Language at the Heart of All Learning
(TEFL TEACHERS ADVANCE: No Matter What The Subject, We Are All Language Teachers)
As we approach another Valentine’s Day this month our attention focuses on matters of the heart. What could be closer to the heart and mind than the language which expresses our feelings and ideas? In the Buddhist tradition I have noticed that whenever a monk speaks about the practices they follow, and the methods they employ to facilitate effective meditation, they will frequently point to their heart when they refer to the concept of “the mind” when discussing the Dharma and their intention to walk a noble path following the necessary precepts. This idea of the Heart being the center of our “mindfulness” is often a new and unfamiliar concept for many Westerners to initially grasp.
The same is true when one considers the role language plays not only in self expression, communication and understanding, but goes further to the heart of one’s own cognitive abilities as research demonstrates the ways in which language patterns, syntax and usage affect human ability to comprehend, and grasp ideas because of the ways the brain is integrated and wired from our native “mother tongue” languages as we begin our mental, emotional and spiritual development.
Language is integral to exploring and sustaining personal development, cultural identity and intercultural understanding. As well as being the major medium of social communication, it is tightly linked to cognitive growth because it is the process by which meaning and knowledge is negotiated and constructed. It is the main tool for building our knowledge of the universe and our place in it. Language then, is central to learning, as well as to literacy, and is thus closely related to success in school.
What is ESL, EAL, TEFL & TESOL Anyway?
Along with the research relating to language and learning, there has been an expansion of jargon. Terms for learners such as English as a second language (ESL), English as an additional language (EAL), second language learning (SLL) and English speakers of other languages (ESOL) carry with them differing connotations depending on cultural context. The term of reference in this document will be “learners who are learning in a language other than their mother tongue”. The term mother tongue is used in the research literature in various ways. It may denote the language learned first; the language identified with as a “native” speaker; the language known best; the language used most. When used in this document, it includes all those meanings.
“Almost all education is language education.” Postman (1996)
Language learning in school is not a separate discipline isolated from all other learning (except when studied as linguistics). As well as being part of social and personal development, language learning in school is crucial for academic cognitive growth and the construction of knowledge. The language of academic discourses and the meaning and the knowledge content of any one discipline are closely interwoven. For example, the discourse of mathematics is distinct from the discourse of history and, in each case, is integral to constructing meaning. Similarly, the discourses of interpersonal communications vary depending on purpose. The language of a complaint will be different from that of a wedding invitation. The features of different discourses have been identified and are described in linguistic genre theory. A linguistic genre is a particular text type created by a specific communicative situation. Examples of some common genres used in school are recount, narrative, report, explanation, argument and discussion. As learners in schools build knowledge in and across disciplines, they move along a continuum of language and learning that includes an ability to use and understand a range of academic linguistic genres.
A conceptual understanding of the language and learning continuum is critical in determining what should be the focus in the processes of language teaching and learning. It will inform the staging of these processes in the curriculum as well as the kinds of materials used and developed for learning. Halliday (1985) expresses some of the complexity of the relationship between language and learning when he talks about “learning language, learning through language and learning about language”.
Three aspects of language and learning development are identified, although it must be emphasized that language development is a process of constructing meaning in which all three aspects, learning language, learning through language and learning about language, are operating at any one time. A separate examination of each, however, can provide a fuller understanding of what is involved.
Learning language
In the early stages of life when a child is first learning to communicate in a mother tongue, he or she is learning to use language symbolically in order to construct meaning and to interact. In a safe, secure and nurturing environment, rich in stimulating experiences, the child exchanges signals with others and learns to recognize, articulate and encode sounds, rhythms and intonations while associating them with meanings or concepts. He or she may associate the sound “bo”, for example, with a ball and learn that by uttering the word the mother is likely to respond in some way; perhaps by rolling it for him. The child is building up a resource for meaning.
The child is also developing what Cummins (1979) calls basic interpersonal communicative skills or BICS. This is the dimension of language that will enable a child to interact socially with teachers and peers when he or she begins school. The language of such communication is supported by contextual cues as well as by gestures and facial expressions. Learners who already have communicative skills in a mother tongue may become functional in social communication in another language within two years because of the transfer of understanding already in place.
As well as oral skills, the young child develops the early literacy skills of recognizing and manipulating symbols for decoding and encoding written texts in order to read and write. This includes learning to form the shapes of the letters or characters of a writing system and their phonetic associations. Learners who have basic literacy skills in their mother tongue are able to transfer some of these understandings and concepts when learning another language. Learning language is ongoing and is further fostered through reading characters of a writing system and their phonetic associations. Learners who have basic literacy skills in their mother tongue are able to transfer some of these understandings and concepts when learning another language. Learning language is ongoing and is further fostered through reading.
Learning through language
At some point a child has enough language so that in addition to it being a communicative tool, it is also a flexible resource for further learning and cognitive growth. Language itself, rather than direct concrete experience, can be used to negotiate new meanings and construct knowledge about the world. Literacy becomes increasingly important in doing this as more abstract learning takes place through dense academic texts in school. The ability to access the language of these texts is referred to as a cognitive academic language proficiency or CALP by Cummins (1979).
Depending on age and experience, for example, some learners may have a wealth of knowledge in a language other than that of the classroom. However, it can take up to seven years for learners who are using a language other than their mother tongue to attain the same levels in academic language proficiency as those expected for learners learning in a mother tongue.
Learning about language
Understanding the relationship of language and meaning and how language works in the construction of knowledge empowers the language user. For example, an understanding of various linguistic genres means that a writer can choose the most appropriate genre for the task. Some learners who are learning in their mother tongue may have an intuitive unconscious sense of how the language works and have a full range of choices and linguistic genres available to them. Learners who are using a language other than their mother tongue cannot always be assumed to have this awareness, which therefore needs to be explicitly taught in such circumstances.
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