Journal #11 E-journaling, TBLT & Distance Learning

E-journaling can be a vehicle for 'practicing' what we 'think' as we write. It is a task that requires writing about what's in our heads, our "head voice". So as we think personal thoughts, we are actually hearing ourselves 'speak', to ourselves, in the language in which we are writing. For the ESL student, this will hopefully be in English, and as they write they can formulate their ideas. E-journaling ideas is comparable to conversational style, so it can conceivably assist the NNS 'practice' what they might say in a conversation. I think this is a process we all go through at times. Sometimes writing things down (in this case in a relaxed style) helps us to clarify what's in our heads, what we really think or feel about something, thereby preparing us for the moment when we are asked to speak on the same topic.

Task Based Language Teaching appears to be the newest frontier of research in SLA. The CARLA site is replete with teaching resources, professional and for the classroom. The 'teaching speech acts' project with its phased approach is seemingly well-planned, but data is missing on the content of the modules used. I would like to get feedback from a student as to the efficacy of the program. The bibliographies by speech act shows the level of dedication UMN has to the Carla project. http://dev-carla.umn.edu/speechacts/bibliography/index.html

Three of the most outstanding articles I have read in the SLA forum are on TBLT. J. Lee, (2000) McGraw-Hill provided tacit definitions of task, which amount to everything we do on a daily basis, through survival tasks. Lee updates the notion of 'communicative' exercises, which can often be masked drills and discrete-point activities, to being the purposeful performance of an activity/instruction/command. Language is not the object to be studied, as Doughty and Long state explicitly in their psycholinguistic analysis of distance learning and TBLT, but it is the 'vehicle' for communication. Lee, p. 35, states that discussions in academic classes have stated purposes, whereas language classes are missing this link. That depends. On the teacher, on the curriculum, on the student level. I think that languages lend themselves to studies in literature, current events, history, sociology, anthropology IN the target language, whereby the interest level is high, and the target language IS the vehicle for communication. Many gaps of knowledge are realized (Skehan and Doughty/Long), meaning is negotiated to complete tasks be they coming to a consensus, preparing details for a report, simulating authentic situations. I liked the definition of 'negotiating meaning' offered by Skehan, "the way learners encounter communicational difficulties while completing tasks, and how they do something about those difficulties." Having interned in a completely TBLT ESL listening/speaking class, I found that there is an inordinate amount of time spent in getting students organized and re-organized. My experience was definitely one where the role of the teacher was "to react to whatever language emerged, and then to help address the gap." I'm not convinced that much learning occurred except for a few students. I would use a combination approach, planning well, having specific knowledge-constructing and activating tasks in mind. Both Skehan's and Doughty/Long's papers were gave helpful parameters in giving teachers tools to set up pertinent, successful, task based activities in the classroom or online. For me, a priori one must accurately assess the needs of the students first. The difference between research on this topic done in segments of 5 to 20 minutes versus what really happens in the classroom is PARAMOUNT. There are two different realities.