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 Friday July 23 2004

Pragmatics: Relevance to ESL?

During my studies so far in this masters program I have been able to see relevance and usefulness of all of my courses to teaching. But while reading about pragmatics I fail to see any relevance to the classroom. Admittedly I haven’t read much on the subject, but what I have read does not seem applicable to teaching. The cooperative principle, while interesting and most likely useful when analyizing conversations is, at least to me, not readily transferable to a teaching context.

The other classes I took on SLA, Testing, Context Use & Analysis of English, TESOL in context, and Innovation in the classroom (Links here) all had relevance to teaching though some of it I did not consider relevant to my teaching context. Perhaps one of the reasons this class is an elective is the lack of relevance to teaching. Hopefully as I continue to read it will become clearer and I can see the usefulness in a classroom situation.



Sean. inscribed these words of wisdom on Friday Jul 23, 2004 at 06:42 PM
general_linguistic_study | Pragmatics |

Picture of David (TEFL Smiler)

David (TEFL Smiler) wrote 406 words  on  Sunday Jul 25, 2004  at  12:39 AM Denmark

If you define Pragmatics roughly as the theory (or theories) behind how we express and understand meaning in context, then language acquisition and pedagogy is very much about Pragmatics.

One book that you might find interesting - especially the introduction and the first couple of chapters (so you might want to try to get hold of a library copy rather than buying it) - is Pragmatics in Language Teaching, edited by Gabriele Kasper and Kenneth R Rose: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0521008581/qid=1090671136/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_3/002-7640915-7692038?v=glance&s=books

I consider Methodology in ELT to be crucial for the teacher. I’d define it as knowing about SLA, the history of different approaches to language teaching and specific methods, classroom management, testing, materials development, and language itself. We know that language isn’t ‘out there somewhere’, but, rather, is in our heads. Much of Methodology is therefore about how our pedagogy can be designed to get students to use what they already know, even if they aren’t consciously aware of knowing it. With this I’m referring to syntax, phonology, the ability to form a mental lexicon, etc.

The big discussion within Pragmatics is really one of whether we take a code-model approach to how people use language to communicate - and I’d actually include Grice here, despite his inferential stuff (which was sort of ground-breaking) - or whether we need to take a cognitive approach. (I believe the latter.) From the look of your course, you’ll be studying both, of course, which will give you a good overview of the subject. It also looks like you’ll have a better focus on the cognitive side of things than is common, which I think is great!

I think you’ll notice the importance and relevance of this course as it goes on. You’ll be able to apply the frames/scenarios/schemata stuff directly to understanding and analysing classroom behavour, I imagine. And the rest you’ll be able to use to improve your own understanding of how your students learn language and communicate, and what important aspects of language learning are often left out of the textbooks. (There are several important articles on the lack of Pragmatics in most ELT textbooks, and how or why this is a problem - I’ll provide you with more details when I return from my trip to the UK.)

OK, I’m not sure if I’ve actually made things clearer or not. I really hope you develop a liking for the subject more and more as the course gets underway.

Picture of David (TEFL Smiler)

David (TEFL Smiler) wrote 20 words  on  Sunday Jul 25, 2004  at  12:43 AM Denmark

I’ve just noticed that you can read the start of the Kasper/Rose book on the Amazon link. Go for it! grin

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