Vol. 4 Issue 14 – Article: ‘Different Stages Of Learning English In The Tertiary Level’ by Dr. V.Vasanthi

This article is submitted by Dr. V.Vasanthi.

Introduction

Language learning process is not accurately traceable yet there is enough scope to trace the absorption of the same in a regular class room without any formal assessment.  It is also important sometimes to check the progress or the capability of students before putting them to a common evaluation pattern which is considered to be a serious step in awarding the grades.  Many classrooms deal with students who are basically of the same aptitude, knowledge and competency in the primary levels.  Just like there are differences in the advancement of the athletes in a running race, there are fair chances of some students advancing without any hitch, some making an average progress and some lagging behind. Therefore, in the secondary level there are differences owing to the learning ability and conditioning of the children in the primary level. More so, in the tertiary level, the differences in the aptitude, knowledge, skills and competency vary to a larger extent owing to the differences in the background of the students. The streaming pattern in many institutions in the tertiary level solves these problems to some extent by picking students with similar knowledge and aptitude. Yet, the students start afresh and advance in the class room and reach different levels of progress. This research paper attempts to analyse the different stages and the gaps created  among the students in terms of  knowledge, skills and competency and contemplate different methods to bridge these gaps.

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Some factors affecting the uniform learning potential of the students

1. Lack of interest
2. Competency of the teacher
3. Confidence level
4. Curriculum
5. Pedagogy
6. Saturation
7. Relationship with the teacher
8. Social conditioning
9. Differences in the social status of the students
10. Absenteeism
11. Lack of continuity in classes
12. Listening competency of the students

Beginning

To begin with, the students are either in a positive frame of mind or indifferent where in a powerful motivation is required to produce maximum results. This research paper will only deal with the students who are motivated and ready for learning. In such a lot, language learning process was traced and an experiment was conducted among a set of twenty average students in the tertiary level for a period of three months. The teacher met the students every day for one hour except Sundays and the total number of hours put was 72. Evaluation at the end of every month showed three different stages. Taking into account the difficulties in presenting all of the twenty samples, only two samples have been taken for discussion. The first stage can be called the stage of unlearning where the students had to realise that they had been carrying their wrong practices through their high school days.

The First Stage

Unlearning

In this stage, students are expected to possess some knowledge as far as language is concerned as they should have put in a minimum of 10 years in learning though the intensity of the exposure may vary. In case of convent educated students the emphasis may be to a larger extent on speaking with some glaring errors in writing. Whereas, the students whose speaking skills are under- developed may show some good samples of writing. In both the cases the unlearning has to take place. In some cases, we may find that both the spoken and written forms of the language have to be developed and in this case too, some unlearning has to be done before the learning starts. Therefore this stage of unlearning is the initial stage which has to be properly tackled by the teacher and the student before the learning takes place. A powerful motivation and confidence boosting methods should be followed by a teacher in a positive way. Let us now look into some common wrong learning that is manifested among the students who enter the tertiary level. Some of those are as follows:

1. Wrong usage of vocabulary
2. Using informal language in the place of formal
3. Grammatical errors
4. Spelling errors
5. Thinking in the native language and translating it into English
6. Errors in pronunciation

A poem titled ‘telephonic Conversation’ by Wole Soyinka was taught to the students and at the end they were asked to talk about what they felt about the theme, by sharing their favourite words or phrases in the poem. At the end of this they were asked to write a few lines.

Here are a few samples of the students’ writing:

Sample 1

The author in this poem shows out how people being discrimineted and how the white people show their hate on them. He is making a call to the land owner and asking if he could come for rent in that house. As the author knew that Negroes were not given houses, he said that he was African. For that the lady silenced and asked what colour he was.

Sample 2

The author begins the poem with a phone call. He thinks to himself about the location of the house to which he wanted to move. So he calls the land lady. The land lady picks the phone. The author then warns that he was an African. The lady went into a deep insulting silence.

In these two samples above we could find that almost all the errors pertaining to writing as discussed in this paper were rampant and the students had to unlearn a lot of things. In the first sample, apart from the spelling of discriminated, it can be seen that the student has missed the auxiliary before the word being. In the second sentence, we find that a simple present could replace the continuous. Also, usage of the word ‘shows’ instead of ‘points’ demonstrates the picking of wrong vocabulary. The phrase, ‘come for rent’ is a literal translation of the fragment from his native language, Tamil. The word ‘Negroes’ had to be replaced by a more euphemistic word, black. The usage of the word ‘silenced’ points out the need for learning grammar intensively by the student.

In the second sample too, although we find that it is better from the first sample, same kind of errors have occurred. The phrase, ‘thinks to himself’ could be replaced with ‘contemplates’ or ‘ponders over’. The last sentence is in simple past while the others are in simple present.

The students were made to be aware of these mistakes and were insisted on taking conscious and continuous efforts, which in a short span of time yielded good results. It was seen that the errors pertaining to spelling, pronunciation and vocabulary could be shaken off before they were ushered into the next stage whereas grammatical errors and the habit of translating from the native language could not be changed. At this stage, the student is confused about the differences between his perception and the ideal sentence structure. .Therefore the next stage can be said to be marked by bridging the gap between the actual and the ideal.

Second Stage

Bridging the gap

This is the most challenging part of language learning, where the student is perplexed at first. Effort of the student is the key and in most cases the language learners tend to get discouraged at this stage.  In fact, any failure in the language acquisition process can be attributed to the lapse in tackling this stage successfully. The developments after the second stage were traced through yet another written assignment and this time, they were asked to write a passage on the topic ‘Addiction to facebook’ and the samples have been provided as under:

Sample A

Now-a-days facebook has become popular and every one are using it. Many people have accounts in face book. They are chatting, playing games and making friends.  But at the same time it is also problem for some women. They are getting into trouble by using face book.

Sample B

Facebook has become a very interesting pastime for young people. It is interesting because, any one can find a person in the facebook, become friends with them and share information and pictures. It is also easy to create a profile and many school children have accounts.

In these two samples above we can see that both the samples A and B have improved and the spelling errors and conjugation errors have vanished but the habit of thinking in the native in the sample A has not changed and the uniformity of tense forms has not been achieved. Instead of having used a present continuous, the student could have used simple present. The student is confused about the singularity of ‘every one’.

In the case of sample B, more refinement is required especially in the phrase, ‘Many school children have accounts’. Apart from this the student has fared well as he was better than A even at the first stage. But this development could not be brought easily. Constant drilling and correction were instrumental in repeatedly making the students know the differences between the right usage and the wrong. Yet,  many confusions regarding the use of articles and prepositions prevailed. After this stage, ‘Thinking in English’ began to happen due to the constant exposure to the perfect usage. The third stage could therefore be called, “Thinking in English”.

The Third Stage

Thinking In Engliah

This stage can be called a stage of imitation where the student has taken examples from the correct usage and due to familiarisation and enough exposure, starts using those expressions. At this point the entire findings of this research culminate into one fact. Imitation is the key for language learning. After imitation, comes improvisation and finally sophistication. To record the development at the end of the third stage (i.e. end of three months) an activity was conducted and the students were asked to do a casual role play on a particular situation. They had prepared the dialogue before hand and this showed a considerable improvement.

Sample A:  Hello!! Are you Kumar by any chance?

Sample B:  hey prashanth! How are you doing man?

Sample A: I am fine. What brings you here?

Sample B: I came to check if there is any opening in this office. By the way what are you doing now?

Sample A: I have been working here for the past 2 years. What did you do?

Sample B: I was doing a correspondence course in M.B.A.

In this sample above it can be seen that the fluency has not been achieved even though the improvement has happened. The phrase, ‘What did you do?’ should have been ‘What have you been doing?’ . The research took into account only three months of vigorous drilling with a conducive atmosphere for learning and evaluation provided that the co-operation of the students was ensured.

However, this experiment was conducted mainly based on bringing results in writing skill and when an oral test was conducted, it yielded poor results owing to the fact that speaking requires more practice and proficiency.

Conclusion

Thus the learning process of the student was traced in the tertiary level and inferred that the progress takes place in different stages of which three are important. However this research paper did not concentrate on the ways and methods to deal with the tackling of the problems faced in these different stages, which would be another potential topic for discussion.

Bio Note

Dr. V.Vasanthi has been teaching English language for the past 10 years and has been teaching in Loyola college, Chennai, for the past six years. She has published work books to develop communiation competence, besides publishing in reputed national and international journals on ELT and Literature. Besides, She has undergone institutional training in three classical dance forms of India, namely Bharathnatyam, Kuchipudi and Mohiniattam. she synthesizes her ideas derived from class room teaching and scientifically adapts these experiences in her research articles.