WK2 | Reading Reflection Response

This passage is from the beginning of the first section of chapter 2 in which basic concepts of language learning are discussed. This paragraph uses dialects or manners of speaking as an example of how there are cultural norms to how language can be context dependent, such as applying for a job vs. hanging out with your friends.

The text expands upon the concept a little bit in the following paragraph with this quotation:
“In general, language proficiency may be defined as the ability to use a language effectively and appropriately throughout the range of social, personal, school, and work situations that comprise daily living.”

When I was trying to learn Spanish in the classroom, one of the earliest concepts taught was how to conjugate the irregular verb “tener”. When saying “I have” you can say “yo tengo”, and when saying “they/he/she has”, you would say “el/ella/ustedes tiene”. However, I became confused when hanging out with some friends who would say “Yo tiene”. I assumed initially that this is a verb formation that I had not learned about yet, but the context for this phrase was always very simple and easy to parse as “I have”. Even more confusing, I learned that other Spanish speakers would not speak this way. This seemed to be an idiosyncratic variation that was particular to my friend group.

It’s funny to think about this in the context of English, because a fluent speaker can easily understand linguistic variations without thinking too much about it. If someone says to me “Look at that beaut’... I has got to get me one of those!”, I don’t even think about the fact that they just broke a few grammatical rules. I understand exactly what is meant without having to seek clarification. However, when this same phenomenon occurs for a second language learner, they may need someone to explain to them bluntly the meaning of the phrase.

This passage is from the section that discusses “How Language Variety Affects the Power and Prestige of its Users”. This section of the book explains how certain languages or characteristics of speech may affect how an individual is perceived, positively or negatively. There are certain languages which can confer power and status for the fluent speaker. Certain languages may fade from common use due to this social dynamic, and people may even abandon their indigenous cultures.

This excerpt comes from the passage about the term dialect. As was covered in the “WK2 | Language or Dialect Assignment”, there are perhaps some blurred lines between the distinction of what is considered a language and what is considered a dialect. As I said in that assignment, it is possible that there is some highly technical reason that an expert linguist may declare 2 languages to be related dialects and another 2 to be separate languages. I do not know the answer to that.

There was something that I was thinking about after I submitted that assignment that is worth considering. In the NativLang video that we watched for that assignment, the example is used of different dialects of English that are unintelligible to modern English speakers, and this is compared to Swedish and Finnish languages, which appear to be closely related. What is interesting, is that the English dialect examples in the video are separated by large amounts of time, whereas the Nordic languages are presumably both modern examples. The other thing that is not mentioned in the video, is the amount of bilingual Finnish and Swedish speakers there are. If these 2 languages are truly closely related, wouldn’t there be people that are easily able to learn both languages? It’s perhaps possible that if you rolled back the clock Finnish and Swedish might stem from the same language from an earlier time. This earlier language might be unintelligible to the modern Finnish or Swedish speaker.

Without any real answers to these questions, I’m just adding more questions to this discussion, but I believe that there is likely more to the story about dialects than what the video has informed us of.

This passage from the book insists that dialect is a pejorative term. I have never heard the word “dialect” used in this way before. When I was just starting high school, my parents moved us from suburban western New York to rural South Carolina. This was a rather abrupt change for me. I recall getting poked fun at for the way that I talked from friends, teachers, and others as well. I do not believe that anyone was intentionally trying to perturb me, but making conversation of what was a very obvious difference in the manner in which we spoke english. I also thought the ways in which the Southerners spoke was very bizarre, but I did not think any less of them for it. In fact I proudly adopted certain characteristics, having spent some of my most formative years there. The word “Y’all” is an incredibly useful term that has since been very widely adopted across the country, but undoubtedly originates from the deep southern dialects.

I do realize that my experience may possibly be an unusual exception, but it is not unrealistic to assume that other people have had the same experience as I have. Children are also bullied for the way that they speak, as well as any other minor difference that bullies may notice. Bullying is, of course, unacceptable behavior. But exploring distinction between different dialects can be a beautiful, enriching experience that does not have to make people feel lesser than or ‘othered’.

The excerpt I am focussing on is from the chapter on realia. Realia is a term that refers to the use of objects in an educational setting. For example, when the class is learning about the concept of an apple, the teacher will bring in an apple for each student to look at and experience. This helps make a connection between a vocabulary term or concept and a physical object.

There are 3 types of relia mentioned in the book:

1. Concrete = When the object is the real version of the concept being discussed. (bringing in an apple when discussing apples
2. Replica = when the object is merely a representation but not the actual item. (bringing in plastic human skeleton for a biology lesson)
3. Semi-concrete = when the object is an abstract representation of the actual item. (showing a photograph of mars for an astrophysics lesson)

The use of Realia helps students store ideas better in their long-term memory because they have more than an abstract concept to remember, they also have sensory data to associate and remember.

Figure 5.1 includes a list of potential realia to include in lessons. I saw this final category of “ethnic items” and I kind of got hung up thinking about it for a while. What is an ethnic item? What is not considered to be an ethnic item? Are some things considered ethnic items to certain groups of people and not others? The list of questions I had continued to grow.

“Ethnic Items” is a type of idea that everyone has a vague idea of what is meant, but nobody could properly define it. Individuals when asked to name an ethnic item may be able to give a clear list of things that most other people may agree with, but how they are categorizing those items is perhaps a little mysterious.

I teach a world music survey class at Bakersfield College and always on the first day of class, after some preamble and a few warm-up exercises, I ask the class to tell me what ‘world music’ is. The answers always range widely and everyone usually has interesting philosophical musings when this question is posed. There are answers that are ‘better’ and ‘worse’, but I never tell anyone that they are correct or incorrect. (for example a better answer might be: “world music is music that has experienced less globalization than other music, such as rock’n’roll.” a ‘worse’ answer might be: “world music music that is made by people not living in USA”. Neither answer is right nor wrong, but one has fewer exceptions. ) But always by the end of class, the white board is filled with lists and categories, and we will not have settled on a definition as a class. This exercise is useful to show the students that this very common term ‘world music’ has no clear definition or boundaries, but that when the term is used people generally think of the same kinds of things. Even after going through the whole course, students still cannot clearly define the term, but everyone has a clear idea of what it refers to. I think this is a very similar idea to “ethnic items”.

Considering that this concept is difficult to explain to college students, I wonder what would be required to teach the idea to children who are in the process of learning a second language. Oftentimes, when people are explaining things to young children, the best way to explain it is the simplest way of explaining it. But the simple way of explaining something may not effectively capture the full meaning of the idea. For example, if the child asks for a cookie, and the parent says “oh no sorry honey we ran out of cookies!”. While this may be true, the parent does not bother to explain that they did not buy more cookies because the child’s desire for cookies was getting a little out of hand and maybe taking a break from cookies for a while might make less of a necessity at every meal time, and also the cookies are very expensive and money has been tight lately, etc. etc.. The parent may not explain this because the child will not understand anyway, and they only really need to understand the simplest reason why they cannot have any more: because there are not any more to be had.

This is perhaps useful because this gives working information to the child that they can use to navigate their understanding of the world around them. When they are older or understand more, they will be able to attach more complex meanings to situations and at that time they can be told a more complicated reason by the parent.

In the classroom we know that using scaffolding with the zone of proximal development concept is one of the best ways to get students to learn the most amount of material and retain it well. This means only giving them certain information (scaffolding) but expecting them to achieve a higher level of meaning on their own (with appropriate guidance). I do wonder how this applies to cultural concepts that are being taught in language classes for children.

In my fieldwork observations this week, the ELD class was reading a novel together. The teacher would pause on certain words and have a brief conversation to make sure that everyone understood the meaning of the word. One of the words that was paused on was the word “Colloquial”. I do not recall exactly what the teacher said to describe the term, but it was something very simple. Merriam-webster (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/colloquial) defines colloquial as: “used in or characteristic of familiar and informal conversation”. But this is one of those kinds of ideas that is very difficult to set limits on. To dive in deeper, one has to to ask all kinds of questions about what kinds of speech would count as academic, colloquial, both, or neither. One could easily say the same phrase with extremes of informal and formal speech: “nah it ain’t gonna rain no more” , versus “I do not believe that it is going to rain any longer”. But where is the line where it is no longer considered to be academic language and informal? Is there a gray area where language is not considered to be either academic nor colloquial? What is the essential difference between these 2 phrases and how they are understood? This is a concept, like world music, that can spin off into lengthy philosophical debates.

This quote is found in the ‘conclusion’ section of the TPR chapter.
Total Physical response (TPR) is a technique of explaining words or concepts by making associations with gestures or physical movements.

From the websites https://tprsonline.net/asher and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_physical_response
we can understand more about what this method was derived from. Dr. James Asher has 3 hypothesis:

1. Comprehension precedes production. There is a silent period when language learners may only respond physically with nods and gestures. This silent period is crucial for success.
2. Physical activity engages the right hemisphere of the brain which is important for language learning
3. Language learning should not involve any stress or negative emotion.

Based on these 3 hypotheses, TPR can be a very effective tool to use with young children or learners that do not have very much vocabulary yet.

This quote stands out to me because this technique is only useful for English language Learners that are very young or that do not have very much vocabulary. As I was reading some of these techniques and watching some videos online of examples of this technique I was thinking how terribly this would go over with the middle schoolers that are in my school. I think it is important to keep in mind that while this technique might work well for children, older kids are often turned off or will respond negatively when they are treated like younger children. Unless the children are specifically kinesthetic learners they may not get as much out of this as other methods.

Also, as an adult who has experimented with learning languages, I know that this is not the most effective method for me personally. I am reminded of an incident that occurred once when I was helping my Spanish speaking friend Sandy fix a drum. While we were working together on the drum, Sandy kept saying “vuelta”. At the time I did not know what that meant, and his particular pronunciation didn't give me any clues to how it might be spelled. Throughout the session, he kept telling me: “vuelta, vuelta”, but I didn't comprehend what he was asking me to do. It was only later on when I talked to my friend Toby, who is bilingual, that I finally understood that he was asking me to turn the drum over. During the session, Sandy said “vuelta” and he turned his hands using a gesture. I actually understood what he wanted from the gesture alone and responded accordingly. However, perhaps because of the particulars of the context, I never actually made any association between the gesture and the word at the time, even though we spent hours fixing this drum. What would have been infinitely more helpful for me, is if a bilingual person could have just explained: “vuelta means to turn”. I would have understood it immediately.

During my fieldwork observations this week, the teacher would pause on certain words in the text they are reading to define them. I asked the teacher if there is a reason why she doesn’t use spanish to explain (the class is 100% spanish-speaking). The answer is that sometimes she does, but she is not fluent so she cannot always do this. Although if it were me in the students shoes, I know what I would want to experience. I would want to first hear the word explained in the second language alongside whatever visual other accompaniment that helps associate the word with its meaning (a photo, video, realia object, etc), and then I would like a clear explanation in my native language. This just makes the understanding much quicker for me. If I am only experiencing the context for a second language, it could take me weeks before I establish meaning for the sounds I am hearing.

Just to solidify this idea, there are phrases that I have heard in the language known as Lokumi, that I still, to this day, do not have a meaning to associate with the words, but I do have the context for when they are spoken. For example, “ito iban echu” is something that is said at the conclusion of a particular kind of religious drumming ceremony. This phrase is what is used to conclude the ceremony. I know when to say the words and have spoken them many times. I fully understand the context in which they are being said and I can provide a rough translation even based on the context (it is something along the lines of ‘everything has been done correctly and it’s all good’), but I do not understand the meaning of the words.

From the WK2 | Video Lecture

At 3’20”

“An adult may not be likely to say ‘I ranned outside’, but a child, who is learning grammar, may over apply a rule like always adding ‘-ed’ to the end of the word when it is past tense..”

This quotation comes from the lecture posted in canvas about the theories of language acquisition. This quote is excerpted from the section discussing B.F. Skinner’s Behaviorist theory. This theory states that children learn language primarily through imitation. Positive and Negative reinforcement occurs when a child is either understood or not, respectively. This theory is the basis for the audio-lingual method, which focuses on strict memorization as a means of learning a language.

This quote is an explanation of a limitation of the theory, related to grammatical rules. The example provided is something a language learning child might say: “I ranned outside”. This is not something a fluent adult would say, so it is not possible for this phrase to have been learned via strict imitation. This is an example of how children are extrapolating grammar rules from what they have learned and over-applying them in situations where there are exceptions to the rules, or they are not warranted.

“I ranned outside” is not something that would have been learned through imitation, it takes a modification of distinct concepts to put together such a statement. The vocab words: “I + Ran + Outside” and the assumed past tense conjugation: “-ed”.

For anyone who has tried to learn a latin based language, this is always a tricky part of the process that often requires strict memorization; learning to conjugate verbs properly. There are always irregular verb conjugations, so it is not possible to follow a singular rule in most languages, especially in english. But when you conjugate a verb incorrectly, it is not because you are imitating someone who has done it that way. It is most likely that you are going off the limited information you have access to and making a guess. ( What is a likely conjugation for this verb? )

Ironically, the best solution to correct such an error is actually to imitate a native speaker. A fluent english speaker would never say “you go-ed to the store”, a spanish speaker would never say “tu iriste para la tienda”. If you hang out with fluent speakers, you will hear the particular phrases used in the context where they are appropriate, and you then can adopt the phrases into your own lexicon.