Plebeian English Teaching

Why study linguistics? How can studying linguistics lead to a successful EFL classroom?

Of course there are many factors that go into an EFL classroom that attributing a successful classroom.  However, an EFL teacher should have a basic understanding of language works. This idea of basic competence is actually a heated topic of discussion.  Some believe that being a native speaker is enough to be an EFL teacher.  It should be noted that this belief benefited me in the beginning of my teaching career; however, I believe that teachers need to grow and develop as long as they are teachers (thus this blog).

If a teacher wants to develop their skills, then the teacher needs to develop an understanding of how words work, or morphology.

While the word “morphology” looks challenging, it can be broken down down into simpler parts.  The two simpler parts include derviational and inflectional morphology.  Derivational morphology strives to understand how a language makes new words; inflectional morphology focuses understanding on the different parts of speech interact in a language. Breaking a word down into a morpheme, or the simplest form of the word.

Most English teachers have to teach lessons on suffixes, prefixes, and adding “s” or “es” to third person singular verbs. Suffixes and prefixes, such as “un” and “pre”, are examples  of derviational morphology.  They change the meaning of the word.  Adding “s” or “es” to third person singular verbs is an example of inflectional morphology

Why is this important?

A teacher should understand the students in the classroom.  The first language of a student heavily influences student’s second language acquisition (Brown, 2007).  Knowing the differences between the English and the first language will help bridge the gap between the students and the teacher.

Here are the 8 English inflectional endings.

Click to access EnglishInflectionalAffixes.pdf

I hope this helps.

Reference:

Brown, H. (2007). Principles of language learning and teaching (5th ed.). White Plains, New York: Pearson.

Hornsby, D. (2014). Linguistics: a complete introduction. London: Teach Yourself.

Education turns into factory work.  Students come in, and test go out.  While some lament this, it seems that school for the most part is a safe place to be.  Danger and school should never mix.  If this is to be our fate, then amor fati.  The question becomes how can educators make school a positive place to be.  This leads me to reflect on the idea of consistent variety.  It is one of those ideas that has echoed in my head for a long time.  School should be a place were different educational games are played in fair and familiar ways.  Maybe learning is about stretching the imagination just far enough to make the moment meaningful.  Please know that this thought obviously not entirely mine.  This is a simple reflection of a long day of playing hangman.

Yesterday’s blog was about the difference between phonemes and allophones.  The problem is how to make this information pertinent to an EFL classroom.  Since phonics is part of the curricula, it should be obvious where to use this new piece of news.

Being such a novice, implementing any changes to my teaching style and lesson plans seem premature.  Right now, the awareness of how different language learners make mistakes is important.

Fretting over whether my students aspirate or don’t aspirate the “t” sound does not appeal to me.

This morning I read a little from “Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching”. The selection that I read this morning about Audiolingualism noted the importance of positive reinforcement.  From that point of view, it is better practically speaking to focus on the phonemes when teaching and not the allophones.  Maybe it is laziness? However, maybe good is good enough for beginners learning a language.

Reference:

Hornsby, D. (2014). Linguistics: a complete introduction. London: Teach Yourself.

Richards, J. C., & Rodgers, T. S. (2001). Approaches and methods in language teaching.

Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press

What did I learn?

I learned that words, or lexemes, are made up of phonemes.  Phonemes are made up of allophones.  This is not a completely accurate description.  Linguists, like all intellectuals, enjoy using jargon to describe simple concepts. This gives them a higher degree of precision when talking about a topic and additionally makes them sound smarter.

Nailing down what exactly is a word is difficult.  It is only simple when live a bubble and view the world solely through the lens of THE MOST GLORIOUS ENGLISH.  In some languages, it is hard to distinguish between a word and a sentence.  I run into this daily because Korean is an agglutinating language, which means it uses morphemic blocks.  Anyways, I will get back on the topic.

If we just accept the common idea of what a word is, then we can break down the parts of the word.  For example, “stop” and “top” both have a “t”.  The “t” is a phoneme.  In my and your head and only in our imagine does the letter “t” exist.  The difference is that the “t” in “top” is aspirated.  This difference is real and shows the difference between two allophones.

Here is a great video that explains this better.

Reference:

Hornsby, D. (2014). Linguistics: a complete introduction. London: Teach Yourself.

I am into my first third of my career as an educator.  There have been thousands of bad classes, false starts, and ton of miscommunication.  Some of it is due to having my career in Asia.  Most of it is because of my failures.

Today I was sitting in a bus on the way home.  All of the signals were in a foreign language I barely understand. Snow was slowing falling.  I was wondering if my students understood my lessons.  I pondered if they understood my plans for them.

There in the distance was an old woman with a bent back digging through the trash.

The moment made me mad. Do I understand my lessons? Do I understand my students?

The snow has stopped falling.

There is nothing but the abyss…

What was the first language?  Why did language start? Who spoke it? Did multiple people start speaking in different places?  Did they speak different languages?

It is painful for some to admit that there are no answers.  Yet, an honest look at language leads to conclusion that something is amiss. Does this paucity of answers tell us something?

In the second chapter of “Linguistics: A Complete Introduction”, there is no clear answer to these questions. People who claim to know the first language have vested interest in maintaining power through language.

This disappointment is followed by another.  Where does language come from? Does it come from the nature or the gods? Does it come from our own minds?

First, Plato argues that nature comes from the gods in our own head.  This linguistic naturalism stated that words come from us intrinsically and rationally. Then this rationality was juxtaposed with empiricism that language with its arbitrariness came from the senses. Thirdly, Chomsky strikes back with the idea the humans are innately equipped to learn languages.

It is only a disappointment if you like answers.  Who doesn’t mind waiting 10,000 years to learn that the number 42 is the ultimate answer to the question of life, universe, and everything?

Hornsby, D. (2014). Linguistics: a complete introduction. London: Teach Yourself.