Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc.

(TESOL)
What the "Good Language Learner" Can Teach Us
Author(s): Joan Rubin
Source: TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 9, No. 1 (Mar., 1975), pp. 41-51
Published by: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)
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TESOL
Quarterly
Vol. 9, No. 1
March 1975
What the "Good
Language
Learner" Can Teach
Us*
Joan Rubin
The differential success of
second/foreign language
learners
suggests
a
need to examine in detail what
strategies
successful
language
learners
employ.
An indication is
given
of what these
strategies might
consist
of and a list of several
widely recognized good
learner
strategies
is
given.
In addition to the need for research on this
topic,
it is
suggested
that
teachers can
already begin
to
help
their less successful students
improve
their
performance by paying
more attention to learner
strategies already
seen as
productive.
It is common
knowledge
that
everyone
learns his first
language
with
a fair
degree
of
success,
the reason
being
that
everyone
is born with the
ability
to learn a
language
and then
grows up
in a
community
in which he
needs to function to some
degree through language,
the rules of which are
imparted
to him in the normal course of the
day. Yet,
it is
equally
common
knowledge
that some
people
are more successful
(however
this is
defined)
than others at
learning
a second
language.'
This differential success is
often
explained by saying
that "X has more
language learning ability
than
Y." Yet there is
something
curious here: if all
peoples
can learn their first
language easily
and well
(although
some have more verbal skills than
others), why
does this innate
ability
seem to decline for some when second
language learning
is the task?
Although
one of the more essential skills
which
many people try
to
acquire through
formal education is
competence
*
An earlier version of this
paper
was
prepared
in 1971-72 while the author was
a consultant to the New Haven Unified School
District,
Union
City,
California under
an ESEA Title VII
grant.
Drafts of this
paper
have
profited
from
suggestions
for im-
provement by
Andrew
Cohen,
Robert
Cooper,
Sarah
Gudschinsky,
H. H.
Stern, Bjorn
Jernudd,
Clarence
Wadleigh,
Dene
Lawson, Nancy
Lou
Belmore,
Vera
John-Steiner,
Edward
Hernandez,
Michelle
Rosaldo,
Richard
Tucker,
and Albert Marckwardt. All
errors remain
my responsibility.
Thanks are due also to teachers of the French
depart-
ment,
the Hebrew
class,
and the
Teaching
of
English
as a Second
Language depart-
ment at Stanford
University
for
allowing
me to attend
classes,
discuss
strategies
with
their
students,
and listen to
tapes
of students
discussing
their own
personal strategies.
I am indebted to a number of
people
who
helped
orient me to the relevant literature-
Robert
Politzer, George Spindler,
Bernard
Siegel,
Tom
Owens,
and Irene
Thompson.
Thanks, too,
to the
English
as a Second
Language department
at the
University
of
Hawaii and
especially
Charles Blatchford for their
cooperation
and enthusiasm in
testing my
observation instrument and
offering suggestions.
Ms.
Rubin, Visiting
Researcher at the Culture
Learning Institute,
East-West Cen-
ter,
University
of
Hawaii,
is author of National
Bilingualism
in
Paraguay
and editor
(with
B.
Jernudd)
of Can
Language
Be Planned and
(with
R.
Shuy)
of
Language
Plan-
ning:
Current Issues and Research. She has
taught
ESL in Brazil and at
Georgetown
University
and has trained Peace
Corps
volunteers in
language teaching methodology.
lThis difference
may
not occur with
very young
children
learning
a second lan-
guage
in a natural
setting
with the kinds of communicative demands made in the use
of a first
language.
41
TESOL
QUARTERLY
in a second or
foreign language,
the success record for
attempts
to
help
students
acquire
this skill has been
notoriously poor.2
More
positively,
we can observe that this
ability
does not decline for
all students
studying
a second
language.
We all know of students who
learn
a second
language
in
spite
of the
teacher,
the
textbook,
or the class-
room situation. How do these individuals achieve their success? I would
like to
suggest
that if we knew more about what the "successful learners"
did,
we
might
be able to teach these
strategies
to
poorer
learners to enhance
their success record.
Good
language learning
is said to
depend
on at least three variables:
aptitude,
motivation and
opportunity.
Of the
three,
the
first-aptitude-
is assumed to be the least
subject
to
manipulation;
how
subject
to
change
it
is,
is a
question frequently
discussed in the literature. Some authors feel
that
language aptitude
is "a
relatively
invariant characteristic of the
individual,
not
subject
to
easy
modification
by learning" (Carroll
1960:
38).
Others
(Politzer
and Weiss 1969;
Yeni-Komshian
1967;
and Hatfield
1965)
have demonstrated that
language aptitude
can be
improved
somewhat
through training;
still others have
pointed
to the intricate
interrelationship
between
aptitude
and motivation.
There are two
major
tests of
language aptitude currently
in wide use:
one
by
Carroll and
Sapon
and one
by
Pimsleur. That
by Carroll-Sapon
(Carroll
1965:
96)
uses
mainly linguistic parameters
as criteria to
predict
language learning
success:
(1) phonetic coding, (2) grammatical
sensitivity
-the
ability
to handle
grammar, (3)
rote memorization
ability,
and
(4)
inductive
language learning ability-the ability
to infer
linguistic
forms,
rules and
patterns
from new
linguistic
contexts with a minimum of
super-
vision and
guidance.
The test
by
Pimsleur
(1966)
adds a motivational
dimension and identifies three
components:
(1)
verbal
intelligence-familiar-
ity
with words and the
ability
to reason
analytically
about verbal materials,
(2)
motivation to learn the
language,
and
(3) auditory ability.
These
tests
are to be used with those who have not had
prior experience
with a
foreign
language.
While these tests are
helpful
in
predicting
success, they give
the language
teacher and learner little direction as to what can be done about a
person's
ability. Commonly,
the
poorer
student
may
notice that the better
student
always
has the
right
answer but he never discovers why,
never finds
out
what little "tricks" lead the better student to the right
answer. For
the
student who wants to
improve
his
learning, aptitude
tests don't give enough
detailed information about the kinds of habits a learner will need to develop.
Rather than
letting
him
just
admire the good
student and feel inferior,
we
a This evaluation of the success record seems to be
generally agreed upon by
teach-
ers as well as
students,
no matter whether the success criterion is passing the course,
acquiring
certain skills
(reading, writing, speaking
and
understanding)
or
actually put-
ting
to use what has been learned. Indeed,
students in
many
American
universities
have been so dissatisfied with the
profits
from second
language courses, they
have
pe-
titioned with success to have the
language requirement
removed.
42
GOOD LANGUAGE LEARNER
need to isolate what the
good
learner does-what his
strategies
are-and
impart
his
knowledge
to less successful learners.
By strategies,
I mean the
techniques
or devices which a learner
may
use to
acquire knowledge.
Some of the
strategies
which seem to be im-
portant
are the
following: (1)
The
good language
learner
may
be a
good
guesser,
that
is,
he
gathers
and stores information in an efficient manner
so it can be
easily
retrieved. He
may
listen to a
phrase, pick
out the words
he understands and infer the rest. He
may actively
look for clues to
meaning-in
the
topic, setting,
or attitudes of the
speakers.
His
guessing
strategy may
be stratified from the more
general
to the
specific
so that he
gets
the most information from each
question
or sentence.
(2)
He is often
willing
to
appear
foolish in order to communicate and
get
his
message
across.
(3)
He will
try
out his
knowledge by making up
new
sentences,
thus
bringing
his
newly acquired competence
into use. I will
give
more details on
good
language
learner
strategies
later in this
paper,
but it is
important
to
recognize
here that tests of
aptitude
are meant to find the minimal number
of dimensions to
predict
success without
detailing
all of the
many strategies
involved. If the focus is to
help
students
improve
their
abilities,
then these
strategies
should be looked at in much
greater
detail.
A second variable mentioned
frequently
in
regard
to
good language
learning
is that of motivation. Several articles discuss those
aspects
of
motivation which are essential for
good language learning.
Gardner and
Lambert
(1959)
have isolated two kinds of
motivation, by
now well-known:
instrumental and
integrative. They
find that the latter correlates more
with successful
language learning.
While it is
generally agreed
that the
best
language learning
occurs in the
country/region
where the
language
is
spoken
or when the
language
is the most common one at
home,
some would
go
so far as to
say
that the classroom is no
place
to learn a
language.
Macnamara
(1971) points
out that the essential difference between a class-
room and the street as a
place
to learn a
language
is motivation.
According
to
Macnamara,
the student seldom has
anything
so
urgent
to
say
to the
teacher that
they
will
improvise
with whatever communicative skills
they
possess
to
get
their
meaning
across.
However,
the
good language
learner
seems to have a
high
motivation to
communicate,
no matter where he is.
The
problem
is how to
provide
the
necessary
motivation for others within the
school framework-if that is
possible. Cooper (1973: 313)
also
emphasizes
the need factor in
promoting language learning:
"If we want to enable the
student to use
English,
then we must
put
him in situations which demand
the use of
English."
With
proper motivation,
the learner
may
become an
active
investigator
of the nature of the
language
to be learned. Francis
(1971)
feels that students will learn to do what
they
themselves exert
themselves to do.
A third variable mentioned above was
opportunity.
This includes all
those activities both within and outside the classroom which
expose
the
learner to the
language
and which afford him an
opportunity
to
practice
43
TESOL
QUARTERLY
what he has learned. We have all noted that the
good language
learner
takes and creates
opportunities
to
practice
what he has learned while the
poorer
learner
passively
does what is
assigned
him. The
good language
learner uses the
language
when he is not
required
to do so and seeks
op-
portunities
to hear the
language (attends foreign language movies, joins
foreign language clubs,
listens to T.V. or the
radio,
uses the
foreign language
with other students outside
class).
What is
important
here is to discover
what
advantage
students take of the
opportunities they
either have or create.
I
agree
with
Ervin-Tripp (1970)
who
suggests
that there has been too much
attention on the
input
to the learner and too little on what is
going
on in
the learner himself. She
suggests
that the focus on
opportunity
alone without
considering
the use that the learner is
making
of such an
opportunity
will
not allow an
adequate
model of
language learning. "Any learning
model
which
predicts language learning
on the basis of
input
without
regard
to
the selective
processing by
the learner will not
work, except
for trivial
problems."
If
language learning
is
really
the
acquisition
of communicative com-
petence
as well as of
linguistic competence,
then we need also to examine
how the
good language
learner defines
opportunity
as
exposure
to
many
different social situations so as to
get
a
proper
feel for the circumstances
in which a
language
code is to be
employed.
It is
clearly
difficult to
separate
these three variables
(aptitude,
motiva-
tion, opportunity)
since
they
do
impinge
on one another. An individual
with lots of natural
ability
and motivation but with little
opportunity may
have
difficulty
in
acquiring
a
language.
If
opportunity
is
present,
but there
is little motivation or
poor learning skills,
then we
may expect
that the
language
learning
will
proceed slowly. Equally,
a
person
with lots of natural
ability
and
opportunity may
fail to learn because of
poor
motivation.
What is clear is that the
good
learner has or creates all of these and
the
poorer
learner does not. If we are to
improve
the success of the class-
room
teaching,
we will need to know a
great
deal more about the
learning
process.
The Good
Language
Learner
While there is little
systematic
work
relating language learning strategies
to
success,
there are a number of observations which can be made about
individuals
who are
good language
learners. I have been able to isolate
some of these
by observing
students in classrooms in California and
Hawaii,
by
observing myself
and
by talking
to other
good language learners,
and
by
eliciting
observations from some second
language
teachers. As I have
begun
to observe
classes,
what fascinates me is how often the teacher
plows
ahead with the lesson
seemingly
with little awareness of what is
going
on in each
student,
and often without
directing
the attention of the
poorer
students to how the successful student arrived at his answer. That
is, many
foreign language
teachers are so concerned with
finding
the best method
44
GOOD LANGUAGE LEARNER
or with
getting
the correct answer that
they
fail to attend to the
learning
process.
If
they
attended to it
more, they might
be able to tailor their
input
to their students' needs and
might
be able to
provide
the student with
techniques
that would enable him to learn on his own.
Indeed,
no course
could ever teach all we need to know about a
language
and the teacher
must find the means to
help
the student
help himself,
when the teacher
is not around.
The task of
observing
these
strategies
is a
complicated
one because
they necessarily
involve
cognitive processes
which neither the learner nor
the teacher
may
be able to
specify. However,
when our attention is focused
on
observing
these
strategies,
I think we
may
find it easier to isolate some
of them. Just
recently,
I discovered that
by using video-tape
more of these
strategies
would be observable than
by just using
a
tape
recorder.3 With the
video-tapes
we
hope
to
help
learners and teachers see what is
going
on in the
classroom. We
hope
to be
able,
as
well,
to abstract the learner
strategies
by interviewing
the learner about his behavior
during
a
particular
classroom
while
showing
him a
tape
of his behavior.
In
spite
of the fact that we are
only beginning
to isolate these
strategies,
I think that it is useful to list some of the ones found thus far.
They
remain
general
but
give
an idea of the kind of
strategies
I think we
ought
to be
looking
for.
Strategies
1. The
good language
learner is a
willing
and accurate
guesser.
It seems
that the
good language
learner is both comfortable with
uncertainty (indeed
he
may enjoy it)
and
willing
to
try
out his
guesses.
A
good guesser
is one
who
gathers
and stores information in an efficient manner. The
good guesser
uses all the clues which the
setting
offers him and thus is able to narrow
down what the
meaning
and intent of the communication
might
be. In this
sense,
he is
carrying
over into his second
language
behavior
something
that
all of us do in our first
language
interactions. We never
comprehend
all
that the
speaker
intended and we are
always using
whatever clues the en-
vironment,
and the discourse
may give
us.4
Guessing
is based on what we
know about the social
relationship
between the
speakers,
the
setting,
the
event,
the
mood,
the channel and all of the other
parameters
that
Hymes
has isolated for us in the
ethnography
of communication
(Hymes, 1972).
It is based on what we know about the rules of
speaking (Cf. Paulston, 1974,
for some
examples
of the
importance
of
knowing these).
It is based on
factual
probability (Twaddell, 1973).
It is also but not
exclusively
based
on what we know about
grammar
and lexicon.
81 am indebted to
Roger Prince,
a
graduate
student in the
English
as a Second
Language Program
at the
University
of
Hawaii,
for his
willingness
to
explore
the
use of
video-tape
in this research.
'What is
fascinating
to me is that most
language
classrooms
discourage
this nor-
mal communication
strategy by telling
students not to
guess
or
by
not
asking
the
good
guesser
how he
got
there.
45
TESOL QUARTERLY
The
good guesser
uses his feel for
grammatical structures,
clues from
the lexical items he
recognizes,
clues from
redundancy
in the
message.
He
uses non-verbal
clues,
word-association
clues,
outside
knowledge
(his
general
knowledge
of
society,
of similarities to his native
language).
He makes
inferences as to the
purpose, intent, point
of view of a
message
or com-
munication.
The
ability
to
guess
seems to relate to one's first
language
as much
as to one's second. Mueller
(1971: 153)
calls our attention to the fact
that
people may vary
in their
ability
to
comprehend
what
they
hear or read
in their native
language.
The fast reader and the
good
listener can under-
stand while
paying
attention to a minimum of cues. He can overlook un-
known
words,
or can read even
though focussing only
on content words.
Such a
person guesses,
or makes inferences
about,
the
meaning
of words or
sentence structure. A
wrong guess
does not disturb
him,
but is
quickly
corrected from the
subsequent
context.
Carton,
who directed an
important
initial
study
on the role of
inferencing
in
language learning,
concurs:
"Individual learners
vary according
to their
propensity
of
making inferences,
tolerance of risk and
ability
to make
valid,
rational and reasonable in-
ferences."
(1966, 18).
Carton also
suggests
that there are three
steps
to
guessing: (1) scanning, confirmation,
and
testing
for
adequacy, (2)
as-
sessment of
probability
that the inference is
correct,
and
(3) re-adjustment
to later information.
The
ability
to
guess changes
as one
gets older;
adults seem to
stratify
their
guessing
from the more
general
to the
specific, gathering
the most in-
formation from each
question.
In two
separate articles,
Jerome Bruner and
N. H. Mackworth
(1970)
and F. A. Mosher and K. R.
Horsby (1966)
have shown that adults use different
strategies
in
guessing
than do children
and that
they
are more efficient
guessers.
The
importance
of
guessing
and
inferring
has been
recognized
for a
long
time in second
language learning (see
for
example,
Twaddell 1967 and
1973) yet
the details of how this is to be
taught
are not at all
clearly
worked
out. Twaddell does make some fine
suggestions
about
guessing
in his more
recent 1973 article. Some texts assume that
guessing
will take
place, yet
none train students
directly
to do so.5
2. The
good language
learner has a
strong
drive to
communicate,
or to
learn from a communication. He is
willing
to do
many things
to
get
his
message
across. He
may
use a
circumlocution, saying
"the
object
on
top
of
your
head" when he doesn't know the word for hat. He
may para-
phrase
in order to
explain
the different
meaning
of a
phrase (for example,
one student
explained
that the term "snack bar" had a different
meaning
in
Japan
than it does in the United
States).
He will use
gestures
to
get
his
message
across or
spell
a word when his
pronunciation
is not clear. He will
5
The direct method assumes that the student will
guess
the
appropriate cognates
found in the
target language yet
never allows the teacher to refer to the mother
tongue
so that the
guessing
is
expected
of the student but is never a
part
of the
teaching strategy.
46
GOOD LANGUAGE LEARNER
use a
cognate,
from
any language
he
knows,
to
try
to
express
his
meaning.
He
may
not limit himself to a
particular
sentence construction but will use
those constructions he does have to the fullest. For
example,
he
may
use
"going
to go"
if he doesn't know the future in
English,
the
important point
being
to
get
the
message
across
(Richards, 1971,
discusses similar
strategies).
He
may try
to form new words
by nominalizing
a verb or
verbalizing
a noun
and then
checking
the
response. Having
this
strong
motivation to communi-
cate,
the
good
learner will use whatever
knowledge
he has to
get
his
message
across. This
strategy
has an
important by-product
in that if he is successful
in
communicating,
his motivation to
participate
and
acquire
the
necessary
tools to do so will be enhanced.
3. The
good language
learner is often not inhibited. He is
willing
to
appear
foolish if reasonable communication results. He is
willing
to make
mistakes in order to learn and to communicate. He is
willing
to live with a
certain amount of
vagueness.
4. In addition to
focusing
on
communication,
the
good language
learner
is
prepared
to attend to form. The
good language
learner is
constantly
look-
ing
for
patterns
in the
language.6
He attends to the form in a
particular
way, constantly analyzing, categorizing, synthesizing.
He is
constantly trying
to find schemes for
classifying
information. He is
trying
to
distinguish
relevant from irrelevant clues. He is
looking
for the interaction or relation
of elements
(using
as a basis for this
analysis
information from his own
language
or others that he has
learned). Naturally,
the more
experience
a
learner has with
doing
this sort of exercise the more successful he will be.
It has often been observed that a
person
learns his second or third
foreign
language
more
easily
than his first
just
because he has had
practice
in
attending
to the
important
formal features of a
language.
5. The
good language
learner
practices.
He
may practice pronouncing
words or
making up
sentences. He will seek out
opportunities
to use the
language by looking
for native
speakers, going
to the movies or to cultural
events. He initiates conversations with the teacher or his fellow students
in the
target language.
He is
willing
to
repeat.
He will
usually
take ad-
vantage
of
every opportunity
to
speak
in
class; indeed,
in
any
one class
certain students seem to stand out and are called on more
frequently.
6. The
good language
learner monitors his own and the
speech
of others.
That
is,
he is
constantly attending
to how well his
speech
is
being
received
and whether his
performance
meets the standards he has learned. Part of
his
monitoring
is a function of his active
participation
in the
learning process.
He is
always processing
information whether or not he is called on to
per-
form. He can learn from his own mistakes.
7. The
good language
learner attends to
meaning.
He knows that in
order to understand the
message,
it is not sufficient to
pay
attention to the
grammar
of the
language
or to the surface form of
speech.
He attends to the
6This is what
Carroll, Sapon and Pimsleur have called "grammatical sensitivity
and inductive
language learning ability."
47
TESOL
QUARTERLY
context of the
speech act,
he attends to the
relationship
of the
participants,
he attends to the rules of
speaking,
he attends to the mood of the
speech
act. In
learning
one's first
language,
some scholars have
suggested
that
meaning comprehension
is
prior
to structure
acquisition.
Macnamara
(1972)
argues
that an infant doesn't start to learn his first
language
until he can
understand what is said without
hearing
the utterance. In the case of the
second
language learner,
the learner
already
has a known structure and a
lexicon which can be used to sort out some of the
message. Thus,
context
is less
prominent, although
still
very important
for the second
language
learner.
He sees
language
as
serving many functions,
and he looks for
ways
to
convey
these functions. He knows that in
any
social
interaction,
there is
room for the
interpretation
of the
speaker's
intention. He knows that
many
cues to the
message
are to be found in
observing
the nature of the inter-
action. There are a whole host of social dimensions which the
good language
learner uses to
help
in his
understanding
of the
message
and to enable him
to frame an
appropriate response.
The
good language
learner
may try
to isolate those features which
give
him maximum
intelligibility.
He
may develop
a
feeling
for those
phono-
logical
cues which best enhance
intelligibility.
In
English,
this
might
mean
that he
emphasizes
accurate
production
of intonation
patterns
over that of
individual sounds because of the intimate
relationship
of these
patterns
with
syntax.
In
English,
some
mispronunciation
of individual sounds will be
tolerated if intonation
patterns
are accurate.
There are lots of other
things
which the
good language
learner does
which need
exploring.
Some other hints are in the literature for memoriza-
tion
techniques.
Carroll
(1966: 104) suggests
that "The more
meaningful
the material to be
learned,
the
greater
the
facility
in
learning
and retention."
It
might
be
expected
that the
good language
learner finds
ways
to make
the
things
he must memorize more
meaningful.
Carroll
(1966: 104)
also
suggests
that: "The more numerous kinds of association that are made
to an
item,
the better are
learning
and retention."
Again
we need to observe
what the
good language
learner does to enhance associations.
Further Research
The above list offers some
good insights
into the
cognitive processes
that
seem to be
going
on in
good language
learners. A recent article
by
Stern
(1974)
lists some additional learner
strategies
which enhance our
insights
into the
process. However,
this is
just
a start and more
systematic
and
deeper
observation will need to be carried out. To do so a number of factors need
to be taken into account first since it is clear that considerable variation
between learners
may
be
expected.
The learner
strategies (of
even successful
learners)
will
vary
with:
(1)
The task-some material
may require
rote memorization while other mate-
rial
may require
oral drill.
(2)
The
learning stage-language
learners
may
in
48
GOOD LANGUAGE LEARNER
fact use different
strategies
at different
points
in time in the
learning process.
(3)
The
age
of the learner-it is
probably
true that adults do better
guessing (having
at their
disposal multiple
hierarchies of redundant
cues)
while the child has not
yet developed
such hierarchies. Children on the
other hand
may
be freer in
adapting
to new situations and to
acting
out a
communication.
(4)
The context-if second
language learning
takes
place
in the classroom with little or no
opportunity
for
practice,
the
type
of
strategies
used
may
well be more limited and distinct from those used
where the learner has an
opportunity
to and
perhaps
has an
obligation
to
use his
language
for real communication
purposes. (5)
Individual
styles-
some
people
are not comfortable unless
they
have
something
written in
front of them or unless
they
have the
grammatical points
under considera-
tion in front of them. Some
people
learn better
by
visual means while
others learn better
by auditory
means.7 We should
expect
that there
would be
many
different kinds of
"good language
learners."
(6)
Cultural
differences in
cognitive learning styles-in
some
societies, listening
until the
entire code is absorbed and one can
speak perfectly
is a
reported
form of
learning;
in other successive
approximation
to native
speech
is used as a
learning strategy;
while in still others rote
learning
is the most common
learning strategy.
Good learners
may
have considerable
insight
to con-
tribute to their
learning
difficulties and to their
preferences
for instructional
methods.
By looking
at what is
going
on inside the
good language learner, by
considering
how he is
successful,
what
strategies,
what
cognitive processes
he uses to learn a
language,
we
may
be led to
well-developed
theories of
the
processing
of
linguistic
information which can be
taught
to others.
Perhaps
we can then establish
procedures
to train others to use these or
similar
procedures
to
acquire
a second
language.
In the
meantime,
teachers can
begin
to look at what the
good
student
does to
acquire
his skill.
They
can
stop,
if so
doing, inhibiting
the use of
communicative
strategies
in the
classroom,
that
is,
use of all sorts of clues
to
guess
at
meaning.
Rather
they
should
encourage
students to transfer
what
they
know about the world and about communication to second lan-
guage learning.
I
agree completely
with Twaddell
(1973)
who
says
that
"The learner must be
allowed,
must be
encouraged,
to
accept temporary
vagueness
in the
early stages
of
familiarity
with a
given
word."
Indeed,
I
would
say
that the
early
learner should be
encouraged
to
accept temporary
vagueness
in
many
other areas of
language learning.
In this
sense,
he will
be
replicating
the more natural communication
process
where the
partic-
ipants
in communication do not
always hear,
understand or
properly
inter-
pret
what is
being
said to
them;
still
they
do not
panic
but continue the
7 Individul
learning styles
are
reported
to be affected
by
several variables as well:
(a) general cognitive style (b) personality
traits
(perfectionism, self-confidence,
extro-
version) (c) past
school
experiences (d)
educational achievement
(e) experience
in
learning
other
foreign languages.
49
TESOL
QUARTERLY
conversation and see if the item becomes clarified in the course of the
dialogue.
The teacher should
help
students understand how
topic, context, mood,
human
relationships help
him narrow down the
possible meaning
of a
sentence,
or a word. He should
help
the student
guess
what the
linguistic
function of a
particular
item
might
be. In this
sense,
the teacher would be
helping
the student learn how to learn a
language.
When we have researched this
problem
more
thoroughly
we will be able
to
incorporate learning strategies
into our
methodology,
we will be able to
help
the learner select the
appropriate
method for his own
learning style
and
we will be able to
adapt
the
strategy
to the
particular
cultural
learning
style.
The inclusion of
knowledge
about the
good language
learner in our
classroom instructional
strategies
will lessen the difference between the
good
learner and the
poorer
one.
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