SLA RESEARCH IN THE CLASSROOM/SLA RESEARCH FOR THE CLASSROOM
By Patsy M. Lightbrown
Department of Applied Linguistics
Concordia University
Montreal, Canada
Anniversary article. Classroom SLA research and second language teaching
In Lightbown (1985a), I summarized SLA research by stating ten generalizations which were consistent with the research to that date.¹ I concluded that
SLA research could not serve as the basis for telling teachers what to teach or how. One of the reasons for that was the limited scope of SLA research at the time. Another reason was that most of the research had not been designed to answer pedagogical questions. However, I suggested that SLA research was one important source of information which would help teachers set appropriate expectations for themselves and their students. In this paper, following a review of language teaching practices of the past fifty years, I reassess the ten generalizations in light of the considerable amount of classroom-based SLA research which has been carried out since 1985, especially that which has addressed pedagogical concerns in primary and secondary school foreign and second language classes. For the most part, this research tends to add further support to the generalizations, and this gives them greater pedagogical relevance. Nevertheless, I argue that teachers need to continue to draw on many other kinds of knowledge and experience in determining the teaching practices which are appropriate for their classroom.
1. Adults and adolescents can ‘acquire’ a second language
Krashen (1982 and elsewhere) made a distinction between acquisition (language knowledge that develops incidentally as learners focus on meaning in comprehensible input) and learning (knowledge about language gained through formal instruction or metalinguistic analysis). Research has provided support for the hypothesis that second language (L2) learners acquire some linguistic features without intentional effort on their part or pedagogical intervention on the teacher’s part...
2. The learner creates a systematic interlanguage which is often characterised by the same systematic errors as a child makes when learning that language as his/her first language, as well as others which appear to be based on the learner’s own native language...
3. There are predictable sequences in L2 acquisition such that certain structures have to be acquired before others can be integrated
Classroom research has added support to the early SLA research evidence that many linguistic features are acquired according to a “developmental sequence” and that although learners’ progress through a sequence may be speeded up by form-focused instruction, the sequence that they follow is not substantially altered by instruction (e.g. R. Ellis, 1989). When classroom input is very restricted or when learners’ production consists largely of memorised formulas, there is sometimes the appearance of difference (Weinert, 1987). The restricted or distorted samples of the target language that learners are exposed to in some types of language instruction can lead to a developmental path that appears to reflect the acquisition of something other than the target language...
4. Practice does not make perfect
This does not mean that practice, broadly defined, is not an essential part of language learning! In stating this generalisation in 1985, I was thinking of practice as it was often defined in audio-lingual classrooms – pattern practice and drill in isolation from meaningful language use. As suggested under generalisation number 3, when learners drill and memorise language material that is beyond their current level of development, they may eventually exhibit “U-shaped” behaviour (Kellerman, 1985). That is, their apparently high level of accuracy, based on the use of memorized chunks, can drop and then rise again as they come to create novel sentences. Even when instruction is not oriented to the rote learning of whole phrases or sentences, learners may have difficulty recognising the components which make up the chunks of language they are frequently exposed to....
5. Knowing a language rule does not mean one will be able to use it in communicative interaction
The relationship between knowing “rules” for language use and actually using language in a way that is consistent with those rules is not straightforward. Native speakers use language fluently and accurately but are rarely able to articulate the rules that characterise their use of the language. Second language learners who have had extensive instruction in the language may, in contrast, be able to articulate rules that their spontaneous language use does not reflect. However, classroom SLA research has shown that learners do benefit from instruction that focuses their attention explicitly on language form, albeit not necessarily in the form of “rule” learning
6. Isolated explicit error correction is usually ineffective in changing language behaviour
Learners’ spontaneous language use does not suddenly change when they are told that they have made an error. This does not mean, however, that feedback on error is not beneficial. The evidence suggests that error feedback can be an effective type of form-focused teaching if it is focused on something that learners are actually capable of learning and sustained over time...
7. For most adult learners, acquisition stops ... before the learner has achieved native-like mastery of the target language
... and ...
8. One cannot achieve native-like (or near native like) command of a second language in one hour a day
The Critical Period Hypothesis – that post-puberty learners of a second language will always be distinguishable from learners who have had sustained substantial exposure beginning in early childhood – continues to find support in research that focuses on the long-term outcomes of L2 learning (see Long, 1990 for a review)5. The Critical Period Hypothesis is often interpreted simplistically as “younger is better” for L2 acquisition. However, in the context of the foreign language classroom, the relevance of the Critical Period Hypothesis is questionable. Native-like mastery of a target language is rarely attained, even when learners begin foreign language instruction at an early age. There are many reasons for this.
Research in Quebec has shown that students who had intensive exposure to the second language near the end of elementary school have an advantage over those whose instruction was thinly spread out over a longer period of time. That is, even though students began at the same age and received a comparable number of hours of instruction, the more compact instruction was more effective... Similar results have been observed in French immersion (Genesee, 1987; Turnbull et al., 1998)....
9. The learner’s task is enormous because language is enormously complex
Learning the vocabulary, morphology, syntax and pronunciation of a new language is a very great challenge, and many students never achieve mastery of these aspects of a foreign language. As noted above, native speakers and learners who are exposed to a second language in their family or community from early childhood will have thousands of hours of exposure to the language, while classroom learners usually count their exposure in terms of hundreds of hours at best. The magnitude of the task of learning a second language, especially one that belongs to a different language family, can hardly be overstated. To be sure, there are individual differences in language learning aptitude, and these differences make the task more manageable for some learners than for others. Even for “talented” learners, however, language learning is a lifelong challenge. Furthermore, learning a language means more than learning vocabulary and morphosyntax...
10. A learner’s ability to understand language in a meaningful context exceeds his/her ability to comprehend decontextualised language and to produce language of comparable complexity and accuracy
There is plenty of evidence that learners are able to get the meaning from the language they hear, even if they do not understand all of the linguistic features that contribute to making the meaning. They do this by using contextual cues and world knowledge. This is a very positive factor in the success of CLT and CBLT. However, a number of researchers have observed that some features of language either develop quite slowly, or never seem to develop fully, in learners who are exposed to the language in contexts where the emphasis is exclusively on getting the meaning and never (or almost never) on learning specific linguistic features. This may be due to the very low frequency of some linguistic forms in classroom interaction or to other limitations inherent in the types of interactions which occur in classrooms. Swain (1988) found that teachers in French immersion classes often used the historical present or future while teaching history lessons, thereby reducing the frequency with which students were exposed to past tense forms in contexts referring to past events.
VanPatten has gone beyond Krashen’s hypothesis by making a more precise claim about the kind of comprehensible input that is beneficial to learners. His pedagogical recommendations are also different. Unlike Krashen, he does not assume that learners will find the input they need when they simply get the general meaning of the utterances they hear. Instead, VanPatten argues that input must be adapted in very specific ways so that learners will process it for language acquisition as well as for comprehension...
CONCLUSION
There is a rich literature of SLA research that can help shape teachers’ expectations for themselves and their students, and provide valuable clues to effective pedagogical practice. Nonetheless, there remain a number of concerns regarding the application of research findings to classroom practice, and Hatch’s (1978) admonition to “apply with caution” is as pertinent now as it was then.
Unfortunately, such caution is not always used. For example, Truscott (1996, 1999) uses SLA research findings to support the recommendation that feedback on error has no place in the FL/SL classroom, and Krashen (1989) claims that research confirms that pleasure reading will eliminate the need for guided instruction in L2 vocabulary acquisition. In my view, such recommendations for pedagogical practice are not consistent with much classroom SLA research cited above. Furthermore, they encourage teachers to engage in pedagogical behaviour that is not compatible with their understanding of their role as teachers. This is not to say that anything that goes against teachers’ intuitions is incorrect. For one thing, our pedagogical intuitions are partly shaped by the theories of language acquisition on which our own training was based. Current research challenges those theories, and future research is quite likely to challenge the views we hold now. Thus, it is completely appropriate for teachers and researchers to question intuitions about FL/SL pedagogy and to explore their validity. But when researchers make strong claims that are at odds with the views teachers have developed through their experience with learners, and when those claims are made on the basis of research that has been done in contexts that do not reflect reality as the teachers know it, they are likely to alienate teachers and lead them to dismiss researchers as ivory tower oddities.
Since 1985, much SLA research has addressed pedagogical concerns, and many young teachers will have SLA as one component of their knowledge base for teaching. This component will shape their expectations about what they can achieve in the classroom. However, it is only when they have tried out some of the pedagogical applications suggested by SLA research that they will understand what it really means for their own teaching context. SLA research is an important source of ideas for SL/FL teaching, but it is not the only or even the principal source of information to guide teachers in the art and science of SL/FL teaching. Differences in both the opportunity and the need to use the language outside of school, differences in L1 literacy experiences, differences in L1-L2 language distance, differences in the organisation of the school and classroom, and many other factors contribute to differences in the kinds of classroom practices which will be effective in different contexts. The existence of these different realities reinforces the need for more classroom-based research in an even wider range of contexts. There is a great need for replication studies in many areas of research (Valdman, 1993) and this need is particularly acute in classroom SLA research. Pedagogical innovations must be implemented and adapted according to local conditions including the strengths of individual teachers and students, the available resources, the age of the learners, and the time available for teaching.
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... _classroomThe Role of SLA Research in L2 Teaching: Reply to Sheen
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... y_to_Sheen
