4. Language Acquisition :How to acquire foreign language in an interesting and fun loving way
-Pooja Kalia
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ABSTRACT
The aim of my paper is to focus on child language acquisition that is how during the early years, the child acquires the mother tongue in a natural way without any formal teaching. It is a great achievement as each and every language has its own complexities in terms of morphology, phonology, grammar, syntax, vocabulary etc. If a child could acquire mother-tongue effortlessly, then why it becomes a herculean task when the same child learns the second language L2 i.e. English and this is evident in the mushrooming growth of spoken English institutes charging huge fees from the innocent preys. Through this paper my endeavor is to solve this Gordian knot that “where lies the problem and why? Why most of the students have phobia of foreign language especially English and are tongue tied in English. How can we make our generation to learn and acquire English in a fun loving way without making them cram the rules of grammar? If children like to play games and if music has a great healing power then why we cannot bring the joy of games and music in the classroom. This will not only help in breaking the shackles of monotonous routines but they will play while learning and learn while playing.
Key words: Functionally illiterate, global status, Over-generalization, systematic simplification, linguistic development, cerebral lateralization, effective communication.
INTRODUCTION:
Teaching and learning English in India has always been a challenge, both for the teachers and the taught. Widely spoken throughout the world, English took over Indian tongues with the coming of the colonial rule. Gradually the language became part of the curriculum in educational institutes and the language of communication of the elite. The English rule faced a stiff resistance in Punjab from ruling power here and the language faced a challenge in becoming a medium of instruction and conversation. English being the backbone of modern cultures and globalization is insufficiently developed among the students in Punjab. The irony is even after spending 10-12 crucial years of their life learning English language from 1 to +2, most of the students remain tongue tied and the same heritage of functionally illiterate learners in English is passed on to the colleges.
CHILD LANGUAGE ACQUISITION: THE EARLY YEARS
The remarkable achievement of acquiring the mother-tongue takes place with little or formal teaching without injecting any wonder-drug in their brains. And by acquiring the native tongue the child has solved the mystery of language. The child has discovered it even without knowing that language exists and he has found out how it works and learned to use it. The linguistic interaction between children and their caregivers, and later, their peers is the only language to which children are exposed. In a sense, it is a language “CLASS” that bears no resemblance to traditional school classes.
There are a number of experiences that can play a major role in shaping a child’s development. The experiences that parents and other caregivers, provide during the earliest years of a child’s life is the most crucial. By paying close attention to and interacting with the world and people around him, and without any school type formal instruction, the child has done a task far more difficult, complicated and abstract than anything he will be asked to do in school, or than any of his teachers has done for years. He has done it by exploring, by experimenting, by developing his own model of grammar of language, by trying it out and seeing whether it works, by gradually changing it and refining it until it does work. That is he has solved the mystery of language. (Gardner:2014).
According to psychologists, the child at lower age can pick up more languages without any difficulty. When a child meets a new language which is not his mother tongue, his mind automatically tries to apply the first language experience to it (Harold: 1990). Language cannot be learned by merely studying rather it is learned by exposing the learner to L2. For this, it is important that teachers should act as mentors.
FOREIGN LANGUAGE AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF GRAMMAR
The grammar of children’s English becomes evident when they are able to produce utterances consisting of two words. The word order patterns found in children’s English shows that their language is rule governed and not random. In addition to reflecting the rule governed creativity of their language, children’s errors of overgeneralization show that they construct their own grammatical rules. Correct uses of basic word order suggest that they learned two fundamental facts about English grammar: word-order is crucial for communication and the basic word-order pattern is a sequence of subject and verb e.g. utterances of child- ‘mama help’ and not ‘help mama’.
As children’s utterances become longer, it becomes clear that their grammar increases in complexity (Pakenham:2010).‘Systematic simplification by omission’ is one of the main characteristic of child language. But the important thing is that the child utterances do not contain the words: the, to, in,I, me, is and are. These articles, prepositions, pronouns and auxiliary verbs are function words and these words are completely absent from the children’s English at the early stage of linguistic development (Pakenham: 2010).
Eg. Rahul Sleep papa wet
Rahul Book Papa dry
It becomes clear that English, even at this early stage is rule governed and not random. Children have the innate capacity to construct its own mini-grammar without cramming formal rules of grammar and without direct formal teaching. That’s why, during early years of acquiring native language, the child says:
‘Baarish aaya’ instead of ‘barish aayi’.
The important thing is that there are developmental mistakes and if a child commits any grammatical mistake, he/she should not be scolded in front of all as English is not our mother-tongue e.g. If a child says:
‘The police catched the thief’ instead of
‘The police caught the thief’
A teacher must correct the sentence politely with a smile because at least the child has learned a rule of grammar ‘-ed’ as past marker. By beginning to use incorrect plural forms like mens, hairs, foots, feets, mouses, sheeps, cattles etc., shows that they have learned the rules for regular plurals. A child learning to talk does not learn by being corrected all the time if corrected too much, he will stop talking. But in school we never give a child a chance to detect his mistakes, let alone correct them. We act as if we thought he would never notice a mistake unless it was pointed out to him soon he becomes dependent on others especially the teacher. We should let him do it himself. The child comes to feel that learning is a passive process, and the learner a blank sheet for other people to write on, something that someone else does to your, instead of something you do for yourself.
ROLE OF RULES FOR GRAMMATICAL USAGE
If a child had been made to cram rules of grammar to learn his own native language, he would never have learned to speak at all. It seems terribly unfair to expect a child or anyone else to do it in a foreign language what they could not even do in their own language.
English grammatical usage is largely a matter of fact. It is a fact which the learner can only accept that we say:
One girl, two girls
One child, two children
One woman, two women
Similarly, a child may be perplexed when confronted with such examples of pronunciation In certain context, one could say: “Do you understand me” and at another moment in a slightly different context, one could say:
“Are you understanding me?.” An average learner would do well to accept this fact without trying to puzzle out the reason and to believe that on both occasions, the usage of language was correct. That is why, it is said, “not too much drill on rules compels the children to speak”. Our aim should be not to make them cram the rules of grammar but to get our pupil speak and write the language grammatically; not to teach them theories about English but to make them proficient in using the language itself for effective communication. So, do not overload their innocent minds by stuffing rules, just put a spark in them to learn the language. That’s why, it is rightly said:-
“If you wish to speak well you must murder the language first”.
ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING: THE PRESENT SCENARIO
Teaching of English has become a real challenge right from the beginning of the history of English language teaching to date. Though language is the backbone of civilization and cultures across the world but still everybody in our country is lamenting on the deteriorating condition of English in schools and colleges. We see sorry state of affairs in India since Indian students are school made bilinguals. The study of L2 in India is largely compulsory in the sense that it is prescribed to a student in the present educational structure, syllabi and curricula. That’s why, most of the students study English not as a subject to be ‘learned’ but as a subject to be ‘passed’. A student does not bother about knowledge or learning of language but makes all efforts to get the diploma or degree no matter what way he is able to get it. Michael West in his book On Learning to speak a Foreign Language said:-
“A language is not a subject which can be taught; it is a subject which must be learnt.”
Children have an uncanny and remarkable ability for learning languages, which decreases year by year until the child has reached his mid teens. Unfortunate, that is when we usually begin to teach them L2. Scientists have attempted to account for the remarkable inability of adult learners to acquire a native like pronunciation and command in the second language.
This is the age at which cerebral lateralization is completed. Cerebral lateralization is the process by which the two hemispheres of the brain increasingly specialize in particular functions. When lateralization is complete, it closes the critical period of life during which humans can acquire native speaker pronunciation in a language. From the research it seems that a child’s brain has a degree of flexibility and after lateralization this flexibility declines significantly. Unfortunately, that is when we usually begin to teach them L2.
HOW TO MAKE LANGUAGE TEACHING INTERESTING AND FUN LOVING
Ben Jonson had rightly said:-
“To speak and to speak well are two things. A fool may talk, but a wiseman speaks”.
If we apply it in today context, we will find that there are very few students who can really speak well after completion of their studies. Thus to make teaching of language interesting, try to relate it to the activities that children would love to play and have fun. We must bring the joy of games, songs toys, puzzles and movement into the ESL classroom. We can also use video clips and real objects to make it relevant and interesting. Tell the children to put on the puppet shows and do role plays. Teach them songs, folk songs and easy pop tunes. There is a famous Chinese proverb:-
I hear, I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”
If we use a variety in our lesson and add fun to the ESL classroom, all our students will learn English better and virtually effortlessly.
Language as Game:
It is rightly said;
“Teach me the way I learn, if I do not learn the way you teach”
Language learning is a hard task which can sometimes be frustrating. Well chosen games can provide intense and meaningful practice of language and can remember better. It also gives students a break and at the same time allows students to practice language skills. Games are highly motivating, amusing and at the same time challenging. Moreover, they employ meaningful and useful language in real contexts and increase cooperation. Thus, it is possible to learn a language as well as enjoy oneself at the same time. Games are not just time filling activities but have a great educational value.
This also enables learners to acquire new experiences within a foreign language which is not always possible during a typical lesson. Furthermore, in the words of Richard-Amato, they “add diversion to the regular classroom activities, break the ice and also used to introduce new ideas”. An innovative teacher who is full of life, vigour and resourcefulness can turn a dull class into a lively two-way interactional game and can act as best audio-visual aid.
Games are often used as short warm-up activities or when there is some time left at the end of lesson. Games ought to be at the heart of teaching a foreign language. They can be used at all stages of the lesson, provided they are suitable and carefully chosen. Not only this, they can also help in revision by recalling material in a pleasant and entertaining way. For improving their stock of vocabulary, one can use flash cards and other games to help them build vocabulary effortlessly. Write one word on the blackboard and tell them to give associate words related to it.e.g. School-teacher-pupil-desk-chair-headmaster and so on. They might take a game that interests them and involve healthy and friendly competition e.g. one important game of their interest is forming story on the spot. Tell them to make a circle and continue the story from the point where the previous student left. One might initiate a story “there was a girl who never used to talk with others. She was quite introvert and even do not like to play……”
Another is we can ask them to think of an adjective that describes them and an activity that they enjoy doing. Each word must begin with the same letter that starts their name e.g. a student might say:-“I am handsome Harry and I like to fly kites.”
ADVANTAGES OF USING GAMES
- Through games children experiment, discover and interact with their environment.
- Through playing games, students can learn English the way children learn their mother-tongue without being aware they are studying: thus without stress, they can learn a lot.
- It makes the foreign language immediately useful to the children and brings the target language to life. Thus, even shy students can participate positively.
- Games add variation to a lesson and increase motivation and provide the stimulus for language learning by keeping them involved. They are a welcome break from the usual routine of the language class.
- Games encourage students to interact and communicate. They provide language practice in the various skills-speaking, writing, listening and reading.
- Games bring in relaxation and fun for students, thus help them learn and retain new words more easily. Vocabulary games bring real world context into the classroom and enhance students’ use of English in a flexible way.
- Games are not only used for mere fun, but for improving learner’s communicative competence and generating fluency.
MUSIC AS STIMULANT
As an ESL teacher, one can play movies and music in the second language. Every language has its own rhythm. This will help the learners to catch on to that rhythm. The structure of music lends itself to repetition and memorization, and is a great teaching tool for the young. Songs can not only teach but entertain also like the alphabet song or nursery rhymes also provide wonderful teaching tools for children. Bilingual versions of popular children’s songs are easily available which helps to develop good accent and pronunciation in the early budding stage.
Using music and song is one of the tools that can be used to teach English to class, regardless of the age of the learner. Music is a tie that binds all cultures and languages and therefore, one of the best ways to make learning English fun. In case of young learners, one must use songs that are of repetitive nature and easy to understand e.g. ‘Old Mc Donald’. This will improve their listening skills, language and conversational skills. For young learners, teacher can tell them to stand up and use total physical response to underscore the words they are hearing in the song. Make it a game. e.g. write the main words on a blackboard and explain each word to the class so that they can understand what it means. Firstly, make the class listen to song (the first time) and point out the word as it comes up in the song. In the next round, split the class into teams and play the song again. This time whichever team hears a word, and become the first one to identify it on the blackboard gets the reward. This will give birth to the spirit of friendly competition. But one must make sure to choose the songs that are appropriate for the age & culture of your class.
CONCLUSION
The bond between teacher and learner should always remain intact for the growth and progress of learners. As Abdul Kalam says, “Winners don’t do different things but they do things differently.” There is no need to teach a new concept in an innovative way in the form of games and music which students will enjoy and learn. Moreover, English is not our native tongue and teachers should understand that provided children have access to the language spoken in their environment, all children successfully learn that language, regardless of their intellectual or socio- economic differences. And one must not forget that children’s acquisition of their native language, during the first five years of life, is an impressive achievement. And the language acquisition process is completed successfully without the help of formal teaching. But when the child enters the formal teaching scenario, the new language i.e. L2 seems to be a burden to him. The child is expected to speak and frame grammatically correct sentences. e.g. if a child is hungry and says:- “hungry, eat food” instead of writing grammatically correct sentence: “I am hungry. I want to eat food”, a teacher may accept it temporarily, but make a note to correct this at an appropriate time.
This does not mean that child has committed a crime. If what the child intends to convey is communicated though in a scattered way, the child should be appreciated instead of being humiliated in front of all. The basic purpose of language is communication and if the message is communicated though not in the perfect state during early stage, the teacher should be patient enough. It is a gradual process and children tend to produce errors due to the process of over generalization. As they grow older, their English utterances increase in complexity. But unfortunately as more stress is given on producing grammatically correct sentences, the child soon learns not to ask questions and the result is the child or the silent spectator becomes passive who never participates in the class but try to copy the sham utterances and paste them in their examination.
During the early foundation years of learning, teachers should understand that it is crucial to have congenial environment for learning. This is because a child is like a tortoise and tortoise moves forward if it sticks its head out and it will do so if it feels secure. So, the learner should be devoid of any phobia about language so that they can learn it in a proper way. Teaching of English in India, to a great extent, is examination oriented only. But teachers should cater to the practical needs of learners, to make them competent enough to interact with one another.
REFERENCES
- Allen B. Harold. Teaching English as a Second Language: A Book of Readings. Tata Mc Graw Hill Publishing company Ltd. Bombay, 1990.
- Flink-Levy, Rachael. The Silent Voice: The problem Learner in the English Classroom. English Teachers Journal No. 38, 1989.
- Pakenham, Kenneth J. Making Connections, A Strategic Approach to Academic Reading. Cambridge University Press, New Delhi. 2010.
- West, Michael. Learning to read a Foreign Language: An Experimental Study. Longmans. Green and Co., Ltd, 1936.
Electronic Source
- www.teflgames.com
- www.quotegarden.com. The Quote Garden: A Harvest of Quotations for Word Lovers. copyright © 1998-2018. Feb.23, 2018.
- Gardner Peter S. New Directions: Reading, Writing and Critical Thinking. Cambridge University Press, Delhi, 2014
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