Q.1 Which teaching method do you prefer to teach

English in your classroom keeping in view the national

educational scenario? Justify your comments with

arguments.

Ans: In this assignment we are going to study two of the

oldest methods of teaching foreign languages, these

methods are the grammar translation method and the direct

method. We shall look at the main features of both of these

methods and see how they can be used by the teacher in the

class room. Finally we shall assess each method and see

whether or not they have a part to play in English language

teaching in Pakistan.

Before proceeding to the topic proper it looks appropriate to

discuss what approach, method and technique are. Over the

years there have been many changes in the ways in which

people learn and teach foreign languages. During the second

half of this century especially, many different teaching

methods have come into fashion and have just as quickly

gone out again. When we want to discuss these different

methods, there seems to be a problem: the terms

approaches, theories, philosophies, methods, techniques,

etc. seems to be used interchangeably, with those taking

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part in the discussion unsure as to exactly what the other

participants mean when they use these terms. Therefore,

before we start discussing different methods of language

teaching, let us try to define these terms as we shall be

using them throughout this course.

Approach:

An approach to language teaching is a set of beliefs about

language when underlies or prescribes the use of a certain

method. For example, if you believe that language is

primarily concerned with speaking, then you will follow a

method of language teaching which concentrates on

developing the spoken skills. If you believe that language is

a set of rules, then you will adopt a teaching method which

gibes emphasis to the rote learning of grammatical

structures and so on… the terms principle, theory, and

philosophy can mean the same as approach in this context.

Method:

A method of language teaching is a complete set of

procedures and techniques that follow a systematic scheme.

They are often prescribed by the approaches, as we have

just seen. For example, the audio-lingual method is based on

the view that language consists of grammar, and that we

learn it through repetition. Thus a teacher using this method

will use drilling, repetition, and reinforcement.

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Technique:

This is the narrowest term of the three, and refers to specific

procedures within the method. For example, while the

teacher is conducting a language drill, he will first call on the

whole class to respond, then he will call on a group within

the class to respond, and then he will call on an individual.

This is a technique within a method.

The classical approach to language learning

Underlying this method we find the traditional, or classical

approach to language teaching; it was believed that modern

languages could be taught in exactly the same way as the

ancient languages of Greek and Latin had been taught for

many centuries. But here we need to ask ourselves a

question: what was the purpose in teaching these ancient

languages? They had been dead for hundreds of years;

nobody actually spoke them anymore. The answer is that

they were taught purely as an academic exercise- learning

these languages was considered to be an excellent training

for the mind. Since the languages themselves were long

since dead, there was no question of training students to

understand and produce conversational forms; emphasis

was thus given to the grammatical system and to the

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reading and translation of literary texts in the target

language.

The purpose of learning a modern language, such as English

or Japanese, however, may be very different. Usually the

student wants to be able to communicate in the language

which he is learning, and this means that he must master

the skills of listening and speaking in the target language

just as much (and probably more so ) than those of reading

and writing. The classical approach to language learning,

however, takes little account of this need.

The Grammar Translation method

Let us imagine that we are unseen observers in an English

class which is being taught by the grammar-translation

method. What exactly is happening?

When the teacher enters the classroom he will greet the

students and carry out any class ‘business’ in the mother

tongue. Again in the mother tongue, the class will be

directed to open their textbooks at the page where they left

off in the last class. The textbooks will contain rather heavy,

literary-style texts, and will be unlikely to contain examples

of modern conversational-style English. The teacher may say

a few words about what was read the day before, and then

he will start to read through the text and to translate it

section by section. The students hurry to note down the L1

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translations of any words they don’t understand. They may

be given a word list to memorize as a homework task.

Translation is followed by a few comprehension questions in

L1, or the students may be asked to gibe an L1 translation of

sentences from the text. Finally the teacher may write up a

paradigm or model construction about grammar.

Advantages of Grammar-translation method:

It can be useful for large classes

It can be useful for inexperienced teachers.

It may gibe adult learner confidence.

Students get plenty of practice in reading, grammar

and translation.

Disadvantages:

The student cannot use the language for

communication.

The student cannot use the language appropriately.

The Natural Approach to Language Teaching

We are now going to look at another approach to language

learning and teaching- one which is very different from the

classical approach. This is not surprising, as it was developed

in the second half of the nineteenth century as a reaction

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against the strict intellectual confines of the classical

approach and its resulting grammar-translation method. In

its development we can find a parallel to the reaction

against the classical style in literature and the arts. The

Romantic Movement, with its emphasis on a ‘return to

Nature’. According to the exponents of the Natural

Approach, then, language was first to be learnt through

speech, since this was the natural route taken by a child

when he acquired his first language. Reading and writing

followed later. Just as a young child learning his first

language rarely, if ever, had the rules of grammar explained

to him, so in learning a second language he was to follow the

same patch by finding out for himself how the language

worked. The developing science of psychology was also

applied to language learning; the resulting theories called for

teachers to help the students learn by enabling them to

visualize actual objects and link them with words in the

target language; to encourage the students, especially the

younger ones, to learn through play, and through activity in

everyday situations. Most important of all, language was

natural, and the heavy literary texts were to be a thing of

the past. Instead, texts were chosen which reflected the day-

to-day culture of the countries where the target language

was spoken.

The Direct Method

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By now we understand that a new educational approach

often gives rise to a new method, and the natural approach

was no exception. The principles of this approach to

language teaching became enshrined in what came to be

known as the direct method. Even so, the grammar-

translation method was not cast aside overnight. Indeed, in

many parts of the world, it lingers on to this day. Now again

we will come to the advantages and disadvantages of this

method.

Advantages

The language learnt is useful for communication.

The student will gain confidence in speaking.

The method is motivating.

Disadvantages

Teacher’s refusal to translate can waste time.

Many students feel more confident if they are given

some grammar rules.

The direct method needs excellent teachers.

To conclude we can rightly say that every method and

approach has its merits and demerits. It is now up to the

learner and the teacher to get the most benefit of them by

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using these methods according their situation. An interesting

research that was held in Islamabad is given below.

Method plays an important role in the teaching of language.

It is a planned and systematic effort of the teacher for

establishing sequence in the various parts of the teaching.

The direct method, as its name suggests, is teaching the

foreign language without the interference of mother tongue.

It is also called "natural method" because the students learn

the foreign language in the same way as they learn their

mother tongue. In this method, not the word but the

sentence is the unit of the grammar, while the traditional

method aims at teaching English by word-to-word translation

in mother tongue. The child begins to develop his vocabulary

from a single word. The Solomon four-group design was used

for the treatment of the data. The students of Federal

Government boy's secondary schools of Islamabad were the

population of the study. In this design: Subjects were

randomly assigned to four groups. Intelligence test was

administered to determine the level of each student before

treatment and to equalize the students of four groups.

Experimental groups were taught by direct method while the

Control groups were taught by traditional method for a

period of three months. At the end of the treatment, a

posttest was administered and scores of pre-test, posttest

and intelligence test served as data of the study. Applying t-

test and analysis of variance tested to know the significance

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of difference between the scores of groups at 0.05 levels.

The main objectives of the study were:

to determine the role of direct teaching in the

academic achievement of student in English at

secondary level,

to determine whether the direct teaching method is

more effective than traditional method in teaching of

English,

to examine the effects of direct teaching on the

academic achievement of high achievers and low

achievers,

to investigate whether the students can retain the

learning for a longer time when taught through direct

method,

To give recommendations for improvement of suitable

method of teaching English at secondary level.

To achieve the objectives of the study, null hypotheses were

formulated and tested. Obtained data was analyzed,

interpreted and concluded that direct teaching method was

more effective as a teaching-learning technique for English

as compared to traditional teaching method. Students in the

direct teaching method outscored than students working in

traditional learning situation. Low achievers in direct

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teaching showed significant superiority over low achievers

learning English by the traditional method.

CONCLUSION

Thus direct teaching was found to be more effective method

for teaching English to the low achievers as compared to

traditional method of teaching. High achievers, whether they

were taught English by direct method or traditional method,

retained learnt material at the same rate. Low achievers

taught English by direct method retained more material as

compared to low achievers taught by traditional method of

teaching. Therefore direct teaching seemed to be more

effective teaching learning technique for low achievers

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Q.2 Does the mastery of grammatical structure

enable a student to communicate in real language

situations? What do you think? Give real life examples

in favour of your arguments.

Ans: Mastery of grammatical structure no doubt helps a

learner to learn language, also helps to understand it but it is

not very much helpful for a student to be fluent and use the

language in real life situations, though he will be very good

at writing and reading, he may be well equipped in solving

the exercises of direct and indirect speeches, transformation

of voices, use of correct very but only in written form, when

a need comes to use this skill with some native speaker, he

will not be able to communicate properly with him.

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Why a student who has learnt a foreign language by

grammar rules is unable to speak frequently or use in a real

life situation? He answer is the student has been consistently

out off the language and has studied the highly formal,

literary form of it. He is usually unable to communicate with

a native speaker .this is hardly surprising that the learner

has never got the opportunity to use this language skill with

some native speaker at school or college level. When he

tends to open his mouth he tends to speak like a nineteenth

century prose.

The second object on this teaching method is that those who

have learned a foreign language, no doubt, they know a lot

about the language, but they do not know anything about

itself. By this we mean that he has spent years and yeas at

school explained at him the grammar rules, but he cannot

apply what he has learnt in order to communicate.

Such a learner cannot use the language appropriately.

Language learnt for its own sake and out of any day-to-day

content may be wrongly used when time eventually comes.

For example the stiff and formal’ please be seated’ is not

going to make a speaker of modern English at ease when he

himself expect the less formal ‘have a seat’ wouldn’t you? or

do sit down. Similarly a foreign learning Urdu needs to know

when and to whom to say ‘for example’ ‘baith Jao’ and

‘Tashreef Rakhiay’.

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So, we can say that students cannot use the language for

communication when he is learning rules first and he is given

no opportunity to speak at school. Then definitely, he will

only keep learning the rules of the new language and when

ever he is to face a situation where he has to speak a foreign

language, he feels disturbed, rather he faces difficulty to

speak the required language. He has learnt the heavy text

book words, when he goes for some shopping in a market, if

he uses these typical old words, common people will be

unable to understand the words used by him. As for

forgiveness the word ’pardon’ was used in books. If he uses

this word before a common citizen, he will never be excused

because people will be unable to understand the word

spoken by him. When he wants to speak with someone, he

will keep in mind all the rules he has learnt about that when

he will recall so much rules, then definitely he will be

confused to use the language. He will keep thinking about

that and will be unable to speak that.

Secondly for communication, communicative competency is

required rather than understanding the rules of the

language. The communicative competency can be achieved

only by frequent use of the target language when a learner

is given opportunity to speak the target language according

to different situations. For example when a person meets a

banker he uses different language and the learner gets the

opportunity to learn and speak. Similarly when a learner of a

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new language goes to market and meets shopkeepers and

other people he will be able to learn the new words and will

also get the opportunity to speak it freely. This will help the

person to learn a language which is more useful for him in

his common day life.

ROLES OF TEACHERS AND STUDENTS

In such a class where grammar translation method is being

used, there students are only passive listeners. The

teacher’s role is active. He takes a book and starts reading

from it and explains the lesson in their native language. He

does not give the opportunity to the students to speak the

language which they are using. Thus the students do not

have confidence to speak while they want to use it. Their

role remains for years and years of only a passive listener.

They cannot use it for communication.

The teachers, who are using this method, do not have

adequate training in English language teaching. They do not

plan anything for their lesson. They only bother about the

vocabulary of the text which they have to teach in the class.

The teacher does not discuss the lesson except his routine

preparation and students are never asked to answer in

target language, due to which they cannot use this language

as a true learner of a language.

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The students get only plenty of practice in reading and in

writing exercises requiring grammatical manipulation. They

become only enable to produce reasonable translation in

both the target language and in their mother tongue.

GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE CLASSICAL APPROACH

Underlying this method we find the traditional, or classical

approach to language teaching; it was believed that modern

languages could be taught in exactly the same way as the

ancient languages of Greek and Latin had been taught for

many centuries. But here we need to ask ourselves a

question: what was the purpose in teaching these ancient

languages? They had been dead for hundreds of years;

nobody actually spoke them anymore. The answer is that

they were taught purely as an academic exercise- learning

these languages was considered to be an excellent training

for the mind. Since the languages themselves were long

since dead, there was no question of training students to

understand and produce conversational forms; emphasis

was thus given to the grammatical system and to the

reading and translation of literary texts in the target

language.

THE PURPOSE OF LEARNING MODERN LANGUAGES

The purpose of learning a modern language, such as English

or Japanese, however, may be very different. Usually the

student wants to be able to communicate in the language

15

which he is learning, and this means that he must master

the skills of listening and speaking in the target language

just as much (and probably more so ) than those of reading

and writing. The classical approach to language learning,

however, takes little account of this need.

HOW ONE CAN GET COMPETANCE WITH TRADITIONAL

METHOD?

Let us imagine that we are unseen observers in an English

class which is being taught by the grammar-translation

method. What exactly is happening?

When the teacher enters the classroom he will greet the

students and carry out any class ‘business’ in the mother

tongue. Again in the mother tongue, the class will be

directed to open their textbooks at the page where they left

off in the last class. The textbooks will contain rather heavy,

literary-style texts, and will be unlikely to contain examples

of modern conversational-style English. The teacher may say

a few words about what was read the day before, and then

he will start to read through the text and to translate it

section by section. The students hurry to note down the L1

translations of any words they don’t understand. They may

be given a word list to memorize as a homework task.

Translation is followed by a few comprehension questions in

L1, or the students may be asked to give an L1 translation of

sentences from the text. Finally the teacher may write up a

16

paradigm or model construction about grammar. One can

imagine that how can a person get competence in this

environment.

GOAL OF TEACHER

So the goals of teachers who use the grammar translation

method as a fundamental purpose of learning a foreign

language are to make the students able to read literature

written in the target language. To do this, students need to

know about the grammar rules and vocabulary of the target

language. The role of teacher and student is very traditional.

The teacher is the authority in the class-room. The students

are taught to translate from one language to another

language. The students are given the grammar rules and

examples and are told to memorize them. Then they are

asked to apply these rules to other examples.

LANGUAGE USED IN THE CLASS

Most of the interaction in the class room is from the teacher

to the student is generally literary language. It is considered

superior to spoken language and is therefore the language of

study. Vocabulary and grammar are emphasized. Reading

and writing are primary skills that the students work on.

There is much less attention given to speaking and listening.

Pronunciation receives a little attention. The meaning of the

target language is made clear by translation into native

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language. The language mostly used in class is students’

native language. Having correct answer from the students is

very important. If the students make errors or do not know

answer, the teacher supplies them with correct answer.

CONCLUSION

To sum up, I would be accurate to say that by learning

grammar rules, learner of a foreign language cannot get

mastery over that target language. We cannot get a good

cricketer only by telling him about the rules of the cricket

without putting him in the play ground and without giving

him plenty of practice. Similarly we cannot be a good driver

of a car only by cramming the rules of driving without sitting

on the steering wheel and having a good practice of drive.

We can rightly say that only frequent use of the target

language can help to learn a language which can be useful in

our daily life.

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Q.3 Explain synthetic and analytic approaches to

languages syllabus design.

Ans: An approach to language teaching is a set of believes

about language which underlies or prescribes the use of a

certain method. For example if you believe that language is

primarily concerned with speaking, then you will follow a

method of language teaching which concentrates on

developing the spoken skill if you believe that language is a

set of rules, then you will follow such a method which will

give emphasis to the rote learning of grammatical structure.

The terms principals, philosophy, theory and philosophy can

mean the same as approach in this context.

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The following drill which would be typical of one conducted

in an audio-lingual methods class, the syllabus item labeled

‘present continuous and present simple tense’

DRILL

Teacher: John writes to his friend every week.

Students: He is writing to his friend now.

Teacher: John plays cricket every afternoon.

Students: He is playing now.

Teacher: John helps his father every evening.

Students: He is helping his father now.

The attention of the class is focused on structure or

grammatical forms, involved and not on the meanings or

functions. This does not mean the students do not

understand the sentence, but it would still be possible for

them to understand the structure without their

understanding the meaning as this non sense sentence

shows:

Teacher: John manles to his folta every wate.

Students: He is mandling his folta now.

Nor is it merely a question of understanding the individual

words used. The students can also mindlessly carry out the

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requirements of this drill without understanding the complex

array of meaning which the two sentences convey.

In addition to this purely grammatical meaning, there is

another level at which we can interpret any utterance. We

call this level the level of functional or notional meaning.

These terms are used often interchangeably and you will

come across both terms in your reading. Some writers make

a slight distinction between the two, when we speak very

often it carry out actions. For example, I promise, give an

opinion, complain, suggest and so on. These are some of the

things we can do with language and are called language

functions or notions. We use the grammatical forms of the

language in order to express these functions. For example:

Aren’t you rather hungry?

If we are asked to describe this utterance grammatically, we

should say it is an interrogative. But its functional meaning

necessarily interrogative, it may also function as a question

or it may be an order to be served with food. For each

function of grammar for ‘Aren’t you hungry?’ will remain the

same. One language form can express several different

functions.

There are some useful techniques associated with grammar-

translation method. There are some for the analytic and

synthetic techniques of grammar-translation method. The

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students translate the reading passage from the target

language into their native language. Then the reading

passage

provides the focus for several classes, vocabulary and

grammatical structure in passage.

Since learning of language is most commonly identified with

acquiring mastery of its grammatical system, it is not

surprising that most of the courses have grammatical or

structural organisms. Of course, there is numerous variety in

the ways in which language may be presented in

grammatically structured teaching material.

While admitting that in practice these approaches are not

necessarily mutually exclusive, regarding them from the

linguistic point of view. These can be grouped into two:

Synthetic

Analytic

Any actual course or syllabus could be placed some where

on the continuum between the wholly synthetic and the

wholly analytic. A synthetic language strategy is one in

which different parts of language are taught separately. So

that acquisition is a process of gradual accumulation of the

parts until the whole structure of the language has been

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built up. In planning the syllabus for such teaching, the

global language has been broken down into limited list of

lexical items. The learner’s task is to re-synthesize the

language that has been broken down into a large number of

smaller pieces in the aim of making his language easier. It is

only in the final stage of learning that the global language is

re-established.

In analytic approaches there is no attempt at this careful

linguistic control of the learning environment. Components

are not seen as building blocks. Much greater variety of

linguistic structure is permitted from the beginning blocks

which have to be progressively accumulated. The learner’s

task is to approximate his own linguistic behaviour more and

more closely to the global language.

SYNTHETIC & ANALATICAL APPROACH.

The majority of language courses and syllabus are and

probably always have been constructed on synthetic lines.

Language learning is a complex task. However, a complex

task can usually be broken down into a series off simpler

tasks. In recent years and particularly under the influence of

advances of psychology of learning the identification of the

smaller learning task has been carried out with increasing

linguistic sophistication. The tasks are identified with item

derived from description of the language. In those courses

which are commonly labeled ‘traditional’ the control of new

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linguistics items introduced in any one text-book lesson. You

facilitate learning if you present the learner with pieces of

language that have been pre-digested according to the

category found in a description of the language.

As the methods of teaching have changed, so have the

process by which language is selected and graded. In the

case of older text-books decisions appear to have been

taken on a more or less subjective basis. At least there is in

contrast, the language teaching. Literature of past thirty

years or so is full of discussion of the various factors to be

taken into consideration deciding which forms of language

were to be taught and in which order.

Although in most modern courses control of vocabulary and

of grammatical structure go hand in hand. The methodology

was first direction of vocabulary. The aim was to see that the

vocabulary contents of courses consisted of, in short, the

most useful words. The criteria that have been used in

establishing the relative usefulness of the words are

frequency, range, availability, familiarity and coverage. The

notion of coverage is self-evident. Range consists of a

distribution of a lexical item over a number of different types

of text. Availability accounts for lexical items which may not

be particularly frequent but which are rapidly available to

the meaning.

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Pedagogic considerations are not ignored in the process of

selection. Some items will be ignored and some will be

promoted because they are particularly useful in the

classroom situation. The process of selection therefore is

less important than that of ordering with the grammar the

purpose is rather different. The ultimate goal of a general

goal of a general course will be to each virtually the whole of

the grammatical system.

The syllabus that results from the application of these

criteria will be a grammatical syllabus. The use of a

grammatical syllabus can be majority of syllabuses and

publishers. The vocabulary is secondary in importance and

certainly rarely provided the basic structure of a course. The

view is widely held that major part of the grammatical

systematical system has been learned.

What is learned through a grammatical syllabus is of value

to the learner. It is rather suggested that this is not the

necessary or the most effective way of designing language

courses and that, in any way language learning is not

complete when the content of a grammatical syllabus has

been inter4The view is widely held that major part of the

grammatical systematical system has been learned.

What is learned through a grammatical syllabus is of value

to the learner. It is rather suggested that this is not the

necessary or the most effective way of designing language

25

courses and that, in any way language learning is not

complete when the content of a grammatical syllabus has

been interested.

One danger in basing a course on a systematic presentation

of the elements of linguistic structure is that forms will tend

to be taught because they are there. Sometimes, irregular

verbs are introduced for the sake of completeness even

where they are likely to be of little use of the learning.

One characteristic of grammatical syllabuses that what has

to be learnt is identified as a form and rarely as a set of

meanings. Most syllabuses are in fact an inventory of

grammatical forms. It is very rare for grammatical meanings

also to be specified. The assumption seems to be that form

and meaning are in one-to-one relation, so that the meaning

to learn in association with a particular grammatical form

would be self-evident.

A greater difficulty and one to which there is not an obvious

answer lies in the fact that the syllabus is an ordered list of

structures. If the content is expressed by use of grammatical

terminology, units will be identified by such labels as the

indefinite articles, the past tense, transitive sentence,

adverbs of frequency of course the fundamental facts of

syntax are almost inevitably taught but there remain a good

deal that is not.

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The most significant thing about this is that the teacher will

normally be understood as he intends to be understood. If

this was not so then can communication take place? For

learners, probably, the most striking way in which the

knowledge of language developed through a grammatical

syllabus fails to measure up to their communicational needs

is in its lack of situational relevance. They may have learnt

through oral active method and have command of

grammatical structure.

I should add that there is language teaching based on a

grammatical syllabus, which is sometimes called situational.

The label is most commonly applied to a method of teaching

in which language is always taught in association with some

physical characteristics of the class room. Objects, pictures

and activities are used to illustrate and give meaning to

grammatical and lexical forms. Tenses for example are often

presented in association with some physical characteristics

the class room.

It is clear however; that the situations referred to here is a

pedagogic, class room situation, not situation of natural

language use. It, therefore, cannot meet the natural

situational needs. A grammatical syllabus can also be

situationalized by presenting language in the syllabus form

of dialogue. Therefore, on grounds of linguistic and

motivation, there are reasons for looking an alternative to

27

the grammatical syllabus as a strategy for structuring the

learners’ experience of language.

Analytic approaches are behavioural. They are organized in

terms of purposes for which people are learning language

and the kinds of language performance that are necessary to

meet these purposes. The problem in putting an analytic

approach into practice of one of the putting and finding way

to express what it is that people do with language so that

the unavoidable process of limitation or selection can take

place. This approach is therefore in contrast with those

approaches that rely more upon this capacity of synthesize.

Qn.5. Define the term “ Sociolinguistics” and explain

the relationship between sociology and linguistics.

LINGUISTICS

28

It is the scientific study of language, encompassing a

number of sub-fields. An important topical division is

between the study of language structure (grammar) and the

study of meaning (semantics). Grammar encompasses

morphology (the formation and composition of words),

syntax (the rules that determine how words combine into

phrases and sentences) and phonology (the study of sound

systems and abstract sound units). Phonetics is a related

branch of linguistics concerned with the actual properties of

speech sounds (phones), non-speech sounds, and how they

are produced and perceived.

Over the twentieth century, following the work of Noam

Chomsky, linguistics came to be dominated by the

Generativist school, which is chiefly concerned with

explaining how human beings acquire language and the

biological constraints on this acquisition. Generative theory

is modularist in character. While this remains the dominant

paradigm[2, Chomsky's writings have also gathered much

criticism, and other linguistic theories have increasingly

gained popularity; cognitive linguistics is a prominent

example. There are many sub-fields in linguistics, which may

or may not be dominated by a particular theoretical

approach: evolutionary linguistics attempts to account for

the origins of language; historical linguistics explores

language change and sociolinguistics looks at the relation

between linguistic variation and social structures.

29

A variety of intellectual disciplines are relevant to the study

of language. Although certain linguists have downplayed the

relevance of some other fields, linguistics — like other

sciences — is highly interdisciplinary and draws on work

from such fields as psychology, informatics, computer

science, philosophy, biology, human anatomy, neuroscience,

sociology, anthropology, and acoustics. Fundamental

concerns and divisions

Linguistics concerns itself with describing and explaining the

nature of human language. Relevant to this are the

questions of what is universal to language, how language

can vary, and how human beings come to know languages.

All humans (setting aside extremely pathological cases)

achieve competence in whatever language is spoken (or

signed, in the case of signed languages) around them when

growing up, with apparently little need for explicit conscious

instruction. While non-humans acquire their own

communication systems, they do not acquire human

language in this way (although many non-human animals

can learn to respond to language, or can even be trained to

use it to a degree. Therefore, linguists assume, the ability to

acquire and use language is an innate, biologically-based

potential of modern human beings, similar to the ability to

walk. There is no consensus, however, as to the extent of

this innate potential, or its domain-specificity (the degree to

which such innate abilities are specific to language), with

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some theorists claiming that there is a very large set of

highly abstract and specific binary settings coded into the

human brain, while others claim that the ability to learn

language is a product of general human cognition. It is,

however, generally agreed that there are no strong genetic

differences underlying the differences between languages:

an individual will acquire whatever language(s) they are

exposed to as a child, regardless of parentage or ethnic

origin.

Many linguists would agree that these divisions overlap

considerably, and the independent significance of each of

these areas is not universally acknowledged. Regardless of

any particular linguist's position, each area has core

concepts that foster significant scholarly inquiry and

research.

SOCIOLOGY:

(from Latin: socius, "companion"; and the suffix -ology, "the

study of", is the scientific or systematic study of society,

including patterns of social relations, social stratification,

social interaction, and culture Areas studied in sociology

range from the analysis of brief contacts between

anonymous individuals on the street to the study of global

social interaction. Numerous fields within the discipline

concentrate on how and why people are organized in

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society, either as individuals or as members of associations,

groups, and institutions. Sociology is considered a branch of

the social sciences.

Sociological research provides educators, planners,

lawmakers, administrators, developers, business leaders,

and people interested in resolving social problems and

formulating public policy with rationales for the actions that

they take.

Sociology later emerged as a scientific discipline in the early

19th century as an academic response to the challenges of

modernity and modernization, such as industrialization and

urbanization. Sociologists hope not only to understand what

holds social groups together, but also to develop responses

to social disintegration and exploitation.

The term "sociologie" was first used in 1780 by the French

essayist Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès in an unpublished

manuscript. The term was used again and popularized by the

French thinker Auguste Comte in 1838. Comte had earlier

used the term 'social physics', but that term had been

appropriated by others, notably Adolphe Quetelet Comte

hoped to unify all studies of humankind - including history,

psychology and economics. His own sociological scheme was

typical of the 19th century; he believed all human life had

passed through the same distinct historical stages (theology,

metaphysics, positive science) and that, if one could grasp

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this progress, one could prescribe the remedies for social ills.

Sociology was to be the 'queen of positive sciences. Thus,

Comte has come to be viewed as the "Father of Sociology".

SOCIOLINGUISTICS

It is the study of the effect of any and all aspects of society,

including cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the

way language is used. Sociolinguistics overlaps to a

considerable degree with pragmatics.

It also studies how lects differ between groups separated by

certain social variables, e.g., ethnicity, religion, status,

gender, level of education, age, etc., and how creation and

adherence to these rules is used to categorize individuals in

social class or socio-economic classes. As the usage of a

language varies from place to place (dialect), language

usage varies among social classes, and it is these

sociolectsthat sociolinguistics studies.

The social aspects of language were in the modern sense

first studied by Indian and Japanese linguists in the 1930s,

and also by Gauchat in Switzerland in the early 1900s, but

none received much attention in the West until much later.

The study of the social motivation of language change, on

the other hand, has its foundation in the wave model of the

late 19th century.

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Applications of sociolinguistics

For example, a sociolinguist might determine through study

of social attitudes that a particular vernacular would not be

considered appropriate language use in a business or

professional setting. Sociolinguists might also study the

grammar, phonetics, vocabulary, and other aspects of this

sociolect much as dialectologists would study the same for a

regional dialect.

The study of language variation is concerned with social

constraints determining language in its contextual

environment. Code-switching is the term given to the use of

different varieties of language in different social situations.

William Labov is often regarded as the founder of the study

of sociolinguistics. He is especially noted for introducing the

quantitative study of language variation and change, making

the sociology of language into a scientific discipline.

Sociolinguistics differs from sociology of language in that the

focus of sociolinguistics is the effect of the society on the

language, while the latter's focus is on the language's effect

on the society.

Fundamental Concepts in Sociolinguistics

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While the study of sociolinguistics is very broad, there are a

few fundamental concepts on which many sociolinguistic

inquiries.

Differences according to class

Sociolinguistics as a field distinct from dialectology was

pioneered through the study of language variation in urban

areas. Whereas dialectology studies the geographic

distribution of language variation, sociolinguistics focuses on

other sources of variation, among them class. Class and

occupation are among the most important linguistic markers

found in society. One of the fundamental findings of

sociolinguistics, which has been hard to disprove, is that

class and language variety are related. Members of the

working class tend to speak less standard language, while

the lower, middle, and upper middle class will in turn speak

closer to the standard. However, the upper class, even

members of the upper middle class, may often speak 'less'

standard than the middle class. This is because not only

class, but class aspirations, are important.

Class aspiration

Studies, have shown that social aspirations influence speech

patterns. This is also true of class aspirations. In the process

of wishing to be associated with a certain class (usually the

upper class and upper middle class) people who are moving

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in that direction socio-economically will adjust their speech

patterns to sound like them. However, not being native

upper class speakers, they often hypercorrect which involves

overcorrecting their speech to the point of introducing new

errors. The same is true for individuals moving down in

socio-economic status.

Social language codes

Basil Bernstein, a well-known British socio-linguist, devised in

his book, 'Elaborated and restricted codes: their social

origins and some consequences,' a social code system which

he used to classify the various speech patterns for different

social classes He claimed that members of the middle class

have ways of organizing their speech which are

fundamentally very different from the ways adopted by the

working class

Restricted code

In Basil Bernstein's theory, the restricted code was an

example of the speech patterns used by the working-class

He stated that this type of code allows strong bonds

between group members, who tend to behave largely on the

basis of distinctions such as 'male', 'female', 'older', and

'younger'. This social group also uses language in a way

which brings people together, and members often do not

need to be explicit about meaning, as their shared

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knowledge and common understanding often bring them

together in a way which other social language groups do not

experience. The difference with the restricted code is the

emphasis on 'we' as a social group, which fosters greater

solidarity than an emphasis on 'I'.

Differences according to age groups

There are several different types of age-based variation one

may see within a population. They are: vernacular of a

subgroup with membership typically characterized by a

specific age range, age-graded variation, and indications of

linguistic change in progress.

One example of subgroup vernacular is the speech of street

youth. Just as street youth dress differently from the "norm",

they also often have their own "language". The reasons for

this are the following:

To enhance their own cultural identity

To identify with each other,

To exclude others, and

To invoke feelings of fear or admiration from the

outside world.

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Strictly speaking, this is not truly age-based, since it does

not apply to all individuals of that age bracket within the

community.

People tend to use linguistic forms that were prevalent when

they reached adulthood. So, in the case of linguistic change

in progress, one would expect to see variation over a

broader range of ages. Bright (1997) provides an example

taken from American English where there is an on-going

merger of the vowel sounds in such pairs of words as

'caught' and 'cot' Examining the speech across several

generations of a single family, one would find the

grandparents' generation would never or rarely merge these

two vowel sounds; their children's generation may on

occasion, particularly in quick or informal speech; while their

grandchildren's generation would merge these two vowels

uniformly. This is the basis of the apparent-time hypothesis

where age-based variation is taken as an indication of

linguistic change in progress.

Differences according to gender

Men and women, on average, tend to use slightly different

language styles. These differences tend to be quantitative

rather than qualitative. That is, to say that women make

more minimal responses than men is akin to saying that

men are taller than women (i.e., men are on average taller

than women, but some women are taller than some men).

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The initial identification of a women's register was who

argued that the style of language served to maintain

women's (inferior) role in society . A later refinement of this

argument was that gender differences in language reflected

a power difference . However, both these perspectives have

the language style of men as normative, implying that

women's style is inferior..

Questions

Men and women differ in their use of questions in

conversations. For men, a question is usually a genuine

request for information whereas with women it can often be

a rhetorical means of engaging the other’s conversational

contribution or of acquiring attention from others

conversationally involved, techniques associated with a

collaborative approach to language use Therefore women

use questions more frequently. In writing, however, both

genders use rhetorical questions as literary devices. For

example, Mark Twain used them in "A War Prayer" to

provoke the reader to question his actions and beliefs.

Self-disclosure

Female tendencies toward self-disclosure, i.e., sharing their

problems and experiences with others, often to offer

sympathy contrasts with male tendencies to non-self

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disclosure and professing advice or offering a solution when

confronted with another’s problems.

CONCLUSION

Sociolinguistics is closely related to both sociology and

general linguistics. It is also linked to such disciplines as

geography and social-anthropolog, but our concern in this

assignment was exclusively with the first two. So, in

conclusiono we may rightly maintain that sociolinguistics is

shared between sociology and linguistics.

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Q:4 How are three approaches to syllabus design:

grammatical, social and national different from each

other? Which aproacch is best in our educational

system.

Ans:

Introduction

The purpose of this assignment is to examine the currents

running through syllabus design and to highlight the issues

relevant to teachers considering creating their own

curriculum.. It will hopefully also help instructors better

evaluate their own programs and course books. It is

therefore concerned with linguistic theory and theories of

language learning and how they are applied to the

classroom.

In the past, the focus of syllabuses has shifted from structure

to situations, functions and notions to topics and tasks. In

fact,with the development of the latter it is palpable that

"the traditional distinction between syllabus design and

methodology has become blurred". So, how should we

initially define syllabus?

Syllabus: A Definition

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A syllabus is an expression of opinion on the nature of

language and learning; it acts as a guide for both teacher

and learner by providing some goals to be attained.

Hutchinson and Waters define syllabus as follows:

At its simplest level a syllabus can be described as a

statement of what is to be learnt It reflects of language and

linguistic performance.

This is a rather traditional interpretation of syllabus focusing

as it does on outcomes rather than process. However, a

syllabus can also be seen as a "summary of the content to

which learners will be exposed". It is seen as an

approximation of what will be taught and that it cannot

accurately predict what will be learnt. Next, we will discuss

the various types of approaches available to course

designers and the language assumptions they make.

The Structural Approach

Historically, the most prevalent of syllabus type is perhaps

the grammatical syllabus in which the selection and grading

of the content is based on the complexity and simplicity of

grammatical items. The learner is expected to master each

structural step and add it to her grammar collection. As such

the focus is on the outcomes or the product.

One problem facing the syllabus designer pursuing a

grammatical order to sequencing input is that the ties

connecting the structural items maybe rather feeble. A more

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fundamental criticism is that the grammatical syllabus

focuses on only one aspect of language, namely grammar,

whereas in truth there exist many more aspects to language.

Finally, recent corpus based research suggests there is a

divergence between the grammar of the spoken and of the

written language; raising implications for the grading of

content in grammar based syllabuses.

The Situational Approach

It is suggested that the framework for most foreign language

teacching is provided by a grammatical syllabus and that

dissatisfaction with this shows itself most readily n concern

that the language acquires in this way is not adequate for

the sittuational needs. It is obvious then that thte most

commonly proposed alternative is to take situational need to

take as a starting point and thereby to construct a

situational syllabus to construct to rreplace a grammatical

syllabus. It is the obly other kind of syllabus that is used to

replace the grammatical structure to construct teaching

material.

The argumentt for the situational grammar is fairly straight

forward. Although languages are described generral

systems, language is always used as situational and social

context and cannot be fully understood witthout that

context. Our choice of lingistic form may be restricted to

some features of social situations and in any way we need a

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sport of language to face any type of situations. There

instead of learning subjecct and their contents. We should

take account of learner and his needs. It is more efficient

forces because we are concerned with what the learner need

and what is relevant to the learner.it is more motivating

because it is learner rather than subject centered. The

distinction betweeen language for learning and languae for

use will disappear. Units in the syllabus will have situational

instead off grammatical tables.

In order to carry out behavioural analysis that underlie the

sittuational syllabus. We must have a set of parameters for

describing the significant features of situations.

The situational courses do exist. They consist of learning

units with label like ‘ At the post office’. Buying a heater

ticket. Asking the way and so on. In all probability they are

successful in what they have placed. But there is a big

problem to think whetehr we take them as a model for

teaching organisatiions of language taeching. The difficulty

language teaching. The difficulty centres on what is meant

by situation.

The Notional/Functional Approach

Wilkins' criticism of structural and situational approaches lies

in the fact that they answer only the 'how' or 'when' and

'where' . Instead, he enquires "what it is they communicate

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through language" . Thus, the starting point for a syllabus is

the communicative purpose and conceptual meaning of

language i.e. notions and functions, as opposed to

grammatical items and situational elements which remain

but are relegated to a subsidiary role.

In order to establish objectives, the needs of the learners will

have to be analyzed by the various types of communication

in which the learner has to confront. Consequently, needs

analysis has an association with notional-functional

syllabuses. Although needs analysis implies a focus on the

learner, critics of this approach suggest that a new list has

replaced the old one. Where once structural/situational items

were used a new list consisting of notions and functions has

become the main focus in a syllabus. White claims that

"language functions do not usually occur in isolation" and

there are also difficulties of selecting and grading function

and form. Clearly, the task of deciding whether a given

function (i.e. persuading), is easier or more difficult than

another (i.e. approving), makes the task harder to approach.

The above approaches belong to the product-oriented

category of syllabuses. An alternative path to curriculum

design would be to adopt process oriented principles, which

assume that language can be learnt experientially as

opposed to the step-by-step procedure of the synthetic

approach.

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Initially, several questions must be posed. Do you want a

product or process oriented syllabus? Will the course be

teacher or learner led? What are the goals of the program

and the needs of your students? This leads to an

examination of the degree to which the

In light of this background, and given the monolingual nature

of Japanese society and the lack of exposure to the target

language outside the classroom, a task based strategy with

a blend of approaches and emphasis on communicative

learning, may well be one of the most suitable types of

syllabus design on offer for language learners in Japan.

Conclusion

Clearly, there is a vast amount of material to disseminate

when considering syllabus design. The numerous approaches

touched on here all offer valuable insights into creating a

language program. The grammatical, situational and

functional-notional, all have objectives to be attained, a

content to be processed and learnt. The foundations of the

product syllabuses remain fundamentally similar, whereas

the underlying assumptions about language and language

learning from the analytic approaches differ greatly: process

type syllabuses assert that learning a language is transient

and cannot be itemized ; pedagogical procedure takes

precedence over content.

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If our assumptions about the nature of linguistics and

language learning is one of "language as communication"

then a syllabus based around activities and tasks which

promote real and meaningful communication will seem

advantageous. We have shown that the false beginner in

Japan will have learned structural rules to a surprisingly

complex degree, yet may find it difficult to use, or indeed,

may never have had an opportunity to use the language

learned. Consequently, the belief that learning is facilitated

by activities that include real communication, may be the

most suitable belief to adopt in the Japanese classroom.

Further points to consider when critically reviewing a

syllabus are the objectives of the course as well as the needs

of the learners. Ultimately, and perhaps ideally, a hybrid

syllabus will result purely due to pragmatic reasons.

It is wise to take an eclectic approach, taking what is useful

from each theory and trusting also in the evidence of your

own experience as a teacher.

Thus, to what extent has an integration of the various

approaches taken place? Does the syllabus specification

include all aspects? If yes, how is priority established? These

questions must also form part of the criteria when designing

or assessing your own syllabus.

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