History of English language teaching
Changes in language teaching methods throughout history have reflected recognition of changes in the kind of proficiency learners need, such as a move toward oral proficiency rather than reading comprehension as the goal of language study: they have also reflected changes in theories of the nature of language and of language learning.
Kelly (1969) and Howatt (1984) have demonstrated that many current issues in language teaching are not particularly new. Today's controversies reflect contemporary responses to q uestions that have been asked often throughout the history of language teaching.
It has been estimated that some 60% of today's world population is multilingual.
A multilingual person, in a broad definition, is one who can communicate in more than one language, be it actively (through speaking, writing, or signing) or passively (through listening, reading, or perceiving). More specifically, the terms bilingual and trilingual are used to describe comparable situations in which two or three languages are involved. A multilingual person is generally referred to as a polyglot. Poly (Greek: πολύς) means "many", glot (Greek: γλώττα) means "language".
Multilingual speakers have acquired and maintained at least one language during childhood, the so-called first language or mother tongue (L1). The first language (sometimes also referred to as the mother tongue) is acquired without formal education, by mechanisms heavily disputed. Children acquiring two languages in this way are called simultaneous bilinguals. Even in the case of simultaneous bilinguals one language usually dominates over the other. This kind of bilingualism is most likely to occur when a child is raised by bilingual parents in a predominantly monolingual environment.
In linguistics, first language acquisition is closely related to the concept of a "native speaker". According to a view widely held by linguists, a native speaker of a given language has in some respects a level of skill which a second (or subsequent) language learner can hardly reliably accomplish. Consequently, descriptive empirical studies of languages are usually carried out using only native speakers as informants. This view is, however, slightly problematic, particularly as many non-native speakers demonstrably not only successfully engage with and in their non-native language societies, but in fact may become culturally and even linguistically important contributors (as, for example, writers, politicians and performing artists) in their non-native language. In recent years, linguistic research has focused attention on the use of widely known world languages such as English as lingua franca (or working language, bridge language, vehicular language) is a language systematically used to make communication possible between people not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both mother tongues, or the shared common language of professional and commercial communities. In lingua franca situations, most speakers of the common language are functionally multilingual.
From both a contemporary and a historical perspective, bilingualism or multilingualism is the norm rather than the exception. It is fair then, to say that throughout history foreign language learning has always been an important practical concern. Whereas today English is the world's most widely studied foreign language (Arabic official language of 26 states, the third most after English and French), 500 years ago it was Latin, for it was the dominant language of education, commerce, religion, and government in the Western world.
As Arabic occupied a position similar to Latin (in Europe) throughout the Islamic world many of the Arabic concepts in the field of science, philosophy, commerce etc., were often coined by non-native Arabic speakers, notably by Aramaic and Persian translators. This process of using Arabic roots in notably Turkish and Persian, to translate foreign concepts continued right until the 18th and 19th century, when large swaths of Arab-inhabited lands were under Ottoman rule. In the sixteenth century, however, French, Italian, and English gained in importance as a result of political changes in Europe, and Latin gradually became displaced as a language of spoken and written communication.
As the status of Latin diminished from that of a living language to that of an "occasional" subject in the school curriculum, the study of Latin took of a different function. The study of classical Latin (the Latin in which the classical works of Virgil, Ovid, and Cicero were written) and an analysis of its grammar and rhetoric became the model for foreign language study from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. Children entering "grammar school" in the sixteenth, seventeenth, to the eighteenth centuries centuries in England were initially given a rigorous introduction to Latin grammar, which was taught through rote learning of grammar rules, study of declensions and conjugations, translation, and practice in writing sample sentences, sometimes with the use of parallel bilingual texts and dialogue (Kelly1969; Howatt 1984).
Once basic proficiency was established, students were introduced to the advanced study of grammar and rhetoric. School and learning must have been a deadening experience for children, for lapses in knowledge were often met with brutal punishment. There were occasional attempts to promote alternative approaches to education; Roger Ascham and Montaigne in the sixteenth century and Comenius and John Locke in the seventeenth century, for example had made a proposal for curriculum reform (and for changes in the way Latin was taught (Kelly1969; Howatt 1984), but since Latin and, to a lesser excellent, Greek) had for so long been regarded as the classical and therefore most ideal form of language, it was not surprising that ideas about the role of language study in language study in the curriculum reflected the long establish status of Latin.
The decline of Latin also brought with it a new justification for teaching Latin. Latin was said to develop intellectual abilities, and the study of Latin grammar became an end itself.
When once the Latin tongue had creased to be a normal vehicle for communication, and was replaced as such by the vernacular languages, then it most speedily became a 'mental gymnastic', the supremely 'dead' language, a disciplined and systematic study of which was held to be indispensable as a basis for all forms of higher education, (V. Mallison, cited in Titone 1968:26).
As Arabic occupied a position similar to Latin (in Europe) throughout the Islamic world many of the Arabic concepts in the field of science, philosophy, commerce etc., were often coined by non-native Arabic speakers, notably by Aramaic and Persian translators. This process of using Arabic roots in notably Turkish and Persian, to translate foreign concepts continued right until the 18th and 19th century, when large swaths of Arab-inhabited lands were under Ottoman rule. In the sixteenth century, however, French, Italian, and English gained in importance as a result of political changes in Europe, and Latin gradually became displaced as a language of spoken and written communication.
As the status of Latin diminished from that of a living language to that of an "occasional" subject in the school curriculum, the study of Latin took of a different function. The study of classical Latin (the Latin in which the classical works of Virgil, Ovid, and Cicero were written) and an analysis of its grammar and rhetoric became the model for foreign language study from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. Children entering "grammar school" in the sixteenth, seventeenth, to the eighteenth centuries centuries in England were initially given a rigorous introduction to Latin grammar, which was taught through rote learning of grammar rules, study of declensions and conjugations, translation, and practice in writing sample sentences, sometimes with the use of parallel bilingual texts and dialogue (Kelly1969; Howatt 1984).
Once basic proficiency was established, students were introduced to the advanced study of grammar and rhetoric. School and learning must have been a deadening experience for children, for lapses in knowledge were often met with brutal punishment. There were occasional attempts to promote alternative approaches to education; Roger Ascham and Montaigne in the sixteenth century and Comenius and John Locke in the seventeenth century, for example had made a proposal for curriculum reform (and for changes in the way Latin was taught (Kelly1969; Howatt 1984), but since Latin and, to a lesser excellent, Greek) had for so long been regarded as the classical and therefore most ideal form of language, it was not surprising that ideas about the role of language study in language study in the curriculum reflected the long establish status of Latin.
The decline of Latin also brought with it a new justification for teaching Latin. Latin was said to develop intellectual abilities, and the study of Latin grammar became an end itself.
When once the Latin tongue had creased to be a normal vehicle for communication, and was replaced as such by the vernacular languages, then it most speedily became a 'mental gymnastic', the supremely 'dead' language, a disciplined and systematic study of which was held to be indispensable as a basis for all forms of higher education, (V. Mallison, cited in Titone 1968:26).
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