Chapter 8

CW8.2 Field-dependent errors

In one of Naiman et al.’s tests, subjects were given sentences in French which they were asked to repeat. This is sometimes used as a crude way of assessing proficiency – the better speakers make fewer mistakes and the worse make more. Below is one of the sentences from the test. The English equivalent for each word is given underneath it, and a freer translation is below that. To understand the example, it helps a lot if you know French, though this is not absolutely necessary.

You can see from this sentence that in French the word nous can mean to us, and it is put in front of the verb. But the word nous can also mean we, and in this meaning it would also come before the verb. In other words, nous before a verb can mean either we or to us.

When some field-dependent subjects repeated this sentence, they changed it to become:

What is happening here? The learner heard the word nous and automatically thought of it as meaning we. So they wrongly replaced nous a raconté (to us has told) with nous avons raconté (we have told). It is as if they were ‘seduced’ by seeing the word nous in front of the verb and assumed that it must be the subject of the sentence (we). They failed to perceive the underlying structure.

CW8.3 Small-but-fascinating

None of the findings below, from Naiman et al. (1978), is particularly central to their good language learner study. But they are fascinating pieces of information to have. Are you surprised by any of them? Do any of them need an explanation? What might it be?

• ‘[P]oor students tended to prefer written work, such as grammar exercises’ (p. 81).
• In the classes observed during the study, there was more oral than written work. ‘However, there was still very little emphasis given to free discussion as opposed to the more structured activities like class exercises, tests, reading etc.’ (p. 92).
• The researchers were surprised that good learners did not do any of the following very much: correct themselves, repeat things without being asked to, ask the teacher questions. But the good learners did put up their hands a lot (p. 53).
• ‘[I]t is interesting to note that more bottom than top students wanted to be asked [questions by the teacher] more frequently. This may indicate that they feel neglected or that they recognize the need for greater participation’ (p. 79).
• Teachers most often corrected student mistakes in an explicit way, saying exactly what was wrong rather than giving hints. Very few explanations of why something was wrong were given. When a learner got something right, the correct response was often repeated by the teacher, as a reinforcement (p. 94).
• ‘[I]t is interesting to see that not only top students had a favourable attitude towards their teacher … but also bottom students’ (p. 78).
• The researchers outline how to find out about attitudes: ‘a brief, but carefully designed, interview with a student may indicate a great deal more about his overall attitude towards language learning, and therefore the probability of his success, than the results of an involved attitude battery’ (p. 67).

CW8.4 What teachers do

The Naiman et al. study was largely to do with learners, but there are three interesting findings about teachers:

1. As is suggested in Box 8.8, the study revealed a predominance of question/answer techniques in class, with little free discussion or cultural background work.
2. Because of class sizes, it sometimes happened that large numbers of pupils would be ‘ignored’ for some periods of time. But teachers did not concentrate more on better pupils and less on those who were doing badly. The teachers’ treatment overall was even-handed.
3. Teachers are in general rather good at identifying good and bad learners. Tests of various sorts provide objective information on pupils and their progress. But a teacher’s subjective judgement can also be trusted.

CW8.5 Oxford’s strategy system

Oxford’s classification has six main categories of strategy, three under the heading of ‘direct’, and three, under ‘indirect’. These are described below using Oxford’s own words (1990: 14–16):

Direct strategies ‘working with the language itself’

1. memory strategies for remembering and retrieving new information
2. cognitive strategies for understanding and producing the language
3. compensation strategies for using the language despite knowledge gaps

Indirect strategies ‘for general management of learning’

4. metacognitive strategies for coordinating the learning process
5. affective strategies for regulating emotions
6. social strategies for learning with others
   1. In Box 8.9, you are given examples of six strategies, marked A to F. Each of these strategies is an example of one of the strategy types (1–6) above. Try to match the examples in Box 8.9 with Oxford’s strategy types as presented above. Associate the letters (A–F) with the numbers (1–6) above. The matchings are given below.
   2. Now think about your own language learning strategies. Do you ever use any of the strategies described in Box 8.9? What about other strategies under Oxford’s six headings?

CW8.6 Not clear-cut at all

Oxford’s (1996) book is entitled Language Learning Strategies around the World: Cross-cultural Perspectives. It is a collection of papers considering variations in strategy use which can be accounted for in terms of cultural differences. One of the papers, by Levine et al. (1996), looks at the strategies used by two groups of EFL students in Israel. One group is made up of recent immigrants from the Soviet Union. The other are ‘old-timers’ – students (originally from a variety of backgrounds) who have been in Israel for more than five years. Information about their strategy use was collected through questionnaires, interviews and teacher observations.

Sharp differences in strategy use were noted. The recent immigrants used strategies like ‘memorizing grammar rules, rote learning, repeatedly writing down words, using lists of words in translation, doing grammar exercises from a textbook or workbook, and translating verbatim into the native language’. The ‘old-timers’, who had been in Israel long enough to absorb the culture, followed ‘more communicative approaches, using strategies such as asking native speakers for frequent use of relevant vocabulary and taking risks in the use of new structures and words’ (p. 43). According to the authors, these variations can be accounted for in terms of different instructional systems: ‘a strictly centralized, formal and highly prescriptive system on the one hand, and a more autonomous, free, thought-provoking one on the other’ (p. 43).

In her preface to the book, Oxford gives more examples:

• Hispanics have a preference for a global and field-dependent style (‘global’ here means working towards understanding through large jumps, rather than slowly and sequentially). So Hispanic EFL students choose strategies like predicting, inferring (guessing from context), avoiding details, working with others rather than alone and basing judgements on personal relationships rather than logic.
• In contrast, Japanese EFL students prefer to work things out analytically, aiming to be as precise and accurate as possible. They search for small details, prefer working alone and base judgements more on logic than on personal interactions.
• Some cultures encourage a learning style called concrete-sequential – one which prefers direct hands-on experience with step-by-step sequencing. Oxford mentions Korea and some Arabic-speaking countries as examples. These cultures often encourage widespread use of rote memorization strategies.

If you have been in close contact with a language learner from a different culture, think about the differences between how they go about language learning and your own approach.

CW8.7 Talking drivel

The person reported on here was asked to verbalize simultaneously as she did a task. The task was not directly to do with language learning, but what she says about think-aloud techniques is very relevant to learning strategy research. After struggling to verbalize her thoughts for over an hour, she lost patience with the technique. An explosion occurred:

The main problem is that I am so aware of the need to keep talking that I don’t get a chance to think anything through. I’m desperate to be able to switch off, sit back, think about the task in peace and quiet, think something through. I’m not going to be able to come up with anything satisfactory because of this necessity to keep talking. And I’m talking drivel. I found that if I mention an idea, if I didn’t have to verbalize it, I’d be rejecting it in seconds, probably as rubbish. But because I’ve got to verbalize, I find myself following it through, talking about it, exploring it. It’s drivel.

The comments of the subject verbalizing simultaneously have been modified slightly and abridged.

CW8.8 Attempts to teach strategies

It is certainly not only applied linguists who have studied learning strategies, and indeed many of the interesting ideas in the field have come from the wider field of educational psychology. Nisbet and Shucksmith (1986) are concerned with that field, and they note several different types of attempt to teach strategies. ‘Direct’ methods involve identifying strategies and teaching them in an explicit way. Nisbet and Shucksmith prefer more ‘indirect’ approaches which involve increasing teacher and learner awareness of learning processes through activities like discussions or asking learners to keep diaries. They are not in favour of the ‘study skills approach’ that is commonly used at universities worldwide and involves explicit training in how to study. They argue that it lacks a theoretical basis and is too general and decontextualized – learners from different disciplines are often taught together, and hence their specific needs cannot be met.

In the language learning field, a pioneering attempt at strategy training is found in Ellis and Sinclair (1989). What they offer is in effect a self-training manual, divided into two stages. Stage 1 is called ‘Preparation for language learning’. It deals with a series of questions such as ‘What sort of a language learner are you?’, ‘Why do you need or want to learn English?’ and ‘How do you organize your learning?’. Stage 2 is entitled ‘Skills training’. The areas it looks at are: learning vocabulary, learning grammar, listening, speaking, reading and writing. In relation to each, there are exercises that help you to reflect on how you are going about your learning. As an example, for vocabulary learning you are asked which method of learning you prefer – learning words by topic, by translating them into your FL, by writing them down and so on. Then there are associated activities. The idea of learning vocabulary by topic, for example, is explored by giving you a collection of words and asking you to sort them into ‘topics’.

CW8.9 The jury is out

In 2003 the online journal TESOL – EJ devoted an issue to Strategy Research and Training, edited by N. J. Anderson. ‘EJ’ in the journal’s title stands for ‘Electronic Journal’, and its website is www.tesl-ej.org. The special issue contains a number of papers looking at the learning strategy training question. One of these papers, Rossiter (2003) reports on an attempt to measure the effects of strategy training in class. The subjects were two groups of EFL students in Canada. One was given a 12-hour course in ‘affective strategy training’, and the other was not. In this phrase, the word affective has the meaning we saw used in section 7.1, and the training involved trying to create positive affect, particularly by lowering anxiety and promoting self-encouragement.

One exercise in the training course involved the learners in a relaxation exercise. Once relaxed, they were given another exercise using the technique of ‘visualization’. This is the idea that ‘if you can imagine yourself doing something you are more likely to be able to do it’ (Arnold 1999). In this particular exercise, the learners ‘took a mental walk up a mountain to a meeting with a master teacher who inspired them with renewed confidence and insights in how to excel in learning English’.

At several points in the programme, the learners were given speaking tasks and their performances were measured in various ways. Afterwards, they said that they found the training useful (though the visualization technique was not in fact too popular). But did the training work? Rossiter’s conclusion: ‘the results of this study show that instruction in affective strategies … provided no significant … benefit for L2 performance’ (p. 14).

The jury is indeed still out. If the kind of ‘affective strategy training’ described here were on trial and you were a jury member, how would you vote?