Through a glass, darkly: processes and effects of teaching L3 through L2

Mark HopkinsHKUST

Hong Kong, China

Outline

1. Language status and pedagogic history

2. Background to the EDHEC programme

3. Background to the Lang/C programme

4. Reactions from participants

5. Conclusions

6. Implications for L3 instruction

Language of the past… & future?

French was the primary language of Europe from the 18th to early 20th century, became an official language of all major international institutions + sole official language of the EU until 1973 (Economist, 2001).

According to the French government “délégation générale à la langue française”, there are globally 116m learners of French, 0.5% of whom study at the Alliance Française.

Language of the past… & future?

In 1991 there were 2,000 foreign learners taking China's official Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì (HSK); by 2004, the number of candidates had risen sharply to 360,000 with the opening of the first Confucius Institutes, and China’s Ministry of Education estimated that approx 20m people were learning Chinese as a foreign language worldwide; today the number is 40-50m.

In 1996 400 (200 independent) secondary schools in the UK offered Chinese as a foreign language, compared to one in the 1960s. However, since 2010 there has been limited support.

In the US K-12 students of Chinese tripled from 20,000 (2005) to 60,000 (2008); 400 high schools and 2500 elementary schools.

Pedagogic history

• Français langue étrangère (FLE) a colonialist project reinvented (cf EFL); Alliance Française founded at height of Empire (1883), now has 500,000 learners.

• kǒngzǐ xuéyuàn (Confucius Institutes) first set up in 2004.

1071 (133 countries)

2007: 95

(34 countries)

2014: 400 (UK = 13, US = 70)

(105 countries)

EDHEC programme similarities

EDHEC business EDHEC business school school

Lille/Nice (France)Lille/Nice (France)Global Business Global Business programme at programme at HKUSTHKUST

Business programmes use L2 (English) as language of delivery

L3 elementary course with bilingual (L3/English) instructor

1st experience of using L2 (English) to learn L3

High stakes / credit-bearing

1st experience of studying “overseas”

EDHEC programme differences

EDHEC business school EDHEC business school Lille/Nice (France)Lille/Nice (France)

Global Business Global Business programme at programme at HKUSTHKUST

•Previous learning of L3 was through L1 in L1 environment

•L3 taught in L2 environment, with limited exposure to L3

•No previous L3 learning

•L3 taught in L1/L2 environment

Lang/C programme

• French: World Language and Culture

• Targets (false) beginners / ab initio

• 3 credits / 39 in-class hours

• Cultural element (20%) added in 2010

• 10 iterations / 200+ students

• Generally very positive student feedback, compared with language-only courses

Reactions from participantsQuestions 1-2: Amount of prior learning (through L1)?

L1 Fr: at least 30 hours (almost all)

L1 Ch: mostly zero

Question 3: What are the advantages of learning through English?

L1 Fr: similar word order / learn English at same time! / no difference / no advantages

L1 Ch: similar vocabulary, grammar / easy to understand explanations, ask questions / learn English at same time!

“Just need to do some change in words, English can turn into French easily”

Question 4: What are the disadvantages of learning through English?

L1 Fr: less precise explanations / need to translate from Eng to Fr / more difficult / none

L1 Ch: “faux amis” (homographs), different pronunciation make it easy to confuse Fr with Eng / none

“When I speak French I tend to think in English and then translate”

Reactions from participantsQuestion 5: How is the teaching methodology of your English-speaking instructor different from your prior experience?

L1 Fr: greater focus on speaking than writing / more useful, learnt more in 2 months than in 7

months in France!

L1 Ch: mostly N/A or no difference / expects more self-learning

Questions 6-8: Would it have helped if your instructor spoke more L1?

L1 Fr: Yes (more precise explanations) and No (less oral practice)

L1 Ch: No (less oral practice, learn Eng at same time!) and Yes (confusing Fr with Eng)

“I can get a better overall picture of French by learning through English”

“English is the medium of learning anyway!”

Questions 9-10: Amount of cultural learning of L3?

L1 Fr: not enough L1 Ch: mostly enough

Reactions from participants

Question 11: How important is cultural learning for English?

L1 Fr: quite or very important

L1 Ch: not important: “English does not only belong to English-speaking countries”

Question 12: Is cultural learning more important for the L3, and why?

L1 Fr: Yes, because Chinese culture is “more different” / affects behaviour more

“Chinese people are more culturally linked than English”

No, because learning the language is difficult enough!

L1 Ch: Yes, because French culture is “more exclusive” / important for beginners to learn /

“the French really value their culture and history”

“one often learns French just because one wants to go to France”

No, because any language can be learnt for communication only

Reactions from participants

Q13: How important do you consider L1-3?

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

L1 Fr L1 Ch Bothgroups

L2 (English)

French

Chinese

Reactions from participants

Q14: How useful for you personally are L1 & L3?

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

L1 Fr L1 Ch Bothgroups

L2 (English)

French

Chinese

Reactions from participants

Q15: How easy to learn do you find L1-3?

0

20

40

60

80

100

L1 Fr L1 Ch Bothgroups

L2 (English)

French

Chinese

Reactions from participants

Question 17: Have any of your attitudes towards the L3 language/people/country changed since the start of the course?

L1 Fr: “Chinese people have very different cultural reference points / attach a lot of importance to religion / are very weird / quite impolite / very kind but very different!”

“The Chinese language is beautiful to listen to / much more useful than I expected / possible to learn!”

“I cannot live in China because nobody speaks English!”

L1 Ch: Mostly no changes in attitudes, but…

“The French language is more beautiful / fun to learn / not as difficult as I thought / precise / complicated / easy to learn as the vocabulary size is small”

“French people are romantic / easy-going / proud of their language”

“France is a beautiful country with lots of great food / is terrible /

“It is not easy or romantic to learn French!”

Question 16: How important is direct L1 to L3 communication?

L1 Fr: quite important or not important L1 Ch: quite important

Conclusions from data• Due to limited sample size (27+22 respondents), inappropriate

to draw firm conclusions• Attitudes clearly changed more among the French students

(1st study experience outside West?)• Differences in responses between groups were fewer than

might be expected from national stereotypes generational similarities

• Among both groups, pragmatic assessments of their language worlds (relative status of English, French and Chinese)

• Among Chinese group, greater flexibility (willingness to learn through English as well as L1)

• Among French group, deeper understanding of the importance of explicit cultural knowledge in language learning

Implications for L3 instruction 1. Language systems:

• learning L3 through L3 (“direct method”) is clearly more problematic than learning L2 through L2 (or L1 through L1!)

• desirability of L1-knowing instructor depends on relative proximity of L2 & L3 (as well as other factors)

• status of L2 as lingua franca / “langue véhiculaire”

Implications for L3 instruction

2. Learner characteristics prior learning:

Implications for L3 instruction 3. Cultural systems:

• implicit/embedded in language study but can be made explicit through comparison by a bilingual/bicultural teacher-mediator

• “intercultural competence” – Byram, 1997• ideally a 3-way comparison, but especially L2/L3 differentiation if

languages-and-cultures are proximal

4. Mediation:“multilingualism is a mediational system in itself,

sustaining, but also mobilizing and reorganizing language user identities, relationships and possibilities for action and the relative values of languages” – Jyväskylä conference description, 2008

From The Economist 22/12/07 print edition…

Byram, Mike (1997), Teaching and Assessing Intercultural Communicative Competence. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.

Hufeisen, Britta (2000), Tertiary languages with a focus on German as a foreign language. In: Rosenthal, Judith (2000), Handbook of undergraduate second language education: English as a second language, bilingual, and foreign language instruction for a multilingual world. Mahwah, NJ, Lawrence Erlbaum, 209-229.

Mediating Multilingualism: Meanings and Modalities (2008, June 2-5), University of Jyväskylä, Finland. Thomas, Jacqueline (1985), The role played by prior linguistic experience in second and third language learning. In: Hall, R. Jr. (1985), The eleventh Linguistic Association of Canada and United States Forum 1984. Columba, S.C., Hornbeam Press, 510-518.