The developments about sketched began about 100 years ago and have been going on ever since led to intensive theoretical debate and experimentation in the sixties, bringing about in the seventies four different standards, one of which continues the search for new methods, while the others, following the lead of Mackey’s Methods Analysis and the critique of methods implied in the research studies on teaching methods, looked for new emphases in curriculum design, human relations, or in the lessons of learning research. This lesson explained about language pedagogy into an historical context we will indicate a few important dates, trends, names and writing. It happens during the time 1880-1980.
The events of this
period have not been identically everywhere .The North America and Europe that different in many ways.Marechal
(1972) on Bergium or by Apelt (1967) and Rulker (1969) on Germany will
contribute to a better understanding of similarities and differences among
European countries.It
will be borne in mind that the history of English and French
as SL in Africa and Asia. Every language
in different country has unuque characteristics. It is further complicated that
language teaching theory has tended to develop within single language tradition
and within different kinds of educatinal institutions. Every institution
evolved their own pattern of language teaching. Nevertheless, there are common
features which will be emphasized in the summary.Many of items
will be more fully explained in this chapter.
Period I: 1880 to World War I
This happened on last decades of the 19th century witnessed a
determined effort in any ountries of the estern world for
:
a. To bring modern forign language into the school and university,
b. To emancipate modern language from comparison to classic
c.
To
reform the methods of language teaching in a deesive way.
As Gilbert (1953, 1954,
1955) has show this period of reform.The reform movement involved academic scholars for example (Viector
and Passy). Language teacher
for example (Walter and MacGowan in England) and promoters of language teaching
in secondary school for example
Berlitz.
The list below shows the improvements
in this period:
1878 First
Berlitz school opened in Rhode Island, U.S.A. Among
nineteenth-
century pioneers of reform movement
Maximian Delphinus Berlitz is
figure who established about 70 schools in U.S.A, France,
England and
Germany.
1880 Francois
Gouin. L’art d’enseigner et d’etudier les
langue.The English
translation was published in 1892.
1882 Wilhelm
Vietor. Der Sprahunterrcht mss umkehren:
ein beitrag zur
Ueberbardungssfage. He was a specialist in English studies. His pamphlet,
demanding a complete reeorientation of seond language
instruction in order
to deal with the academic overloading in high schools
written under the
pseudonym ‘quousque tandem?’ is regarded a the real
imperatus toward the
reform in Germany (Gilbert 1954)
1883 Foudaation
of the modern language Assoaciation of America.
1886 Foundation
of the International Phonetic Association and its Journal, Le
maitre Phonetique.
1892 Foundation
of the modern language Association of Great Britain.
1899 De la Methode directe dans l’enseignement des
langues vivantes.
Gilbert (1955:8) writes Paul
Passy one of co-author of this book is famous french phonetician.His
books Les sons du Francis, first
published in 1887 and since translated into many languages, has become a
classic. He initiated in 1886 Le Maitre
Phonetique, a monthly journal which soon became the organ of the
International Phonetic Association, also founded by him in the same year.
1900 Report of
the committee of twelve of the Modern Language Association of
America.
The committee
had been appointed in 1896 at the suggestion of the National Education Association. It recommended a compromise solution on the method
controversy, was submitted to the MLA at a meeting held in
1898.
1904 Otto
Jespersen. How to Teach a Foregn Language
The English translation of this work,
originally published in Danish by an outstanding and internationally respected
Danish scholar of English language studies in the title Sprogundervising. One
of the most widely read books on language teaching in this century.
Period II:
World War I and the interwar years to 1940
Tragedy of World War I promoted effort in many countries towards greater
international understanding after the war and the promotion of language
teaching in the post war world. These trends are reflected, for example, in the
British report, Modern Studies, review of language teaching at school and
university (1918). The period is characterized by attempts to resolve the
debate onteaching methods of the preceding era through practical and realistic
solutions for example, the recomendation of a reading approach or Compromise
method. Bloomfield (1942) wrote “ our
school and colleges teachs us very little about language, and what little they
teach us is largely in error.
During this period the first serious
attempts were made to sesolve language teaching problems by research methods.
1917 Harold E.
Palmer. The Scientific Study and Teaching
of languages.
Before World War II Harold Palmer (1877-1949) started as a Berliz
teacher in Belgium.He developed
his own ideas on language teaching when he started a school of English for
refugees.His other works: the Scientific Study (1917), the Oral Method (1921)
and the Principles of Language Study. He is father of British applied
lingustics.
1918 Modern Studies, being the report of the
committee on the position of modern
languages in the
educational system of Great Britain.
This report was based on the work of a committee, appointed by the Prime
Minister, in 1916 during World War I.It criticized universities for their antiquarian approach to languages. It
recommended the placing of language into cultural context.
1919 Cleveland
Plan instituded
Emile de Sauze who
the language supervisor of an American municipality, established a consistent language programme in the school
system of one American school district.
1921 Edward
Thorndike. The Teacher’s Word Book.
A landmark in word count studies.This work was intended as a basis for the reading curriculum in the teaching
of English as the mother tongue, it ws influential as a prototype for similar
investigation undertaken in the interest of oreign language language teaching
1921 Harold E.
Palmer. The Oral Method of Teaching
Languages.
1922 Harold E.
Palmer. The Principles of Language Study.
He wrote three works on methodology that have been cited he came closest
among earlier writers to the concept of language pedagogy based on theoretical
disciplines, the disciplines concerned, linguistics and psychology, were not
yet well developed.
1924-1928 The
Modern Foreign Language Study of the American and Canadian
Committees on Modern Languages.
1926 Michael
West. Bilingualism.
1926 Michael
West. Learning to Read a Foreign Language.
Like Coleman he
advocated a reading approach
1923-1927
Ogden and Richards complete Basic English.
BASIC English is an attemp to
simplify and rationalize the language learning problems.
1929 Algernon
Colemean. The Teaching of Modern Foreign
Language in the United States.
It included the recommendation that
the primary objective of language teaching should be reaading fluency.
1929
Incorpotated Association of Assistant Masters in Secondary Schools.
Memorandum on the
Teaching of odern Languages.It recommended the ecletic ‘Compromise Method’.
1930 C.
K.Ogden. Basic English: A General introduction with Rules and
Grammar.
1933 Leonard
Bloomfield. language.
This classic in
linguistics made its impact on language teaching at the next
stage of
development.
Period III:
World War II and the post-war decades to 1970
The decade of World War II
constitudes a ‘watershed’(Strevens 1972). America wartime language programmes
changed the approach to language teaching approach in radical way
are :
a.
Linguistic scholars were given a
leading role in the solution of the language
teaching problems.
b.
The armed language program
demonstrated that language training does not
necessarily have to
be done in conventional school.
c.
They claimed that languages can be taught to much larger
population of
ordinary learners.
‘Army method was such a radical and
successful innovation as was commonly believed is doudtful and was hotly
debated in the post-war years. American thought on language teaching provided a
challenge of which leaders in the language teaching profession were becoming
increasingly aware.
In the post-war era many country in
the world awakened to language learning problems. Language diversity was
greatly increased in the post-wr world. Several languages were recognized as
world languages and gained official status in the UN and UNESCO. Moreover, the
democratization of schooling meant that language learning lost its educational
elite status.
Another post-war phenomenon was an
increasing intellectual awareness of, and an interest in the scientific study
of language problems. The study of language from the point o view of several
other disciplines including psychology and sociology, and vigorous effort were
made to create interdiciplinary links.
It is not surprising to find that,
renewed and resolute attempts were made in the fifties and sixties. They
included are :
a.The use of a new technology.
b.New organizational patterns for example language in
primary, intensive courses,
bilingual schooling
c.
Methodological innovations for
example the audiovisual method, audiolingual
method
d. The development of ambitious new language material and language teaching
programmes
e. Teacher education schemes.
f. A new research was applied to some of this innovation.
This high hopes of this period were
gradually eroded. The new methods did not produce spectacular results. The list
below are landmark in the developed of language teaching in this third period
include:
1941
Foundation of the English Language Institute (ELI), University of Michigan,
directed by Charles
C.
Fries.Charles
Fries and his student and Robert Lado between 1941 and 1950 developed a
language pedagogy based on linguistic
research and embodied phychological priniples of language learning.
1941 Intensive
Language Program of American Council of Learned Societies.
It led to the
publication of the two booklets below. Linguists began to play an active role
in wrtime language training in the U.S.A (Moulton 1961/1963)
1942 Leonard
Bloomfield. Outline Guide fo the
Practical Study of Foreign
Languages.
1942 Bernard
Bloch and George L. Trager. Outline of
Linguistic Analysis.
1943 Army
Specialized Training Program (ASTP) initiated in the U.S.A
1946 English
Language Teaching Journal.
1948 Language
Learning: A Journal of Applied Linguistics.
1951 The
commission on francais elementaire established at St Cloud the Centre
d’etude du francais
elementraire
1953
UNESCO-sponsored International Seminar on the contribution of the
Teaching of Modern
Languages towards Education for Living in a World
Community at Nuwara
Eliya.
1953 U.S.A.
National Conference on the Role of Foreign Language in American
Schools
This effort is to
grapple with weaknesses in American foreign language capability.
1953 Theodore
Andersson. The Teaching of Foreign
Languages in the
Elementary School.
1954 Charles
E. Osgood and Thomas A. Sebeok (eds). Psycholinguistics:
A
Survey of Theory and Research
Problems.
1954 Publication
of Le Francais Elementaire. (France 1954)
1957 Robert
Lado. Linguistic across Cultures: Applied
Linguistics for Language
Teachers.
1957 B.F
Skinner. Verbal Behavior.
1957 Noam
Chomsky. Syntactic Structures.
1957 The
School for Applied Linguistics founded at the Unuversity of Edinburgh.
1958 Natinal
Defense Education Act (NDEA)
A large numbe of
project related to linguistics, languages, and language teaching were funded,
for example teaching mateial development project, test development, language
institutes and research.
1958 First
experiment in a Bitish grammar school with an audiovisual language
course.
1959 Center or
Applied Linguistics (CAL) founded in Washington D.C. In the
same year its
newsletter, The Lignuistic Repoter
was established.
1960 Edward
Stack. The Language Laboatory and Modern
Language Teaching
It provided
guidance how to install, organize and use language laboratory.
1961
Schere-Wetheimer psycholinguistic experiment at the University of
Colorado
1961 First
language laboratory established in an educational institution in Great
Britain, the Ealing
Tehnical College
1961 CREDIF.
Voix et mages de France
1962
Internatinal meeting on languages in primary education, UNESO institute
for Education.
1963 French
Pilot Sheme and the Nuffield Language Project launched in Great
Britain
1963 Keating
Report. Researh in the U.S.A. critial of the effectiveness of
language
laboratories.
1964 The
Council for ultural Co-operation of the Council of Euope initiate ‘Major
Project-Modern
Languages’.
1964
Internatinal Coference on Modern Foeign Language Teaching, Berlin.
This conference reflected many of
the new trends of development in language pedagogy. At this confeence Caroll
(1966) expressed misgivings about the current language teaching theory and
contrasted the audiolingual habit theory with cognitive code laerning approach.
1964 Committee
on Research and Development in Modern Languages established
in Great Britain.
1964 M. A. K.
Halliday, Angus McIntosh, and Peter Stevens. The Linguistic
Sciences and Language Teaching.
1964 Wilga
Rivers. The Psychologist and the Foreign
Language Teacher.
The first major
work of a writer who has influened the thinking of many language teachers
across the world for nearly two decades.
1964
International Association of Applied Linguistics estblished at a meeting in
Nancy.
1965 William
F. Mackey. Language Teaching Analysis.
This work
which the concept of the method
introduced a new analytical approach to study o language pedagogy.
1965 First
French ‘immersion’ kindergarten class started in an
Anglophone elementary school in St.Lambert, a suburb of Montreal, Canada, on
the initiative of a parent group.
1966 Centre
for information on Language Teaching in Research (CILT)
established in
London.
1966 TESOL
Assoaciation (Teaching of English to Speaker of Other Languages)
founded in U.S.A.
1966 Second
international meeting on languages in primary education.
1966 Chomsky’s
address to language teachers at the Northeast Conference.
He said that he was rather scptical
about the significance, for the teacher of languages, of such insights and
understanding as have been attained in Linguistics and Psychology.(Chomsky
1966:43).
1967-1970
Report of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism
(Canada).
This report attempted to resolve the
differences between English and French population element in Canada.
1968 Bilingual
Education Act.
1968 Report on
Pennsylvania Project completed and published (Smith 1970)
1968 Modern
Language Centre of Ontario Institute for Studies in Education established in
Toronto.
1968 Wilda
Rivers. Teaching Foreign Language Skills.
1969 Official
Language Act (Canada).
This act established English and
French as Official languages at the Federal Level across Canada.
Period IV:
Seventies and Early Eighties
The upheaval in linguistics and
psycholinguistics created by Chomsky’s transformational generative grammar had
begun to affect language pedagogy by the mid-sixties. For some teachers the
disorientation and the sense o decline in foregn language teaching persisted
right through the decade. An editorial in the Audio-Visual Language Journal
commented in 1978’ the seventies have not, in some ways, been the happiest in
Britain.’ Others, however, exploed new direction. At least five major trnds of
development can be detected as characteristics of the seventies.
1. New Methods
The development of the decade of
1970-1980 can be interpreted as various rection againts the ‘method concept’ as
the central issue in second language learning. In spite of the strong reaction
againts methods, several new methods has aroused interest among teachers and
general public. The methods were The Silent Way by Gattegno, Community Language
Learning by Curran and Suggestopaedi by Lazanov.
2. New Approaches to Language Curricula
The trends of the decade was ashift
from a concern with teaching methods to one with language teaching objectives,
language content, and curiculum design. In Britain, a number of applied
linguistics experimented with a vaiety of new ideas, mainly derived from
discourse analysis, speech act theory, and other new development in linguistics
and sociolinguistics.
Other promising changes to the
language curriculum were tried as well. The Canadian experiment on Fench
immersion between 1965 and 1980 illutrates one such new approach. In Britain
and other Euopean countries the concept of language
for special purposes gained momentum as a way of catering for the language
needs of professionals and university students (Strevens 1977a).
3. Human Relation and Individualization in the Language
Class
Another reaction to the inonclusive
teaching method debate of the sixties was to focus more on the learner aas an
individual and as a person. Experiments with individualization of instruction
as a way of language teaching. Other attempted to sensitize teacher to human
values and human relation in the language class, and to create an awareness of
the hidden curriculum of the social and affective climate created by the interaction
among students and between students and the teachers.
4. Language learnign research
A fourth response of the seventies
to the method polemics was research on second language learning was initiated
with great vigour and enthusiasm especially in several North American
university centres.
5. Communicative Language Teaching
From the mid-seventies the key
concept is that of communication or communicative competence. It relects the social view of language which
has found increasing acceptance since the middle of the sixties.
The ollowing names, dates, and
events characterize this period:
1970 Language
in Education in Eastern Africa (Gorman 1970)
1971 Stanford
Conference on Individualizing Foreign Language Instruction
(Altman and Politzer
1971)
1971
Ruschlikon Symposium
1972 Savignon
publishes a seminal experiment on a communicative approach to
foreign language
teaching (Savignon 1972).
1972 Lambert
and Tucker (1972 review in bilingual education (immersion).
1973 St
Wolfgang Symposium, the second meeting on European language project.
1973-1975 A
major research project in Canada on immersion and other alternative
approach to teaching rench as a second language.(Stern et
al 1976a;
Harley 1976)
1974-1975 OISE
Modern Language Centre undertakes research on the good seong
language learner.
(Naiman et al. 1978).
1974 NEFR
completes ten year research on languages for young school children
with controversial
report,
1975 Symposium
at Unuversity of Michighan o language learning research
(Brown 1976).
1975
International comparative studies on English (Lewis and Massad 1975) and
French (Caroll
1975) as second language completed ompleted.
1975 Jan van Ek,
Threshold Level English syllabus is published.
1976 David A.
Wilkins. Notional Syllabus.
1976 A French
team, produces the French equivalent to van Ek’s English
curriculum
1977 Third
meeting on the European Modern Language Project as an information
session on
achievemnets to date and on plans for uture development.
1978 Henry G.
Widdowson. Teaching Language as
Communication.
1978-1979
U.S.A. : President’s ommission on Foreign Language and Internatonal
Studies.
1980 Three new
journal initiated: Applied Linguistics;
Applied Psycholinguistics; and
Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development.Reflecting the intense theoretical and
empirical research interest in the language area, and the intention to back up
policy with language research.
Conclusion
The conclusion of this chapter can
be seen on the figure below:
Period Decade Main
Features
I 1880-1920 Reform/Direct
Method
Phonetics
II 1920-1940 Compromise
method Modern Foreign
Language
study
Reading
Method (U.S.A./Canada)
BASIC
English
III 1940-1950 Linguistic
approah to language teaching
American
Army Method. Intensive
Language teahing 1950-1960
Audiolingual (U.S.A.) audiovisual
(France/Britain)
FLES
Language Laboratory
Psycholinguistics
1960-1970 Audolingual habit
vs. cognitive code
learning (Caroll 1966)
Impact of Chomsky’s theory.
Sociolinguistics
Method research
(Scherer-Wertheimer,
Pennsylvania Project, etc.)
Method Analysis (
Mackey 1985)
IV 1970-1980 Breakaway
from method concept New Method
|
Curriculum emphasis
Speech act
Needs analysis
Discourse analysis
Language for special purposes
Immersion
Proficiency levels
|
`Human relations emphasis
Individualization
‘Autonomie de l’apprenant’
‘Humanistic techniques’
|
Language Learning research
emphasis
First and second languges
Child and adult acquisition
Error analysis
|
Silent Way
Community Language Learning
Suggestopedia, etc.
|
|
Communicative Approach
|
1980
