HỘI THẢO KHOA HỌC TỔ NGOẠI NGỮ trang 155-162

THÁNG 6, 2011 TP.HCM

Language Acquisition

ThS. Lý Nhựt Thiện

Tổ Ngoại ngữ, trường Đại học Sư phạm TP.Hồ Chí Minh

Tóm tắt

Trong những năm gần đây giáo viên có cơ hội tiếp cận nhiều phương pháp giảng dạy. Việc
lựa chọn phương pháp thích hợp sẽ giúp giáo viên đáp ứng nhu cầu của người học. Qua
việc so sánh và đối chiếu những lý thuyết giảng dạy sau đây, chúng ta có thể hiểu rõ hơn
về việc tiếp nhận ngôn ngữ cũng như tìm ra được những đóng góp và hạn chế của những
phương pháp này đối với việc giảng dạy ngôn ngữ. Mọi người đều tin rằng ở Việt Nam
giáo viên thường hay sử dụng phương pháp tiếp cận về hành vi (behaviourism). Phương
pháp tiếp cận về hành vi (behaviourism) được cho là phù hợp đối với việc giảng dạy ở bậc
phổ thông vì học sinh phổ thông chỉ quan tâm đến việc làm sao để thi đỗ. Tuy nhiên, khi
giảng dạy sinh viên đại học thì phương pháp văn hóa xã hội (sociocultural) tỏ ra rất hữu
ích vì sinh viên Việt Nam luôn mong mỏi làm sao để giao tiếp tốt.

Abstract

In recent years teachers can approach a lot of teaching methods. Choosing an appropriate
method will help a teacher meet the need of his learners. Through comparing and
contrasting these theories, we can understand more about language acquistion as well as
find out the contributions and limitations of these methods to language teaching. It is
believed that in Vietnam, behaviourism is given priority. It is because nearly every teacher
at high school applies it when teaching their students. Behaviourism is said to be suitable
to apply because students at high schools only have one need that is to pass their exams.
However, sociocultural theory is very necessary when teaching students at university level
because Vietnamese students now really wish to be able to communicate well.

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1. Introduction

“How do human beings learn a language?” has been a big and controversial
question to a lot of linguists and psychologists. The acquisition of language ranges
from different levels sushi as the word level, the sentence level, and the level of the
whole text. Thanks to the study of the many linguists and psychologists, teachers
can take advantage of their different approaches to apply in their teaching. Being an
English teacher, one has to consider these theories carefully to make a good choice
for his teaching context. In this essay, the writer will compare and contrast
behaviorism and sociocultural theory. The writer then discusses their contribution
and their limitations in term of what they have to offer in language teaching.

2. Body

2.1. A brief history of behaviorism

Behaviorism was based on the experiment on a dog. Pavlov rang the bell as he fed
the dog. After a while, the dog got used to the unconditional response to food that is
“salivation”. Later when he rang the bell without offering the food, the dog still
salivated. Pavlov pointed out that the unconditional response to food (salvation)
became conditioned to the bell. The above process provided the grounds for
behaviourism theory.

Ellis (1985:20) is of the opinion that

Up to the end of the 1960s, views of language learning were derived from a
theory of learning in general. They were few studies of SLA based on the
actual the language that learners produced, and few attempts to examine the
process of SLA empirically before this. This dominant school in psychology,
which informed most discussions of language learning, was behaviorism.

Based on this theory, in order to acquire a second language, learners should follow
stimulus response model in which will lead to response and this process will form a

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habit. Lightbown and Spada (1999:35) state that behaviourists account for learning
in terms of imitation, practice, reinforcement (or feedback on success), and habit
formation. Learners are encouraged to imitate and repeat after the teacher.

2.2. What is social cultural theory?

This method was developed by Vygotsky, a psychologist who worked in the Soviet
Union in the 1920s and 1930s. Lightbrown and Spada (1999:23) note that
Vygotsky concluded that language develops entirely from social interaction. In his
theory, Vygotsky mentions the zone of proximal development. According to Schutz
(2000) the zone of proximal development includes all the functions and activities
that a child or a learner can perform only with the assistance of someone else.

He also emphasises that learning language is a cognitive process starting from

egocentric speech to inner speech. As Lantolf (2000:14) explains this process
Internalisation is a process through which mental actions are formed on the basis
of external, materially based, socila actions. Internalisation, then, is the process
through which a person moves from carrying out concrete actions in conjunction
with the assistance of material artifacts and of other individuals to carrying out
actions mentally without any apparently external assistance.

Take the child who learns to count as an example. At first, he has to point at the
fingers as an external supports (that is egocentric speech). Day by day, he can count
the fingers in his head without looking at the fingers (that is inner speech). So this
method aims at guided or meditated learning. In other words, in order to acquire
language, language learners need someone or something external such as teachers,
mothers, and materials to support their cognitive development of the language.
According to Lightbrown and Spada (1999:23), in a supportive interactive
environment, the child is able to advance a higher level of knowledge and
performance than he or she would be capable of independently. Therefore in the
language class, learners should be given a good environment to practise such as
teacher talk or classroom interaction.

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2.3. Compare and contrast the two theories

2.3.1. Contribution of the two theories to language teaching
First of all, the writer will look at the strengths of bebaviourism. As far as the
positive aspects of behaviourism are concerned, the audio-lingual approach has
proved to be practical and feasible in all teaching environments. The simple and
predictable steps of language teaching follow the order from presenting the
language item, practising it, and then repeating and drilling. Besides, these steps are
applicable to all kinds of learners, classrooms, learning conditions, and above all to
all teachers. From all the good points above, teachers will find it easier for them to
control the class. Especilally, this theory might be suitable for young learners
because these learners accept imitation and repetition as the way of their language
development.

In terms of socialcultural theory, it is learner-centred. During the class, students

will have a lot of chances to get into groups and discuss their ideas. This method
helps learners feel more active and creative in their learning styles. Moreover, Jim
Lantolf and others cited in Lightbrown and Spada (1999: 44) suggest that second
language learners advance to higher levels of linguistics knowledge when they
collaborate and interact with speakers of the second language who are more
knowledgeable than they are. Therefore it develops learner autonomy. This method
is very suitable for teaching ESP because when learning ESP students have to play
a more active role.

While behaviourism focuses on teacher-centred, socialcultural theory focusses on

student-centred approach through the use of collaborative learning and project-
based learning. If a teacher tends to follow socialcultural theories, he will find that
it is very difficult for him to control class.

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2.3.2. Weakenesses
Behaviourism practioners may hold that language acquisition can be achieved
through the process of imitating, practising and reinforcing. Many teachers have
applied Audio-Lingual Approach or Subsitution Drills in their teaching
methodology. Unfortunately, teachers who follow this method have to create
lenghty grammar exercises in the hope that their students would grasp the structures
and produce them not only accurately, but also automatically.

The most serious problem of behaviourism is that humans are not parrots. They will
not appreciate rote learning. Lightbrown and Spada (1999: 45) confirm that many
claims from the behaviourists theory were based on experiments with animals
learning a variety of response to laboratory stimuli. Besides, emphasising too much
on correctness will discourage the students to take risk. Once the students are used
to accuracy, they dare not produce anything. Behaviourism also kills the students’
creativity since they are required to respond passively to the teacher’s leading. In
general, this theory is just good for low-level skills because with high level skills
language learning needs deeper process involving mental activities. Last but not
least, students will never benefit the real interaction and exchange of meaning
because they have to follow the only guidance from the teacher to them.

From all the things mentioned above, the writer thinks that behaviourism is not
good in a sense that it makes learners rely on their teachers so much.

For sociocultural theory, although it is considered the ground for advanced teaching
methodologies such as CLT, Project-based teaching, etc, it still has certain
weaknesses. One of them is the teacher takes time to perform cooperative and
collaborative activities in the classroom. It means in order to have an interactive
classroom teachers have to prepare many interactive activities through organising
pair work and group work. Some teachers are lazy with this teaching style or even
afraid of losing control over classroom management.

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2.4. Some teaching methodologies which are derived from behaviourism and
sociocultural theories
Behaviourism is the background of some teaching methods such as audiolingualism
(ALM), TPR-total physical response, Contrastive Analysis (CA). As we know all
of these methods are based on stimulus-response principles. Take TPR as an
example, to learn a native language or second language, the learners have to imitate
and repeat the sentences of the other speakers. As Asher cited in Richards and
Rodgers (2001: 73), successful adult second language learning is a parallel process
to child first language acquisition. He claims that speech directed to young children
consists primarily of commands, which children respond to physically before they
begin to produce verbal responses. Asher feels that adults should recapitulate the
process by which children acquire their native language. Besides, the characteristics
of ATM are also strongly influenced by behaviourism. One of the characteristics to
Richards and Rodgers (2001:57) is foreign language learning is basically a process
of mechanical habit formation. Good habits are formed by giving correct responses
rather than making mistakes.

With its characteristics, sociocultural theory also produced some teaching methods
such as communicative language teaching (CLT), collaborative learning, and
project-based learning.

Among them CLT, which emphasizes interactive activities as the aim in language
teaching, shows good evidence for socio-cultural theories. Richards and Rodgers
(2001:172) suggest some principles included in CLT as follow:
- Learners learn a language through using it to communicate.
- Authentic and meaningful communication should be the goal of classroom
activities.
- Fluency is an important dimension of communication.
- Communication involes the integration of different language skills.
- Learning is a process of creative construction and involves trial and errors.
The other methods are nearly the same as this one.

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2.5. Application into language teaching:

It is clearly that in Vietnam, behaviourism is given priority. It is because nearly
every teacher at high school applies it when teaching their students. Behaviourism
is said to be suitable to apply because students at high schools only have one need
that is to pass their exams. However, sociocultural theory is very necessary when
teaching students at university level because Vietnamese students now really wish
to be able to communicate well. It is also advisable for the centres, schools for the
gifted or international schools, because at these stages students will be to dicuss
mostly by themselves.

3. Conclusion

Teaching methods really play an important part in the success of one teacher.
Nowadays, teachers have a lot of teaching methods to adapt. Choosing an
appropriate method will help a teacher meet the need of his learners. Brown (1994:
51) confirms that methods tend to be primarily concerned with teacher and student
roles and behaviors. Through comparing and contrasting these theories, we can
understand more about language acquistion as well as find out the contributions and
limitations of these methods to language teaching. But above all this research helps
me to understand deeply the backgrounds of some teaching methologies which are
very popular at the moment. This is very useful in choosing the suitable methods
for the specific teaching and learning situation in Vietnam.

Tác giả
ThS. Lý Nhựt Thiện chuyên ngành TESOL của Đại học Canberra (Australia); là giảng
viên hợp đồng trường Đại học Sư phạm TP.HCM; phụ trách giảng dạy các khóa tiếng Anh
Tổng quát và tiếng Anh chuyên ngành Lý và Tiểu học. Lĩnh vực quan tâm nghiên cứu:
TESOL.
Email: [email protected]

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References

Brown, H.D. (1994). Teaching by Principles. San Francisco: Prentice Hall Regents.

Ellis, R. (1985). Understanding Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford

University Press.

Lentil, J.P. (end) 2000. ’Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning’.
Oxford: OUP

Lightbrown, P.M. and N. Spada. (1999). How Languages are Learned, 2nd Edtion,
Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Richards, J. C. & Rodgers, T.S. (2001). Approaches and Methods in Language

Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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