Study the past if you wish to define the future – Confucius
Teachers are always looking for new ideas to use in class. In this pursuit, they may stop using, and eventually forget about tried and tested activities. It is always useful to look at exercises that are classic, and to examine why these exercises have become classics, and the thinking behind them. There are many methods for teaching English, and it is an obvious point to make that all methods have exercises which are more appropriate to that method than another. Analysing the thinking behind them and considering the intellectual underpinning to these activities offers a chance to review both the procedure of the exercise and how it fits in with our current methodology. Another obvious point is that if teachers are trained in one method, they are, in some way, crippled methodologically. It is only when teachers explore a variety of methods that they have a choice; knowing more than one method of teaching gives a broader classroom methodology, and enables teachers to develop their own eclectic approach based on principle.
Revising various methods and approaches is useful for both experienced and less experienced teachers. When they analyse classic exercises or so called well-seasoned activities – WSAs (D. Gregory) which support different approaches, they may find there is a method or an approach that they are unfamiliar with but discover that they are interested in it, or they can research exercises that support the approaches or methods they want to venture into, and try them out in class.
Experienced teachers might find that they use some classic exercises unconsciously, and would benefit from a chance to review both the procedure of the exercise and how it fits in with their methodology, and why it works. Also there are exercises and activities that used to be popular but somehow have become neglected and forgotten. If an exercise used to work, then why not resurrect it? Ultimately, it is always useful to examine your practice.
When less experienced teachers look at classic exercises they can be sure they will work as they are tried and tested. (If they don’t work in their class then it is food for thought for the teacher and area for possible teacher development.)
In the 21st century driven by innovation and novelty we have to ask the question whether everything has to be new. There is a tendency towards consumerism and the consumption of the new; in ELT this means ‘consumption’ of new ideas. To use a metaphor, we like to try new food and cook new recipes. But there is a case for going back to our old family recipes and cooking traditional food too. In ELT this way of looking at the now and towards the future, rather than occasionally looking back is often promoted by publishers who, in order to guarantee sales, publish new resource books which are described as ‘innovative’, and often make teachers reliant on these resources, especially when photocopiable. However, if something is good it bears repetition; both food and lessons don’t always need to be original.
If we build up a repertoire of excellent exercises that are tried and tested, then we have more freedom and confidence on a daily basis to follow a syllabus in a creative way by avoiding textbook edict and varying the order in which we cover the syllabus. Instead of feeling oppressed by the syllabus and published materials, we can free ourselves up to teach our learners what they need when they need it. And this is so much more interesting for the teacher too.
There are a number of approaches such classic activities come from, and it needs to be emphasised that each method of the past has something to offer to teachers in the 21st century, and sometimes can be ‘repackaged’, for example, with the use of ICT. Sometimes after years of being forgotten a method or approach may become relevant again. In fact, there is a recent body of research supporting these old methodologies, and there are recent publications which are rooted in the methodologies of the ‘past’, often without acknowledging the original approach they are rooted in.
1. Grammar Translation (GT)
The method is considered very dated, and many other methodologies criticised among others its use of mother tongue (L1) and translation. However, now using the mother tongue judiciously is encouraged in books like Using the Mother Tongue by S. Dellar and M. Rinvolucri (DELTA), or pedagogical movements like CLIL – CLIL Compendium. One of the CLIL components – LANTIX promotes deepening the awareness of both mother tongue and target language in the ELT class.
2. Audiolingualism
It is usually associated with drilling, instant error correction and forming automatic language response to a stimulus, including visual ones. It also emphasises the importance of memorizing and grammatical accuracy. Many educators these days say we need to focus more on memory training in language teaching, like in Memory Activities for Language Learning by N. Bilborough (CUP), and undo the negative effects of The Communicative Approach which through its focus on fluency produced users of the language who can communicate freely but have a very relaxed, if not casual, approach to accurate production of the language. Another strong point of audiolingualism is teaching grammar without the presentation of grammar rules and use of metalanguage.
3. Community Language Learning (CLL)
The approach promoted learner centredness and put the initiative in the learners’ hands. This is one of the ways to increase learners’ motivation and their contributions to the lessons. Relatively recently Scott Thornbury co-founded of the Dogme ELT group, which promotes the CLL approach in a repackaged and upgraded form.
4. Humanism
Humanism is a 1980ies ELT movement; the most prominent names in the movement being C. Rogers and E. Stevick. In some ways Humanism is still present in language teaching, opposing exam and target driven teaching, instead promoting creativity, self-directed learning and awareness of learner differences and relationships in the classroom. This is one of the ‘old’ movements which is still overtly referred in niche publications and more seminal works like Meaningful Action: Earl Stevick's Influence on Language Teaching eds. J. Arnold and T. Murphey (CUP). It is also central to Humanising Language Teaching website magazine (www.hltmag.co.uk ) which has a section entitled Old Exercise or in the recent C for Creativity movement initiated by A. Maley and C. Pugliese.
Other trends, approaches and academic schools of thinking about education worth revisiting are: Psychodrama (B. Dufeu), The Silent Way (C. Gattegno), Suggestopaedia (G. Lozanov), NLP (R. Bandler and G. Grinder), The Theory of Multiple Intelligences (H. Gardner), and Positive Psychology (M. Seligman), just to name a few.
To sum up, being aware of the achievements and strong points of the approaches of the past or more peripheral ones, and having the courage to revisit them and implement their strong points, enriches the teachers’ repertoire of activities and benefits their methodology, especially when combined with the recent ELT developments. And like a wise man said: Do not look for something until you have found what you have lost.
Hanna Kryszewska is a teacher, teacher trainer and trainer of trainers. She is a senior lecturer at the University of Gdańsk, Poland. She is co-author of resource books: Learner Based Teaching, OUP, Towards Teaching, Heinemann, The Standby Book, CUP, Language Activities for Teenagers, CUP, The Company Words Keep, DELTA Publishing, of a course for secondary schools: ForMat, Macmillan, and of a video based teacher training course: Observing English Lessons. She is a Pilgrims trainer and editor of HLT Magazine.
