Intro to TEFL

HUMAN LEARNINGGROUP I :

AZIZ, DERRY, HAPPY, ZUL

LEARNING AND TRAINING

Learning defines as a process

of acquiring / getting

knowledge of a subject or a

skill by study, experience or

instruction.

Attributes: - result, relatively

permanent change in behavior

- Build comprehensive

understanding

- lifetime

Training is a process of

shaping into a desire like

form. (www.ideallearningroup.com)

Attributes : - result,

achievement of clearly stated

objectives

- For mastering specific skills

- Short period of time

LEARNING THEORIES - BEHAVIORIMS

1. Pavlov’s Classical Behaviorism / Conditioning

Learning process consisted of the formation of associations between

stimuli and reflexive response.

The conditioned / unconditioned stimulus results the conditioned /

unconditioned response.

S R2. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning

Defines as a process to that attempts to modify behavior through the use

of reinforcement and punishment positive or negative. (learningtheory.com)

Reinforcement aims at increasing behaviors.

Punishments aims at decreasing behaviors

LEARNING THEORIES - COGNITIVE

3. Ausubel’s Meaningful Learning Theory

Defines learning as a process of relating new events or

items into already existing cognitive concepts.

Meaningful learning opposed to rote learning /

memorization.

Systematic forgetting happens when specific items /

information become progressively less identifiable.

LEARNING THEORIES - CONSTRUCTIVISM

4. Rodger’s Humanistic Psychology

- Goal of education is the facilitation of change and learning

- Learning how to learn is more important than being taught..

- Rodger viewed that teachers should :

- 1. Become facilitator of learning process

- 2. Gain trust, acceptance, prizing of others, worthy and

valuable individual.

- 3. communicate openly and empathically to students or vice

versa.

GAGNE’S TYPES OF LEARNING

Signal learningAn Individual learns to carry out a general conditioned

response toward a given signal. Usually this response is

emotional

e.g.

Pupil’s reaction when teacher announces that a test will be administered. A feeling of fear caused by a loud sound. Joy at seeing a likeable toy.

Stimulus-Response Learning

Skinner’s operant conditioning, also called instrumental response. The

individual shows a certain Response (R) to a discriminated Stimulus (S).

Nearly all examples of S-R learning, including vocalization involving

intentional motor behavior.

e.g.

Mastering Response to obtain a reinforcement or reward. Children start to learn words by repeating the sounds and words of adults.

Psychomotor connection learning

Often called the learning of skills. This type involves the combining or

connection of two or more units of S-R learning. The connection is limited

to the physical and non-verbal sequence. Pre-condition to stabilize the

connection is that every S-R bond has to be formed before building the

link.

e.g.

Turning the spring of children’s toy. Writing. Running. Catching and throwing a ball. The strength of the association learnt depends on exercise, past experience and reinforcement.

Verbal association learning

One form of association. But association between verbal or language units.

Naming an objects is the easiest connection. In this case, the first S-R

association involves the observation of the object and the second S-R

association is achieved when the children name the object.

e.g.

Remembering poems, formulae or the alphabet in sequence. Individually, this learned behavior is not considered an important aim of learning. However as hierarchical level, this association is the first step to more important higher levels in learning.

Multiple discrimination learning

Separate associations which have been learnt are connected to form

multiple discrimination. Again, preceding associations needed at a lower

hierarchical level should be learnt earlier. At this level, a person learns

different responses to different stimuli. Because of this, he learns to

identify associations which may be confused with objects or phenomena

resembling each other.

e.g.

Recognizing the names of the children in a class. Differentiating solids, liquids and gases.

Concept learning

Concept learning means learning to respond to a stimulus

according to abstract characteristics such as position, shape,

color and number and not according to the concrete physical

characteristics.

e.g.

A child learns to call a 5 cm cube a ‘block’ and uses this name for other objects that are different in size and shape. Then he learns the concepts of cube and with this he can identify a class of objects that differ in characteristics such as material, color, texture and size.

Principle learning

A principle is a chain of two or more concepts. In principle

learning, one needs to associate more than one concept.

e.g.

The relationship of the circumference of a circle with its

diameter. Three concepts: the circumference, pi, and diameter

are related. Identifying the number of legs to classify

invertebrate animals.

Problem solving

In problem solving, a person uses principles that have been learnt to

achieve an aim. Besides achieving the aim, he acquires the skill to use his

new knowledge and in time his skill is enhanced. He will be able to handle

similar problems. What has been learnt is a higher-order principle that

combines many lower-order principles.

e.g.

Experimenting to test the effect of different types of fertilizer on plant growth.

TRANSFER

o The reliance on the prior learning to facilitate new learning

o The carryover of previous performance or knowledge to subsequent

learning.

e.g.

When children say “I eat a banana” it indicates

that he does the transfer of rule from Bahasa

Indonesia to English.

INTERFERENCE

o Negative transfer

o When previous performance/knowledge disrupts the

performance of a second language

e.g.

I eat banana yesterday

I have a car new

OVERGENERALISATION

Process that occurs as the second language learners act within

the target language: generating a particular rule or item in the

second language – irrespective of native language – beyond

bounds.

e.g.

o Overgeneralisation of past verb. All past verb is ended in -ed(walked, worked, opened) as applicable in all past verb (goed, flied)

o Overgeneralisation in an uttrance: I was walked

Inductive and Deductive Reasoning

Inductive and deductive reasoning are two polar aspects of the generalization

process.

Inductive reasoning (IR): one stories a number of specific instances and

induces a general rule that subsumes the specific instances.

Deductive reasoning (DR): a movement from a generalization to specific

instances

IR Specific General

DR General Specific

See the daft below:

Both inductive and deductive reasoning can be applied in

teaching learning process depend on the goal and contexts of

a particular language teaching situation.

Aptitude and IntelligenceAptitude: a natural ability or propensity. (by. Oxford dic.)

Aptitude is through a historical progression of research that began around the

middle of the twentieth century with John Carroll’s construction of the Modern

Language Aptitude Test (MLAT).

The MLAT required prospective language learners (before they began to learn

a foreign language) to perform such tasks as learning numbers, listening,

detecting spelling clues and grammatical patterns, and memorizing, all either in

the native language, English, or utilizing words and morphemes from a

constructed, hypothetical language. The MLAT was considered to be

independent of a specific foreign language, and therefore predictive of success

in the learning of any language.

Intelligence has traditionally been defined and measured in terms of linguistic and

logical mathematical abilities.

Howard Gardner (1983) advanced a controversial theory of intelligence that blew apart traditional thought about IQ. He

described seven different forms of intelligence, they are:

1. Linguistic

2. logical-mathematical

3. Spatial (the ability to find one’s way around an environment, to form mental images of reality, and to transform

them readily)

4. Musical (the ability to perceive and create pitch and rhythmic patterns)

5. Bodily-kinesthetic (fine motor movement, athletic prowess)

6. Interpersonal (the ability to understand others, how they feel, what motivates them, how they interact with one

another)

7. Intrapersonal (the ability to see oneself, to develop a sense of self-identity

In likewise revolutionary style, Robert Sternberg was in his ‘triarchic’ view of intelligence, he proposed three types of

‘smartness’, they are:

1. Componential ability for analytical thinking

2. Experimential ability to engage in creative thinking, combining desperate experiences in insightful ways

3. Contextual ability: ‘street smartness’ that enables people to ‘play the game’ of manipulating their enveronment

(others, situations, instirutions, contexts)

THE MOST POPULAR

METHODS OF THE 1970s

Methods of language teaching include:

1) Community language learning

2) Suggestopedia

3) The silent way

4) Total physical response

5) The natural way

Community language learning (CLL)

This approach is patterned upon counseling techniques and adapted

to the peculiar anxiety and threat as well as the personal and

language problems a person encounters in the learning of foreign

languages.

The learner is not thought of as a student but as a client.

The instructors are not considered teachers but, rather are trained in

counseling skills adapted to their roles as language counselors.

The language-counseling relationship begins with the client's linguistic confusion and conflict.

The aim of the language counselor's skill is first to communicate an empathy for the client's threatened inadequate state and to aid him linguistically.

Then slowly the teacher-counselor strives to enable him to arrive at his own increasingly independent language adequacy.

This process is furthered by the language counselor's ability to establish a warm, understanding, and accepting relationship, thus becoming an "other-language self" for the client.

Suggestopedia

-This method developed out of believe that human brain could process great quantities of material given the right conditions of learning like relaxation.

- music was central to this method.

- Soft music led to increase in alpha brain wave and a decrease in blood pressure and pulse rate resulting in high intake of large quantities of materials.

- Learners were encouraged to be as “childlike” as possible.

- Apart from soft, comfortable seats in a relaxed setting, everything else remained the same.

The Silent Way

This method begins by using a set of colored wooden rods and verbal commands in order to achieve the following:

1)To avoid the use of the vernacular.

2)To create simple linguistic situations that remain under the complete control of the teacher .

3)To pass on to the learners the responsibility for the utterances of the descriptions of the objects shown or the actions performed.

4)To let the teacher concentrate on what the students say and how they are saying it, drawing their attention to the differences in pronunciation and the flow of words.

Total Physical Response (TPR)

Total Physical Response (TPR) method as one that combines information and skills through the use of the kinesthetic sensory system.

This combination of skills allows the student to assimilate information and skills at a rapid rate. The basic tenets are:

1) Understanding the spoken language before developing the skills of speaking.

2) Imperatives are the main structures to transfer or communicate information.

3) The student is not forced to speak, but is allowed an individual readiness period and allowed to spontaneously begin to speak when the he/she feels comfortable and confident in understanding and producing the utterances.

The natural approach

This method emphasized development of basic personal

communication skills

Delay production until speech emerge i.e learners don’t say

anything until they are ready to do so

Learners should be as relaxed a possible

Advocate use of TPR at beginning level

Comprehensible input is essential for acquisition to take

place.

THANK YOU