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Learning and learning styles
“…as a part of the process of education, teachers
themselves should maintain a continuous process of personal
reflection, within which they become aware of the personal and
cultural values and beliefs that underpin their own and other
people’s actions” (Williams and Burden, p. 2, 1997).
Here’s my attempt to reflect on learning styles and
how I address them.
Introduction
Learners bring to the classroom different
characteristics and different background (age, gender, personality,
motivation, life experience etc.). These factors are very important
for learning process. According to Williams and Burden there are
four key sets of factors that influence the learning process. They
are teachers, learners, tasks and contexts. “They all interact as
part of a dynamic, ongoing process”. (Williams and Burden, 1997, p
43).
The group I teach is a Business English
pre-intermediate group. The teaching of Business English brings
together these areas: knowledge of the language and understanding of
the role of communication in professional situations.
The “three-cornered contest” of ESP includes:
accuracy, fluency and effectiveness. The latter is learner’s total
performance (linguistic and non-linguistic) which determines the
success or failure of communication. Fluency does not necessarily
lead to effectiveness in communication therefore fluency does not
equal effectiveness. So, a teacher must concentrate on teaching
three different (yet related) elements or skills: accuracy, fluency
and effectiveness. ( adapted from Brieger, p 4-5, 1997).
Language knowledge reflects the formal aspects of
grammar, vocabulary and the sound system. In communication we
activate this knowledge to transmit messages through different
channels (presentations, meetings, telephoning or in written
documents (correspondence, reports)).
So as a trainer I have to design and deliver courses
which aim to increase language knowledge and develop communication
skills. The language to be introduced and practiced in Business
English classroom reflects the professional background of the
learners. The channels of communication to be developed and
practiced reflect the professional world of presentations, meetings
and telephoning rather than general communication in discussion.
Profile
of a class that I teach regularly
I teach a group of four adults aged from 19 to 40 years old. This is
not a mixed-ability group, all students are almost at the same level
of language knowledge and skills. All students are speakers of
Russian as a native language. The course they are taking is rather
long - eight months.
Learner 1 is a post-service (in-work) learner with quite frequent
use of English in every-day work. Learner 2 is a post-service as
well with daily use of English. Learner 3 is another post-service
learner with the job that does not involve English currently.
Learner 4 is a pre-service learner, a student at the University, she
would like to connect her future job to include English.
Needs analysis
At the beginning of the course each student had a placement test and
had to fill in the Course registration form. According to the data
that I received from this form all the students wanted to develop
general language knowledge, specialist language knowledge, general
communication knowledge, professional communication skills i.e.
everything that the form suggested, however nobody added anything. I
think that everybody chose all points in this part of the form
because they might estimate themselves as incompetent or not enough
competence in those areas. It would be interesting to ask students
fill this form in again at the middle of the course, that will show
how much they think they have learnt.
The important points to cover in speaking for everyone were
presenting at meeting or conferences, using the telephone.
Participating in meeting was of high importance for post-service
learners and of medium importance for a pre-service student and the
learner whose job does not involve English. I think this shows that
the post-service learner really need these skills for their job.
Everybody chose to be able to understand discussions at meetings.
Listening to conference speeches and lectures did not seem of high
importance to anybody. Writing and reading e-mails was important to
everybody.
Based on the data of the Course Registration Form I designed a
course that consisted of topics typical for business area e.g.
“Great ideas for business”, “Mergers and takeovers”, “Selling
on-line” and many others. Within these topics students are able to
get such skills as making presentations, participating in meetings,
making a business appointment by the phone. Thus by the end of the
course the students are supposed to be able to develop most of the
skill a business person must have to be able to communicate in
English.
The course content
reflects the diverse needs of varied learner groups – from
pre-service students to in-service professionals.
As the course was going I was having individual interviews with
every student asking if she/he is satisfied with the course or would
like to change something. The answers revealed that in general terms
everyone was satisfied but each of the students had some comments to
make, such as: “I think you need to give us more home task”, or “I
would like to learn more words that I can use in law field”, or “I
would like to get more grammar input”. These things were actually
very interesting to have found out because I thought I made my
inputs in a very balanced way and absolutely everyone was satisfied
with everything. What I did first thing - was grammar. I took a
grammar book and we started doing grammar exercises. It was
interesting to see that only one person was enjoying it – the one
who asked for more grammar input. Doing grammar activities in the
classroom was a rather difficult decision for me to make. I do not
usually teach grammar as it, I prefer teaching functions. After
doing grammar tasks I asked for a feedback. The opinions that came
out were interesting. One person said that she really needs to do
more exercises on grammar as for her this is the guarantee of
inaccuracy in speech and this is what she did in different courses
before she became my student. Another student said that due to her
previous experience in a different language school she could not
start speaking for a long time because of too much grammar input and
being afraid of making mistakes and that what she likes about my
classes is that we actually do a lot of speaking activities. That
was a lot of food for thought for me. All of my students are fluent
but not very accurate. I had to think of the ways of how to cope
with it. Since all of them have different learning experience they
all now have different views on the ways a lesson should be held and
what exercises must be used. “…each individual constructs his or her
own reality and therefore learns different things in very different
ways even when provided with what seem to be very similar learning
experiences”. (Williams and Burden, p. 2, 1997).
Learning needs (cognitive and affective)
–knowledge and language skills in a range of business contexts
through communicative activities. Communication training which
develops the effectiveness of the total communication process by
looking at the message in terms of its form and delivery.
Many learners will see their reasons for attending a training course
in terms of improving communication skills. “Some learners see
improvement in terms of better control and fewer mistakes, i.e.
accuracy; others see it in terms of greater spontaneity and more
flow, i.e. fluency; and a third group see it in terms of impact on
listeners, i.e. effectiveness.”
“Regular feedback sessions are a method for the trainer to involve
the trainees in the program and its direction. This is particularly
important on extensive courses where priorities can change as
trainees better understand their own strengths and weaknesses.
Learning styles
“Cognitive styles can hence be thought of as predispositions to
particular ways of approaching learning and are intimately related
to personal types”. (Richards and Lockhart, 1996, p. 59)
Each trainee will approach the task with their own preferred
learning style. Knowing the trainee’s learning style will help the
trainer match up the lesson stages against learner types.
In the book called “Manual of Learning Styles” (1992) Honey and
Mumford identify four learning styles:
1.
The activist
learns by doing the task (they enjoy using the language and
experimenting with communication).
2.
The theorist
learns by understanding the underlining theory (they what to know
why a particular language form is used in a specific situation).
3.
The pragmatist learns by practicing in a controlled
environment (they enjoy the security of controlled practice
exercises, it gives them confidence to use language forms in
communication accurately).
4.
The reflector
learns by watching others doing the task (they might feel insecure
about their ability to perform in the language, however in a secure
environment they become willing to participate in communicative
tasks). (Adopted from Brieger p 108)
Preferred learning strategies
Motivation for studying English in this particular group comes from
wish to get better carrier opportunities as well as to be modern.
The thing is that in Russia it is considered that a modern person
needs to be able to speak English. None of them, however, has a
regular access (exposure) to language, i.e. they do not use English
for communication outside the classroom on regular basis. That is
why I have to tell them where and how to find access to target
language. I tell them some Internet sites, we watch films in
English, listen to songs. Having no exposure to language is a strong
demotivating factor. During the lesson I do try to motivate my
students through finding engaging activities, but I think I need to
consider the ways for a person who lives isolated to find access to
target language and even target culture….I can only think of the
Internet and films here, but I am sure there’s much more to think
of.
The students need to be able to make monologue speech (e.g. make a
presentation of their company) as well as be able to communicate in
a dialogue. They enjoy working in groups. They sometimes even
request for more these kinds of activities. I think this is
connected with the need of an individual to be a part of a team to
solve a problem co-operatively. “….social interactionism
….encompasses the key elements of learning and education” (Williams
and Burden, p.3, 1997)
Since my students are very much oriented for using English in their
work, the first thing we did was making a CV. I delivered a series
of lesson teaching how to write a CV. We also studied how to make
presentations in English, how to write e-mails to business partners,
we did a lot of case-studies where students had to make a group
decision.
During the course students needed to remember a lot of new words. At
first students found it really difficult, so I had to show them some
ways of remembering vocabulary. That was “learner training i.e.
explicit teaching of strategies” (Williams and Burden, p.160, 1997).
So we were making spidergrams. I instructed them on how to do
homework i.e. I told them not to do the whole task at once, but to
distribute it into portions and do a little every day. I do not know
if it worked equally for everybody because different learners react
differently. I did not take a very profound approach to teaching
learning strategies. I now realize that what I did was just
instructing my students of what to do. The much better way would be:
“….first helping students to identify or become aware of strategies
they are already using, then presenting and explaining a new
strategy with a rationale of using it”. (Williams and Burden,
p.160, 1997).
At the beginning of the course the students had problems with
listening. So, I had to teach them what strategy to use when coping
with listening exercises. One student was particularly poor in
listening, so I recorded a CD with the listening exercises for her
so in three months she was very good at listening.
Looking at the students’ faces I sometimes think they are
dissatisfied and it is interesting to see from the questioner that
they actually do enjoy the activities and want more of them. I found
using questioners results very useful. They give a better picture of
how my learners see the process of learning.
The classes are held in the evening and most of the time the
students are tired after work. I really find it very pleasant when
they say things like “English for mу
is better than yoga, because when I am in the
lesson I forget about all my troubles and problems”. Studying a
language involves not only thinking but also emotions. “When
learners learn a new language, they are….actively involved n making
their own sense of the language input that surrounds them as well as
the tasks presented to them” (Williams and Burden, p. 23, 1997).
In the end of a series of lessons I asked my students to write down
the words they have learned during this time. I was happy to see
that students could recall a lot of words they have learnt and this
seemed to make my students inspired and thus more motivated.
Conclusion
“Teachers’ own conceptions of what is meant by learning, and what
affects learning will influence everything that they do in the
classroom.” “….in order to make informed decisions in their
day-to-day teaching, teachers need to be continuously aware of what
their beliefs about learning and teaching are”. (Williams and
Burden, p.2, 1997). Working on this assignment gave me a good
chance to think and crystilise some of my beliefs of learning and
teaching. I haven’t crystallized all of them yet but I feel I am on
the right way.
Bibliography
Burns, A. (1999) Collaborative Action Research for English Language
Teachers. Cambridge University Press, 2003
Richards, J.C., Rodgers, T.S. (1986) Approaches and Methods in
Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press, 2007
Williams, M., Burden, R.L. (1997) Psychology for Language Teachers:
Constructivist Approach. Cambridge University Press, 2007
Richards and Lockhart (1996) Reflective Teaching in Second Language
Classroom. Cambridge University Press, 1996
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