BEGS-185-full-textbook
KNOWING THE LEARNER
Block Introduction
Block 1 focuses on understanding the learner as an individual with diverse learning styles, intelligences, attitudes, and motivations.
Unit 1 provides a general description of learners' capabilities and learning resources.
Units 2 and 3 address disadvantaged learners and learners with minor disabilities, aligning with the government's policy of inclusive education.
Unit 4 discusses learner autonomy, emphasizing efficient learning strategies, self-evaluation, and realistic goal setting.
COURSE INTRODUCTION
English Language Teaching is a 4-credit Skill Enhancement Course comprising 3 blocks and 12 units.
The course aims to provide understanding of learners, learning processes, and effective classroom management and material evaluation methodologies.
Key objectives include:
Gaining insights into diverse learner types, such as the socially and geographically unprivileged and learners with special needs.
Reflecting on classroom discourse and innovative teaching-learning strategies to enhance speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills.
Promoting the integration of language skills for improved communication.
Introducing new theories related to learners, learning processes, classroom management, material selection, evaluation, and teaching methodology.
Emphasizing the use of technology in language learning.
The course begins by understanding the learner and factors affecting second language acquisition, followed by discussing strategies for effective classroom learning.
Key questions addressed in the course:
The impact of textbook choice on the class.
Effective mistake correction and evaluation methods.
Strategies for teaching listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills.
Ways to improve classroom organization and management.
The Personal and Unique Quality of Learning
Learning is an individual process, even in a large class.
Each child's learning is unique, despite common instruction and materials.
The focus is on individual progress, as reflected in report cards.
The "jug and mug model" of teaching, where knowledge is simply poured into the learner's mind, is outdated.
Children's minds are not empty vessels, and new knowledge must be integrated with prior experiences.
Prior experiences influence how a child engages with lessons.
Recognizing uniqueness and diversity is crucial for curriculum and learning.
Teachers face the challenge of adapting standard materials to suit varied learners.
This unit addresses readiness for learning and variations in children's learning styles, focusing on language learning.
The Student’s Readiness to Engage with a New Topic
Students often find certain topics difficult due to a mismatch between assumed prior knowledge and actual knowledge.
This problem arises when a standard syllabus is covered on a fixed schedule.
Readiness is not a fixed characteristic but is closely linked to particular topics.
A child may struggle with grammar but excel in vocabulary.
Low readiness is not related to basic ability or capacity to learn.
Students lacking relevant knowledge need specifically planned help to catch up.
Providing sufficient initial support can eliminate readiness problems.
Interest and Motivation for Schoolwork or Studies
Students may lose interest in studies and want to drop out.
Distinguish between general loss of interest and negative attitudes towards a specific subject or teacher.
General loss of interest affects all school activities and can lead to isolation and unhappiness.
Possible causes include:
Feeling that everything is too difficult.
Lack of help from teachers or friends.
Gaps in prior learning.
Being made fun of by other children.
Unit tests reinforcing feelings of inadequacy.
This can lead to feeling unable to do anything successfully and a sense of worthlessness.
Low motivation is often temporary but can become pronounced without support.
Overcoming loss of motivation in one subject can positively affect other areas.
Creating a supportive social climate in classrooms is crucial.
Teachers need to show awareness of students' difficulties and offer help in small ways.
The feeling of being cared for matters greatly.
Learner Characteristics That Influence Learning At School
Readiness and motivation are influenced by external events, and changing the environment can affect them.
Factors within the child also influence learning and seem to be fairly stable.
These qualities differentiate different types of learners and are related to their general nature or personality.
Qualities are not altogether fixed but can change gradually through teachers' and peers' contributions.
Qualities can be related to the capacity to learn and solve problems or related to preferences and habitual ways of doing things.
Characteristics Lying More in the Cognitive Domain
General Scholastic Ability
The term 'bright' is associated with the ability to understand and remember what is taught, learn quickly, and do well in tests.
It is based on the notion of intelligence and mental ability tests measure scholastic aptitude.
'Studies' do not include all areas important for holistic development like art, music, dance, sports, and teamwork.
High scholastic aptitude may not give a big advantage in activities that are not written answers (to test questions).
The general level of scholastic ability of students does not consistently influence language learning, especially with the emphasis on communication skills.
Teachers should not assume that learners who perform well (or poorly) in other subjects will perform similarly in language class.
The discussion about prior learning and readiness is relevant.
Lack of opportunity to learn is related to inadequate opportunity to learn, not low capacity to learn.
Teachers should not judge others as low in scholastic ability without proper evidence.
Language Learning Aptitude
Some people have a knack for languages, similar to having a feel for music or dancing.
Research on language aptitude increased in the second half of the last century.
Two well-known tests developed:
Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT) of Carroll and Sapon (1959)
Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery (PLAB) of Pimsleur (1966)
These tests deal with phonetic coding, grammatical sensitivity, sound discrimination, sound symbol association, and short-term memory after rote learning.
They focus on cognitive processes underlying speaking and listening.
High scores indicate basic abilities that offer an advantage in learning a new language.
The tests were found useful in identifying potentially good language students.
Limitations: The tests are complicated and require formal school completion of eight years to understand instructions (items).
Tests do not give data about language aptitude of primary school children.
They were developed more than half a century ago when the approach emphasized in drills and pattern practice.
New aptitude tests need to be developed to reflect the focus on meaning and participation in communicative activities.
A basic problem with aptitude is all children learn to speak their home languages successfully before school without different levels of aptitude.
Differences in success levels arise when learning reading and writing in school.
Aptitude is not a relevant or helpful idea for early learning as education policy helps all children learn languages.
Language aptitude test scores can help in choosing optional and advanced language courses at college level.
Learning Styles And Preferences
Learning Styles
Individuals have different styles of learning, not linked to capacity.
Styles involve natural and effective ways of engaging cognitively with new experiences and ideas.
Styles are like being left-handed or right-handed but not so sharply different or fixed.
A student's typical learning style is an orientation or preference.
Styles can change over time.
Learning styles influence learning.
Match between teaching and student's style leads to comfortable and effective learning.
Mismatch could result in ineffective learning.
Many different ways of describing and categorizing styles have been proposed (around 70 models).
There is overlap, with many different words used to talk about same thing.
Sensory Preference
Teaching involves providing input through listening, seeing, and feeling.
The same message can be conveyed in different ways.
Learners differ in their preferred mode of sensory input (visual, auditory, tactile, and kinesthetic).
Visual learners learn best from written statements and pictures.
Auditory learners learn best from spoken messages.
Tactile and kinesthetic learners learn best when they can touch and feel objects or move.
Teachers use all these methods at different times.
Presentations can be chosen and used in a planned manner based on students' styles.
Whole or part focused learning
Some learners focus on general ideas, while others focus on small details.
Described as global versus sequential style of processing information.
Some students learn better when the teacher presents general ideas; others respond well to specifics and details.
Related to field dependence – field independence.
Field-dependent individuals are influenced by the context.
Field-independent individuals are better able to see basic facts or arguments by themselves.
Analytical thinking is a characteristic.
Inductive vs. deductive learning
Inductive learning involves finding patterns or inferring a general principle from specific facts or data.
Deductive learning involves beginning with a rule or principle and discussing its implications and applications.
Some students are more comfortable with inductive approaches, while others are more comfortable with deductive approaches.
Inductive learners learn by discovery.
Deductive learners learn with stated principles and rules.
Convergent thinking vs. divergent thinking
Convergent thinking involves analyzing a problem logically using relevant knowledge and proceeding step by step towards a solution.
Divergent thinking involves looking at a problem from different angles and sometimes even trying to change or reformulate it.
Divergent thinking can lead to unusual or creative suggestions.
Both approaches are useful and important.
Problems in class should allow both convergent and divergent thinkers to try their approaches.
There are no 'good' or 'bad' styles.
Teachers can organize teaching to match styles to facilitate better learning.
Teachers need to add variety to teaching styles by including more types of presentations and activities.
Teachers will recognize different learning styles through interaction with learners.
Personality dispositions – feelings, emotions and social interactions
Personality is the typical way of behaving in daily life, especially when relating to others.
Personality is different from abilities, skills, achievements, and status.
Personal qualities are emphasized when students write about their favorite teacher.
Fairly stable qualities or characteristics of a person are referred to as traits.
The study of personality is a major sub-field of psychology, with major different theories and models.
Personality dimensions have been proposed.
Dispositions influence learning differently than cognitive factors.
One widely mentioned list of personality dimensions (called the big five).
Extraversion - Introversion
Extraversion: Active, energetic, outgoing, talkative, and friendly.
Openness – Closed Mindedness
Openness: Curious, imaginative, original, and with wide interests.
Conscientiousness – Undirectedness
Conscientiousness: Organized, efficient, thorough, and reliable.
Agreeableness – Antagonism
Agreeableness: Good-natured, kind, trusting, generous, modest, and appreciative.
Neuroticism – Stability
Neuroticism: Anxious and insecure, gets upset easily, and shows signs of self-pity.
These are almost natural qualities of a person.
Dispositions of children seem to be positive for classroom participation and others less so.
Teachers must remember that a child with a certain disposition is not doing anything deliberately.
Habitual styles or predispositions should be accepted without judgment.
Changes in personality aspects can occur, but only slowly and based on supportive interaction.
Self–esteem
Related to confidence and capacity to accept challenges and take risks without much anxiety.
Teachers and peers are fortunate when there are such students in class.
Students with low self-esteem must have been through many negative experiences in the past.
The curriculum provides positive experiences.
Social conformity
A marked tendency to be strongly influenced by the opinions of those around them.
Independence and thinking for oneself is also treated as normal and healthy.
A child who tries to follow others and not be different would be high on the social conformity dimension.
Such students may not participate in group activities and may try to avoid tasks calling for innovation.
Individual differences cover cognitive and social-emotional dimensions.
Multiple Intelligences
Howard Gardner presented his Theory of Multiple Intelligences (in 1983).
There are nine intelligences:
Logico-mathematical
linguistic
bodily-kinesthetic
musical
spatial
inter-personal
intra-personal
naturalistic
existential.
Traditional 'intelligence' is related only to logical thinking and problem-solving.
Gardner argues that having a feel for words is intelligence.
The powerful sense of one’s own body is intelligence.
The basic capacity which allows some persons to become good painters, sculptors, designers of visuals is spatial intelligence.
Musical and interpersonal should be easily understood.
Intra-personal intelligence allows people to be happy in themselves (accept their strengths and weaknesses, preserve a high self-concept).
Some persons have a feel for the many things in the natural world - living things, water, minerals.
Existential intelligence refers to the sensitivity and capacity to tackle deep questions about human existence.
Scholastic aptitude is only one among the special aptitudes individuals have.
Social intelligence and emotional intelligence should also be recognized.
Knowledge and skill can develop to a level of excellence with special aptitude.
We need as teachers to be aware of this diversity and develop the capacity to recognize special aptitudes.
We need to nurture their special potentials within our basic commitment to promote the all-round development of each child.
No learning opportunity should be held back from any child.
Flexibility In The Curriculum: Valuing Diversity And Promoting Autonomy
Individuals differ, focusing on thoughts, feelings, hopes, and needs.
Focus on psychological aspects beyond the physical ones.
The survey is brief and has covered only some of the many possible dimensions of individual differences.
A class of 35 or even a small group of 10 has children whose unique personalities will lead to different patterns of learning.
Diversity can be seen as a resource now.
Adapt the ‘standard curriculum’ to suit individual needs.
The curriculum supports the child relates ideas from lessons to life outside school, becomes an active co-creator of new knowledge.
This knowledge will be personal and different for different children.
Teachers do not have to make every child in a class learn exactly the same things, in the same manner at the same rate as in the traditional curriculum.
In a traditional classroom, the given syllabus was covered following the required or recommended method.
RTE drastically changed this process.
Every child had the “right to education of quality” through the elementary stage (till Class VIII), which meant no failures, no dropouts.