The Role of Technology in Pervading English in Non-Anglophonic Regions
By Aadhi. Ramesh Babu & A.Komuraiah
The main purpose of language is communication and we know that there are various scientific and technical inventions have been introduced for communicative purposes English language classroom.This paper gives some methodological frameworks which will make sure success for inexperienced teachers in using various communication technologies, i.e., radio and video programmers in English. We know that English is an international and global language. Sometimes for non-native speakers like India or Africa, it is a foreign or second language. When teacher teaches English for them using the devices like T.V. or computers or radio, he must be very careful. In this way Dave Willis says “several such devices, while making positive contributions to learning, are potentially dangerous if they are overused or misused by a thoughtless programme planner or teacher who harnesses their potential for effective student control rather than effective teaching.”
Why should we use video, TV and radio in English language teaching? Can’t we teach effectively without using these? We would like to give some points about all the technological devices. Firstly, about the T.V. programme, it is a highly effective teaching medium. Video is a valuable and possibly underused classroom tool. There is always the temptation to simply put a video on at the end of term and let our students watch a film without even challenging them to be actively involved. In some listening exercises the teachers must concentrate on specific dialogue to enable the students to learn. It is necessary to challenge them to listen when dealing with features of pronunciation. Movies provide a good source of authentic listening material for the practice of pronunciation. It enables them to speak in good pronunciation.
The advantages of T.V. progammes are:
1. The programme can be played as many times as the learner wants. We very rarely hear a disembodied voice in real life but as teachers we constantly ask our students to work with recorded conversations of people they never see. This is often necessary in the limited confines of the language school and sometimes justifiable, for example, when we give students to practice situational dialogue, we have to add a whole new dimension to aural practice in the classroom by using video. The setting, action, emotions, gestures, _ etc, that our students can observe in a video clip; provide an important visual stimulus for language production and practice.
2. A short sequence from the programme can be selected for intensive study and worked on by the teacher in the classroom. If the students need it, they can watch it again and again.
3. The learners can concentrate on the language in detail and can interpret what has been said, repeat it, predict the reply.
4. Video can aid meaning by showing relevant information in close-up. It is very useful to the students.
5. The students can learn the culture of the target language in action.
6. The students can easily remember what they have seen on the T.V.
T.V. in English Language Teaching:
T.V. is used in teaching English language for several reasons. It offers visual and audio clues to meaning. The learners try to pay attention to the language and also see the context in which it is used. T.V. brings the outside world into the classroom and it provides the learners and teachers to speak something in the classroom. It can motivate the students to speak the sentences. The students can enact by looking others speeches on the T.V. They find it an attractive way of learning since it introduces a change from the teacher and the textbook.
Planning and teaching lessons based on video:
Video is not a method but it is an aid to the teacher. Teachers must plan lessons around a video or plan lessons using video as one of the aids. We know that a basic lesson plan is a platform to a successful teaching and so we have to prepare plan using video. For a successful class, a lot preparation is needed and the teacher should be ready to deal with all kinds of language problems and it is not too difficult to prepare a lesson plan for teaching with video. A few points in preparation for lesson using video are. The first is that select of video extract of about two minutes, the second is that select of language to be taught and the last one is prepare a lesson plan including worksheet for comprehension. We divide three stages of a lesson using video. They are comprehension (set up the situation, and active task) language study and transfer exercises using role play, acting out, etc…It is the framework of a basic lesson plan for teaching with video. During the first stage, the students will know the comprehension questions. During the second stage, the video is studied intensively and the language is selected and practiced and it is used in various situations.
Techniques and communicative activities based on video sequences:
The students watch the video without disturbance and build up sense of situation based on dress, environment, expression, gesture and actions. It encourages the students to expect certain kinds of language.
The T.V. set is covered with a news paper or with something, the students do not watch it but they pay their attention to the sound. This will help them in improving the listening skills. The students compare their performances when the teacher plays the video sequence finally with sound and vision.
Prediction is one of the important activities with video. The students can use voice, scene, expression and gesture as a clue to what will happen next. At the end of the session, one or two students will explain or tell the story of that day’s video in their own words. This will enable their listening and speaking skills.
The teacher will play situation dialogues video to the students. They listen and practice it.
The more conventional and traditional activity which helps students focus on the language in the video. The teacher would provide a script of the sequence under study and the students have to fill in the gaps.
By showing the pictures in the video, the teacher will ask a few questions regarding to it and to elucidate it.
Why we use computers in English Language Teaching:
Computers play a vital role in English Language Teaching. Computers are most popular among students either because they are associated with fun and games or because they are considered to be fashionable. Student motivation is therefore increased, especially whenever a variety of activities are offered, which make them feel more independent. We know that computers are impacting on the two things: one is subject matter and the English language. Computers have now become much more than a tool or a tutor for developing language skills. It is now less a question of the role of computers in the language classroom and more a question of the role of the language classroom in an information technology society.
We use the computers for the student’s improvement in English. Students can use the computer to develop and practice their English. A second perspective was in the use of computers for assisting and understanding of what constitutes the English language and how it works. This statistical analysis of language, initially analysis of written language, but more recently spoken language, has allowed us to examine the frequency of words and this has informed the profession from several perspectives. It has given us insights into the most useful vocabulary to teach and facilitated the emergence of the lexical syllabus. It has also allowed us to look at form-based words and this has given us insights into the grammar that we teach. By using computer, shy or inhibited students can be greatly benefited by individualized, student-centered collaborative learning. High fliers can also realize their full potential without preventing their peers from working at their own pace.
There are many changes in English teaching by using computers and the technological innovations. We are using internet for English teaching in this modern age. By sending E-mail and joining newsgroups, EFL students can communicate with people they have never met. They can also interact with their own classmates. Furthermore, some Internet activities give students positive and negative feedback by automatically correcting their on-line exercises. A foreign language is studied in a cultural context. In a world where the use of the Internet becomes more and more widespread, an English Language teacher’s duty is to facilitate students’ access to the web and make them feel citizens of a global classroom, practicing communication on a global level. Of course using of Internet is sometimes a contradictory matter in English teaching. Jarvis and Atsilarat suggest “the Internet may be a contributory factor in shifting away from a communicative towards a context-based approach to language teaching pedagogy”2
The Advantages of Computer in Organizing English Teaching and Learning:
The computer has certain strengths of handling the English teaching and learning. There are many advantages of the computer can be recognized:
1. Its capacity to control presentation.
Unlike a book, it can present fragments which add up to a whole; it can do so with any built-in time delay chosen by the students or selected for him. It can combine visual or graphic information with text; it can highlight features of text using color and movement. Potentially this is a great advantage over the linear fixed presentation of a book
2. Its novelty and creativity
Yes, oddly enough the computer is creative. Unlike any other classroom aid, it can vary the exercise each time. It is done and adapted its language to what the students produce, within certain limits.
3. Feedback
The computer is capable of analyzing what the student does and taking account of this in what it does next. One way of using this capability is through error correction; the student’s mistakes can be characterized and the appropriate advice given to him; or the computer may best its next move on an analysis of what the student types, whether in terms of increasing difficulty of the exercise, or of an answer in an exercise, or of altering the screen display.
4. Its adaptability
The first three advantages of the computer applied to the student, the last applies to the teacher. Unlike books or tapes, which are produced in a single uniform from publisher, computer programs can be adapted by the teachers to suit the needs of their students. A sophisticated way of doing this is for the teacher to master sufficient programming expertise to adapt the vocabulary, the level, the scoring scheme, or whatever of a program to his or her students.
Why we use radio in English Language Teaching:
In India, we have the large classes and most of the schools and colleges do not have T.V. and videos. Radio becomes the means of communication of a foreign language across large areas of the world. These are more available in cars or buses and certain parts in home like kitchen. The most important thing is that radio can take listeners ears and it keeps them on concentration and that we do not find in the case of T.V. or video. Radio gives more examples in language learning. Asif Shuja says “Although radio programme is less successful in the presentation of a foreign language in context and in communicating meaning, it is more successful at giving examples of that language”3
When the listener listen T.V. or video news or programmes, they may not keep you on the track of language learning but radio is an excellent way of developing listening ability. English Language teaching suggests that the learners should listen to radio news that enable them understanding English though they are non-native speakers. Listening to the radio helps to train the ear of the learner and also it improves fluency. It makes the learners as native speakers that are why most of the learners all over the world listen to the BBC World Service news for British English. The teacher needs to grade the activities used in the news, starting with the structure of the news, then dealing with headlines. News will improve the students all the study skills like listening, speaking, reading and writing. Radio lessons also help the learners in learning English, so for these reasons the teachers must encourage the students to listen the radio news.
Does new technology replace the teachers?
Without the teacher also, the students can attend the programmes and develop their skills by video. Then why the teachers are? The most important thing is that the students are motivated by the teachers only. Video, computers or radio will teach but they do not attract in such a way that teacher does. Expensive equipments are used for the English communication laboratory. We think they will help in many ways but mayn’t give the answers to the students’ questions in an easy way. In this point, Herschbach argues firmly “the new technologies probably will not replace the teachers, but will supplement their efforts, as has been the pattern with other technologies. The technologies will not decrease educational costs or increase teacher productivity as currently used.”4
In this competitive world, students should need to learn how to deal with large amounts of information across the world. At the same time, the role of the teacher has changed as well. We, as teachers, are not the only source of information any more, so we should act as facilitators so that students can actively interpret and organize the information they are given, fitting it into prior knowledge. When we do like that, students will have become active participants in learning and are encouraged to be explorers and creators of language rather than passive recipients of it.
Notes:
Dave Willies “The Potential and Limitations of Video” Video Applications in English Language Teaching. Pergamon Institute of English: Oxford (1983): 17-28.
Jarvis, H. and Atsilarat, S. Shifting Paradigms: From a Communicative to a Context-based Approach. Asian EFL Journal 6:4 (2004)
Asif Shuja “The Use of Communication in the Teaching of English Language in India” English Studies in India (ed) G.R. Malik. and Mohammad Amin, University of Kashmir: Srinagar 9 (2001) 90.
Herschbach, D. “Addressing Vocational Training and Retaining Through Educational Technology: Policy Alternatives” Information Series No. 276. Columbus, OH: The National Center for Research in Vocational Education. (1994)
9. Klein.W. Second Language Acquisition. Cambridge: Cambridge UP (1996): 167.
Aadhi Ramesh Babu, Assistant Professor of English in Kamala Institute of Technology and Sciences, Huzurabad, Karimnagar, Andra Predesh, has been teaching English to undergraduate students for the last 10 years. Besides being a seasoned teacher, he conducts spoken English classes for rural students. He did M.A. English and M.Phil from Kakatiya University, Warangal, Andra predesh. He has also done P.G.C.T.E. and P.G.D.T.E. from CIEFL. He has presented many research papers at National Conferences. Currently he is pursuing Ph.D in English.
A.Komuraiah is Senior Lecturer in A.K.V.R. Co-operative Colleges, Mulkanur, Karimnagar, A.P.
**ELTWeekly Team would like to thank Aadhi Ramesh Babu & A.Komuraiah for contributing this article.