scholarly journals Let Me Hear Your Body Talk: Experiencing the Word for Additional Language Development

2019 ◽  
Vol XIII (2) ◽  
pp. 111-138
Author(s):  
Garrett Scally

This article describes a research project created to investigate the application of theatre devising strategies to create a heightened awareness of non-verbal language and embodied experience of words in second language acquisition (SLA) learning and teaching. This is in response to the tendency in SLA teaching to lack an understanding of the importance and the potential of the body’s involvement in the process. Four workshops in Basel, Switzerland were designed and facilitated with adults from distinct cultural and linguistic backgrounds as part of my doctoral research from February-March 2013. I use data generated by an ethnographic approach to fieldwork by analysing interviews, written responses in the project blog (both by the participants and my own), and observations of responses from participants during the workshops. I discuss the theatrical activities used for this purpose reflecting on the possible effects on participants’ linguistic ability and awareness of their physicality as part of an ongoing research process. I draw on Bourdieu’s notion of linguistic habitus and Merleau-Ponty’s notion of the ‘body experiencing the world’ to provide a theoretical framework for analysing the processes of these workshops. These frameworks also support the development of a theatre practice to support SLA that I am tentatively calling “experiencing the word”. I propose that this approach better provides the pragmatic and social conditions, re-created and rehearsed through drama, needed in learning an additional language. This can be done by turning attention to language learning as an embodied experience.

2012 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 347-375
Author(s):  
Krystyna Droździał-Szelest ◽  
Mirosław Pawlak

This paper reviews 25 doctoral dissertations on second language acquisition (SLA), English language learning and teaching submitted in Poland in the years 2006–2010. The theses were selected for review on the basis of the recommendations of Ph.D. supervisors from leading Polish universities and they are divided into six groups: learner autonomy, individual differences, language subsystems and skills, culture, assessment and miscellaneous. The dissertations are discussed with respect to their main findings as well as their strengths and weaknesses, and the paper concludes with an overall evaluation of the research in terms of its dominant themes and methodology.


2015 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 433-433

The Editor and Board of Language Teaching are pleased to announce that the winner of the 2014 Christopher Brumfit thesis award is Dr Hilde van Zeeland. The thesis was selected by an external panel of judges based on its significance to the field of second language acquisition, second or foreign language learning and teaching, originality and creativity and quality of presentation.


2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 237-248
Author(s):  
Nadia Hakim Fernández

Abstract This piece discusses an experimental ongoing research that began with my experience as an academic freelancer. It focuses on my experience of moving frequently within and between cities under specific work/ life conditions. An autoethnography provides insights not observable in quantitative research designs; and allows for access to embodied experience, along with reflections on emerging topics going beyond the purely personal, namely, mobility, advantage, and (work)place-making. This strategy allowed me to delineate the boundaries of the fieldsite across online and offline settings, including the digital technologies I share with other research participants. Personal maps of geolocalised trajectories overlapped with experiential accounts (photos, audionotes, interviews, and hand-drawn maps) are included. An interpretational thickness emerges from this association of materials. The research process has inspired the development of a smartphone mobile application for documenting such experiences of mobile freelancing, yet to be created with developers, who are, in turn, participants in this research.


2015 ◽  
pp. 1950-1970 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mona Alhinty

The emergence of multi-touch screen tablets has increased the opportunities for mobile learning, as the unique capabilities and affordances of these devices give them an educational advantage over other mobile technologies. Tablets are progressively finding their way into classrooms and transforming modes of learning and teaching. However, research on educational applications of this digital tool, particularly with reference to foreign-/second-language acquisition by young beginner learners, is still limited. In this paper, the use of various tablet applications (apps) to support mobile English-language learning by children as beginners is discussed. The apps are classified into five main categories: communication, content-access, productivity, interactive and storage. The educational affordances of each category are presented and explained, with examples. This typology provides insight into the educational uses of tablet apps for English language learning, and has implications for research in the field of classroom practices and beyond.


2012 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 407-408

The Editor and Board of Language Teaching are pleased to announce that there were two tied winners of the 2011 Christopher Brumfit thesis award: Dr Cecilia Guanfang Zhao and Dr Catherine van Beuningen. Both theses were selected by an external panel of judges on the basis of their significance to the field of second language acquisition, second or foreign language learning and teaching, as well as their originality, creativity and quality of presentation.


Author(s):  
Joy L Egbert ◽  
Seyed Abdollah Shahrokni ◽  
Xue Zhang ◽  
Intissar Ahmed Yahia ◽  
Nataliia Borysenko ◽  
...  

The body of research on CALL tasks and topics grows daily; however, there are still a number of areas that are underrepresented in the literature. While there are many gaps in the CALL research to address, this article specifically focuses on eight gaps, chosen because of their perceived importance in improving CALL evidence and research practices and, by extension, language teaching and learning. In presenting the gaps, each section in this article: 1) provides a rationale for exploring the topic, 2) briefly reviews studies that typify the extant research in the focal area, and 3) provides recommendations for future research. The purpose of this article is to encourage all stakeholders in CALL to join in the rigorous and multi-perspective exploration of these under-addressed areas and strengthen the use of CALL for language learning and teaching.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (4.36) ◽  
pp. 624
Author(s):  
A. Delbio ◽  
M. Ilankumaran

English is the only lingua-franca for the whole world in present age of globalization and liberalization. English language is considered as an important tool to acquire a new and technical information and knowledge. In this situation English learners and teachers face a lot of problems psychologically. Neuro linguistic studies the brain mechanism and the performance of the brain in linguistic competences. The brain plays a main role in controlling motor and sensory activities and in the process of thinking. Studies regarding development of brain bring some substantiation for psychological and anatomical way of language development. Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) deals with psychological and neurological factors. It also deals with the mode of brain working and the way to train the brain to achieve the purpose. Many techniques are used in the NLP. It improves the fluency and accuracy in target language. It improves non-native speaker to improve the LSRW skills.  This paper brings out the importance of the NLP in language learning and teaching. It also discusses the merits and demerits of the NLP in learning. It also gives the solution to overcome the problems and self-correction is motivated through neuro-linguistic programming.   


2004 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 208-210

04–413 Biber, Douglas and Cortes, Viviana (Northern Arizona U., USA). If you look at…: lexical bundles in university teaching and textbooks. Applied Linguistics (Oxford, UK), 25, 3 (2004), 371–405.04–414 Davies, C. E. (U. of Alabama, USA), Developing awareness of crosscultural pragmatics: The case of American/German sociable interactionMultilingua (Berlin, Germany), 23, 3 (2004), 207–231.04–415 Kaufman, Dorit.Constructivist issues in language learning and teaching. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics (Cambridge, UK), 24 (2004), 303–319.04–416 Kern, Richard, Ware, Paige and Warschauer, Mark. Crossing frontiers: new directions in online pedagogy and research. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics (Cambridge, UK), 24 (2004), 243–260.04–417 Liszka, S. A. (U. of London, UK; Email: [email protected]). Exploring the effects of first language influence on second language pragmatic processes from a syntactic deficit perspective. Second Language Research (London,UK), 20, 3 (2004), 212–231.04–418 McArthur, T. Is it world or international or globalEnglish, and does it matter?English Today (Cambridge, UK), 20, 3 (2004), 3–15.04–419 Ying, H. G. (U. of Colorado at Denver, USA; Email: [email protected]). Relevance mapping: a study of second language learners' processing of syntactically ambiguous sentences in English. Second Language Research (London,UK), 20, 3 (2004), 232–255.04–420 Zegarac, V. (U. of Luton, UK; Email: [email protected]). Relevance Theory andthein second language acquisition. Second Language Research (London, UK), 20, 3 (2004), 193–211.


2016 ◽  
Vol 49 (4) ◽  
pp. 564-577 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ema Ushioda

In this paper I propose an agenda for researching language learning motivation ‘through a small lens’, to counteract our tendency in the second language (L2) motivation field to engage with language learning and teaching processes at a rather general level. I argue that by adopting a more sharply focused or contextualized angle of inquiry, we may be able to understand better how motivation connects with specific aspects of second language acquisition (SLA) or particular features of linguistic development. Keeping the empirical focus narrow may also lead to interesting and illuminating analyses of motivation in relation to particular classroom events or to evolving situated interactions among teachers and learners. I propose a number of possible research tasks that might be undertaken by experienced researchers, teacher-researchers or student-researchers wishing to investigate language learning motivation ‘through a small lens’.


2012 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-107
Author(s):  
Raquel Serrano ◽  
Imma Miralpeix

This paper reviews a selection of doctoral theses on language learning and teaching completed in Spain between 2008 and 2010. A total of 16 theses have been identified as representative – in terms of the topics under investigation and the methodology employed – of the doctoral research undertaken in Spain. Current topics include the development of speaking skills, motivation, learner autonomy, pragmatics, learning context, Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL), language learning by immigrant populations and, especially, classroom teaching. A variety of research methods were employed in the theses under review, and while most of them focus on adult learners, some also consider children. The interest of researchers in these topics is consistent with the challenges faced by language teachers in Spain, as well as with the new realities of teaching in this country, with its recently-arrived immigrant population, the expansion of CLIL programmes and the use of new technologies.


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