LEARNER-ORIENTED APPROACHES: VALUABLE IN ACHIEVING LANGUAGE LEARNING

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

A CRITICIAL ANALYSIS OF AN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING TEXTBOOK

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

I. INTRODUCTION

Basic English for College is a text used for English 1 classes which aims to improve the

oral and written communication skills of college students. It is a textbook developed and used

by Ateneo de Manila University faculty members and intended for students who come from

different high schools all over the country. The focus of the book is developing the basic

academic language skills of the students – using communication to achieve their academic

purposes in college. It encompasses the four components of communication: listening,

speaking, reading and writing. The book contains a balance of concepts and exercises for the

college student to practice communicative skills in English (Pascasio, Dalupan, Fernandez,

Nuňez, & Que, 2006).

This critical analysis of the textbook Basic English for College shall present a thorough

description of the subject of the analysis before proceeding to an in-depth discussion of the

methods used and the results of the analysis. The Basic English for College textbook was

analyzed by examining the preface to find out the objectives of the textbook and exploring the

unit on speaking to look into the methods and approaches as well as the theoretical

underpinnings used in the book.

This paper seeks to prove that in achieving the goals and objectives of language

learning, the learner-centered approach develops the independent language learning abilities of

the student.

II. DESCRIPTION OF THE TEXTBOOK

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 Basic English for College is a textbook designed for freshmen college students to

improve on their basic communication skills. It contains 243 pages of concepts, texts,

exercises, and tasks which the student can use to practice their communication skills. The

book’s size is convenient enough for the student to carry it anywhere and read. The textbook is

published in the Philippines and authored by faculty members of the Ateneo de Manila

University, namely Emy M. Pascasio, Lourdes G. Dalupan, Apricinia B. Fernandez, Carol A.

Nuňez, Mary Jennifer J. Que. The authors are either Ph.D or Master’s degree holders, or have

taken graduate studies in courses related to Linguistics and Language Teaching. This revised

edition of the book was published by the Ateneo de Manila University Printing Press in 2006.

Basic English for College is the textbook chosen for this analysis because it has been

used as a textbook for Communication Skills classes. Considering the year of publication which

is 2006, the writer of this analysis wishes to know, from an objective standpoint, whether it is still

effective and appropriate for freshmen college learners today. In addition, the book carries a

wide range of topics wherein the theories and methods of language teaching seem to be

applicable. Furthermore, the textbook incorporates themes and topics in the Philippine context

which students can relate to.

Its content is presented in units or chapters and the topics are grouped according to the

specific communication skill target. The major chapters zero in on listening, speaking, reading,

and writing skills. Each chapter is structured with a short discussion of the topic/ lesson before

proceeding to the exercises. The last sections are devoted to a review of grammatical and

ungrammatical sentences and correct word usage. A supplemental lesson on answering essay

questions is found at the end of the textbook. The unit chosen to critically analyze is the

chapter on Speaking: Expressing Oneself through Speech. There is no particular reason for

the choice of the chapter to analyze except that it is interesting topic to critique.

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III. CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF Basic English for College Textbook

A. Methods/Approaches and their Theoretical Underpinnings

This analysis focuses on the unit on Speaking entitled Expressing Oneself through

Speech. The objective of this unit is for the students to learn to speak in the English language in

different situations and to polish their thinking skills. The content is chronologically organized as

follows: Getting to Know Others, Telling Others about your Name, Role Playing and Language

Register, and Conducting an Interview (Pascasio et al, 2006).

After a careful analysis of the organization and content of the unit on Speaking, the

researcher identified several methods and approaches used in the textbook. The lessons

reveal the use of a Learner-Oriented Language Learning approach. According to Ruanni and

Tupas, this approach allows students to take control of their own learning. They are

participative and take an active part in the language learning situation (Ruanni & Tupas, 2009).

For every lesson in the textbook, there are activities and tasks to be done by the students. In

the lesson on role playing and language register, even the example dialogue has to be

performed by the students. The Learner-Oriented Methods reflected in the textbook is

summarized in Table 1.

Table 1 Summary of Language Methods and Approaches used in the Textbook Basic English for College

Method/Approach Characteristics reflected in the Examples in the Unit

textbook
Communicative Language Use of sociolinguistic Lesson on Language

Teaching(CLT) competence Register (use of

appropriate expressions)
Discourse competence Role playing and

Language register

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 Social Interaction Activities on Getting to

Know Others and

Conducting Interview
Task-based Language Language is used to accomplish Activities for Getting

Teaching(TBLT) tasks. Know Others; Telling

Others About your Name;

Conducting an Interview

Journal writing; Writing a

dialogue; role playing;

panel discussion
Cooperative Language Learning Based on the theory of Group and pair work

Collaborative Learning, learners Activities for Getting to

are given equal opportunities to Know Others lesson

speak. (Ruanni & Tupas, 2009)

Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

The CLT approach is based on the assumption that interaction is used as a way to

achieve language communicative competence (Rhalmi, 2009). Learners get to practice English

language skills through language tasks such as speaking and writing. The activities in the

textbook, such as Getting to Know Others and role playing for an Interview make the students

interact with one another. Social interaction in language learning develops the cognitive skills of

the learners (Ruanni, 2009). In the exercise on Conducting an Interview, the students work in

pairs and are asked to formulate questions relevant to the given situation. They interact with

one another and think. This is learning the language through social interaction which is a

characteristic of the Communicative Language Teaching Approach (Ruanni & Tupas, 2009).

Another feature of Communicative Language Teaching is sociolinguistic competence, which is

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the knowledge on how to use language appropriately in different situations (Ruanni & Tupas,

2009). The learners are exposed to different situations and learn to use the appropriate

expressions. In the topic Role Playing and Language Register, the appropriateness of the

language used depending on the person being spoken to is introduced. It does so with

dialogues as example and exercise. The dialogue below, taken from the book Basic English for

College, is about two long-time friends. The students have to identify expressions used when

talking with friends.

(Eddie and Ali were classmates from grade school to high school. In college, however,
they enrolled in different schools. It has been a month since classes started and now,
Eddie and Ali see each other again.)

Eddie: Hi, Ali! How’s life treating you these days, buddy?

Ali: Not too bad. But my old man’s been in a bad mood.

Eddie: Why? What’s up?

Ali: My beloved sister borrowed the wheels last weekend and drove smack
into the subdivision’s perimeter wall. The car was a total wreck!

Eddie: Jeez! And your sister?

Ali: Well, Helen survived with only a few stitches on her forehead.

Eddie: She does seem to have a knack for getting into scrapes!

Ali: My folks have no one to blame but themselves. They made a spoiled brat
out of her.

Language in the dialogue above performs an act of expressing or showing feelings that

fit the context. The word, Jeez, uttered by Eddie is an expressive. He is expressing how he feels

about the news relayed by his friend Ali. In the context conversing with friends, language

functions to maintain relations. It is also through the role play and the Language Register that

the student gain discourse competence. That is, knowing how to respond to the different

language situations. From the example can be gleaned the underlying principles of Speech Act

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theory and the Cooperative Principle. According to the speech act theory, “language exists for

people” (Ruanni, 2009). We use language so others will understand our ideas and emotions.

The Cooperative Principle assumes that every person involved in the conversation makes a

contribution thereby making the communication a successful one (Ruanni & Tupas, 2009). In

the dialogue, students are made to understand the appropriate expressions to be used when

talking with friends. Another dialogue exercise for that specific lesson changes the context.

This time the young man talks to an older man (Eddie’s father). The expressions used are

different from the given example above. This also demonstrates the Maxim of Relation in which

speakers contribute only relevant information into a conversation (Ruanni & Tupas, 2009).

Task-based Language Teaching (TBLT)

The Task-based Language Teaching (TBLT) is closely associated with the CLT. TBLT

assumes that “language learning is best achieved if activities and tasks are both purposeful and

interactive.”(Ruanni & Tupas, 2009) In the unit on speaking, almost all of the topics included

tasks for the students to perform. An example is the Getting to Know Others lesson in which the

students are asked to describe a classmate and the rest of the class will guess who it is. There

are also other activities to be performed by pair, by group and by the whole class. In Activity 3,

the students are to interview other students to find out interesting information about them. In the

Journal Writing task, they are asked to describe their classmates based on their responses in

Activity 3. In these activities, the learners will be able to accomplish the task of getting to know

their classmates through interaction with one another while using the English language.

Task-based language teaching (TBLT) identifies two kinds of tasks: the pedagogic and

the real tasks (Ruanni, p. 176). The tasks in the book are considered to be pedagogic tasks as

they were performed to achieve language goals and facilitate language learning. The goal for

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the unit on Speaking is to enable the students to use language that is appropriate in different

speaking situations. The tasks given were directed toward the achievement of this goal.

Cooperative Language Learning

Most of the tasks and activities on speaking require collaborative work with classmates.

It provides a learning environment wherein every student in class is given the chance to speak

and use the target language. The task of conducting a panel discussion is a group work

wherein each member will be given a task and opportunity to speak.

B. The Claims of the Textbook

The book’s back cover gives a succinct description of its aim which is “to develop the

student’s academic language skills necessary in pursuing college studies.” (Pascasio, et al,

2006). It continues that the college student should possess skills and strategies to cope with

the complexity and difficulty of studying their chosen courses. Thus, the content and lessons in

the book are directed not just to develop language skills but also learning skills, and more

importantly, cognitive skills that can be applied not only in language but in the content areas as

well (Pascasio, et al, 2006).

The Preface explains the approach used in the construction of the textbook. which is the

Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA). In this approach, students

participate in content directed instructions to become proficient in the language. This approach

is characterized by giving importance to what students already know including cultural

experiences and use this in learning a new language. Its objectives include learning the

language by working in groups, using tasks and learning independently (Language Learning,

2009).

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 Evidence shows that the textbook applies this learning approach. The book attempts to

develop and improve the target communication skills by giving examples and activities that

make the students participate and use the language. For every topic, there are one or more

tasks to be done. These examples and tasks are in the Philippine context, which paves the way

for easier understanding because the learners can relate to the situations. For instance, in the

lesson on Conducting Interview, the students are tasked to construct questions for an interview

with an honest taxi driver who returns money he his passenger left in his cab. The taxi driver is

named Roel Calaunan and his passenger’s name is Wilfredo Hugo. The names and the

situation are a usual happening in our country. Other dialogues and situations in the chapter

similarly uses Philippine context which makes students comfortable in expressing themselves

and their ideas.

Result of the Critical Analysis

The unit analyzed shows the objectives were met through the approaches used. The

goal of the Speaking unit is to use the English language in different situations and to polish their

thinking skills. The Communicative Language Teaching, Task-based Language Teaching and

Cooperative Language Learning approaches contributed to achieving the goal by means of the

tasks and the group and pair work nature of the activities. The learners are being made to

participate individually or interact as a group which developed their language and cognitive

skills. However, the authors of the textbook clearly indicated that the CALLA is the approach

used in the textbook. The authors’ use of culture-based materials and group tasks in developing

cognitive and language learning abilities of the students is consistent with the objectives of the

book. CALLA and the other approaches mentioned in this paper share the common

characteristic of being learner-oriented. Thus, the use of learner-oriented approaches in

language teaching and learning develops the language and cognitive skills of the learners.

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 REFERENCES

Language Learning – CALLA – Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA).

(2009, June 25). Retrieved from http://blog.innovativelanguage.com/tag/cognitive-academic-

language-learning-approach-calla/

Pascasio, E., Dalupan, L., Fernandez, A., Nuňez, C., & Que, M.J. Basic English for College.

Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press.

Rhalmi, M. (2009, Sept. 2). Communicative Language Teaching (The Communicative

Approach). Retrieved from http://www.myenglishpages.com/blog/communicative-language-

teaching-communicative-approach/

Ruanni, T. & Tupas, F. (2009). Second Language Teaching. Quezon City: UP Open University.

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