FP004 – INDIVIDUAL FACTORS IN THE LEARNER'S DEVELOPMENT

PRACTICAL ACTIVITY

General information

The practical activity of this subject consists of carrying out individually the tasks detailed
below. To do this, the learner must keep the statements of each of the tasks and respond
to each of them. In addition, the activity must meet the formal requirements:

• Length: 5-6 pages (excluding instructions, statements, bibliography and annexes, if

any).
• Font: Arial.
• Size: 11 points
• Spacing: 1.5.
• Alignment: Justified.

The activity should be carried out in this Word document following the rules of presentation
and editing in terms of citations and bibliographic references (see Study Guide).

Submission must be done following the procedures described in the subject’s evaluation
document; under no circumstances should it be submitted through the professor’s email.

On the other hand, remember that there are evaluation criteria which are considered
extremely important for the learner to follow. For further information, please refer to the
subject evaluation document.

1
Student's full name: Rojas Chasiguasín Paola Michelle

Group: FP_07IFLD_2022

Date: 26/02/2023

2
TASK 1 ............................................................................................................................. 4
TASK 2 ............................................................................................................................. 5
TASK 3 ............................................................................................................................. 7
BIBLIOGRAPHY ..............................................................................................................10

3
Look at this learner's description of how she learnt a foreign language.

When I first arrived in the country, I did a two-week intensive course. Just to learn the basics
– you know - shopping, directions and so on. Then I just spoke to everyone I could find. I
even spoke to myself out loud sometimes. I bought a grammar book with a key and did
exercises on difficult things like the subjunctive. I found that it really helped me to memorise
verb conjugations, and then slowly I learned how to use them more or less correctly. But I
still make mistakes, and I've been living here for 11 years.

How would you characterize her learning style?

According to Willing (1988): “Learning style include cognitive, affective and psychological
behaviours that indicate learners’ characteristic and consistent way of perceiving,
interacting with and responding to the learning environment”. Of the four main learning
styles identified by Willing, she learned a foreign language in a communicative and analytic
style.

The communicative learning style is quite autonomous, prefers social learning, likes taking
decisions. The text describes her as an independent person, she decides to take an
intensive course, buy teaching material to practice advanced grammar and venture out to
speak with native speakers, all these actions were carried out on her own. Interacting with
native people to practice the language requires social skills, it was a good practice to talk
to every person she could find, daily contact allows learning new words of a language,
having conversations, that is, speaking, watching, and listening to native speakers.

Analytic learning style, is object-oriented, high capacity for making connections and
inferences, prefers logical and didactic presentation. She studied grammar a lot on books
and solve difficult exercises by her own. That says a lot about her preference for didactic
material when learning a language.

How would you describe your learning style as regards language learning? Provide as
much detailed information as you can.

According to Nunan's description of learner styles, from the beginning my style was more
analytical and concrete. The former more oriented towards grammar and the resolution of
exercises, using didactic materials for learning and the latter more oriented towards the use

4
of English outside the classroom, employing very direct means to taking in and processing
information, such as games, films, conversations in pairs.

I learned the basics of English in elementary school and high school. I had fun learning but
I realized that each year the topics to be taught were the same: “VERB TO BE”, “PRESENT
SIMPLE”, “PRESENT CONTINOUS”, “WH QUESTIONS”, “REGULAR AND IRREGULAR
VERBS”. “ARTICLES”, “COUNTABLE AND UNCOUNTABLE NOUNS”, etc. I took those
classes so many times that I learned them by heart, and after a while I found them boring,
because I wanted to level up.

Luckily, I had the opportunity to take private English classes at Benedict School of
Languages. I liked the monitoring of the English teacher during the classes. I liked studying
the rules of grammar through English books and reading texts by myself to find new words
or phrases, I also liked working on solving problems set by the teacher and finding my
mistakes. It was like a kind of self-assessment of my progress in English proficiency.

Laboratory evaluations were my favorite, they took us to a room where we put on

headphones and watched a short video on a specific topic, the teacher played the video 3
times, and after that they gave us an evaluation. I also learned through playing games,
watching films, teamwork, listening to music in English, I tried to use English as much as
possible outside of class so I wouldn't forget it.

I have been learning English for as long as I can remember, I could say since I was 11 years
old. The four skills, speaking, reading, listening and writing I master quite well. I learned
enough to teach the little ones; teaching is a good way to not forget a language. All the
English I know I learned in my hometown and with the help of the internet. Sadly, there was
no opportunity to learn it from the natives. Although I still have the dream of traveling abroad
to put it into practice fluently.

Of the four motivational types examined above, which are your students most most
display? Why do you think this is the case?

In my classes, I have noticed that as students get older, their motivations change. My
students between the ages of 11 and 12 enjoy learning English, and they do it because they
are interested in learning about the culture, their motivation is to meet people who speak
English and to be able to interact with them (Integrative motivation). I know this because

5
they actively participate in the classes, and they have expressed their desire to travel abroad
if given the opportunity.

And not only speak English, most of my students are also interested in speaking other
languages, and the main reason they told me was the need to watch their favorite programs
(cartoons, k-dramas, series) in their original language (French, Korean, Portuguese)
hearing that was kind of funny, because I thought similarly when I was young.

If we talk about students from 7 to 10 years old, most of them are more oriented to learn
English because it is one of the subjects that they need to pass to the next school year, they
still do not develop another type of motivation other than instrumental motivation. They learn
the language for what they can “get” with it, in this case, pass the test.

Which of these motivational types can we, as language teachers directly influence in
the language classroom? How?

Extrinsic motivation, as teachers we can influence learners through constraints and rewards
in the language classroom. We can use a reward system to motivate students to learn a
foreign language, in this case, English. Or we can use a constraint system to educate
learners and motivate them to make an effort.

Give rewards, like give some kind of recognition to the most applied students or those who
participate the most in class:

• Award diplomas to the best students

• Planning school trips

• Extra points

• Exonerate them in a test

• No extra homework

They are given to the students with the best grades at the end of the academic period, it
can be monthly or quarterly. The more recurring the award, the more opportunities students
will have to participate and improve their skills in language learning.

The objective is to increase the self-esteem of the most applied students and encourage
the rest of the class to try harder learning the foreign language to be recognized as their

6
peers. These rewards: diplomas, school trips, exoneration, extra points and no homework,
will develop in learners a feeling of satisfaction with the result and approval, until it becomes
an intrinsic motivation.

Constraints or certain penalties may be applied if the student's performance does not
improve, the punishment has to be educative, at first it doesn't sound good, but somehow
we have to force the motivation to help them improve their performance in learning a
language:

• Extra homework

• Talk to the student's parents

• No lunch break time

• Get the learners out of their comfort zone

Motivate the learner by removing some privileges, the learner cannot take lunch break time
unless he has completed the task correctly. As teachers we must monitor the completion of
the task and clear up any doubts the learner may have, give feedback if necessary. We
must take advantage of the stimulus that we have created in the learner.

Work together with parents and make them aware of their child's poor performance in the
classroom. We motivate the student to learn, since they will have more people monitoring
their development in language learning.

Take the students out of their comfort zone, using dynamic activities, even if they make
mistakes. Ask them questions during class, reading aloud or teamwork. In order to integrate
them actively, to lose fear and be influenced by the responses of their peers, after all,
learning another language is about confidence.

List the pros and cons of introducing the study of a foreign language at an early age.

I think there are more advantages than disadvantages in introducing a foreign language at
an early age.

7
 Pros

• Better pronunciation skills Young learners are more predisposed to

acquiring better pronunciation skills than
those learners who start to learn a foreign
language at a later age. They will not have
a foreign accent in the second language.

• More exposure time to the foreign They are going to be exposed to the foreign
language language for a longer period than those
learners who start learning a foreign
language at a later age, therefore youngers
will have more time to master the L2. The
first ten years of life are the best age for L2
acquisition, because the brain still
preserves its plasticity, the capability of
being molded.

• Better language input According to Krashen, younger would be

exposed to more comprehensible input
than adults, more open emotionally to the
experience of learning a foreign language,
without feeling anxiety or stress.

• Don’t mind looking for support in Children are not threatened by the sounds
learning from others and structures of the new language, they
comprise and acquire secondary levels
much better than adults because they are
more interested in being accepted by the
other members of the speech community.

• Different storage of L2 information Children are more flexible towards the new
language, they are less prone to identify
differences between the target language
and the mother tongue. Young learners

8
 store first and second language separately,
while adults store first and second
language together.

Cons

• There’s no guarantee that children will learn the foreign language faster. They are
not better learners than adults.

• Children do not have a great capacity for concentration.

• Children are not so well predisposed to understand language as a formal system.

• May not have enough support at home to learn and master a foreign language.

• Youngers have not developed cognitive skills and self-discipline.

9
Bidabadi, F., & Yamat, H. (2010). Learning Style Preferences by Iranian EFL Freshman
University. Bangi: Elsevier Ltd.
Collins Dictionary. (s.f.). Definition of Plasticity. Obtenido de
https://www.collinsdictionary.com/es/diccionario/ingles/plasticity
Foreign Language Teaching Methods. Lesson 2: Motivation . (s.f.). Obtenido de
https://coerll.utexas.edu/methods/modules/learners/02/integrative.php#:~:text=So
me%20learners%20have%20a%20personal,and%20is%20called%20integrative%
20motivation.
Funiber. (2019). Individual Factors in the Learner's Development. Spain.
Willing, K. (1988). Language Strategies as Information Management: Some Definitions for
a Theory of Learning Strategies.

10