Michael,
Thanks for bringing this up.
Actually, all my students are Spanish speakers, usually over 40 and usually low income working women with children. For them, pronunciation is a serious problem and also an important stated need. Most of them have dropped out of adult ed classes for a variety of reasons, including the fact that they did not like monolingujal classes because ... they did not understand the teacher!
On the other hand, I recently started a class of younger women who are part of a Latino PTA. Many of them had studied English in Mexico and do not have the same difficulties pronouncing English as older students.
FYI - the literacy rate in Mexico may actually be higher than in the US. 
So, yes, it is important to define our "audience" a bit better.
Paul

Paul Rogers
805-258-3310
pumarosa21 at yahoo.com
PUMAROSA.COM

--- On Fri, 7/24/09, Michael Gyori <mgyori at mauilanguage.com> wrote:


From: Michael Gyori <mgyori at mauilanguage.com>
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4596] Variability in L2 teaching & learning
To: "The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List" <englishlanguage at nifl.gov>
Date: Friday, July 24, 2009, 4:19 AM




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Hello Paul, Steve, and all,

I am glad to see a desire for minds to meet and benefit from everyone's attempts to teach ESL as successfully as only possible!

Krashen's five hypotheses in "Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition" were acclaimed by many teachers back in 1982. Much research in SLA has since been conducted; back then, the field itself was only perhaps 20 years into its existence as a recognized discipline in its own right.

One reason Krashen was and  continues to be so popular is that his theories helped teachers perceive their challenges in the classroom as being par for the course rather than symptomatic of insufficient teaching skills. Also, teachers were given a way out by latching on to hypotheses that appear easy to implement, at least on the surface level (try operationalizing "i+1"!).

Please keep in mind that hypotheses are "if x then y" assumptions, and that they are subject to scrutiny: do they provide roadmaps that enable our students to learn more quickly and "better" than they used to or would (have) otherwise?

Outside of the classroom, and unfortunately often in the "ivory towers" of research, Krashen is not nearly as embraced as among practitioners (cf. e.g. Barry McLaughlin, Leo van Lier, Timothy Mason). 

One, I believe critically important, difference between Paul's and Steve's experiences lies in the characteristics of their learner audiences. Paul seems to work mainly with Hispanic learners, many of whom, I surmise, have limited formal educational backgrounds and Spanish literacy. Steve's learners, on the other hand, seem to derive from more educated backgrounds and higher SES; further, they also appear to be comprised of many more language groups than Paul's.

If I am correct, then their respective learners' needs and life goals may be quite different in key respects, as are the pedagogical approaches that are indicated. 

When you factor in that Paul's learner audience is presumably mainly one of SL learners, while Steve caters to many FL learners, it is easy to see how their approaches to language teaching can be distinct in quite fudamental ways.

It is very important to identify the theoretical and experiential underpinnings and guiding principles in conjunction with the learners we work with; otherwise, we run the risk of all being "right" in how we perform our profession, and yet disagreeing because we fail to define the educational domains within which we operate.

Of course,  learners' attitudes towards L2 acquistion play a pivotal role in the teaching-learning equation.  Positive attitude and affect, though necessary, are not by themselves sufficient trademarks of successful learning, especially with students who have not learned how to learn. 
The characteristics of teacher-student interactions, the skills and knowledge that guide them, the ambience, the background knowledge all participants (teachers and students alike) bring to the table, as well as their real-life circumstances and often constraints are also necessary ingredients that need to be factored into instructional success.

Michael
www.mauilanguage.com



Date: Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:22:30 -0700
From: steve at thelinguist.com
To: englishlanguage at nifl.gov
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4591] Re: The Silent Period Hypothesis

Paul,

To each his own. I like a lot of repetitive listening. If there are synergies between Puma Rosa and LingQ we should explore them. Good luck.

On the silent period you may want to check this out too.

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/8111/krashhasan4.html

Steve



-- 
Steve Kaufmann
www.thelinguist.blogs.com
www.lingq.com
604-922-8514

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