from that time.
- The pitfalls - it is not easy for a foreigner to think 24 hours a day in a second language, even being young, it is an extreme effort, sometimes It does not work and I began to forget many words in portugues, I mean, I started writing wrong.
- The challenges it can impose for both teachers and students - as a student I can tell that be a bilingual is really a challenge, it depends on our own capacity and desire to be one.
|
|
Carolina Echevarria
Guest
|
Post by Carolina Echevarria on Sept 8, 2016 19:45:23 GMT
As I see it,there isn't such a thing as to forbid Ss to think in another language; we can't control that. However, we do teach lessons making Ss try to communicate in the target language only, so that they are encouraged to get their messages across even if they need to backtrack, rephrase or paraphrase themselves. This, I believe, is positive itmay provide them fluency practice.
On the other hand, language learners are bilinguals, so there will be moments of interference need - because they don't know a word or an expression in the weaker language, but they do want to say that. At this light, the use of L1 is completely understandable and enriching.
|
|
|
|
Post by Liliane Carvalhaes on Sept 9, 2016 3:12:16 GMT
It's really interesting to hear all that because I went back to the time when I arrived in the US. At the beginning I was really shy to speak my first English words but after 8 months it really blossomed and from that time on the mixing of Portuguese and English became natural for me. The brazilian community where I lived is really large and this switch coding phenomena which she talks about is "normal" and I would say "unnoticed" by its speakers. I believe people do it but they do not really think about it. In my household the phenomena continues...My children and husband also do it and it makes part of who we are now. I never thought about it as something unusual because many migrant families that live overseas do it. Code switching gives us a sense of belonging in both Portuguese and English worlds...and I love it!
|
|
|
|
Post by Thainara Padrini on Sept 9, 2016 13:56:22 GMT
Hi Friends!
First of all, I would like to say that Alexa’s research is very interesting. Maybe if we use those kinds of books with our little students in our classrooms they could develop their languages in a better way. This theory that she uses called "translanguaging'' sounds very engaging to me because you can give it to young students learning in a new perspective. They have possibility to learn and acquire multiple languages at once and they can do this with the freedom of mixing languages just like fluent bilingual speakers are used to do normally. As Alexa pointed out "Second language not only helps with critical thinking and analytical skills but also improves the understanding of the first language". I agree with her.
Just like my friend Daise I am also not a teacher yet and about the advantages and disadvantages of trying to inhibit L1 and start "thinking'' in the L2 from the earliest possible learning stages I can say something because it is what I always have been trying to do as a student and it helps sometimes but not all the times (for instance when I need to say my name or some word that only exists in my mother tongue).Based on the aspects of Language mode that sometimes bilinguals are in a totally monolingual language mode where one language is active and the other is not. Other times they are in a bilingual language mode and they can mix languages (code-switching - shift completely to the other language for a word, a phrase, a sentence and borrow that is to borrow a word or short expression from that language and to adapt it morphologically and often phonologically into the base language)). In this case both languages are active but the one that is being used as the main language of communication (the base language) is more active than the other. Another aspect related that is also important are the Interferences. They can be of two kinds: there are static interferences which reflect permanent traces of one language on the other and there are dynamic interferences which are the ephemeral intrusions of the other language. Interferences can only be studied if the bilingual is in a monolingual mode as other forms of mixing. Code-switching and borrowing do not normally take place in that mode and really takes place in bilingual language mode. All these concepts discussed by Grosjean (2010) led me to confirm my previous guess: sometimes you can and should "think'' in L2 and other time is better to mix them. It all depends on factors such as the interlocutor, the situation, the content of discourse and even the function of the interaction . This is what ,in my opinion, we should teach and it is very challenging of course.
Thank you.
Thainara Padrini
|
|
|
|
Post by cgress on Sept 9, 2016 14:12:36 GMT
I remember when I went to the USA to learn English. I didn´t know English at all. I lived with guardians who barely spoke Portuguese or non of it. I had to communicate, so I was immersed on the language. On the first two weeks I went to girl scouts camp with only american teenagers. I tried to communicate through the dictionary, by showingwords as to be understood. By the end of these two weeks I had learned some vocabulary. It was funny, because after a month when I called my mom, I was already mixing the languages. After 6 months I only spoke English and when neede, it was hard to speak my native language. When I came back to Brazil after a year, it was the craziest thing. I was in a monolingual mode. I would try hard to speak in Portuguese, but by the middle of the sentence, I was back to English. For about 2 months I had to manage to control the language spoken. So in my opinio there is no problem in mixing languages. Most students think in their native language and try at first to translate, but as much L2 exposed they are, as Carolina said, more positive it may provide them fluency practice.
Adults are aware of their needs on learning a second language, so as bilinguals they try to think in a language to translate to the other. Kids who are immersed in another language, they understand when to use each of it. My students when arrive at school they know that for that period they will be speaking English and as soon as the Portuguese teacher arrives, they change their language. It´s kind of "automatic".
As in for every begginer in L2, it is a challenge for them to start speaking, but as soon as they gain some vocabulary and with teacher´s approaches they soon feel confident, even is is to speak a few words. Challenges, all teachers and students have, but the way they react to it is the key to successful learning.
|
|
|
|
Post by VANESSA LEROY on Sept 9, 2016 19:22:26 GMT
I think inhibit their L1 and start "thinking in the L2" from the earliest possible learning stages is not an easy task but not impossible. I have been teaching over 10 years and in jobs , private English language course, is still not easy for them - and they are in an environment totally in English. I think that as Ss the advantages is creating a new possibility for them to concentrate and work with words that they can recognize into a context, on the other hand, the process that they are using in mind to it , we - teachers - do not know anything about. As teachers in this process, advantages can be a class, in monolingual, flowing easily because the students can understand or trying to think in the target language or ,and maybe a disadvantage too is to keep students doing the process the teachers want to.
"Second language not only helps with critical thinking and analytical skills but also improves the understanding of the first language", Alexa pointed out and I think that it is totally true when we present Ss languages that they normally mix when speaking. It is a process as she said during video that bilinguals do and it not a mistake.
|
|
|
|
Post by Wanius Carvalho on Sept 10, 2016 11:38:53 GMT
As Professor Ricardo mentioned, my biggest concern is in trying to do this from the earliest stages. Provided that I work with private students, I have found a number of students traumatized by “crazy” teachers (as they use to call them) who spoke English from day one as if Ss were able to catch the L2 out of nowhere. In some cases, teachers expect that Ss have some prior to knowledge to understand basic structures, but they do not. I usually watch videos in foreign languages, mostly Asian ones, to put myself in the situation of a newcomer in his / her first day of class so that I do not sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher, as well.
On the other hand, I do agree that at later stages we have to push students to communicate in the target language, otherwise, there would be no reason for learning a foreign language. But, given the fact that we live in an expanding circle nation, we have to admit that our students practice their L2 skills mostly as a translanguage. For example, when Ss share photos on social networking websites, they use hashtags in as many languages as they are learning. I was wondering, for example, about a translation for #TBT (hashtag throwback Thursday) in which they are supposed to share an old photo of theirs on Thursdays…
|
|
|
|
Post by Lívia Sampaio on Sept 10, 2016 15:29:02 GMT
Thinking about the idea of "how bilinguals excel at choosing the appropriate language and how proficient they are in deactivating their other languages." ( Grosjean 2010) I have a student who is 5 and his father is French and his mother Brazilian , so he speaks French at home but of course, on the streets, at school he speaks Portuguese. I chose this example to illustrate because his mom told me that nowadays he just speaks French with his father whethever they are, if his father tries to speak Portuguese or also English with him he answers in French. And with his mother he just speaks Portuguese. As he is at an English school his parents, who both know how to speak English, always try to speak English with him and the boy refuses. He is fluent in two languages and in process of learning in a third language and he switches them all the time and choose the appropriate moment to use each one. Another point that I can notice in this example and Grosjean also mentioned is the fact that "Bilinguals who manage to stay in a monolingual mode in addition, who speak that language fluently and have no accent in it, can often "pass" as monolinguals." because with you listen to the boy speaking Portuguese or French you can think that he is monolingual because he has no accent or mix words.
|
|
|
|
Post by viviankarine on Sept 11, 2016 13:17:07 GMT
Hello everyone!!! I am amazed...amazed by the text, video and my classmates ‘posts. I am thinking about so many things right now and I don’t know if I am going to able to sum up everything I have in my mind. I have been working as teacher of English for ten years, and I’ve had different kind of students and also I’ve worked in different kind of schools with different approaches. And even after all this time, I am always mesmerized by how young learners learn English as a second language. When I say young learners, I mean like five or six years old. These students are so young that some of them just know how to write their names. Code switching is pretty normal for them, they don’t know many words in English, however few words they know they use it confidently. And it’s amazing how they learn (at least, most of them) fast and simply. I agree my classmate Liliane, when she says that they do it unconsciously, even in an environment that English is a second language. It’s like there is a switch that they turn on and off according to the situation. In the morning when my little students arrive at school, they say goodbye to their parents in Portuguese and greet me in English, and all the time they are at school they try to use the words they learnt in English. Not because somebody says “you can’t speak in Portuguese in here”, but because their sense of belonging. As Liliane said, code switching give us the sense of belonging, transiting through Portuguese world as well as the English world.
|
|
|
|
Post by viviankarine on Sept 11, 2016 13:29:27 GMT
I think inhibiting L1 and start "thinking in the L2" from the earliest possible learning stages is not so easy however, it’s not impossible. As I said before it’s amazing how kids learn a second language and how simple code switching is for them, because they are so young that they don’t understand some things even in their mother tongue. On the other hand, I agree with Wanius, as the students get older, we must push them to communicate in the target language otherwise there wouldn’t need to learn another language. Considering that most students limit their contact with the target language in class, the teacher must speak the foreign language as much as possible and avoid code switching.
|
|
|
|
Post by Jessica O on Sept 11, 2016 14:06:53 GMT
All the students that I teach come with the idea that they can't speak the L2 because they are thinking in L1, so I do believe this creates a block for learning. It is important to teach using the language they want to learn, but also in the beginning this could be hard and not effectives as Alexa Pearce mention in her Ted Talk, teachers will be Charlie Brown like and it will not work well for learners. I think learning is a process that it will eventually occur the mixing between L1 and L2, althought it doenst need to be something terrible, but part of the steps.
|
|
Anna Myotin - Grant
Guest
|
Post by Anna Myotin - Grant on Sept 11, 2016 21:44:26 GMT
Grosjean (2010) argues that we shouldn´t talk about inhibiting the L1, but instead deactivating a language. This highlights my point of view that there is no real "danger" in translanguaging.
Now about the disadvantages of such pedagogical approach in which students are required to inhibit the L1 would be that students need the L1 in order to negociate meaning, and how are they going to deal with unknown words, how is this going to affect the student´s interlanguage, are all questions that should be considered before prohibiting the student of activating the L1, because this is what happens in many places. As is shown by Grosjean, students can alternate between languages - code switching and this may have no negative impact in interaction, and as an exchange between languages, it can be beneficial like pointed out by Alexia and also mentioned by my colleague Tainara "Second language not only helps with critical thinking and analytical skills but also improves the understanding of the first language". So not to acknowledge that and treat the L1 like a sort of taboo in the classroom may not be the best choice.
On the other hand, the advantages would be that sometimes students do rely a lot on the L1, and they have this habit of trying to translate one language into the other, which in my opinion can harm the educational process, and by the inhibition or deactivation of one´s L1, this may be avoided. This pedagogical approach can be also useful for more advanced groups, in which students have to be able to communicate in the L2 all the time. However I do think that it poses many challenges, such as the trasnlanguage phenomena is present in the students life, films with subtitles, the national exam enem is a mixing of the two languages and if the ultimate aim is to form bilinguals or multilinguals then is this the best approach? I wouldn´t be so sure.
Thanks
|
|
|
|
Post by Aline Santiago on Sept 11, 2016 23:31:53 GMT
I was also caught by this part of the text where Grosjean defends the deactivation of language instead of inhibiting it. Students' L1 can be very useful sometimes specially for making parallels between certain types of structure and to convey the meaning of words. However, we have to be careful not to let this habit interfere in their learning process.
In fact, we all know that it is impossible for the student to "think" in a language they don't dominate. How can we ask them to do so? I suppose we should promote an environment where students feel the need to communicate in English in order to be understood. This way, they would unconsciously be deactivating their L1, but not because someone has imposed it, but because they feel like doing it.
|
|
|
|
Post by Priscila on Sept 11, 2016 23:58:53 GMT
|
|
