When teaching/ learning a language it is necessary to consider the processes that it involves.
Dr. H. Douglas Brown in his book "Teaching by principles" let us know about what he calls 12 principles which we as teachers can take into consideration to set the learning process and to focus in what we consider it should bedone to achieve our students' goals.
Basically the author focuses on how we think about the language, how do we feel about it and how it is including its system. Just to kkep them in mind I mention the principles: automacity, meaningful learning, anticipation of reward, intrinsic motivation, strategic investment, autonomy, language ego, willingness to communicate, language-culture connection, native langugage effect, interlanguage and communicative competence. It was really interesting to figured out where and how every principle takes place during the learning process; personally, I would say we have to do what we can to enhance each benefit from them.
I completely agree with you, Nancy. It's good for us as teachers to know and understand the principles and to be able to see them in action in our classrooms. Was there any one of these principles that stood out for you as being especially prevalent in your classroom and with your students? I have always found, that especially in EFL classes, that intrinsic motivation can be one of the most challenging to tap into. What is making students want to study and acquire this language? How do we as teachers instill motivation in our students, or is it possible for us to without giving them some sort of external reward (prizes or punishment) to do so?
ResponderEliminarKeep up the good work, and always try to apply this theory to what you know and experience in real life.
Nancy - Where have you gone? No blog entries......Write some more please!
ResponderEliminarMolly, at first I thought intrinsic motivation was the appropiate principle to answer your question but thinking deeply I consider that autonomy is the one we should develop in our students because it enables students to be aware of their responsabilty when learning, also it lets teachers to act as guides during the process.
ResponderEliminar