Early Language Education as a Distinctive Research Area

This article presents our narration of the emergence and development of a research area about the teaching and learning of the English language in Colombia and the creation of a research group named Critical Studies of Colombian Education Policies. The narration includes a description of the bilingual education policy in Colombia and a literature review of how the themes Different Shades of the Colombian National Plan of Bilingualism and Theoretical and Practical Concerns over Bilingualism have been addressed by authors of local journals, such as How, Profile, Íkala, and Colombian Applied Linguistics Journal, in the issues published from 2008 to 2020. The description and literature review link the life stories of our growth as teachers and researchers as related to the research area and research group mentioned above. A final part of the narration refers to our contributions to the ELT field in Colombia through the following two themes: Dimensions of Language Policies: A Political Discourse Perspective and Making Teachers’ Agency Relevant: Bottom-up Approaches to the Study of Language Education Policies.

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Personal experiencing of spoken English by Poles

Problemy Wczesnej Edukacji ◽

10.5604/01.3001.0010.1996 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 36 (1) ◽

pp. 33-41

Author(s):

Michał Daszkiewicz

Keyword(s):

Qualitative Study ◽

Young Children ◽

Language Learning ◽

Early Education ◽

Teaching Method ◽

Language Education ◽

Positive Outcome ◽

Early Language ◽

Spoken English ◽

Teaching Procedure

The paper addresses applicability of terms and rationale normally associated with early language education to the learning (and articulation) of English by adult Poles. It discusses how grown-ups – supposedly aware of how important speech is for their language success – prove victim to affective obstacles, require the personally – and emotionally-experienced sense of achievement, which implies that the character of their language learning does not depart too far from that of young children. The paper opens with a section concerning the (Polish) national edge of the learning of English and focusing on the learners’ decision not to speak having a personal and crucial character. Then, the issue of affective obstacles is examined theoretically in a discussion on the suitability of specific early education terms for adult language education, and empirically – through a qualitative study of what effect is obtained among Polish grown-ups by using a language teaching method resting on L2 early education terms. It is observed that following a simple teaching procedure in which learners were presented with a set of topic-oriented questions and exemplary answers and then requested to remark (in Polish) on (a four-faceted construct reflecting) how they feel about their productive language learning, an immediate positive outcome is obtained on the affective stratum.

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