Dear FLE 324 members,
Taking into consideration the class discussions we had on the article called "the Goals of ELT" by Cook (2007), please write a reflection paper by making comments on various perspectives taken by the author making references to the following points:
a)your position concerning the adoption of the native speaker or a multicompetent L2 user as a goal to pursue in an EFL class.
b)the position that you have adopted from each of the following perspectives:
i) prospective EFL teacher,
ii)an EFL learner at different levels of proficiency in English,
iii) an EFL user at different levels of proficiency in English,
iii)the aims of instruction.
While writing your reflection paper, you need to clearly state both the author's perspective and your own perspective, do a critical appraisal of the author's views,indicating where you agree and disagree with the author's ideas.
The length of the reflection paper should be be
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In his article “The Goals of ELT” Cook (2007), mentions the external and internal goals of language teaching and discusses on which of these goals the language instruction should focus on, and she also explains the concept of L2 user. As it is suggested by Cook pursuing to be a multicompetent L2 user is a more reachable goal for the majority of the students and also the concept of the being a multicompetent L2 user gives importance to both internal and external goals.
ReplyDeleteIn EFL classes it might be an unrealistic to expect that all students will reach the native speaker level and this also puts lots of pressure on the learners. This pressure may also inhibit students from speaking the language because of the fact that they know that they will never reach a native speaker level. On the other hand, some students may want to take the native speaker proficiency as goal for themselves so always focusing and encouraging L2 competence may affect these learners in a bad way. As a result, adopting L2 competence as a goal to pursue in EFL classes is a more sensible since it is more attainable by the most of the students as long as we do not ignore the ones who want to achieve native speaker proficiency.
As a prospective teacher, I do not think that teachers should have native level proficiency but taking native level proficiency as a goal is important since we will be models for students’ oral production. As an EFL learner and user, I did not try to reach native speaker level until I realized that as a teacher it is important to have correct pronunciation and now I do not think that I can reach a native speaker level so I try to make my best to correct my pronunciation and intonation.
If the native speaker is taken as the aim of language instruction, as the Cook (2007) claims since it is impossible to be a native speaker, it will only cause degrees of failure. It would be very demotivating for the learners. I also agree that very few non-native speakers talk to native speakers and most of the communication takes place among non-native speakers. Multicompetent L2 speaker as the goal of language instruction is more beneficial for learners. First of all is more achievable for most of the students and it gives more strength to students such as code switching
The article named ‘The Goals of ELT’ by Cook (2007) deals with the goals of ELT and elaborates on some issues concerning reasons for learning a second language, native speaker as the target of language teaching and the L2 user concept.
ReplyDeleteAccording to this article, reasons for learning a second language are divided into 2 categories which are external and internal goals. In my opinion, as it is also suggested by Cook, people usually have some external goals to learn a second language. In that sense, most people may want to learn English for such reasons as gaining a prospective career, travelling around the world, meeting other people in the world, learning about different cultures and also for realizing some academic purposes. However, I think that one cannot be successful in language learning without being motivated internally. These external goals should give way to internal goals for people to be successful at language learning. Thus, as teachers, we should help students to set some personal reasons for learning English. If a student has an internal goal and intrinsic motivation to learn English, she or he will benefit from language learning activities more and they will have more fun and endurance towards challenges of learning English.
When it comes to the issue of trying to speak like native speakers, I agree with the point of the author that it is impossible for an L2 user to become a native speaker of anything other than your first language. This unrealistic desire causes affective filter to increase and people can make more mistakes when they are under the stress of this issue. I believe that as a teacher, we should help students to develop this awareness because all native speakers have different backgrounds regarding social, cultural and ethnic background, so even if we may try to do our best to sound and speak like native speakers, we should not try to resemble them totally at all. In that sense, as a prospective teacher, I do not agree with the idea that teachers should be native speakers of that second language but I believe that we should take native level proficiency as a goal because whatever we do and how we do our teaching affect the learning of our students. Apart from this, students take teachers as models. Considering this, we should not value the components of the language separately and differently. Enough attention should be given to each component of language. Thus, I will try to be more like a native speaker but without putting so much pressure on myself to be so.
Taking all these into consideration, the goal of becoming a multi-component L2 speaker which emphasizes both internal and external goals of language learning, is more valid and achievable for the students as Cook suggests. Students should be judged by how successful they are as L2 users not by their failure at being like native speakers of that language. Thus, they will not be under the pressure of having a failure when they talk to native speakers. This also gives opportunities like code switching and translation to students when they have difficulty in their conversation.
FLE324 REFLECTION PAPER 2
ReplyDeleteEsranur Efeoğlu 1620012
I really enjoyed reading the article “The Goals of ELT: Reproducing Native-speakers or Promoting Multicompetence among Second Langauge Users?” by Vivan Cook because the ideas presented in the paper reflected my own attitude towards the definition of ‘foreign language learner’ which is described as multicompetent L2 user in the text.
As the author clearly states adopting the term ‘native speaker level competence’ into the EFL classroom has no function at fostering the teaching process at all. It is impossibe for an L2 user to become a ‘native’ speaker anyways. Even if we can try really hard and become one, is it that crucial? I do not think so. English is the langua franca which means the majority of communication in English does not even involve native speakers. The aim of an EFL class should not be shaping the students into imitations of native speakers (which is already quite unrealistic.) but to help them become multicompenent L2 users who can make use of different language systems in a quite higher cognitive level than monolinguals. EFL classes should help students integrate their foreign language knowledge into their live and use it to attain a broader perspective of live. It does not matter whether you are a native speaker or not if the goal of using the language is the same.
A prospective teacher of EFL should take these facts into consideration while deciding on the goals of his/her course. If the teacher demands all the students to reach a native-level proficiency, it will most probably be a disappointment for both herself/himself and the students. As Vivian(2007) states the teacher should take into consideration the L2 users’ degrees of success rather than different degrees of failure. EFL learner should also be aware of the distinction between ‘native speaker’ and ‘L2 user’ fact. The article clearly demonstrates the differences between the native speaker and L2 user in different cognitive apsects, such as the use of code-switching and having the command of both L1 and L2. I agree that both learners and users of L2 should know that L2 users have a different command of the second and the first languages according to his/her needs. An L2 user may read in one language, communicate in another, listen and understand but do not speak in another, yet these skills can satisfy his/her needs successfully. Therefore as a conclusion, the aims of instruction should take into account the specific needs of language learners and help them improve their foreign language skills in a more realistic view.
I especially like how Vivian(2007) states that the English language is not copyrighted by the native speakers of the language. Therefore; as EFL teachers, L2 learners and users we shouldn’t let the disappointment defeat our language learning enthusisasm and motivation, rather we should make use of the advantages of being able to blend both L1 and L2.
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ReplyDeleteIn the article “The Goals of ELT” Cook (2007), it is mentioned the importance of the goals of language teaching. The author discusses the focus on which of these goals should be in the language teaching. Additionally, in the article, the importance of L2 users is mentioned. Foreign language learners are described as multicompetent L2 users by Cook in this article. It is argued that the native like accent cannot be the first condition of speaking a foreign language. The motivation of learning a second language differs between the learners. The language may be learnt just for curiosity of that language and culture or to survive in a foreign country or so on. Because motivation in language learning differs between learners, we as teachers should make our students aware for their own motivation of learning a language.
ReplyDeleteIn the article it’s been suggested that the goal of language learning is divided into two main categories which are external and internal goals. So what is external and internal goal of language learning? External goals are the goals of language use outside the class. Internal goals are just the opposite which is the language use in the class. These goals concerned with the mental development of the students. It’s my view that, generally all the second language learners have an external goal of learning a foreign language, as it is also mentioned in the text. People having external goals may aim to learn a language just for travelling, business, learning a different culture or to survive in a different culture. However, every learner should have an internal goal as well in order to be successful in learning a second language. If a language learner is motivated both externally and internally, that learner will be more successful while learning. So as teachers, we should lead our students to be motivated in both to be successful.
Another issue that is argued in the article is that, one cannot speak like a native speaker. At this point I agree to the author, because a learner can only be like native speaker but not totally a native speaker. A learner should be aware of this issue and should not be under pressure of speaking like a native speaker. This would be an obstacle for a learner to speak in the target language, because s/he may be under pressure of making mistake. Thus, we as future teachers should make our students aware of this issue. Not everyone can speak like natives, its not possible. Off course the pronunciation is very important, but it does not mean that the learner should make accent and speak like natives, we should not expect this from our students. One important point that I think is that, a teacher’s pronunciation must be good; it does not mean that the teacher should speak like native. Proper pronunciation is a must for a teacher because students take teachers as models of that target language. What ever the teacher says in that target language, students get from her and learn it in the way she pronounce. That’s why I think I would be a good model for my students because I think my pronunciation is good enough for my future students to be a good model for them.
As a result of these issues, the goal of learning a language should be both external and internal in order to be more successful while learning a language. The students should be guided to be a successful language learner instead of putting pressure on them to speak like a native speaker, its impossible. If this pressure will not be on the surface the students may feel more comfortable and they may not be afraid or shy to talk in the target language even with natives.
Emine EREN
ReplyDelete"The Goals of ELT" by Cook (2007)
In my opinion the adoption of the native speaker or a multi competent L2 user as a goal to pursue in an EFL class is something which is unnecessary and almost impossible to achieve. As it is stated in the article, being in expectation from the students in an EFL class to be like native speaker or multi competent as a goal is nothing else but making them discouraged. This puts the L2 users under pressure. When I think about my own experiences and as a prospective teacher, I have the same idea with Cook (2007). The students should be compared only with their equivalences who are again L2 users like themselves. When it comes to linguistic issues, it is almost impossible as monolinguals to learn another language (L2) like native speaker. Because they have knowledge and ability to use their mother tongue efficiently and then they try to gather the other language. After a distinct age, not matter how advanced you are in the other language it cannot be the same as native speaker of it. As an EFL learner sometimes I want to be like native speaker of the languages I try to learn, but I am aware of the fact that this kind of goals are not practical and encouraging. I also know that not being like native speaker does not make me inefficient in that language. As it is stated in the article, if I can read English texts, books, newspaper etc, I can speak and communicate when it is necessary, I can write even an academic article and I can make translations in that language to my mother tongue, so there is no need to be like native speakers. These competency levels show that I can live in the country in which that language is spoken without getting into trouble.
In his article,Vivian Cook mentions about the goals of ELT, he proposest that language learning should have purposes in order to be effective, native speaker as the target of language teaching, and second language user.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, Vivian Cook suggests two types of goals, that is, he divides the goals of ELT into two as the external goals and internal goals. He says that external goals are related to a person’s personal life engagements, for example, travelling to different countries, reading books in different languages, making a Ph.D in another country etc. What is meant by the external goals, shortly, is that they are out of the classroom. However, internal goals are the ones that are intended to develop a student mental development. What I understood from this is that while learning a language, a person can improve his/her learning skills, learn new approaches to language learning etc. In my opinion, external goals are given importance more than the internal ones nowadays as people think that a new language which is learned should serve a purpose that the individual can use in his life. I, also, think that this is true because, as people, we are practical and we act according to our purposes, our goals in life. So, there should be something to motivate us in order to deal with it. So, as a prospective teacher, when we start our teaching life, we should consider these points, we should try to give our students a purpose to learn the language.
Also, the article proposes two target levels of proficiency in the second language. I think, as a target of our langauge teaching, we should dedicate “the level of a native speaker” This idea of Cook reflects my opinion related to this, as well. The aim of our students while learning English should be reaching to a native speaker’s proficiency in my opinion. In this way, they make effort more and the more effort they show in English, the more proficient they become.
Even though we, teachers, know that it would be very difficult even impossible to reach the level of a native speaker, the goal should be that. Also, a teacher, I think, should try to be as a native speaker of the foreign language. His/her skills need to be quite improved in order to be beneficial for the students. However, being like a native speaker isn’t enough for a language teacher. That teacher should be also good at teaching skills, that is, ELT skills. In the article, the writer also looks fom the perspective of targeting the L2 user proficiency. I think, we should make our students’ minds clear about this issue as it is the thing that determines how an individual will make effort for that.
In the article, the author mentions internal and external goals of learning an L2. Although each approach to FLE mostly emphasizes one of these goals(For example,communicative approach-external goals)I believe that both internal and external goals should be emphasized and valued in teaching and learning a foreign language.
ReplyDeleteAs a prospective EFL teacher I think that the author is right to say that defining the goal of L2 learning as being nativelike is an unrealistic goal for many learners and it is also unfair for us who are educated to be EFL teachers, but not nativelike. I believe that native speakers of English help young learners especially to develop good prononciation skills, however this skill should be supported by other skills, as well. So a native speaker of English can be a very good model for learners in terms of speaking, but he/she is likely to be inadequate in teaching other sides of the language. So I think, having a native speaker as a teacher together with an educated teacher in this area could be a good idea.
I also agree with the author on that bilinguals have a better understanding of their mother language. Learning English as well as German helps me to compare the features of these language with the ones of Turkish, and it gives me a better awareness of languages.
As a L2 user I can say that being nativelike is not my main goal in learning English. However I also think that it is important to give importance to the pronouciation because our L2 user identity can never be thought seperately from our teacher identities. Namely, we will use English in our EFL clasrooms in the future and we will be good models for our future students.
In this article, Cook (2007) deals with mainly three points related to second language learning. The first issue discussed is the goals of ELT, secondly the reasons of L2 learning and lastly the issue of native speaker versus L2 user discussion.
ReplyDeleteCook clearly suggests that ELT has mainly two goals, internal and external. I agree with him at this point. People usually learn languages for external goals. There are the ones who learn a language just for the sake of learning the language that is to say for the internal purposes. However, the majority of our students will learn the L2 just because they are required to learn. So, as a prospective language teacher, I have the idea that we should prepare our activities and lesson plans in a way that will appeal to the external goals of our students. However, we should not miss one point; we should try to target the internal goals in language learn whenever it is possible because language learning will be realized if the learners are motivated to learn above all. As an EFL user, I can say that during the years I was an EFL learner, the internal goals of language learning were not targeted. As a result, I have difficulty in speaking the L2 outside because we were given little chance to practice the language and use it freely and flexibly.
Cook continues to elaborate on some ideas related to second language learning. First of all, we should not forget that the main reason in language learning is to communicate. This communication may be oral or written, it does not make change. However, if a learnt language is not used in some or other way, it is doomed to be forgotten. That’s why, in our language classes, we should give our students as much chance as possible to talk and practice the language. Students may learn the language for some specific purposes and our instruction should serve their purposes. At this point, I want to add my views on task-based language learning about which Cook does not talk a lot in his article. In my opinion, we need to provide the language learners with the necessary language, structures, vocabulary etc. which will help them survive and express themselves because it would be unrealistic to expect them to learn even the most trivial word in a language, which are even unknown to the native speakers themselves. So, by providing them with the necessary language, we can help our learners achieve their set goals and purposes for language learning.
Lastly, Cook touches upon the issue of native speaker versus L2 user. Before starting a discussion related to this topic, I want to talk a little bit about the term L2 user. L2 users are the ones who use the target language in various situations. They are different from the L2 learners in that they actively use the target language in their daily lives. L2 users generally deal with the written activities n language learning. As a result, it would be unfair to compare them with the native speakers. However, some people tend to compare L2 users with the native speakers of the target language because both are the active users of the L2.
However, this is also unfair because L2 users, L2 learners, native-speakers, monolinguals, bilinguals etc. are all different from each other. Their minds, their perspective related to their first and second language are all different. Above all, we cannot expect all of these people to have the same abilities and capacities towards a language. People carry the traces of where they born, their values, cultures etc. We cannot expect the learners not to carry the traces of their first language and accents. As we discussed in the class, we should not expect our students to be native-like. They cannot be as proficient as the native speakers as the native speakers. Such expectancy will only cause them to be frustrated and decrease the learning which may occur. Besides this, if there are native students in our class, we should not compare the L2 users with the native speakers because this is not fair. If necessary, we should make comparisons among the non-native students.
ReplyDeleteThe minds of the L2 users and monolinguals also work differently. L2 users get more aware of their first language. Taking all this into consideration, we should not treat the first language of the students as something detrimental, as prospective language teachers. We should always try to benefit from their L1 to increase the chance of language learning. We should never forget that our aim is to teach the target language not to forbid the first language. Our opinions are the same with Cook at this point. He also adds that we can raise language awareness of the students by benefiting from their fist language. As language teachers, we need to treat according to the levels, capacities and abilities taking into consideration the varieties among them. The main point is to be able to have enough proficiency to communicate with the other people.
Cook touches upon several aspects of ELT in his article. As an EFL learner at different levels of proficiency, I think that my proficiency at least in speaking would be better if we had learnt English with different teaching methods rather than grammar-translation method. This is a great disadvantage for me and also for most of the students in the country. As an EFL user at different levels of proficiency, I cannot say that I’m very good at speaking because I have not practiced the language much. Besides this, my listening skill is not at a level that I would like it to be.
In his article Cook explains learning English like a native speaker or just an L2 user. Then, he defines external and internal goals to learn English as a second language. External goals are related to the students’ use of language outside the classroom: travelling, reading books in another language, etc. Internal goals relate to the students’ mental development as individuals. Most of the methods in language teaching have external goals as their first principles such as audiolingualism, communicative language teaching, and situational teaching. Actually, I think internal goals are only for learning Latin now to train brain. For a long time the primary goal of language teaching is communication in a globing world. Cook (202) states that enabling students to use an L2 does not just give them a tool for communication but changes their lives and minds in all sorts of ways.
ReplyDeleteWhile learning an L2 some have the goal of being like a native speaker. Teachers who think like that inquire how close their students resemble native speakers. According to this view the best teacher is therefore a native speaker. However, it is impossible for an L2 user to become a native speaker. In addition I believe that when somebody learns an L2 it is not always used to communicate with a native speaker. Generally many L2 users speak to people who are not native speakers. For example I speak in English with tourists form German, Egypt, Japan and so on whose native language is not English.
We are advance L2 learners but at the same time L2 users in courses or in any other social places at METU because METU is an international university. In the article it is stated that an L2 user should be compared with another successful L2 user, a member of the same group, not with a native speaker, who by definition is a member of a group that the L2 user can never join. I strongly agree with this idea. As I mentioned before it is impossible to be like a native speaker, so why bother? Our students will be L2 users and I believe we will be perfect example of L2 user for them We as a prospective English teachers are authentic sources of knowledge about what it is like to be an L2 user. As Cook mentioned that students should be judged by how successful they are as L2 users, not by their failure compared to native speakers. Ls users have the right to become L2 users, not imitation native speakers.
In my previous reflections, especially, in those related with teaching reading, I stressed that a motivating and logical purpose is needed in order to encourage students to read in English and to make them love reading in English. That is to say, the purpose of a student to read something should not be just to enhance his or her reading comprehension skills, or purpose like that. There should be a purpose related to his or her life that motivates the student to read it. And such kinds of purposes or goals are mostly internal. External goals cannot be as eternal as internal goals, I think. In his article, Cook includes this internal and external goals issue in teaching English. I think, the same issue is valid in learning English. Such external goals as gaining a prospective career, travelling around the world, meeting other people in the world, learning about different cultures and also for realizing some academic purposes cannot be as lasting as internal goals. Those who learn English for an external goal like one of those mentioned above will most probably have less motivation for and less perseverance in learning English than those people who have an internal goal for learning English. What is an internal goal? I see more motivation and determination in those who are learning a foreign language for religious purposes, for example. Learning Hebrew in order to read Old Testament or Arabic to read Quran or to read books of commentaries that are originally written in that language motivate and encourage those learners more than above-mentioned external goals. This is just one of the internal goals that we could provide for our students or for us as learners. Finding internal goals like that will work more in language teaching, I think.
ReplyDeleteThe second issue is the aim to be attained for a language learner, native-like or L2 users are two options. As it is stated in the article, the former one is not only unnecessary but unattainable as well. This is also what I think about that issue. In my prospective career as a teacher, I will definitely pay attention to the points that are emphasized while evaluating my students. Comparing them with native speakers’ proficiency level in English is, of course, absurd, because of the reasons that Cook mentioned in his work and the reasons my friends remarked in their comments. The comparisons between L2 users, monolinguals and bilinguals seem a bit exaggerated to me. I have not looked at the sources of information that Cook included in his work, so it may not be fair to judge beforehand anyway.