Multiple Intelligences in the structure of a new English syllabus for secondary school

Methods  of  foreign  language  teaching  is  understood  here  as  a  body  of  scientifically  tested  theory  concerning  the  teaching  of  foreign  languages  in  schools  and  others  educational  institutions. It  covers  three  main  problems:

1.      aims  of  teaching  a  foreign  language;

2.      content  of  teaching, i.e. what  to  teach  to  attain  the  aims;

3.      methods  and  techniques  of  teaching, i.e.  how  to  teach  a  foreign  language  to  attain  the  aims  in  the  most  effective  way.

Methods  of  foreign  language  teaching  is  closely  related  to  other  sciences  such  as  pedagogies, psychology, physiology, linguistics  and  some  others.

Pedagogics  is  the  science  concerned  with  the  teaching  and  education  of  the  younger  generation. Since  Methods  also  deals  with  the  problems  of  teaching  and  education, it  is  most  closely  related  to  pedagogics. To  study  foreign  language  teaching  one  must  know  pedagogics. One  branch  of  pedagogics  is  called  didactics. Didactics  studies  general  ways  of  teaching  in  schools. Methods, as  compared  to  didactics, studies  the  specific  ways  of  teaching  a  definite  subject. Thus, it  may  be  considered  special  didactics. In  the  foreign  language  teaching, as  well  as  in  the  teaching  of  mathematics, history  and  other  subjects  taught  in  schools, general  principles  of  didactics  are  applied  and, in  their  turn, influence  and  enrich  didactics. For  example, the  so-called  “principle  of visualization" was first introduced  in  teaching  foreign languages. Now  it  has  become  one  of  the fundamental  prin­ciples  of  didactics  and  is  used  in  teaching  all  school  subjects  without  exception. Programmed  instruction  was  first  ap­plied  to  teaching  mathematics. Now through didactics it is used in teaching many subjects, including foreign lan­guages.

Teaching  a  foreign  language  means first  and  foremost  the formation and development  of  pupils' habits  and  skills  in  hearing, speaking, reading, and writing. We cannot ex­pect to develop such habits and skills of our pupils effec­tively if we do not know and take into account the p s y c h o l o g y  of  habits  and  skills, the  ways  of  forming  them, the  influence of  formerly acquired habits 'on the formation of new ones, and  many  other  necessary factors  that  psychology  can supply  us  with. At  present  we  have  much  material  in  the field  of  psychology  which  can  be  applied  to  teaching  a  foreign  language. For example, N. I. Zhinkin, in  his  investigation  of  the mecha­nisms  of  speech  came  to the conclusion that  words  and  rules of combining  them  are  most  probably  dormant  in  the kinetic center of  the  brain. When  the  ear  receives  a  signal  it  reaches  the brain, its  hearing  center  and then  passes  to  the  kinetic  center. Thus, if a teacher wants his pupils to speak English he must  use  all  the  opportunities he has to make them hear and speak it. Furthermore, to master a sec­ond  language  is to acquire another code, another  way of   receiving and transmitting information. To  create  this  new code in  the most  effective way one must  take  into  consid­eration  certain  psychological  factors.

Effective  learning  of a  foreign  language  depends  to  a great  extent  on  the pupils' memory. That  is  why  a  teacher  must know how he can help his pupils to successfully memorize  and  retain  in  memory  the  language  material  they  learn. Here  again  psychological  investigations  are  significant.  In learning  a  subject  both  voluntary  and  in­voluntary  memory  is  of great  importance. In  his  investigation  of  involuntary memory P. K. Zinchenko  came  to  the  con­clusion  that  this  memory  is  retentive. Consequently, in teaching  a  foreign  language  we  should  create  favourable  conditions  for  involuntary memorizing. P. K. Zinchenko  showed  that  involuntary  memorizing  is  possible  only  when

pupils  attention  is  concentrated  not  on  fixing  the  material  in  their  memory  through numerous  repetitions,  but  on  solv­ing  some  mental  problems  which  deal  with  this  material. To  prove  this  the  following  experiment  was carried out. Students of group A were given  a  list  of  words  to  memorize  (voluntary memorizing). Students of  group B did not re­ceive a list of words to memorize. Instead, they got  an  English  text  and  some  assignments  which  made  them  work  with  these  words, use  them  in  answering  various  questions. Dur­ing  the  next  lesson  a  vocabulary  test  was given  to  the  stu­dents  of  both  groups. The  results  were  approximately  the  same. A  test  given  a  fortnight  later  proved, however,  that  the  students  of  group  B  retained  the  words  in  their memory   much  better than  the students of group A. This shows  that  involuntary  memorizing  may  be  more retentive under certain circumstances. Experiments  by  prominent  scientists  show  that  psychology  helps  Methods  to  determine  the role  of  the  mother  tongue in different stages of teaching; the amount of material for pupils to assimilate at every stage of instruc­tion; the sequence and ways in which various habits and skills should be developed; the methods and techniques  which  are  more  suitable  for  presenting  the  material  and  for  ensuring  its retention  by  the  pupils, and so on.

Methods  of  foreign  language  teaching  has a definite relation  to  p h y s i o 1 o g y  of  the higher nervous system. Pavlov's  theories  of  "conditioned reflexes", of the "second signaling system" and of "dynamic stereotype" are the examples. Each of these interrelated theories bears a direct  relation  to  the teaching  of  a  foreign  language.

According  to  Pavlov  habits  are conditioned reflexes,  and  a  conditioned  reflex  is  an action  performed  automatically  in  response  to  a  definite  stimulus  as  a result  of previ- ous  frequent  repetitions  of  the  same  action. If we, thoroughly study the  theory of conditioned  reflexes  we shall   see  that  it  explains  and confirms the necessity for frequent repetitions and revision of material pupils study as one of the means of inculcating habits. Pavlov showed  that  man's  higher  nervous  activities — speaking  and  thinking — are  the  func­tions  of  a  special  system  of  organic  structures  within  the  nervous  system. This system is  developed  only  in  man. It  enables  the  brain  to  respond  to  inner  stimuli  as  it  responds  to outer stimuli or signals perceived through the sense or­gans. Pavlov  named  this  the  second  signaling  system.

Consequently one of the forms of human behaviour  is  language behaviour, i. e., speech response  to different  communica­tion  situations. Therefore  in  teaching  a  foreign  language we  must  bear  in  mind  that pupils  should  acquire  the language they  study  as  a  behaviour, as something  that  helps  people  to  communicate  with  each  other  in various real situations  of  intercourse. Hence a  foreign  language  should  be  taught  through such  situations.

Pavlov's  theory  of "dynamic stereotype"  also  furnishes  the  physiological  base  for many  important  principles of language teaching, e. g., for the topical vocabulary ar­rangement.                              

Methods  of  foreign  language  teaching  is  most  closely  related  to  linguistics, since linguistics  deals  with  the  problems  which  are of paramount  importance  to  Meth­ods, with language and thinking, grammar and vocabulary, the relationship between grammar and vocabulary, and many others. Methods  successfully  uses, for example, the results of linguistic  investigation  in  the  selection  and  arrangement  of  language  material  for teaching. It  is  known  that  structur­al  linguistics  has  had  a  great  impact on  language  teach­ing. Teaching materials  have 'been prepared  by  linguists and methodologists  of  the structural school. Many  prom­inent  linguists  have  not  only  developed  the  theory of lin­guistics, but  tried  to  apply  it  to  language  teaching. The  following  quotation  may  serve  as a  proof  of  this:

"It  has  occurred  to  the  linguist  as  well  a s to  the  psycholo­gist  that  the  foreign  language classroom  should  be  an  excel­lent  laboratory  in  which  to  test  new  theories of language  acquisition."

Methods of  foreign  language  teaching  like  any  other  sci­ence, has  definite  ways  of  investigating  the  problems  which  may arise. They are:

1. a critical study of the ways foreign languages were taught in our country and abroad;

2. a thorough  study  and  summing up of the experience of the best foreign language teachers in different types of schools;

3. experimenting with the aim of confirming or refuting  the  working  hypotheses  that  may  arise  during  investigation. Experimenting  becomes  more  and  more popular  with methodologists. In  experimenting  methodologists  have to deal with different data, that is why in arranging  research  work  they  use mathematics, statistics, and  probability  theory  to interpret  experimental  results.

In  recent  years  there  has  been  a  great  increase  of  interest  in  Methods  since foreign language "teaching  has  many  attrac­tions  as  an  area  for  research. A  great  deal of useful  research  work  has  been  carried out. New  ideas  and  new  data  pro­duced  as  the result  of  research  are  usually developed into new teaching materials and teaching techniques.

It  should  be  said  that  we  need  research  activities  of the  following  types: descriptive research  which  deals  with "what to teach"; experimental  and  instrumental  research  dealing with "how to teach". More  research  is  now  needed  which  compares  different  combination of  devices, various  teaching aids.  

         Supplement 2. Methods  of  Foreign  Language  Teaching

At  the  term  of  the  17th  century  Volfgang  Ratichius  (1571-1635)  complained  about  contemporary  methods  of  LT  stressed  rote  learning  and  grammar  at  the  expense of  reading  and  spearing. He  initiated  the  principle  of  cognitive  leaning  of  Latin  translation  as  a  basic  means  of  semantization  and  emphasized  on  repetition  as  a  favored  technique. But  it  remained  for  his  successor, the  famous  Czech  educator  Ian  Comenius  (1592-1670)  to  devise  new  methods  of  LT  based  on  new  principles. Instead  of  rules, I. Comenius  used  imitation, repetition  and  plently  of  practice  in  both  reading  and  speaking.

In  1631  Ian  Comenius  published  his  book  “Ianua  linguarum  reserata” – “The  Gates  of  Languages  Unlocked”  in  which  he  described  new  methods  of  language  teaching  based  on  his  principles. The  book  included  a  limited  vocabulary  of  a  few  thousand  word; each  used  in  a  sentence  which  gave  some  indication  of  meaning.

“Orbis  Pictus”  (1658)  is  another  book  by  Ian  Comenius  in  which  a  Latin  text  is  accompanied  by  illustrations  and  translations  into  the  mother  tongue. Great  attention  is  paid  to  direct  associations  between  the  word  in  a  FL  and  an  object  it  denotes. In  this  way  the  role  of  the  mother  tongue  was  limited. Ian  Comenius  recommended  the  following  principles:

–        from  easy  to  difficult;

–        from  simple  to  complex;

–        from  know  to  unknown.

 Language  teaching  remained  the  chief  concern  of  Ian  Comenius. His  “Linguarum  methodus  novissima” (Contemporary/modern  methods  revised)  contains  one  of  the  first  attempts  to  teach  grammar  inductively. “Didactica  Magna”  was  a  more  ambitious  work  that  went  beyong  language  teaching  and  laid  the  foundations  for  modern  pedagogy.

Grammar-Translation  Method

This  method  has  been  with  us  through  the  centuries  and  is  still  with  us. It  has  had  different  names; at  one  time  it  was  called  Classical  Method  since  it  was  used  in  the  teaching  of  the  classical  language, Latin  and  Greek. The  method  involves  many  written  exercises, much  translation  and  lengthy  vocabulary  lists. The  teacher  describes  in  detail  the  grammar  of  the  language, focusing  on  the  form  and  infection   of  words. This  method  aims  at  providing  an  understanding  of  the  grammar  of  the  language  in  question  expressed  in  traditional  terms, and  at  training  the  students  to  read  and  write  the  target  language, rather  than  mastering  the  oral  and  aural  skills. To  do  this  the  students  need  to  learn  the  grammar  rules  and  vocabulary  of  the  target  language. It  was  hoped  that, by  doing  this  students  would  become  more  familiar  with  the  grammar  of  the  native  language  and  that  this  familiarity  would  help  them  speak  and  write  their  native  language  better. It  was  also  thought  that  foreign  language  learning  would  help  students  grow  intellectually; it  was  recognized  that  students  would  probably  never  use  the  target  language, but  the  mental  exercise  of  learning  it  would  be  beneficial  anyway.

Students  study  grammar  deductively: that  is, they  are  given  rules  and  examples, they  are  told  to  memorise  then, and  then  are  asked  to  apply  rules  to  other  examples. They  also  learn  grammatical  paradigms  such  as  the  plural  of  nouns, degrees  of  comparison  of  adjectives  and  adverbs, verb  conjugations. They  memories  native  language  equivalents  for  foreign  language  vocabulary  lists.

The  techniques  of  G-TM  imply  bilingual  vocabulary  lists, written  exercises, elaborate  grammatical  explanations, translation, and  total  involvement  in  reading  and  writing.

The  objectives  of  G-TM  are  non-utilitarian – confined  to  understanding  of  literature  which  gives  keys  to  great  classical  culture.

The  advantages  of  this  method  lie  in  its  limited  objectives: understanding  of  written  language  and  some  basic  writing  and  translation. The  method  is  not  demanding  for  the  teacher  (simple  preparation  from  a  textbook  and  little  physical  endeavour).

The  disadvantages  of  this  method  include  a  total  neglect  of  spoken  language, communication  skills, use  of  esoteric  vocabulary, and  monotonous  procedure  in  class.

Thus  the  Grammar-Translation  Method  is  simply  a  combination  of  the  activities  of  grammar  and  translation. The  teacher  begins  with  rules  isolated  vocabulary  items, paradigms  and  translation. Pronunciation  either  is  not  taught  or  is  limited  to  a  few  introductory  notes. Grammar  rules  are  memorized  as  units, which  sometimes  include  illustrative  sentences.

Harold  Palmer’s  Method

Harold  Palmer  the  great  English  authority  and  teacher, experimented  extensively  with  the  question-answer  method. He  considered  question-answer  work  to  be  “the  most  effective  of  all  language  learning  exercise  ever  devised”.

Palmer  insisted, however, that  if  this  technique  was  to  be  carried  out  successfully, all  questions  asked  by  the  teacher  must  be  carefully  planned  and  thought  out  beforehand. Questions  should  never  be  haphazard, either  in  form  or  content. Specifically, H. Palmer  thought  that  any  question  asked  by  the  teacher  should  be  of  a  nature  that  admits  the  following:

a)      an  obvious  answer, not  an  answer  that  requires  one  or  more  complicated  acts  of  judgement  on  the  part  of  the  student;

b)     an  easy  answer, not  one  that  requires  the  use  of  word, facts, or  constructions  unknown  to  the  student;

c)     a relevant  answer, direct  answer  involving  only  a  moderate  change  through  the  process  of  conversion, substitution, or  completion  of  the  material  contained  in  the  teacher’s  question.

In  H. Palmer’s  view, there  are  three  stages  of  learning:

1.                                                            Receiving  knowledge.

2.                                                            Fixing  it  in  the  memory  by  repetition.

3.                                                            Using  the  knowledge  by  real  practice.

H. Palmer  was  the  author  of  some  50  theoretical  works, textbooks  and  manuals. Of  great  interest  are  H. Palmer’s  “100  Substitution  Tables”, in  which  sentence  patterns  are  arranged  in  tables  for  pupils  to  make  up  their  sentences, following  the  pattern. His  main  findings  can  be  conveniently  summarized  as  the  following  objectives:

1.      Phonetic, semantic  and  syntactic  aspects.

2.      Oral  speech  by  way  of  speaking  and  understanding.

3.      Accumulation  of passive  material  with  subsequent  active  reproduction.

4.      Techniques  used  for  translation  include  visuality, interpretation  and  verbal  context.

5.      Speech  patterns  to  be  learn  by  heart.

6.      Rational  selection  of  vocabulary  based  on  frequency  counts  and  utility.

7.      Topical  selection: minimum  vocabulary  list  of  3000  words.

H. Palmer  paid  great  attention  to  a  system  of  exercises, which  in  his  should  include:

1.      receptive –question  and  short  answers  to  them;

2.      receptive-imitative –words  and  word-combinations  repeated  after  the  teacher;

3.      conversational –questions, answers, commands  and  completion  of  sentences.

Thus  H. Palmer  method  is  based  on  rationalization  of  teaching/learning  process  and  systematic  selection  of  material. Teaching  speaking  features  prominelity  in  H. Palmer’s  method, hence  its  name  “oral  method”.

Direct  Method

The  Direct  Method  appeared  as  a  reaction  to  the  GTM  and  the  failure  to  procedure  learns  who  could  use  the  foreign  language  they  had  been  studying.

The  Direct  Method  was  based  on  the  belief  that  students  could  learn  a  language  through  listening  to  it  and  that  they  learn  to  speak  by  speaking  it – associating  speech  with  appropriate  action, like  the  way  the  children  learn  native  tongue. The  Direct  Method    received  its  name  from  the  fact  that  meaning  is  to  be  related  to  the  target  language  directly, without  going  through  the  process  of  translating  into  the  student’s  native  language.

The  various  “oral”  and  “natural”  methods  which  developed  at  the  turn  of  the  century  may  be  grouped   under  DM. The  students  learn  new  words  and  phrases  from  objects. Actions  and  mime. When  the  meaning  of  words  could  not  be  made  clear, the  teacher  would  resort  to  semantization  but  never  to  native  language  translations. From  the  beginning, students  are  accustomed  to  hearing  complete  meaningful  sentences  in  the  target  language. Grammar  is  taught  at  a  later  stage  inductively, numerous  examples  of  a  certain  principle  are  presented  and  the  rule  is  then  inferred  from  these  examples. An  explicit  grammar  rule  may  never  be  given.

Students  learn  to  think  in  the  target  language  as  soon  as  possible. Vocabulary  is  acquired  more  naturally  if  students  use  in  full  sentences, rather  than  memorizing  long  lists  of  words. Vocabulary  is  emphasized  over  grammar. Although  work  on  all  four  skills  occurs  from  the  start, oral  communication  is  seen  as  basic. Thus  the  reading  and  writing  exercises  are  based  upon  what  the  students  have  orally  practiced  first. Pronunciation  also  receives  due  attention  from  the  beginning  of  the  course. Desides  studying  every  speech  the  learns  also  do  history, geography  and  culture  of   the  country  or  countries  where  the  language  spoken.

The  teacher  who  employs  DM  asks  the  students  to  self-correct  their   answers  by  asking  them  to  make  a  choice  between  what  they  said  and  alternate  answer  he  supplies. There  are, of  course, other  ways  of  getting  students  to  self-correct. For  example, a  teacher  might  simply  repeat  what  a  student  has  just  said  using  a  questioning  voice  to  signal  to  the  student  that  something  was  wrong  with  it. Another  possibility  is  for  teacher  to  repeat  what  the  student  said, stopping  just  before  the  error. The  student  then  knows  that  the  next  word  was  wrong. There  are  also  other  options  of  remedial  work.

The  main  principles  of  DM  can  be  summarized  under  the  following  headings:

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