The Multilingual World

of the Learner UNIT 2 USING MULTILINGUALISM

AS A RESOURCE
Structure
2.0 Objectives
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Learning Theories and Language Teaching
2.3 The Indian Context
2.4 Multilingualism as a Resource
2.5 Consequences of Using Multilingualism as a Resource
2.6 Let Us Sum Up
2.7 Key Words
2.8 Suggested Readings
2.9 Answers

2.0 OBJECTIVES
This unit will enable you to:

 critically examine the role of learning theories and their influence on language
teaching methods;

 reflect on your own beliefs and classroom practices;

 appreciate that knowing and using more than one language is basic to each
one of us;

 explore how multilingualism can be used as a resource; and

 examine the long-term consequences of using multilingualism as a resource.

2.1 INTRODUCTION
Most of us in India grow up generally speaking more than one language and
listening to many languages around us. We use these languages easily, often
mixing or switching between them without consciously thinking about doing so.
For example, we may say to someone: aaj weather kitna zabardast hai! (How
awesome is the weather today!) or voh ladka jo corner seat par baitha hai
is so good looking (The boy who is sitting on the corner seat is so good looking).
In day to day conversations such utterances are common. And the remarkable
fluidity with which we make use of multiple languages in a variety of ways comes
naturally to us. In fact, if you question yourself whether you think in ‘a particular
language’ before speaking, you may find it difficult to answer that. This is because
you have access to more than ‘one language’ and these languages comprise
your verbal repertoire in multiple ways.
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While informal settings give the freedom to come up with such utterances, formal Using Multilingualism as a
Resource
settings of schools do not. We are expected to stick to ‘a standard variety’
in our classrooms. Deviation from it or language variations find no place in
language classrooms. Students who come to school with a natural multilingual
orientation suddenly find themselves at a loss in a system where their verbal
repertoire is not valued. There is a continuous pressure in schools, for instance,
to allow only English in an English class and Hindi in a Hindi class. CCTV
cameras installed in some schools ensure that the medium of instruction remains
strictly English. It is not surprising then that students in such schools, where
language classes have no scope for accepting any other language other than
English or any language variation, find these classes threatening and non-engaging.
We all know that India is a multilingual country. We have four distinct language
families that despite their diversity share common linguistic features. Census data
and informal sources put the estimate of number of languages in India anywhere
between 400 to 1600+. And yet, this multilingual reality, also represented in
language classrooms, is completely ignored. Should not a multilingual classroom
demand multilingual solution? Should we not look for pedagogies that are rooted
in multilinguality? It’s time we rethink our curriculum, materials and pedagogies
based on our reality.
This unit will attempt to make you understand why it is important to reflect
on our beliefs and classroom practices based on our multilingual reality.
Check Your Progress 1
1. Do you allow your students to respond in Hindi/Regional language, a mix
of Hindi Regional language and English or any other language in your class?
What are your reasons for doing so?
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2. Make a linguistic profile of your class. Collect data to find out which
languages your students know, the age they acquired them, and region/
state they belong to. What does your data reflect?
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2.2 LEARNING THEORIES AND LANGUAGE

TEACHING
This section gives an overview of how behaviorism emerged as one of the most
influential learning theories of the19th century. Propagated by Watson, Ivan
Pavlov and B F Skinner, this school of thought established the role of environment
as primary in learning. It was believed that any behavior could be conditioned
over a period of time till it became a habit. Several experiments were conducted
on animals to prove that learning involved forming new habits. Language learning
was considered no different from any other behavior. 127
The Multilingual World While these developments were taking place in the field of psychology, the
of the Learner
structuralists in the field of linguistics began to also look at languages as a set
of structures. People like Hockett, Bloomfield and Sapir focussed on rules that
governed these structures. Languages were broken down into simple structures
that could be taught in a linear and additive manner.
These perspectives therefore, with certain underlying assumptions, impacted how
languages were taught. Learners were largely seen as passive recipients of
knowledge and their mind as a storehouse where knowledge could be
accumulated. Languages were seen as distinct from one another, whether L1,
L2 or L3, that were organized as separate systems, almost as rigid compartments
in our mind.
The classical grammar translation method was in vogue in the 16th century. It
was used for teaching foreign languages, primarily Greek and Latin. Students
learnt grammar rules to be able to translate texts of one language into another.
The rules were learnt by rote and then practiced by doing grammar drills.
The Direct Method originated as an alternative to grammar translation method,
laying more stress on listening and speaking of L2, and vocabulary development.
It was believed that listening and speaking skills could be nurtured and developed
in L2 if learners practiced enough L2. This method prohibited the use of L1
in the classroom.
The audio lingual method came about as an outcome of Behaviourism. The advent
of audio technology during the 1950s pushed further the importance of developing
spoken skills in L2. This method focussed on training through a system of
reinforcement. To develop proficiency in L2, the teacher adopted the methodology
of using drilling and practice to teach grammar so that the learners could rote
memorize and mimic patterns of L2 repeatedly. Correct usage elicited positive
reinforcement and incorrect usage negative reinforcement till the time students
attained accuracy and perfection. Mistakes in L2 were considered pathologies
that had to be treated by more drills. The direct method and the audio lingual
method were similar in that they kept L1 out of classroom.
All these methods perceived the learners as mere passive recipients. However,
several methods that followed this such as the Humanistic method, the
Communicative method, have brought the attention on the active learner and
the learning context.
Check Your Progress 2
1. Do you think some elements of these language teaching methods prevail
even today in our classes? If yes, which ones?
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2. As teachers of English, do you feel that L1 should be not used in teaching
L2? Give at least two reasons to support your answer.
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 Using Multilingualism as a
2.3 THE INDIAN CONTEXT Resource

Most of us perhaps don’t remember much of what was taught in our language
classrooms. But what we do remember is how we spent countless hours
memorizing rules of English grammar, learning definitions of parts of speech,
making sentences using difficult words, and copying questions and their answers
from the blackboard. Language classes focussed on developing discrete skills
in listening, speaking, reading and writing. Language textbooks were structured
‘from simple to complex’ beginning with decoding of letters of the alphabet to
words (that were random/decontextualized collection of words), followed by
short sentences and finally paragraphs. Nothing much seems to have changed
since then.

The bottom-up approach to teaching a language continues to exist in many

schools till date. With its focus primarily on learning the form of language rather
than its usage, it has failed to help students communicate for instance, in English
in their daily lives. While children are always fluent speakers of languages they
come to school with, they fail to achieve language fluency in English with
piecemeal formal training. The problem gets further aggravated because they
are not given the freedom to use languages that they already know in their
language classroom. Surely, the problem lies not with them but elsewhere. The
entire education system pushes for accuracy in learning a language through rote
learning. Language classes focus on grammar tasks, vocabulary building and
comprehension which is content-based rather than in actual communicative
situations. Mistakes are perceived as lack of learning. Opportunities to reflect
or express their own ideas are seldom provided. Exposure to authentic sources
of learning materials that exist in the form of story books, brochures,
advertisements, wrappers, cartoon strips, movies or documentaries remains
limited in classrooms. The textbook becomes the bible, initiating our children
to learn a language in a structured sequential manner.

Further, as teachers, we enforce homogeneous classrooms while the actual reality

is quite the opposite. We forget that students come from varied linguistic and
cultural backgrounds, with different levels of prior knowledge and experiences.
Outside the classrooms, we can observe how our students with different linguistic
backgrounds communicate with each other. They can be heard mixing languages
or switching between them. They don’t have the liberty to communicate the
way they naturally do inside our classrooms.

However, we need to re-think and re-examine our pedagogy and the long
tradition of nurturing a homogenous linguistic culture by focussing on one
dominant language in our classrooms. We will have to go beyond grammar
teaching. The focus will have to be on using authentic materials, texts and activities
that will give our students greater exposure. If we have to make language learning
engaging and meaningful, we will also have to accept the multilingual orientation
of our students and use it as a resource. We need to understand that if we
promote only the use of English in our classrooms, we signal to our students
that we don’t value their own languages or that variations of any sort are
unacceptable forms of language.
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The Multilingual World Check Your Progress 3
of the Learner
1. Have a careful look at the English language textbook you use to teach
English. Try to analyze how the book is organized, the nature of its content
and exercises. What generalizations can you draw from it?
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2. Do you think it is important to go beyond our textbooks and workbooks
when we teach English to our students? Why or why not? Make a list
of some other authentic materials that you can use in your classrooms.
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2.4 MULTILINGUALISM AS A RESOURCE

Recent research has shown that in multilingual societies where people know
multiple languages, language boundaries are porous and fluid. What this means
is that people have internalized these languages to an extent that they do not
have to consciously think in one language before speaking in another. In other
words, people are inherently multilingual in such societies and have the ability
to use one or more languages, or switch or mix them according to the situational
domains they are in. If we accept this reality, we will have to accept that creating
homogenous classrooms where we impose one language and ignore the
multilingual reality will not work well. We are not fair to the children when
we dismiss their linguistic and cultural backgrounds. By doing so, we alienate
them and their backgrounds in our classroom. As teachers of English, it is time
we reflected on our beliefs and teaching practices.
It is possible to use the multilingual diversity as a resource in our classroom
by maintaining multilinguality at the centre of language teaching activities. But
how exactly do we do that? If you, for instance, have to teach them a poem
in English, what could you possibly do? Here are a few suggestions:
Get them first to recite the English poem.
Then, focus on the theme that it deals with.
Next, let them identify subtle elements and features of the poem that they may
identify.
Now, split your class into groups to translate the poem into any other language
of their choice.
Finally, get each group to present their translated versions of the poem.
What you will find is that once this activity is done, many rich discussions will
130 naturally emerge around the poem. What would become important in such an
exercise is not about the accuracy of translation but the process of translating Using Multilingualism as a
Resource
the poem. This activity will not only be cognitively challenging and more engaging,
but will also help your students to generalize rules of grammar on their own.
Students will begin to notice on their own that while Indian languages are verb-
final, English is verb-medial or that Indian languages have postpositions while
English has prepositions.
Let’s take another activity of forming plurals:
List some nouns in English with their plurals on the board
Next, ask a random set of students to come to the board and write the
equivalents words in the languages they know
Your board may end up with data like the following:
English Hindi Assamese Bangla Malyalam
cap-caps topi-topiyan tupi-tupibore tup-tupiguli tappi-tappigal
cat-cats billi-billiyan mexuri- bilie-bilieguli puchcha-
mexuribore puchchagal
book-books kitab-kitabe kitab-kitabore boi-boiguli pustakam-
pustagal
dog-dogs kutta-kutte kukur-kukurbore kukur- patti-pattigal
kukurguli
Even with this limited data, the students will take no time to observe, classify
and categorize the plural markers in each language. In one glance, they will
tell you that the plural marker in English is -s; Hindi -yan and -e; Assamese
-bore; Bangla -guli and Malyalam -gal. Further, they will observe that Assamese
and Bangla are quite similar in that they share vocabulary or that Hindi has
more than one plural marker or that although the plural marker is -s in English,
the realization of that -s is -z in the word ‘dogs’. You could then get them
to explore with more data in each language and generalize rules of their own.
They will discover that Hindi, for example, has more plural markers and that
almost all languages have exceptions where there is a zero plural marker (English:
sheep-sheep) or an odd one that is not affixed for a majority of words (English:
ox-oxen).
Another example of using multilingualism as a resource could be when you are
teaching them question formation in English. You could again get students to
write the equivalents of English information questions:
 English: Where did you go yesterday?
Hindi: aap kal kaha gaye the?
Haryanvi: tu kaal ki gaya tha?
Punjabi: tussi kal kitte gaye si?
 English: Why are you crying?
Hindi: aap kyon ro rahe ho?
Haryanvi: tu kya tayi rove hai?
Punjabi: tussi kyon ro rahe ho? 131
The Multilingual World  English: What have you brought?
of the Learner
Hindi: Aap kya laye hain?
Haryanavi: tu ke laya hai?
Punjabi: tussi ki liyaye ho?
Given this data on the board, you can ask you students to analyze it. They
will observe that in English, the question words begin with -wh whereas in Indian
languages with-k; that question words come in the sentence initial position in
English but that is not true for Indian languages. They can explore more data
of other languages and discover that all Indian languages behave similarly in
forming questions. The next step could be to get them to also write answers
to these questions, observe the data and generalize that the answer to each
question comes exactly beneath the question word in Indian languages but not
in English.
In Hindi for example:
aap kal kidhar gaye the?
me kal agra gaya tha.
Such activities will generate a lot of excitement and involvement of students
as they discover and learn more about their own languages along with English.
Rather than memorizing rules, they will learn to formulate rules on their own.
Check Your Progress 4
1. Elicit data from 2-3 other languages that are represented in your class on
the degrees of adjectives. Derive your own rules and discuss the similarities
and differences across languages.
English pretty-prettier-prettiest
Hindi sundar-bahut sundar-ati sunder
2. Do you agree that such activities can be incorporated in your teaching and
will help students to learn better? Why or why not?
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2.5 CONSEQUENCES OF USING

MULTILINGUALISM AS A RESOURCE
The above section would have hopefully made you think about your own teaching
methods and beliefs. While using such activities, your role and that of the
textbook or materials you use is bound to change. This may leave you feeling
insecure but you must understand that classroom transactions based on such
activities will actually enhance learning and redefine your role as an observer
and listener as opposed to a giver of knowledge. You will have to create a
linguistic profile of your students at the beginning of the year to know which
132 languages are represented in your class. You will have to also observe how
children interact with each other informally and if you can generalize certain Using Multilingualism as a
Resource
patterns of language use. Once you do this, you will feel more confident and
empowered to try out this approach to teach English. This of course does not
mean that the role of the textbook will totally get eliminated. You will just have
to find spaces within the context of your class to use multilingualism as a resource.
Your teaching strategy will automatically go through a change.
The benefits of using such activities will be far greater than the usual language
classes that focus on learning rules by rote. For example:
 Students and the language teacher will have enormous exposure to multiple
languages.
 Students will get an opportunity to represent their home languages in class.
 The level of participation and involvement will increase making learning more
engaging and meaningful for students.
 Students will gain confidence as they engage in group activities to observe,
classify, categorize languages and formulate rules on their own. This will
build their meta cognitive and linguistic awareness.
 The amount of data generated from within the classroom will far exceed
language data given in any standard textbook.
 The distance between the teacher and her students will narrow as the teacher
herself becomes a learner and a facilitator rather than an authoritarian figure
in the classroom.
 Teachers will constantly become reflective through this new teaching
practice.
 The whole teaching learning enterprise will revolve around functional
proficiency rather than having a limited focus on building discrete academic
skills.
 A social change may come about as students discover that all languages
are patterned, and rule governed. There is nothing superior or inferior, pure
or impure, or backward about any language.
Check Your Progress 5
Using multilingualism as a resource in your classroom, plan for an activity in
your class. Write down your observations about your own role and the impact
it had on your students’ learning.
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The Multilingual World
of the Learner 2.6 LET US SUM UP
We would all agree that language has a deep connection with our identities.
In India, most of us maintain multiple identities by being multilingual. If we
continue to promote monolingualism in our classrooms, we will do great injustice
to our students by recognizing merely one language that is not theirs. Adopting
multilingualism as an approach to teach English is likely to generate fascinating
learning opportunities and possibilities. Such a class will be sensitive to cultural
and linguistic diversity and help create an atmosphere of social tolerance, justice
while enhancing analytical and cognitive abilities of our students.

2.7 KEY WORDS

Behaviourist learning theory: a school of thought in psychology that viewed
animal and human behavior as habits that could be observed, measured and
conditioned over a period of time.

Structuralist learning theory: a school of thought in linguistics that looked

at form of language as a set of structures that could be broken down into
subparts.

Multilingualism: the ability to use fluently more than one language by an

individual or society

2.8 SUGGESTED READINGS

Agnihotri, R. K. 1995. Multilingualism as a classroom resource. In K. Heugh,
A. Sieruhn, & P. Pluddemann (eds.), Multilingual education for South Africa,
3–7. Johannesburg/Germany: Heinmann.

Agnihotri, R. K. 1997. Multilingualism, colonialism and translation. In S.

Ramakrishna (ed.), Translation and multilingualism: Post-colonial contexts,
34–46. Delhi, India: Pencraft International.

Agnihotri, R. K. (1998). Mixed codes and their acceptability. In R. K. Agnihotri,

A. L. Khanna, & I. Sachdev (Eds.), Social psychological perspectives on second
language learning (pp. 191– 215). New Delhi: SAGE.

Garcia, O. (2009). Education, multilingualism and translanguaging in the 21st

century. In

A. K. Mohanty, M. Panda, R. Phillipson, & T. Skutnabb-Kangas (Eds.),

Multilingual education

for social justice: Globalizing the local (pp. 128–145). New Delhi: Orient
Blackswan.

Pandit, P. B. 1988. Towards a grammar of variation. In L. M. Khubchandani

(ed.), Language in a plural society, 40–49. Delhi, India: Motilal Banarasidass
& Shimla IIAS.

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 Using Multilingualism as a
2.9 ANSWERS Resource

Check Your Progress 1

1. This is to reflect on your teaching practice. If you do not allow any other
language other than English, is it because you feel that is the only way
they will learn and get exposure to English or is it because you feel that
their L1 will interfere with learning of English? If you allow mixing, switching
or use of any language, is it because you want your students to be as
comfortable in class as they are outside the class?
2. Creating a linguistic profile will help you to know your students better and
plan your activities that may require data from other languages. This data
will also help you to reflect on the fact how our classrooms are essentially
multilingual in nature.
Check Your Progress 2
1. This question will help you to reflect on the role of teacher, textbook, and
the teaching methodology. For example, do we still not focus on dictation
of words that our students memorize and reproduce?
2. This is about your beliefs. If you believe that L1 interferes with L2 learning,
why do you believe so?
Check Your Progress 3
1. Textbook analysis should help you to comment on the nature of its content,
organization and exercises. Is the book guided by behaviouristic principles
or does it have any scope of independent analysis and link with the personal
experiences of the learners?
2. This is to help you identify some authentic materials on your own. These
could be films, documentaries, magazine articles, wrappers etc. You will
have to think of activities around them and the purpose of using such
materials.
Check Your Progress 4
1. The purpose of this activity is to see how Indian languages are similar in
nature and different from English. The basic reason for this is the different
word orders that Indian languages have as opposed to English.
2. This is an open-ended question. You will have to first believe that
multilingualism is indeed a resource and then try out an activity in your
own classroom.
Check Your Progress 5
This is also an open-ended activity.

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