06.25.13 ~ VanPatten, Chapter 5
This chapter was devoted to clarification and dispelling many myths that exist about SLA. Topics included the roles that L1 interference, heavy correction of students, drills, difficulty of the language being learned, motivation, age, and learning styles all play in L2 acquisition. The topic that gave me the most to think about here was that of drilling and repetition. One idea that kept coming up again and again throughout this chapter is that teachers tend to teach language as they were taught it and sometimes I find myself falling into that trap as well. I am glad to see that VanPatten not only dismisses the usefulness of traditional drills and repetition, but also provides solid evidence as to why those methods are not very helpful.
This chapter was devoted to clarification and dispelling many myths that exist about SLA. Topics included the roles that L1 interference, heavy correction of students, drills, difficulty of the language being learned, motivation, age, and learning styles all play in L2 acquisition. The topic that gave me the most to think about here was that of drilling and repetition. One idea that kept coming up again and again throughout this chapter is that teachers tend to teach language as they were taught it and sometimes I find myself falling into that trap as well. I am glad to see that VanPatten not only dismisses the usefulness of traditional drills and repetition, but also provides solid evidence as to why those methods are not very helpful.
No comments:
Post a Comment