Promoting Oral Proficiency at FRSD

 

 

Have you ever had a language class in high school? If yes, what do you remember? More importantly, can you actually communicate with others or carry on a conversation beyond the basic, "Hola, cómo estás?" Would you feel comfortable and confident being in a foreign country where that language is predominantly spoken? Unfortunately, more often than not the answer to these questions tends to be no.

So, what happened during all of those years that were spent studying the language? Is it a coincidence that so many people cannot actually communicate in a foreign language after taking upwards of four years during their high school experience? Do effective language classes just prepare students to understand the basics of a language? Is it impossible to actually speak the language by only studying the language in your high school career? 

 

Remember your answer to the first question at the top of this page? The reason you likely answered "no" relates to the fact that you likely studied Spanish in a traditional, outdated language classroom. In the traditional Spanish classroom, students conjugate verbs, fill in lines with verbs that have no context, memorize endless lists of boring, useless vocabulary, use English to master grammatical concepts, and then take tests on these non-communicative skills at some point throughout this process. This is the atmosphere that most expect to encounter in the language classroom, mainly because this is how they were taught and, thus, think that this must be how one learns another language.

 

This idea of teaching a second language stems from a methodology called "grammar-translation," which was developed centuries ago to teach "dead" languages - i.e. Ancient Greek and Latin. As the name implies, there was a strong focus on studying grammar rules and using translation. Essentially, the method was developed to read ancient texts and to understand the origins of modern grammar rules, while also considering the influences that ancient Greek and Latin had on them. Pretty boring, right? Most importantly, there was no focus on developing communication skills with the language because that was not the point of those classes.

 

In one form or another, the grammar-translation method is (unfortunately) still the dominant belief of "effective" language learning and teaching.  The reason why this method of teaching a World Language still exists is simple - it is hard to make a change from the "the way we've always done it." You may hear others say "that's the way I learned and it is what we have to do." If you want to be able to speak the language and develop your comprehension skills, then the outdated grammar-translation method (or similar methods) are not the solution. 

 

Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is the complete opposite of the grammar-translation method in the foreign language classroom. Its name is appropriate, as this type of language teaching holds communication at its core. This teaching style was developed after research was conducted to show that the traditional language classroom was not working and was not producing any real communicative proficiency of the language learners. Remember that the original idea (that is still commonly accepted today) is that communication in a second language can be learned/taught by studying, practicing, and drilling with grammatical structures. Essentially, it was thought that if these meaningless habits were practiced enough and "mastered", students would have the ability to communicate. Research studies and findings show the complete opposite.

 

CLT focuses on the following research findings: communicative language ability (expression and comprehension of others) develops as language learners engage in communication, not habit formation with grammatical items. Therefore, students must have every opportunity possible to engage with and interact in the target language and culture on a daily basis.

 

At the Franklin Regional School District, students are "immersed" in the Spanish language for at least 90% of each class period. Regardless of whether students are in Spanish 1 or Spanish 5, they are constantly involved with interactions of the language that are appropriate to their respective level of proficiency - comprehending, analyzing, interpreting, processing, and producing the Spanish language with their peers, their teacher, and even with native speakers on occasions. Our main focus is to increase each student's ability to communicate in real-world contexts, showing them how the language is used on a daily basis for a meaningful purpose. The only true way to do develop these skills is a classroom that is focused on proficiency, communication, and cultural competence.

How is it possible to communicate almost completely in the Spanish language during each class period, regardless of the students' prior experience with the language? Think of it this way: how were we able to learn and speak our native language? Nobody gave us a book and made us memorize vocabulary and grammar while conjugating verbs. Instead, something else much more beneficial happened.

 

An effective language teacher makes use of visual resources (pictures and photographs, maps, videos, PowerPoint presentations, etc.) along with gestures, facial expressions, whiteboard drawings, acting out words, and many other acquired techniques. Once again this is very similar to how we learned our native language through interactions with our family members.The teacher does not just stand in front of the class, start speaking Spanish, and expect students to make any progress with their own abilities. A large degree of effort is required on the teacher's part to design a meaningful curriculum that allows for this type of environment to occur in the classroom. The teacher can no longer simply hand students packets of information with exercises to complete and expect this type of results.