Write a reflection paper on the article "Post-method Era” by Kumaravadivelu (1994). Please do not forget to make references to the following points in your paper:
a) your own perspective as a prospective EFL teacher related to the significance of and the level of applicability of macro and microstrategies offered by Kumaravadivelu (1994) in the EFL context in Turkey
b) your own perspective as a prospective EFL teacher about the ways the macro and microstrategies are and should be integrated into the EFL classes in the Turkish education system
c) your own perspective into the possible challenges and obstacles on the way to the proper integration of the macro and microstrategies mentioned in the article
d) the new roles assigned to EFL teachers and learners in Turkey, the responsibilities and requirements of EFL teachers
e) To what extent and in what ways do you think your previous EFL teachers in Turkey reflect the characteristics of the post-method era?
f) To what extent and in what ways do you find yourself as a prospective post-method era teacher? Where do the macro and microstrategies concerning the post-method era stand in your own teaching philosophy as a prospective teacher?
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ReplyDeleteFLE324 REFLECTION PAPER 1
ReplyDeleteEsranur Efeoğlu 1620012
In the article “The Postmethod Condition: (E)merging Strategies for Second/Foreign Language Teaching”, Kumaravadivelu (1994) gives a guideline for teachers who also feel that ‘there is a need for an alternative to method rather than an alternative method’. He suggests ten macro strategies that are the general plans derived from previous pedagogical research on language teaching and he promote the teachers to use micro strategies that are the techniques which will be designed or used based on the specific teaching needs. I think 10 macro strategies which Kumaravadivelu highlights are quite essential components of an effective teaching environment. However, successful application of all those strategies into EFL classes in Turkey is probably being way too optimistic. Apart from the evident fact that our education system has many constraints that prevent teachers realize their ideal way of teaching, teacher themselves are also biased to act in a ‘passive’ way of teaching that do not require them to develop their own teaching. Even though all the economical and technological demands are provided, what is more important is to change the concept of ‘teaching’ in the minds of teachers. However, I believe today some of the macro strategies are integrated into the courses, though far from being adequate. Most of the teachers are trying to present the language in meaningful contexts and integrate language skills. In the Kumaravadivelu’s article, I especially like the ideas of minimizing perceptual mismatches, activating heuristics, raising cultural consciousness and promoting learner autonomy because I think that these are the biggest problems in the EFL classes in Turkey. I do not think language teachers are totally aware of the importance of these issues. The students are not promoted to integrate the foreign language into their lives, mostly because of the lack of enough intrinsic or even extrinsic motivation. There is also not much emphasis on the culture of the foreign language, even if there is, the content do not exceed the capital and flag of the country and a few examples of its cuisine. There is no space for raising the curiosity of students and letting them empathizing with the foreign culture at all. Furthermore, most probably because of the mismatch between how teacher wants to implement her way of teaching and the limits of syllabus/curriculum, Turkish EFL classrooms fail to activate heuristics. Except for a few activities focusing on reading passages and sentences, the students are not able to receive enough input to help them experience discovery learning. It is quite difficult to make use of all the strategies throughout the teaching process but the responsibility of the foreign language teacher should be at least being aware of these concepts and try to implement them any time she/he can. Consequently, one of the new responsibilities of an EFL teacher is to have insights into their own teaching and choose to make use of appropriate teaching style according to that aspect. Teachers should be equipped with enough professional knowledge to decide on what is necessary or not according to the needs of the students. Students, too, need to have a wider perspective on foreign language learning in the sense that they should be aware of their own learning and monitor themselves throughout the learning process. Integrating the foreign language into their lives will lead higher success and comprehension of the said language if the students’ interest and motivation can be promoted by the teacher.
ctd.
ReplyDeleteWhen I look back at my own foreign language learning history, I guess some of my teachers tried to implement some of the strategies while teaching English. I had teachers who tried their best to motivate us and promote learning autonomy by motivating us into extensive reading and watching English movies/animations which helped us integrate the language into our lives. My teachers were sensitive to students’ needs and they would offer extra guidance for those who have problems in specific areas of the foreign language. Even though there were constraints to implement all the strategies into EFL classroom, I am glad that some of them tried their best at their own teaching.
As a prospective teacher, I find the guideline of Kumaravadivelu important in the sense that it promotes teacher autonomy. I have never been an advocate of a specific teaching method and I thought that it is up to the profile of students and the circumstances that shape the teaching. I do hope that I can blend my own philosophy of teaching -which is likely to go between various personal assumptions before a real teaching experience- with these advices in the future.
In his article "The Postmethod Condition: (E)merging Strategies for Second/Foreign Language Teaching", Kumaravadivelu first mentions the characteristics of the post-method condition and then defines ten macrostrategies which are ‘theory neutral’ and as well as ‘method neutral.’ That is they are not based on any specific theory or methodology. Post-method condition is not a search for new method but it is a search for an alternative to the method. Teacher autonomy gains a considerable amount of importance in post-method condition, and teachers are required to acquire a reflective viewpoint in their teaching and to be open to changes in their way of teaching.
ReplyDeleteMacrostrategies suggested by Kumaravadivelu are general guidelines for language teaching in EFL and ESL environment. Since these macrostrategies are a general framework they can be adapted by the teacher for their specific situations. Thus they can be applied in the EFL context in Turkey by the EFL teachers. The applicability level of these macrostrategies is depend upon how teachers interpret these strategies and implements them. Promoting student autonomy, lacking in each step of the Turkish education system, should be used by the teacher to overcome the difficulty of providing enough L2 input for the students. Since the students will become autonomous, they can search for sources to improve their language skills and this is much more important than just teaching rules and making practices in class. In this way also class is no more the only place students engage in language, but it becomes a part of their life. Students also encouraged take part in class activities actively which is defined as facilitating negotiated interaction as a macrostrategy. Constructing a communicative environment can be hard in a foreign language context such as Turkey because all students can communicate in their mother tongue and there is no need for them to communicate in the foreign language. Thus whenever they have a chance they will try to switch to their mother tongue.
Implementing all these strategies demands a great deal of teacher labor. Teachers should be wise enough to analyze their context and choose relevant and necessary micro and macrostrategies for using in their classes. They should have the necessary background knowledge and open to try new techniques in their classes. As a language teacher they will be responsible for choosing the best strategies in their classes so they should know their students and students’ needs very well.
My previous language teachers, till I came to prep school, were all using grammar translation method generally and a deductive way of teaching, so in no way they were post-method era teachers. Rather than trying to find new ways to teach us the things we have difficulty, they were using the same techniques over and over again which is very demotivating for us. I assume that as most of the teachers they were not aware of these strategies or they did not want to deal with all these since implementing all these strategies requires teacher work. When I started to study at the prep school, I realized that language teaching is very different than what I know about it. Especially in my second term at the prep school our instructor encouraged us to become more autonomous and our materials are much related to our social life.
As a prospective teacher I believe that with the methods which have very strict rules and steps it is impossible to facilitate a productive learning environment. Since each student and context has its own unique characteristics, using the macrostrategies suggested by Kumaravadivelu is more sensible than using one method. I also believe that language learning cannot be achieved only with class work, so ‘maximizing learning opportunities,’ ‘fostering language awareness ’and‘ promoting learner autonomy’ have important places my teaching philosophy.
Kumaravadivelu has what I perceive to be a very personalized vision of language teaching and the "postmethod" state of English language teaching. He illustrates this by first grounding the reader in the concepts of language, language acquisition, and language teaching, as well as a comprehensive discussion of methodology in language teaching.
ReplyDeleteI found his final section in the article a bit compelling. Here Kumaravadivelu outlines his vision, noting the positive research contributions over the decades yet acknowledging that contexts are very real determinants of pedagogy. The postmethod condition commends strategies to "advance a context-sensitive, location-specific pedagogy that is based on a true understanding of local linguistic, socio-cultural, and political particularities. An approach to language teaching that embraces such situational criteria is relevant to any teacher's, researcher's or attentive student's awareness of just what is being taught how. While it may go without saying that incorporating such postmethods into teacher training is thus desirable, the author reinforces this need by stressing the links between pedagogies and ideologies.
Today, there is a new wave of effort to define effective teaching in Turkish education. This requires a
reestablishment of the curriculum.The teachers have so many responsibilities in order to be an effective EFL teacher.They are expected to know everything about the needs of the students.They are supposed to be effective during the lesson as much as possible.
My previous EFL teachers in Turkey reflect so much the characteristics of the post-method era.As,most of the EFL teachers benefit from the old version of the education.That is,they get the help of the techniques of the previous teachers.
In the furute, I hope I won't stick to just one strategy. I will use moft of the strategies to be an effective teacher. By using various methods, The learning will be more effective and enjoyable both for the studedents and the teacher.
BETÜL SAN
1620301
In his essay, Kumaravadivelu numbers ten significant micro strategies to be used in post method era. All of these strategies are of great importance and are all proven to be effective and beneficial in foreign language teaching. However, it can be said that not all of them have been adopted by the FLE teachers all over the world. To talk about the situation in Turkey, we can say that the number of the teachers who try to utilize these micro strategies are much fewer compared to the overall average.
ReplyDeleteIt is a commonly agreed fact that foreign language strategies are quite poor in Turkey. Compared to all other countries, especially to the European ones, the success rate of the students in foreign language learning is relatively low. As the reason seems not to be due to low intelligence of Turkish students, it is strongly advised for FLE teachers and even the school managements to check out the current strategies they have been using.
Among Kumaravadivelu’s ten strategies, the one which teachers mostly fail to implement is “to promote learner autonomy.” Although learner centered teaching/learning is considered highly beneficial and essential by most of the teachers, the situation appears to be just the opposite when it comes to practice. The reason should be the difficulties of promoting students with more autonomy in the class. It might be hard for teachers to find appropriate activities and an appropriate way of conveying the knowledge to the students in a learner centered class. It requires the teachers to get the best performance with less speaking and intervention.
A second possible reason of this failure may be due to the fact that most of the students actually tend to believe that the more they speak about the topic, the more students will get informed and learn. As this notion contradicts with the truth, the results are not aroused as they are supposed to be.
As another problematic strategy, “maximizing learning opportunity for students” can be handled. The best and easiest way of providing them with this chance is to giving them homework, asking them to do research or assigning a project. Via these tools, the students will get the chance to be in interaction with the target language out of the class. From this perspective, it can be said that especially in recent years our country has improved its “homework conception.” With the new regulations, teachers are supposed to give more project based assignments which require students to use more creative and self initiative and they are expected to put into practice what they have learned in the classroom. However due to the lack of self-esteem and excessive interference of the parents into students’ school lives; these assignments are generally being done by an adult in order to get a better mark. Consequently, this micro strategy too, becomes harder to implement in real life.
Although so far the negative sides of the compatibility of Turkish educational system with the post method techniques are mentioned, it can be denied that Turkey has achieved a great success in revising and altering old teaching methods. The foreign language teachers are trained in accordance with the requirements of the post method era, and new regulations are applied in this context. Younger teachers are enthusiastic about utilizing these modern techniques and disciplines in their classes. To my opinion, about the future of foreign language teaching, a more positive and hopeful attitude can be adopted.
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ReplyDeleteDuygu Çandarlı 1549070
ReplyDeleteFLE 324 Section 2
Reflection Paper 3
In this paper, I aim to do a critical analysis of the article called “The Postmethod Condition: (E)merging Strategies for Second/Foreign Language Teaching by adding my own perspective about the significance, applicability of macro and microstrategies offered by Kumaravadivelu, challenges to them within the framework of EFL teachers and learners.
Kumaravadivelu puts forward that in L2 methodology there is postmethod condition which means a shift away from the concept of method to “location-specific, classroom-oriented innovative practices”. In fact, the concept of method can explain why Turkish TEFL fails as centralized pedagogic decision making simply cannot work in a specific context.
Within the framework of the postmethod condition, the author suggests 10 macrostrategies that can be used in a classroom setting through microstrategies. It seems to me that those macrostrategies are a bit interrelated with one another. For instance, in order to activate students’ intuitive heuristics, teachers should contextualize linguistic input so that students can infer rules from textual data. All of the macrostrategies offered in the article are really important, but I find maximizing learning opportunities, facilitating negotiated interaction, contextualizing linguistic input, integrating language skills, promoting learner autonomy particularly significant. In my opinion, the last macrostrategy, ensuring social relevance, is the prime element for other macrostrategies as EFL teaching is bounded with the social, political, economic and educational conditions of the country. These macrostrategies should be integrated into the EFL classes in Turkish educational system. However, I find the macrostrategy 9, raising cultural consciousness, a bit problematic. It raises the question of whose culture students should be familiar with: English, American or Australian? Teachers should attach importance to create a cultural awareness of the English speaking countries and cross-cultural communication generally by treating the learner as a cultural informant.
It is easy to suggest that these strategies should be applied in Turkish EFL context. Nevertheless, there are some challenges and obstacles to the integration of them. For instance, teachers may not have sufficient time to ensure learner uptake or do revision in order to maximize learning opportunities as the curriculum is loaded with many topics that should be covered throughout the year. However, teachers should give importance to the quality of learning rather than quantity. Secondly, facilitating negotiated interaction is not easy to achieve in a teacher-centred educational system, which may be attributed the cultural issues in Turkey. Students are simply not used to having a topic control or conducting group activities, which I inferred from my observations throughout this year. However, if teachers are willing to give students freedom and encouragement to initiate talk, students will be get used to negotiated interaction in the course of time, which can lead to an increase in students’ intrinsic motivation.(CONT.)
(CONT.)Thirdly, contextualizing linguistic input is another issue that has to be tackled with. I still remember having written isolated vocabulary items eight times just to memorize and forget very quickly. Teachers should refrain from these traditional methods and present meaningful contexts. What is the point of memorizing isolated words when one cannot form a sentence by using them? Last but not least, promoting learner autonomy is the biggest obstacle that Turkish educational system has not overcome yet. As teachers are afraid of losing control over the classroom, they do not incorporate students into decision-making process about the class activities. Self discovery and project-based learning have a little place in Turkish EFL context. Teachers should train students to use metacognitive, cognitive, social and affective strategies and give some responsibility to students for their own learning. Before that, teachers should be familiar with these strategies themselves.
ReplyDeleteMy previous EFL teachers do not reflect the characteristics of post-modern era very much as they implemented traditional methods instead of using these strategies. EFL teachers should be both a researcher and a teacher. Although teachers can have an access to a lot of information about students’ learning process, they do not make any effort to use it effectively. Conducting an action research can be the solution of most of the problems as teachers can find out what works or does not work in their classroom context. They can have a role of reflecting on their own teaching, keeping up with the recent trends of new techniques in EFL and assessing their teaching continuously. I am of the opinion that new generation EFL teachers will do their best to develop their own practical theory of language pedagogy by taking these issues mentioned above into account. I am also enthusiastic to extend these macrostrategies and expand my knowledge about ELT by conducting an action research and monitoring my students, which I include in my teaching philosophy.
When I first look at the article of Kumaravadivelu and its title I got the impression that, he, by declaring the deficiencies of methods that have emerged so far, proposes a new method that is to be applied in foreign language teaching. Although it was not the case, my impression was not totally wrong. He dislikes the very concept of method itself, and suggests an awareness that consists of ten macro strategies. He describes this awareness that as long as teachers or researchers in L2 teaching are captured in the web of method, they will continue to get embroiled in an endless search for unavailable solution. Then he names this awareness as “post method condition” and summarizes it in this sentence “a search for an alternative to method rather than an alternative method. “ The situation is like the same situation in sciences’ advancing by approximations in which each new stage results from an improvement, not rejection, of what has gone before. According to him, “The post method condition empowers teachers to construct classroom oriented theories of practice. Because of the fact that the methods that have come so far are not derived from classroom experience and experimentation but artificially transplanted into the classroom, and on account of that, these methods are far removed from classroom reality, even those who design syllabi and producers of textbooks do not firmly follow the fundamental philosophy of a given method, and more importantly, even teachers who are trained in and claim to follow a particular method do not fully conform to its theoretical principles and classroom procedures.”
ReplyDeleteWhen we look at his macro strategies, firstly they are not based upon some assumptions of one specific theory of language teaching and the framework of these macro strategies is not conditioned by a single set of theoretical principles or classroom procedures related with any one specific language teaching method. During his first and second macro strategies, Kumaravadivelu mentions the encouragement of learners to take part in the learning environment and seizing every opportunity for maximizing learning opportunities, even the difficulties encountered during the ongoing lesson. After that he talks about the way in which the learner-learner and learner-teacher interaction should take place. According to him, first of all, the two interactions should include freedom and encouragement to start talk, not just respond and talk; in order to hasten the students’ comprehension and production. His suggest for this kind of interaction is group activities which naturally produce more negotiated interaction than teacher fronted activities and asking referential questions which permit open ended responses. Afore-mentioned points are obviously very important for our country in which learning environment is teacher-oriented and textbooks are full of questions which posses predetermined answers.
In his third, fourth and fifth macro strategies Kumaravadivelu states his opinions most of which are in accordance with Krashen’s thoughts about the ample amount of comprehensible input. To me, his suggestions in third, fourth and fifth strategies are important in terms of helping us to moderate the learners during classroom activities and enabling them with noticing of some fundamental grammar rules not directly but indirectly through examples. The issue of “contextualize linguistic input” which is mentioned in the sixth macro strategy is inarguably very significant in meaning making easier and enabling the acquisition of linguistic elements to be more lasting through bringing the integrated nature of language into the learners’ attention. Integrating language skills (macro strategy 7) has a good effect in triggering cognitive and communicative associations with other skills. Kumaravadivelu talks about those issues of promoting learner autonomy, raising cultural consciousness and ensuring social relevance in his last three macro strategies. In terms of dealing with the misunderstandings and miscommunications with the target language’s culture, I agree with his proposal about raising cultural consciousness, but when we take our country’s culture, which is very different from British or English language speaking countries’ culture, into consideration, to me, culture of British people should be taught heedfully to young learners. The differences between cultures or strange things they encountered while studying that culture will cause some problems for young learners who have not completed their cognitive and emotional development.
ReplyDeleteAs far as I remember, I hadn’t had any teacher who shows the characteristics of the post-method era, except one in high school. He tried to conceptualize the input for us while teaching grammar. It was effective, since he gave examples from his life and he was also aware of what’s going on in the learning environment. By not sticking in the course book too much, he will use every opportunity to teach something new, and our lessons were passing, let’s say with ample amount of comprehensible and also authentic input. However during our primary level of education and high school years, there was not any teacher like that. All of them were strictly stuck to the course book, most probably because of they did not have a better alternative to lecture us than those offered in the course book. Actually, the course books were trying to conceptualize the linguistic elements in forms of dialogues, mostly a series of dialogues between the same characters, but they were, to a significant extent, losing the authenticity of the material.
I can easily proclaim myself as a “prospective post-method era teacher”. As a significant number of my friends were, I was also affected by the theories of Krashen. And I hope I am not misperceiving, most of the macro strategies offered by Kumaravadivelu are in accordance with his theory. As I stated above, with only one of his macro strategies, I had a problem; the “raising cultural consciousness” issue. Apart from it, his macro strategies, since they are very general, are also well applicable for teaching other languages, which is an important thing for those continuing their minor programs. To conclude; since at the very beginning of my education career in here, there have been a distance between me and the methods proposed so far in English. Like most of my friends I dislike being depended on one specific method. So the distance between me and those methods enabled me to have a panoramic view of the whole methods to get their good sides and bring them together in my own teaching approach. These strategies of Kumaravadivelu will help me in reformulating it and moderating the practice part in my teaching career, I hope.
Sahura Ertuğrul 1620046
ReplyDeleteI always find an approach in teaching and learning language restrictive because it has limitations as well as its contributions. Before I read the article, I believed in eclecticism because I trusted it to give me creativeness, freedom and perfectness in the classroom. It won’t have any limitations or obstacles; it will only carry the most useful parts of all theories and approaches. However; when I read it, I saw that all approaches and theories are based on the assumptions about language rather than classroom experiences so in practice, they don’t work very well as work on the paper. The eclecticism is also a mess in the classroom because there are no criteria which part of an approach is useful and when they are useful. The author suggests macro and micro strategies rather than a new specific approach, and also they are based on the classroom experiments. I think, these strategies are important because they don’t limit the teacher with a specific view, they just try to give advises and suggestions for best teaching and learning language. They offer chance and provide environment to make language learning more real and easy. They can be applied in all contexts because they are the features which should be in every language classroom and they don’t demand teachers any physical and economical; they just show us the ways and ask the teacher to create best learning and teaching environment for their students. They are the tips for teachers which are valid and applicable for all classrooms.
These strategies offer language acquisition for learners in the classroom. When looked at the Turkish educational system, the students are asked to achieve exams rather than language acquisition, so this situation obliges teachers to give lecture as much as possible to make them ready for the exams. Language is taught as combinations of rules and vocabularies rather than a communication tool, which makes language a machine like system. Therefore, first of all, teachers should change expectations from students and prejudices of students against the language learning. Both teachers and students should view the language as lively communication tool which is improved by comprehending and using it. In this aspect, these strategies will become appear in the Turkish classrooms on their own. I think they are mostly needed in Turkish education system because as a student in Turkish schools, at the end of the high school, I just have a lot of unrelated vocabularies and many grammatical rules without any writing, speaking and listening skills in English. I still have difficulties in communicating in English because of the fossilization of my language acquisition.
cont.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, time, and comprehensible and ample input are the most important problems while applying these strategies. In any Turkish state school, there is only four hour English course so it limits the teacher to use effectively these strategies and especially learners to acquire the language. In Turkey, besides classroom activities, there is need for home activities to make language acquisition easy and fast, because in only four hour a week, you don’t focus on everything so the big responsibility and hard work wait for the learners. The learners can gain the points of language acquisition and they study at home so in the classroom, the teacher just focuses on the most important points to make them comprehend the input. On the other hand, these strategies require exposition to the language input. It may be difficult for all teachers to find ample and comprehensible input especially in listening. These materials used in classroom should be selected carefully and they should be appropriate to the needs of the students. Therefore, teachers also need to be work a lot to create an effective learning environment. The teacher also should be very good in language to control and guide the students in student centered works and discussions. It is not possible to apply all strategies in all classes so teacher should best know the students’ needs and the quality of the tasks and so s/he will be able to apply appropriate strategy for related task in appropriate time.
If we used some metaphors, in the past, teachers were like orchestra chiefs who are at the center of the teaching process, control everything and just give instructions, but now, they are like counselors or mentors who show the students the ways, guide them and offer opportunities to practice and self production. The students begin to aware of language as communication tool so they want to speak, listen, read and write effectively. Therefore teachers have to be well prepared for each class, provide ample and comprehensible input and have communication and guidance skills besides lecturing skills. Teachers need more classroom control, too. It is because that they have to make connection between different skills and different activities, smooth transitions, lead the discussions, control and check the works and create real life contexts in classroom environment. That is, teachers should be more energetic and enthusiastic to teach and more active to keep the classroom pace. It can be said that the teachers who sat behind the table stand up and take action.
I escaped almost nearly the post method area. My previous teachers used some of these strategies in some parts of listening, reading and speaking. They were stick to the course book and we made some discussion as suggested in the book and had right to select what we read and wrote about, and sometimes we selected the listening topics. In general, our classes were funny and sometimes student centered but the main focus was on the grammar rules and vocabulary memorization like every school.
I believe in the power of the language, that is a language is alive with its culture and people and gains power when it is used. Therefore, in my classroom, I will try to integrate all skills and get benefit from all the theories and approaches which will help my students acquire the language. These macro and micro strategies will help me create an effective learning and teaching environment. The most important part of the language teaching for me is the production part so I will try to give ample and comprehensible input to get positive productions. These strategies helped me create my own ideas and strengthen my belief on language. Therefore, I can name myself as a post method era teacher in terms of independency on any approach and obsession to freedom in my classroom.
The article “The Postmethod Condition: (E) merging Strategies for Second/Foreign Language Teaching”, Kumaravadivelu (1994) claim that there are ten strategies for teachers in English language teaching. These ten strategies are derived from previous pedagogical research on language teaching. These macrostrategies can be applied, but this depends on how teachers interpret these strategies and implements them. I think these macrostrategies are very beneficial, but I am not very hopeful about the application of these methods in our education system. I think these macro strategies and such beneficial methods for the language teaching are just seen in the academic researches and articles. I do not think that the teachers in our schools are aware of these strategies. Most of the teachers are classic teachers, they write some grammar rules on the board and you should know every single detail, because they suppose that the language means grammar. When I was at high school, we even didn’t know what a group work is or peer work or other strategies.
ReplyDeleteIf the teachers were aware of these strategies, they could integrate them, but I am not so hopeful about it. Although many teachers are not aware of these macrostrategies, the teachers in private schools or in universities can integrate these strategies I think. The integration of these skills will help the teachers to achieve their goals in teaching foreign language. There may be some problems in the implementation and integration of these strategies. Some teachers are not open minded and they are closed to new techniques and they just apply what they know. Besides, the schools principal may resist to post-method era strategies. The people who are responsible for the management of the schools may impose the teachers that they should not use such techniques, because they want students just to focus on the exams. For example; in my high school, one of out English teachers was a graduate of metu and I am sure he was aware of these strategies, because the school principal did not allow him to teach. The director of the school did not give importance to language teaching and he did not support any material which our teacher wants for the lesson. He just wants us just to solve questions for the university entrance exam.
For using the macrostrategies suggested by Kumaravadivelu, there are some responsibilities of the teachers. They should improve themselves and improve their knowledge about these strategies. Rather than just giving the rules or translation method, they should extend their vision and should be aware of the strategies. If they know themselves, goals and the strategies, they can apply them even if there are some problems in the education and school system.
As a prospective teacher, I would integrate these macro strategies in my lesson and use them according to my goals and the topic. I would not just give the rules or use the classical methods. I always try to develop myself and in the future I will also try to develop myself about implementing these strategies for my students. I think that I will not just depend on the old ways and I will be a post- method era teacher.
Selman Eser
ReplyDelete1529973
In his article “The Postmethod Condition: (E)merging Strategies for Second/Foreign Language Teaching”, Kumaravadivelu suggests a very useful framework based on postmethod condition.
Firstly he suggests maximizing learning opportunities. He puts responsibility of managing the learning both on teacher and students and suggests that they should work together to create learning opportunities and make use of them. This seems like working only on students with a sense of responsibility (certainly not very young learners) and with proper student-teacher cooperation.
The next strategy he mentions is facilitating negotiated interaction. This is useful in the sense that it forces meaningful communication among learners, which is proven to be useful in language development. It can be applied easily by pair or group work activities, as long as teacher actively monitors the pairs or groups.
Next, he suggests activating intuitive heuristics. This is essentially suggesting indirect teaching of grammar through discovery. As much as it takes time to teach indirectly, such knowledge will last longer and prove to be more useful. It is known to be effective for younger learners.
Similar to activating intuitive heuristics, he also suggests contextualizing linguistic input. So this strategy suggests integration of syntactic, semantic, pragmatic, and discourse phenomena. This means serving the language in a meaningful context as giving words in sentences and sentences in meaning contexts.
Another strategy mentioned in the article is fostering language awareness. This strategy aims to give explicit knowledge to raise language awareness of students to speed up the learning process. This should be possible to apply for learners who are ready to receive explicit teaching of language.
Lastly, postmethod era gives autonomy to teachers. This means teachers are expected to act autonomously, theorize from their practice and practice what they have theorized. They need to develop a reflective approach to their own teaching, evaluate their teaching practice and initiate changes based on that.