Topics

46

English / Language and Brain

« on: April 15, 2012, 01:46:35 PM »

Brain is divided into two hemispheres: the left and right hemispheres.The hemispheres are connected by bundle of nerve fibers: the corpus callosum.

Contralateral control: Each hemisphere controls opposite side of body
Left hemisphere controls right side of body
Right hemisphere controls left side of body

47

English / Basic Aspects of Psycholinguistics

« on: March 05, 2012, 12:19:58 PM »

Psycholinguistics, earlier called the psychology of language, is the study of the language-processing mechanisms. It is concerned with the relationship between language and the human mind.


Psycholinguists are interested in the acquisition of language, how children acquire their mother tongue. The study of the acquisition of language by children is often called developmental psycholinguistics.

There are two possible directions of study in psycholinguistics. One is that we may use language as a way of explaining psycholinguistic theories and processes, for example, the role of language as it influences memory, perception, attention and learning. The other is that we may study the effects of psychological constraints on the use of language, for example, how memory limitations affect speech production and comprehension. It is the latter which has provided the main focus of interest inlinguistics, where the subject is basically regarded as the study of the mental processes underlying the planning, production, perception and comprehension of speech. The best-developed branch of the subject is the study of language acquisition of children.

48

English / In-house seminar arranged by the dept. of English, Uttara campus

« on: February 14, 2012, 03:12:15 PM »

An in-house seminar was arranged on the 12th February, 2012 by the dept. of English, Uttara campus.

The presenters were: Gopa Biswas Caesar, Lecturer, Dept. of English and Antara Basak, Lecturer, Dept. of English.

Most of the faculties of different departments and students of English Dept. were present in the seminar. It was a successful one and English dept. hopes to keep on arranging seminars like this frequently.

49

English / Language and Society

« on: February 02, 2013, 09:53:32 AM »

                                                       Language and Society

Social Relationship

Social relationship can be recognized into two types: primary and secondary.

Primary relationships are personal. The participants are close physically as well as emotionally. They know each other well and value their relationship not for what they can get out of it but for what it is. Here they are themselves and feel free to express their own ideas and opinions. They share the same values and have similar attitudes to things.

Secondary relationships are with people who live further away. These relationships have more members. The members do not know each other as well as in primary relationship. Their behavior is less natural and the relationship is valued for what its members can get out of it. Here values and goals are different. The interaction is one of giving and taking or transitional.

In addition to social groups to which an individual belongs there may be other groups to which he wishes to belong. In order to get a place or to move up in this reference group the individual will try to behave like the member of that reference group.

An individual in society plays many roles in many social situations and the language he uses is very much affected by his role. The individual has a set of codes according to his role relationship in the domain. The individual is therefore able to choose from the varieties of possibilities and skills available to him, the roles and language which are most suitable for the setting and occasion.

50

English / Approaches and Methods of First Language Acquisition

« on: January 31, 2012, 03:14:28 PM »

                                                            The Audiolingual Method


The outbreak of World War II heightened the need for Americans to become orally proficient in the languages of their allies and enemies alike. To this end, bits and pieces of the Direct Method were appropriated in order to form and support this new method, the "Army Method," which came to be known in the 1950s as the Audiolingual Method.
The Audiolingual Method was based on linguistic and psychological theory and one of its main premises was the scientific descriptive analysis of a wide assortment of languages. On the other hand, conditioning and habit-formation models of learning put forward by behaviouristic phychologists were married with the pattern practices of the Audiolingual Method. The following points sum up the characteristics of the method:
•   Dependence on mimicry and memorization of set phrases
•   Teaching structural patterns by means of repetitive drills
•   No grammatical explanation
•   Learning vocabulary in context
•   Use of tapes and visual aids
•   Focus on pronunciation
•   Immediate reinforcement of correct responses
Approach:
Theory of Language
A new interest in phonetics, phonology, morphology and syntax developed.
   Elements in a language were thought as being produced in a rule-governed way.
   Language samples could be described at any structural level of description: phonetic, phonemic, morphological etc.
   Linguistics levels were thought of as systems within systems.
The phonological and grammatical systems of language constitute the organization of language by implication of the units of production and comprehension.
Theory of Learning
The psychological foundation of Audiolingualism is
      
   Reinforcement (behavior happens again and again and forms a habit)

Stimulus→ Organism →Response behavior

                 Negative Reinforcement (behavior does not happen again and no habit is formed)
But its popularity declined after 1964, partly because of Wilga Rivers's exposure of its shortcomings. It fell short of promoting communicative ability as it paid undue attention to memorisation and drilling, while downgrading the role of context and world knowledge in language learning. After all, it was discovered that language was not acquired through a process of habit formation and errors were not necessarily bad or pernicious.
Behaviorism, including the following principles:
•   language learning is habit-formation
•   mistakes are bad and should be avoided, as they make bad habits
•   language skills are learned more effectively if they are presented orally first, then in written form
•   analogy is a better foundation for language learning than analysis
•   the meanings of words can be learned only in a linguistic and cultural context
Design

Objectives
Here are some of the objectives of the audio-lingual method:
•   accurate pronunciation and grammar
•   ability to respond quickly and accurately in speech situations
•   knowledge of sufficient vocabulary to use with grammar patterns.
The syllabus
Audiolingualism uses a structural syllabus.
Types of learning techniques and activities
•   dialogues
•   drills
Learner roles
Learners play a reactive role by responding to stimuli. In early stages learners do not understands the meaning of what they are repeating, by listening to the teacher, imitating accurately and responding to and performing controlled tasks, they learn a new form of verbal behavior.

Teacher roles
Teacher’s role is central and active. He models the target language, controls the direction and monitors and corrects the learners’ performance.
The role of instructional materials
Textbooks and printed materials are introduced with text of dialogues, drills, and other practice activities. Tape recorders and audiovisual equipment have central roles in an audiolingual course.
Procedure
Here is a typical procedure in an audio-lingual course
•   Students hear a model dialogue
•   Students repeat each line of the dialogue
•   Certain key words or phrases may be changed in the dialogue
•   Key structures from the dialogue serve as the basis for pattern drills of different kinds.
•   The students practice substitutions in the pattern drills
Since language a formal, rule-governed system, it can be formally organized to maximize teaching and learning efficiency. Audiolingualism refers to as the mechanism aspects of learning and language use.

51

English / History of Language Teaching

« on: November 13, 2011, 12:47:08 PM »

Language teaching has its own history as it has been going through different methods according to the kind of proficiency learners need. During these days this world is a place of multilingual people. The prestige of the standard language has been changed in different times. English is considered as world’s mostly popular foreign language but 500 years ago Latin was the dominant language as it had been used for trade, education, religion and government purposes. During sixteenth century French, Italian and English gained the prestige where as Latin gradually disappeared as a spoken or written form of communication. In the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth century Latin was used for school children to get introduced with grammar. Grammar was taught through rote learning of rules, translating sample sentences and sometimes bilingual dialogue practices. In the eighteenth century modern languages entered in school curriculum but these were also taught in the same way as Latin was taught. By the nineteenth century this method based on teaching Latin became the standard way of teaching foreign language. Only some morphological and syntactical rules were taught. Oral work was minimum, handful of written exercise were there. This approach came to be known as Grammar Translation Method.
Grammar Translation Method:
According to this method learning foreign language is to know everything about something rather than the thing itself. GT method was first introduced in the United States as the Prussian Method. Principal characteristics of GT method are:
   Goal of foreign language study is to learn a language for reading its literature and for intellectual development. In GT method language is learnt through detailed analysis of grammatical rules followed by translating sentences and texts into and out of the target language. First language is used a reference in learning and teaching foreign language.
   Reading and writing are the major focus where as speaking and listening have no attention.
   Vocabulary selection is based on the reading texts used, dictionary study and memorization.
   Sentence is the basic structure of teaching and learning practice.
   Accuracy is emphasized.
   Grammar is taught deductively.
   Students’ native language is the medium of instruction.
Though GT method dominated the European and foreign language teaching from 1840s to the 1940s, it is still used in teaching and learning all over the world in different modified forms.

The Reform Movement
The Reform Movement introduced the foundations for the development of new ways of teaching and learning language. The principal reformists are Henry Sweet in England; Wilhelm Vietor in Germany, and Paul Passy in France.
The reformists advocated:
   The study of the spoken language.
   Phonetic training in order to establish good pronunciation habit.ted with
   The use of conversation texts and dialogues to introduce conversational phrases and idioms.
   An inductive grammar teaching
   Teaching should be associated with the target language, not the native language.
The Reform Movement grew the interest in developing naturalistic principles of language learning. This led to the use of natural methods and ultimately developed as Direct Method.

The Methods Era
The word ‘method’ got a new notion. Different teaching approaches and methods emerged having different characteristics in terms of goals. To change and improve the teaching methodology assumption were made about how foreign language is learned and on preferred teaching techniques. The most active period in the history of approaches and methods was from the 1950s to the 1980s. The 1950s and 1960s was the emergence of the Audiolingual Method and the Situational Method, which were followed by the Communicative Approach.

52

English / Teaching Listening

« on: June 29, 2011, 01:59:22 PM »

Listening is one of the four integrated language skills and one of the two receptive skills. It is very important to teach listening skill in the classroom because it is really difficult for the foreign learners to understand oral English spoken by the native speakers at a normal speed.

When we acquire a new language, productive skills tend to follow receptive skills. Learners can usually understand more than they can say- so listening naturally comes before speaking in the learning process. This means that we must give students the chance to hear language and understand it before we ask them to produce it themselves. We cannot develop our students’ speaking skill unless we develop their listening skill since most speaking situations require listening as well. Students in countries where English is a foreign language, as for example Bangladesh, do not have plenty of exposure- so the more opportunities we can give them to listen English in the classroom, the better.

In the classroom, students listen mainly to the teachers.  Typically, they listen to classroom instruction, teacher reading from the text book, the teacher’s questions. Many teachers tend to translate what they say into Bengali so that the students will understand better. The result of doing this is that the students will not bother to listen to what the teachers says in English. They therefore get very little listening practice.

They also listen to their fellow students. Again this can provide a very useful source of listening practice. Most of the students do not bother to listen to one another; they only listen to the teachers. A useful source of listening is thus removed. Tape recorders, radios or other technological aids are very useful aids, especially for exposing the class to a greater variety of voice and accent. For bringing real life situation teacher can give the class very useful listening practice just by using their own voice.

In Bangladesh, in most of the cases, teachers do not have necessary resources According to their curriculum they do not have opportunity to do any listening practices. There is no listening and speaking test in exam and so students and parents are not interested. In case of foreign teaching and exams like IELTS, students cannot understand the foreign pronunciation and accent. Students do not fully realize the discourse point of view. Most of the students may not have exposure with English spoken by native speakers. Another problem is recognizing phonetic contrasts. Unfamiliar with how the sounds are produced by the native speakers is a great problem. In English all sounds are not pronounced in the right way. Consequently students face listening problem.

In the classroom situation we are usually concerned with focused listening. We expect the teachers to listen carefully and remember afterwards what they have heard. The students have no expectation about what they are going to hear. This is not a very natural situation. They students will not know what to listen for, because they do not know what questions the teacher will ask them. Their listening will consequently be unfocussed.

Teachers can help the students focus their listening by giving them some idea about what they are going to listen to before they ask them to listen. They can also give them a few guiding questions or a simple listening task before they start listening so that they know what they have to listen for. The guiding questions should focus on a few relevant and important points, rather than on insignificant details. They should also be quick and easy. Tasks like listen and complete, listen and do, listen and draw, listen and decide: True or False can be given

Listening is undoubtedly important. So, care should be taken to develop this skill among the students. An authentic and interesting listening practice can be helpful to achieve this goal.

53

English / Debate activities at Uttara Campus

« on: June 14, 2011, 02:13:24 PM »

The students of Uttara Campus are going to have debate activities from 20th of this Month.
We wish to spread it among all the students of this campus and thereby to have a good debate group from this campus as well.

Antara Basak
Lecturer
Dept of English

54

English / A little story!!!!!

« on: June 12, 2011, 12:10:42 PM »

Don't Draw a Conclusion Before You Know the Fact!!!!!!

One old man was sitting with his 25 years old son in the train. Train is about to leave the station. All passengers are settling down on their seat. As the train started the young man was filled with a lot of joy and curiosity. He was sitting on the window side seat. He put out one hand and feeling the passing air. He shouted, "Papa see all trees are going behind". Old man smiled and admired son's feelings.

Beside the young man a couple were sitting and listing all the conversion between father and son. They were little awkward with the attitude of 25 years old man behaving like a small child.

Suddenly young man again shouted, "Papa see the pond and animals. Clouds are moving with train". Couple were watching the young man embarrassingly.

Now it starts raining and some of water drops touch the young man's hand. He got filled with joy and he closed the eyes. He shouted again," Papa it's raining, water is touching me, see papa".

Couple couldn't help themselves and ask the old man. "Why don't you visit the Doctor and get treatment for your son?"

Old man said, " Yes, We are coming from the hospital as today only my son got his eye sight for first time in his life".

From collection

Antara Basak
Lecturer
Dept of English
Uttara Campus

55

English / Celebration of Bangla New Year in Uttara Campus

« on: April 20, 2011, 10:40:51 AM »

Dear All,

I am so happy to inform you that the students of Daffodil University Uttara Camps have celebrated the starting of Bangla New Year. Though it was not decided from before, the students took the initiative to decorate the campus with colourful papers and other things.
The campus was looking gorgeous. The students started their program by staging a scene from Doctor Faustus. They sang songs, acted out jocks, recited poetry and so on. There was a little arrangement of Bangladeshi Snacks and everyone enjoyed it.

The enthusiasm of the students made us, all the teachers glad.

Hope they will be able to perform much better in extracurricular activities further.

Antara Basak
Lecturer, English
Daffodil International University
Uttara University