Krashen and "Krashenite"

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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Iversen » Sat Feb 25, 2023 9:40 am

Cainntear wrote:Chomsky's dominance despite Tesnière's attempt to correct his errors is still having repercussions today, because computer programming languages were first invented during the height of Chomskyan grammar fads and the fact that Chomsky was so wrong about language is why computer languages are so bloody hard for humans to use.

It all comes down to a question of strategy. One keyword here is 'transformational grammar'. Transformations is a splendid way of describing the ways simple phrases can be made more complicated. Should we then avoid that word because Chomsky used it? Then the dominance of Chomsky and his offspring on Google would become even more pronounced. In other words I can't just stop using such a splendid notion just because somebody else also used it. Transformations is a splendid way of showing how sentence structures can be built, and they also function in a grammar à la Tesnière. But because of the overwhelming amount of articles written by Chomsky's followers people might think that I were a Chomsky disciple who believed in meaningless green grammar if I used the word.

And yes, "meaningless green grammar" is exactly my meaning about Chomsky in a nutshell. Inspired by his constituent structure teachers (Harris & co) he wanted to to built a mechanism that basically functioned without reference to meaning, and on top of that: his political stance attracted a lot of American university people so much that they swallowed his opinions on other matters (like language) raw. There were attempts to build generative semantic models, but ironically they failed because they were built on Chomskeyan principles, just turned upside down.

To describe a language you should first to look at how concrete words and structures work (and semantic criteria is an essential part of that), and THEN you can build a description that fits the results as closely as possible. And lo and behold, THEN you find out the hard way that it's the construction possibilities of the verb that in almost all cases dictate how a sentence is built - not the structure of the subject. Which is exactly what Tesnière wrote, but his message simply drowned in the fog of attempts to implement Chomsky's faulty ideas (which he revised several times, but without ever realizing where he had gone wrong in the first place).

Iversen wrote:For me comprehensible input is a splendid notion, but I don't use it as Krashen intended (for instance I'm an ardent supporter of bilingual texts for intensive study - he apparently isn't).

Cainntear wrote:But I'll say it more clearly this time:
If you say "comprehensible input", people will Google comprehensible input and they will find Krashen.
If you say "comprehensible input" therefore, you will not be understood.
It is a term that invites misinterpretation.
Therefore it is not a useful term.

Same problem: "comprehensible input" is in itself a splendid catchword, and it very precisely refers to something I also recommend, namely to study texts that are just one step above the things you already know. Actually it would be even better to write "almost comprehensible input", but that expression is not nearly as catchy. However because Krashen used it and thousands of grammar-hating disciples in his wake popularized and banalized it there is indeed a risk that you will be associated with that kind of people if you use the word "comprehensible".

So what else could you say instead of "comprehensible input" that conveyed the same meaning? Frankly I don't know, and therefore I continue to use it, but always stressing that an excellent way to make something fully comprehensible is to have a translation within reach. Besides I always stress the importance of grammar studies. OK, kids learn their mothertongue by building on short simple snippets of language from their parents and peers, not from reading thick grammar books. But if you can make order in the case endings of substantives in a new language simply by looking at a table, then f*** Krashen - just go for it.

I'm aware that Krashen's formulation always will pop up in Google searches far more often than anything I have written, but to give him and his followers a monopoly on interpreting "comprehensible input" would just make that situation even more tragically onesided. The least I can do is to use his favorite catchphrase, but then let people know that his use of it is skewed and potentially harmful.
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Irena » Sat Feb 25, 2023 10:50 am

Iversen wrote:So what else could you say instead of "comprehensible input" that conveyed the same meaning? Frankly I don't know, and therefore I continue to use it, but always stressing that an excellent way to make something fully comprehensible is to have a translation within reach. Besides I always stress the importance of grammar studies.

[...]

I'm aware that Krashen's formulation always will pop up in Google searches far more often than anything I have written, but give him and his followers a monopoly on interpreting "comprehensible input" would just make that situation even more tragically onesided. The least I can do is to use his favorite catchphrase, but then let people know that his use of it is skewed and potentially harmful.

Yup. I really see no point in letting some snake oil salesman have a monopoly on a good, descriptive term.
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby galaxyrocker » Sat Feb 25, 2023 1:20 pm

Cainntear wrote:In faaaact... Chomsky's dominance despite Tesnière's attempt to correct his errors is still having repercussions today, because computer programming languages were first invented during the height of Chomskyan grammar fads and the fact that Chomsky was so wrong about language is why computer languages are so bloody hard for humans to use.



Just wanted to butt in and ask if you had any good recommendations on where to start reading Tesnière's works?
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Cainntear » Sat Feb 25, 2023 2:04 pm

Iversen wrote:It all comes down to a question of strategy. One keyword here is 'transformational grammar'. Transformations is a splendid way of describing the ways simple phrases can be made more complicated. Should we then avoid that word because Chomsky used it? Then the dominance of Chomsky and his offspring on Google would become even more pronounced. In other words I can't just stop using such a splendid notion just because somebody else also used it. Transformations is a splendid way of showing how sentence structures can be built, and they also function in a grammar à la Tesnière. But because of the overwhelming amount of articles written by Chomsky's followers people might think that I were a Chomsky disciple who believed in meaningless green grammar if I used the word.

Well, I'm kind of in two minds about this. On one hand, the term transformational grammar works because it has a well-described, well-delimited purpose: changing one sentence into another. On the other hand, the very fact that it so clearly delimits the action does really push people towards an assumption of "meaningless green grammar" because I don't see applications of transformational grammars as having any real place on the quest for fluency.

On balance though, I think it may still be useful as a technical term, even if only in the realm of natural language processing (which is something endangered by modern mis-named AI). The problem I have with "comprehensible input" is that it *looks like a technical term*. As such, it's essentially pseudo-science. It seems to be more specific than "reading of an appropriate level for the student" (or "listening material of an appropriate level for the student") but it isn't really. The longer alternative invites the question "what is an appropriate level?"... which annoys teachers because they rarely have an answer for it; "comprehensible input" does little to open up similar discussion, and does tend to push towards Krashen.

This is not so much the case with "transformational grammar" because if you say "rules for how to change a sentence into something else", people will immediately get it. Krashen's "comprehensible input" is pseudo-science because it looks scientific but there's no quick explanation that you can say and have people immediately go "aah... got it!" A simple reading says "comprehensible input" means "reading stuff you understand". That has little educational benefit. The point of reading stuff that's challenging is good, but it's not very much of an "aah.. got it" phrase. How challenging does it have to be? This is just drawing people into a whole world of vagueness.

I believe that there's value in reading a book that contains words and grammar you actually know, because it might still be slow for you and reading that sort of thing sharpens your skills. I trust you believe the same thing. I believe that is better described in an honestly vague umbrella term of "reading at your level" with explicit explanation.

People often read "comprehensible input" and think that it means that, but then someone tells them that it means "reading something that you understand the meaning of, but don't understand the language of". This opens up a truckload of questions.

How do I understand something I don't understand the language of?
"You'll know it when you see it." (Aye, right!)
What happens if I think I understand it, but I've misunderstood it?
"Then it's not comprehensible input, and it's too hard."
OK, so you're saying I won't know it when I see it...?
"No, I'm saying you've picked something too hard for you."
What do I do to pick something that's right for my level, then?
"It's got to be n+1 comprensible input, so that it is just one level harder than your language."
You mean I've got to analyse the book in advance so that I know it's suitable...?
"Oh no, never analyse. You just... know."
What happens if I think I understand it, but I've misunderstood it?
"You're repeating yourself now."
Yes -- because you still haven't explained it.
"Oh, there's no use talking to you. You've clearly been brainwashed by teachers."
How do you know that?
"Because you don't believe me."
What exactly have you explained?
"I've explained everything!"
You've explained nothing.

I don't know if you see where I'm going here, because I know I'm increasingly likely to ramble on... :? but my point here is that "transformational grammar" is descriptive and instructive, and "comprehensible input" is neither descriptive nor instructive but deliberately paints itself that way so that people can genuinely believe that it is descriptive and instructive. The hypothetical conversation above is really not far removed from genuine exchanges in the real world.

I feel "books/DVDs/Netazon Prime Plus videos at an appropriate level" is better than "comprehensible input" in that it tacitly admits to its own vagueness. "Comprehensible input" appears in denial of how vague it is.

And yes, "meaningless green grammar" is exactly my meaning about Chomsky in a nutshell. Inspired by his constituent structure teachers (Harris & co) he wanted to to built a mechanism that basically functioned without reference to meaning,

Exactly. I do not know whether it was Chomsky's intention or not, but Krashen's "grammar doesn't matter" was an inevitable consequence of Chomsky's divorce of grammar from meaning. I do not know what Chomsky said about the nature of language, because my lectures on the history of generative grammars didn't go into that.

To describe a language you should first to look at how concrete words and structures work (and semantic criteria is an essential part of that), and THEN you can build a description that fits the results as closely as possible. And lo and behold, THEN you find out the hard way that it's the construction possibilities of the verb that in almost all cases dictate how a sentence is built - not the structure of the subject. Which is exactly what Tesnière wrote, but his message simply drowned in the fog of attempts to implement Chomsky's faulty ideas (which he revised several times, but without ever realizing where he had gone wrong in the first place).

Exactly. Modern scientists long ago abandoned pulling theories out of there backsides and inventing systems based on their theories that apparently proved them right (eg humans can't have evolved from monkeys because it's impossible to evolve less hair (and other such nonsense)). Language researchers have been very slow to do the same things.

Same problem: "comprehensible input" is in itself a splendid catchword, and it very precisely refers to something I also recommend, namely to study texts that are just one step above the things you already know. Actually it would be even better to write "almost comprehensible input", but that expression is not nearly as catchy.

Right, you have correctly identified that an accurate description seems less profession.
I say an inaccurate description is less professional, no matter how it appears/

So what else could you say instead of "comprehensible input" that conveyed the same meaning?

As I say "material appropriate to your level" -- be honest about the lack of precision.
always stressing that an excellent way to make something fully comprehensible is to have a translation within reach.

Yes, and that's how Krashen weaselled out of all rigorous analysis, and ardent Krashenite still do.
"Studying dictionaries won't help you."
You mean I should throw out my dictionary...?
"No, I mean it should only be used to make your input more comprehensible."

Who? What? When? Where? Why?

I'm aware that Krashen's formulation always will pop up in Google searches far more often than anything I have written, but give him and his followers a monopoly on interpreting "comprehensible input" would just make that situation even more tragically onesided. The least I can do is to use his favorite catchphrase, but then let people know that his use of it is skewed and potentially harmful.

The core problem, one again, is that "comprehensible input" is a phrase that has the outward appearance of precision, but is monumentally vague. It is pseudo-science, and pseudo-science can't be "improved", it simply must be binned.
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Cainntear » Sat Feb 25, 2023 2:08 pm

galaxyrocker wrote:
Cainntear wrote:In faaaact... Chomsky's dominance despite Tesnière's attempt to correct his errors is still having repercussions today, because computer programming languages were first invented during the height of Chomskyan grammar fads and the fact that Chomsky was so wrong about language is why computer languages are so bloody hard for humans to use.



Just wanted to butt in and ask if you had any good recommendations on where to start reading Tesnière's works?

I cannot remember with accuracy if I had come across him earlier, but I know I read about him in Daniel Jurafsky's book Speech and language processing. I have a feeling I looked his papers up online and I may have read his paper, but I cannot recall.

To be honest, you're better asking Iversen than me.
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Iversen » Sat Feb 25, 2023 2:47 pm

galaxyrocker wrote:Just wanted to butt in and ask if you had any good recommendations on where to start reading Tesnière's works?

I have only read one book of him, namely his "Éléments de syntaxe structurale", which I borrowed from the Danish "Statsbibliotek" in the late 70s - and I took a lot of notes from it :geek: :geek: . When I then wanted to check up on some details in 1980 while I was writing my dissertation the library told me they couldn't find it on the shelves and because it hadn't been reported as missing I couldn't make the library order it from another library. :o :twisted: :evil: OK, then I had to rely on my notes- and after I got my final papers in 1981 I didn't need to try again because I dropped all language studies for the next 25 years. ;)

I have no idea whether the book still can be found anywhere (except maybe here), but now that Tesnière's name came up again I checked the English Wikipedia article about him, and it gives you a reasonable good summary of his central ideas - including the information that there is a second version from 1988 (I used the posthumous first edition from 1959). The French article is far less informative, which is somewhat surprising, given that the man wrote in French.

As for the transformations: there has been some debate about Chomsky's claim that all languages use embedding - one native Brazilian language called Pirahã has been quoted as a counter example - but even then the overwhelming mahority of languages do embed. And to describe embedding there is no better why to do it than transformations, whatever the framework under which you are using them. And I have no intention of letting the Chomsky camp monopolize the word.

Sentence building is of course mostly an automatized process (at least in your better languages), but can still be dragged into the conscious mind - like when you are speaking or writing and suddenly remembers something that should be mentioned and then you embed it. In Chomsky's world there is a deep structure and a surface structure, but for some reason he wants to describe the transformations as if they occurred before the concrete words are chosen. For me the order is different: somewhere in my brain the need to use one or more words somehow materialize (because I need them to express something, heaven and the deeper layers of my brain knows what) - and then the clever brain finds a way to integrate those words into a sentence using the available mechanisms. And among these is the mechanism that attaches relative clauses to a nominal thingy.

If you really battle finding the right formulation for something then you know how utterly conscious this process can become. On the other hand: if you just do smalltalk in your native language you may not even be aware of the complexity of the task. However you always start out with some flabby semantic content, and then your brain finds some suitable words and a way to build these into a grammatical skeleton. It is not like the skeleton is there first, and then you find some words to use it for.
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Kraut » Wed May 17, 2023 11:41 pm

https://www.lucalampariello.com/comprehensible-input/

Cracking the Comprehensible Input Code
According to linguist Stephen Krashen, comprehensible input is that kind of input that is "a little beyond" our current level. This is how we acquire language and it certainly makes sense, but does it tell the whole story?

Is comprehensible input all we need to learn languages successfully, or are we still missing other pieces of the puzzle?

Let’s find out!
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Cainntear » Thu May 18, 2023 8:42 am

Kraut wrote:https://www.lucalampariello.com/comprehensible-input/

Cracking the Comprehensible Input Code
According to linguist Stephen Krashen, comprehensible input is that kind of input that is "a little beyond" our current level. This is how we acquire language and it certainly makes sense, but does it tell the whole story?

Is comprehensible input all we need to learn languages successfully, or are we still missing other pieces of the puzzle?

Let’s find out!

Warning: the line "Let's find out!" is like a red rag to a bull here. I don't expect Luca to actually do anything approaching research or investigating, and instead to simply state his opinions. That would make this line dishonest, as it would mean he's misrepresenting his opinion column as a piece of investigative journalism.

Is it true? Let's find out!

LL wrote:What’s behind Krashen’s Comprehensible Input?

If you've never heard of Stephen Krashen before, then he's someone whose work you should really get to know. Krashen is a widely-published linguist whose ideas form the backbone of Second Language Acquisition (that is, language learning) as we know it today.
In particular, Krashen is known for his many conjectures, hypotheses, and other ideas, two of the most popular being the concept of "comprehensible input", as well as the Input Hypothesis that goes along with it.

"Comprehensible input" is input that is slightly above your current language skill. In Krashen's writings, you also see this referred to as "i + 1", where "i" is your level right now, and the "+1" refers to whatever the next level above yours might be.

With that in mind, let's now dig into the "Input Hypothesis.”


Krashen is not a "widely-published linguist" -- he is a widely-cited linguist. His Wikipedia article lists 12 articles. I mean, that's probably not everything, but the real figure is likely not very high at all.

He is possibly the most cited in the language teaching literature, but that's not necessarily a good thing: Krashen's writings and appropriation of terminology have dominated so heavily that it's practically impossible to write about language learning without explicitly stating that you totally disagree with him. The constant mention of his name to say he's wrong is a massive confounding issue. Although my dissertation was never published (so doesn't affect his impact factor) I made the somewhat rebellious stance of only citing a book author that stated that the modern SLA field no longer accepted a difference between "learning" and "acquisition". I think I did so in the full expectation of getting feedback from my superviser to cite Krashen's "Acquisition-Learning Hypothesis", but I don't recall that ever happening.

To describe him as someone "whose ideas form the backbone of Second Language Acquisition" is utterly ridiculous. I studied a masters in SLA, and if his ideas are a backbone, then my masters was essentially invertebrate. He was mentioned because he had to be, but the whole course was based around the exact opposite of the comprehensible input hypothesis. Hell, in the first half of term 1, CI was brought up and I was totally on edge. Then the lecturer (who was my dissertation superviser later, incidentally) started talking about i+1 comprehensible input and immediately said "i+1 what?!?!" Krashen talks in pseudoscience -- i+1 sounds scientific and mathematical, but without defining "i", there is no maths.

And talking of pseudoscience, has anyone ever noticed that Krashen's "hypotheses" have remained "hypotheses" for about 40 years? A hypothesis should be tested and evidence gathered to support or refute it. When you have supporting evidence for your hypothesis it becomes a "theory". The term "hypothesis" sounds fancy and scientific to the world and "theory" seems to be negative because you have the common phrase "it's only a theory", but the truth is that the common use of "theory" corresponds to the technical term "hypothesis". If Krashen's hypotheses have remained hypotheses for pretty much as long as I've been alive then at best they are technically true, but have so little practical relevance that it can't be detected by scientific investigation or they're really, really wrong. In fact, in 2001, Wilfried Decoo delivered a lecture which has been widely distributed, entitled On the mortality of language learning methods in which he challenged the modernity of so-called modern methods by quoting a book, then revealing that it was from the late 19th century. There was a big thing about "natural methods" which were essentially indistinguishable from the input hypothesis, which he pointed out were dropped in the early 20th century because they weren't working, and it didn't matter whether the problem was that the natural methods camp were outright wrong, or simply that the natural approach wasnt practical given the time available in school language lessons. Doesn't matter. They were found not to work at the turn of the century and that was repeated by the Krashenites who had revived the ideas in the 1980s.


His main point about life cycles within language learning methods has been kind of fundamentally altered by the internet. No ideas die once they exist online. Well done to Luca for leading the zombie army.

Input Hypothesis

In Krashen's own words, the Input Hypothesis suggests that:

"We acquire language in only one way: when we understand messages, when we obtain 'comprehensible input'. We acquire language, in other words, when we understand what we hear or what we read—when we understand the message."

According to Krashen, if the Input Hypothesis is true, then a few other things must also be true:

"First, language acquisition is effortless. It involves no energy, no work. All an acquirer has to do is understand messages."
"Second, language acquisition is involuntary. Given comprehensible input, and a lack of [emotional] barriers, language acquisition will take place. The acquirer has no choice".

If you've never heard these ideas before, then they might seem pretty shocking. It's rare to hear anyone use words like "effortless" and "involuntary" when it comes to language learning; in fact, I think we're more used to hearing words like "difficult" and "frustrating" whenever the subject comes up!

Right. This is twisting a truth. First of all, it ignores the fact that a lot of people find comprehensible input approaches quite "difficult" and extremely "frustrating" . I mean, if you expect people to know what a word means when they know they don't know it, you can predict a frustrating experience... but then you still choose to deny that? You can only do that by blaming the learner. Notice Krashen's words (and I've removed the minor paraphrase here):
"Given comprehensible input, and a lack of affective barriers, language acquisition will take place. The acquirer has no choice".

He's admitting that it doesn't work, but he's blaming the learners. They have an "affective barrier", and Luca has quite aptly paraphrased that as "emotional barriers". Krashen was hiding behind using an effectively invented technical term to pretend that he wasn't blaming the learner, but he was.

So what gives? Where is the disconnect between Krashen's theory and the apparent "reality" that so many of us language learners face every day?

Notice how here Luca is arguably using the colloquial term theory correctly, but in doing so is arguably also promoting Krashen's hypotheses to a higher status. Notice how he uses scare quotes around "reality", and in doing so further promotes Krashen's hypotheses beyond their evidence-free status by implying that Krashen has the "real truth". (And yes, I realise I'm using scare quotes for something Luca hasn't actually said.)

To better understand where Krashen is coming from, I think it's useful to define a couple of terms. First, let's talk about explicit learning, and second, let's examine implicit learning.

"Explicit learning" is the kind of learning that takes active effort. If you studied a language in school, this is likely the type of learning that you engaged in, most of the time. It involves deliberately trying to take what you don't know and drill it into your memory.

"Implicit learning" is quite the opposite. This type of learning is done passively, usually through mere exposure to the information you are trying to learn. A good example of this is how you learned your mother tongue. When you were a child, you probably never had to do grammar drills to learn the verb tenses of your first language. It just happened naturally!

When Krashen says that comprehensible input makes language acquisition "effortless", he's saying that it provides an optimal environment for "implicit learning"—again, learning that is done passively, rather than actively. By contrast, the effortful language learning that you're used to most likely involves little comprehensible input and a lot of "explicit learning", which is by definition more difficult.

...and here we have a problem that is pervasive in modern education.

"Active learning theory" is seriously misunderstood, and this has led to the notion that there is such a thing as "passive learning". "Active learning" boils down to one thing: you can't learn passively, because your brain needs to be active to learn. You cannot learn implicitly without an active brain -- implicit vs explicit and active vs passive are totally orthogonal ideas. If you do explicit instruction well, your students are active and learn; if you do implicit instruction well, your students are active and learn. If you do either of them badly, your students are passve and don't learn.

There is so much talk about teaching and learning methodologies that mischaracterises the favoured theories by relating them to good teachers and demonises the unfavoured theories by equating them with bad teachers.

While the idea of "effortless language learning" certainly sounds more appealing than the frustrating learning experiences most of us had in school, I'm not entirely convinced that an all-comprehensible-input-based, implicit learning method is the way to go.

I think Krashen may have missed the mark here for one reason; a flaw in implicit learning that I've encountered often when trying to put it into practice myself:

The flaw? Implicit learning, though effective, is incredibly SLOW—often painfully so!
...
Comprehensible input is clearly useful, but wouldn't it be better if there were a way to—you know—speed things up a bit?

That's where Krashen and I diverge. I believe that's a better way for adults to learn foreign languages—one that can enable most of us to reach a conversational level quickly, without being as effortful and frustrating as explicit language learning often can be.

Luca is evoking Krashen to big himself up, and he then completely disagrees with Krashen's fundamental point while minimising how huge this is.

And also minimising how he's completely retreading old ground and shedloads of people more qualified than him have already said what he's daying. No teacher has ever said that reading target language books is bad -- they've only said that there's more to language learning than doing that. All Krashen has ever said is effectively that you just want to read books, and doing anything else is a waste of time.

Luca repeatedly talks about the one person who disagrees with him and completely ignores the people who agree with him. Why, because if he draws attention to people who understand language learning, he's pushing readers away from his naive opinion pieces, and how would he make a living then?!? Why, he'd have to find something useful to do!!

While Krashen believes that knowledge gained through explicit learning (that is, explicit knowledge) can never turn into implicit knowledge, I believe that explicit knowledge can often facilitate and reinforce information gained implicitly.

AAAAARRRRGH!
I could cite so many names that agree with him, and he only mentions Krashen... WHO DISAGREES WITH EVERYTHING HE STANDS FOR!

To be clear, I'm not exactly saying that Krashen and his Input Hypothesis are wrong;

Yes. He. Is.
comprehensible input should be the foundation of any language learning plan.

That is not what Krashen says.
I myself try to get as much comprehensible input as I can, but I always supplement that input with learning tools and aids in my native language (or a language I know well), so that I can make the learning process as efficient as possible.

And this is not disagreeing with a guy that says tools and aids in your native language are useless? Really? That's like saying "I don't disagree with vegan diets, because I eat plants too, but I don't think you can survive without meat." Yes, that's disagreeing with vegan diets, and Luca is disagreeing with Krashen.

Before I read and listen to a target language dialogue, I always make sure I obtain (or create) a bilingual copy of the text (affiliate), in both my native and target languages. This gives me a way to quickly fill in gaps in understanding as I mentally process the target language content.

Disagrees with Krashen.
As I get my input, if I find that there's a grammar structure that I repeatedly fail to understand, I won't just gloss over it until my brain figures it out. Instead, I'll go online and read a short explanation of the grammar point in my native language, and maybe even take a short quiz on it, if one is available.

Disagrees with Krashen.
As my input levels increase, I don't simply let my pronunciation skills grow naturally, based upon the pronunciation of the native speakers I've listened to. Rather, I seek out feedback from others, and even do a little technical research on the sound system of my target language.

Disagrees with Krashen.

Differently from Krashen, I believe that certain "explicit" learning tools (like translations, grammar explanations, and even feedback given in your native language) can help you learn a new language while saving lots of time that you would otherwise spend waiting for your brain to implicitly "absorb" the language!

Dis. Agrees. With. Krashen.

As such, I believe it is best to learn new languages in a way that combines both Krashen's implicit learning methods and some of the more typical methods for explicit learning that we're already familiar with. This is because explicit learning FACILITATES the acquisition of implicit knowledge, which is essential to learning a language well.

No.
No.
No.
Krashen's views are "only this works, nothing else does." If you combine techniques, you are doing What Mainstream Educationalists Do and NOT what Krashen does.

Luca's entire schtick would fall apart if he presented it honestly, because he would basically be saying "good teachers are good... trust them".

[Sorry for a long rant. Just couldn't help myself given the topic.]
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Le Baron
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Le Baron » Thu May 18, 2023 12:08 pm

Cainntear wrote:I studied a masters in SLA, and if his ideas are a backbone, then my masters was essentially invertebrate.

This made me laugh. :lol: Good analysis.
LL wrote:"Implicit learning" is quite the opposite. This type of learning is done passively, usually through mere exposure to the information you are trying to learn. A good example of this is how you learned your mother tongue. When you were a child, you probably never had to do grammar drills to learn the verb tenses of your first language. It just happened naturally

Ah...this thing. Yes, I don't think I was doing grammar drills as a child, but learning to understand or use the language wasn't simply 'effortless'. It's just that most children simply don't care about what they don't know, and actually do make a fuss about things they are aware of, but can't understand or express. Anyone who has had children must know the situation where a child lacking the ability to form words properly at a young age tries to tell you something and falls stiffly backwards onto a bed in tears and frustration when you don't understand. It's often hilarious.

Adult learners are haunted by the spectre of everything they know in their native language to a much more sophisticated level of mastery. That's why SLA feels so damn slow and difficult.
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Re: Krashen and "Krashenite"

Postby Cainntear » Thu May 18, 2023 1:28 pm

Le Baron wrote:
LL wrote:"Implicit learning" is quite the opposite. This type of learning is done passively, usually through mere exposure to the information you are trying to learn. A good example of this is how you learned your mother tongue. When you were a child, you probably never had to do grammar drills to learn the verb tenses of your first language. It just happened naturally

Ah...this thing. Yes, I don't think I was doing grammar drills as a child, but learning to understand or use the language wasn't simply 'effortless'. It's just that most children simply don't care about what they don't know, and actually do make a fuss about things they are aware of, but can't understand or express. Anyone who has had children must know the situation where a child lacking the ability to form words properly at a young age tries to tell you something and falls stiffly backwards onto a bed in tears and frustration when you don't understand. It's often hilarious.

Indeed. And in fact the "terrible twos" are quite widely accepted as being the result of the kid's brain being well enough developed that the kid knows what they want to express, but don't know how to say it. The idea that "learning like a child" is "effortless" ignores the entire concept of the tantrum. (Actually, a niece of mine was a preternaturally early speaker -- like, when I took her brambling before her second birthday, she was probably talking better than many kids entering primary school. She never developed tantrums. Although that isn't to say that she never went off in a huff. Just that there was no sitting down or lying down while screaming and flailing her arms around.)

Adult learners are haunted by the spectre of everything they know in their native language to a much more sophisticated level of mastery. That's why SLA feels so damn slow and difficult.

Absolutely. I put a large part of my overcoming of the differences between languages down to me analysing my own language and finding reasons why it didn't make sense.
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