Speaking and Instructed Foreign Language Acquisition

Mirosław Pawlak, Ewa Waniek-Klimczak, Jan Majer, Mirosław Pawlak, Ewa Waniek-Klimczak, Jan Majer

• Publisher: Multilingual Matters
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781847694744
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Psycolinguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Developing the ability to speak in a foreign language is an arduous task. This is because it involves the mastery of different language subsystems, simultaneous focus on comprehension and production, and the impact of a range of social factors. This challenge is further compounded in situations in which learners have limited access to the target language. Thus, there is a need to explore issues related to teaching, learning and testing speaking with a view to translating the guidelines based on theoretical positions and research findings into feasible and context-specific pedagogical recommendations. This is the rationale behind this book, which considers speaking from leading theoretical perspectives, investigates individual variables which affect its development, and reports the results of studies focusing on different aspects of its instructed acquisition.

Part 1

Theoretical Perspectives on Instructed Acquisition of Speaking

Chapter 1

Instructed Acquisition of Speaking: Reconciling Theory and Practice

MIROSLAW PAWLAK

Introduction

It is perhaps fitting to start this chapter with a quote from Bygate (2002: 27) who so aptly comments that ‘The study of speaking – like the study of other uses of language – is properly an interdisciplinary field. It involves understanding the psycholinguistic and interpersonal factors of speech production, the forms, meanings and processes involved, and how these can be developed’. Indeed, when reading recent overviews of critical issues involved in learning, using, teaching and testing this crucial skill (e.g. Burns & Seidlhofer, 2010; Bygate, 2002, 2008, 2009; Hughes, 2002; Luoma, 2004; Tarone, 2005; Thornbury, 2005), it becomes clear that describing, understanding and explaining these complex processes requires insights from such disciplines as theoretical and applied linguistics, psychology, sociology, neurology or educational studies. More specific contributions, in turn, accrue from particular branches or combinations of these disciplines including, among others, phonetics, phonology, syntax, morphology, pragmatics, conversation analysis, corpus linguistics, second language acquisition, psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics or neurolinguistics. Such a huge diversity of influences and the inherent intricacy of their manifold relationships testify to the tremendous complexity of the speaking skill, the inevitable outcome of which is the difficulty involved in its successful development when acquiring a second or foreign language, be it naturalistically, in the classroom or with the benefit of both of these conditions. This difficulty is particularly acute, however, in the case of instructed language acquisition in the foreign language context where out-of-class exposure is often restricted, language instruction is confined to just several hours a week and the quality of classroom discourse is far from conducive to the development of effective communicative skills (Majer, 2003; Ortega, 2007a; Pawlak, 2000, 2004, 2009).

An important source of ideas on how these problems can be tackled are theories, models and hypotheses that specialists have put forward over the last few decades to explain different aspects of the process of second and foreign language acquisition, including the reception and production of speech as well as the appropriation of the requisite knowledge, abilities and skills. This chapter aims to demonstrate how such theoretical perspectives can provide a basis for formulating a set of useful guidelines for learning and teaching speaking in a foreign language setting, such as the one typical of language education in Poland. Following a brief overview of the main challenges in instructed acquisition of speaking, firstly, the key tenets of influential psycholinguistic theories and hypotheses which are more or less directly relevant to the development of speaking skills will be presented, that is the model of speech production (cf. Kormos, 2006; Levelt, 1989, 1999), interactionist approaches (cf. Gass, 1997; Long, 1981, 1996; Swain, 1985, 1995), skill-learning theory (cf. DeKeyser, 1998, 2001) and the model of language proficiency (Skehan, 1998). Secondly, the pedagogical implications stemming from these theoretical positions will be discussed and the feasibility of implementing them in the foreign language classroom will be addressed. The chapter will conclude with a proposal for a tentative model of teaching speaking which is based on the recommendations of theorists but at the same time recognizes the constraints that teachers have to face daily in their classrooms.

Challenges of Instructed Acquisition of Speaking

Before embarking on the task of reconciling theory and practice for the benefit of more effective instructed acquisition of speaking in a foreign language, it appears warranted to take a closer look at what is involved in the mastery of this skill as well as the resultant challenges that have to be faced when learning and teaching it. What must be emphasized from the very outset is that there is a broad consensus among specialists that the ability to engage in oral language production, although it tends to be taken for granted, is ‘(…) the most complex and difficult to master’ (Tarone, 2005: 485). This complexity, which is clearly reflected in the contributions to the present volume, is related to a number of issues, such as the fact that the act of speaking is rarely a monologue and typically also involves simultaneous listening and comprehending; it happens in real time, thus being transient and dynamic; it involves mobilizing various aspects of communicative competence, including non-linguistic resources; it is heavily reliant on the situational context and it must take account of the broader cultural and social milieu. It also impinges upon the process of the acquisition of this skill because, as Burns and Seidlhofer (2010: 197) point out, ‘(…) learning speaking, whether in a first or other language, involves developing subtle and detailed knowledge about why, how, when to communicate, and complex skills for producing and managing interaction, such as asking a question or obtaining a turn’. Such difficulties, in turn, inevitably generate a number of problems for teachers, particularly those in foreign language settings, as they have to create in their classrooms optimal conditions for the acquisition of all the components of the skill of speaking as well as ample opportunities for contextualized, meaningful and integrated practice in using it.

A description of the characteristics of speaking in a foreign language can be approached from different angles, but typically it is conceptualized in terms of two interrelated facets, that is the various types of knowledge that learners possess and their expertise in adeptly using this knowledge in real communication, which have been, respectively, labelled in latest state-of-the-art articles as language as a system and language in contexts of use (Bygate, 2002), form and function (Tarone, 2005), what learners know and what learners do (Thornbury, 2005) and oral repertoires and oral processes (Bygate, 2008). The current discussion, however, draws upon a more detailed characterization of the construct of spoken language offered by Bygate (2009), who breaks it down into (1) the spoken repertoire, (2) the conditions of speech and (3) the processes of oral language production. With respect to the first of these categories, it includes a range of linguistic elements, which can be subdivided into phonological (i.e. both segmental and suprasegmental), lexicogrammatical (morphological and syntactic resources, lexis, as well as formulaic and pragmalinguistic units) and discourse features (i.e. socio-pragmatic features and pragmatic discourse structures), and different constellations of which are used with a view to attaining social or informational purposes in specific situations (cf. Roever, 2009). Broadly speaking, these purposes are related to three overarching functions of oral discourse, namely interactional (i.e. maintaining social relationships), transactional (i.e. conveying information) and ludic (i.e. using language for entertainment) (cf. Brown & Yule, 1983; Tarone, 2005). As demonstrated by the findings of research in corpus linguistics (e.g. Chafe, 1985; Cullen & Kuo, 2007; O’Keefe et al., 2007), the occurrence and distribution of various linguistic features is characterized by fragmentation, or relative lack of modification and subordination, high incidence of sub-clause-level units or fragments and frequent evidence of editing, and involvement, which manifests itself in the use of elements signalling personal identity or group membership, or expressing feelings and attitudes towards the interlocutor or discourse content. As a result, spoken language is typically associated with short turns and frequent turn-taking, pausing, false starts, hesitations, fillers, backchannels, negotiation, repairs, communication strategies, the use of deictic pronouns, ellipsis, questions, negatives or disjuncts, although some of these are by no means confined to speech (cf. Biber et al., 2002). As regards the conditions in which spoken language is produced, Bygate (2009) points to the presence of an interlocutor, as well as conditions closely related to it: reciprocity, entailing making adjustments to allow smooth communication, and time pressure, deriving from lack of planning time and the need to listen to what is being said, both of which operate simultaneously and are responsible for the occurrence of fragmentation and involvement. Finally, the processes of language production are accounted for in terms of the stages of conceptualization, formulation, articulation and monitoring, posited by most models of speech production (de Bot, 1992; Kormos, 2006; Levelt, 1989), as well as controlled and automatic processing, viewed as gradable rather than categorical (cf. Segalowitz, 2003).

A question that arises at this juncture is whether it is at all feasible to acquire such a complex and multifaceted inventory of features, abilities and subskills, automatize them to such an extent that they can be used in real-time processing and apply them successfully to achieve specific communicative goals in an appropriate way in various culturally bound contexts. In the light of the fact that even prolonged, massive exposure to the target language (TL) together with its pragmatic and sociocultural norms, such as that available in second language contexts or, to some extent, in immersion education, by no means guarantees the attainment of high levels of proficiency, including accurate, appropriate and distinct speaking skills (e.g. Harley, 1989; Klatter-Folmer & Van Avermaet, 1997, cited in Van den Branden, 2007; Schmidt, 1983), such problems are bound to be exacerbated in foreign language settings. It is difficult to see, for example, how an average learner who attends four or five lessons a week, hardly ever uses the foreign language in a meaningful way in these lessons because of the nature of classroom interaction, has scant access to that language outside school and does not interact with native speakers can ever be expected to gain control over even a fraction of the repertoire described above, not to mention its skilful use in face-to-face communication. In fact, even advanced learners, such as those studying foreign languages for professional reasons (i.e. teachers, translators, linguists), who have apparently mastered their formal aspects, experience great difficulty with deploying these resources in spontaneous communication, let alone the fact that emulating the distinctive characteristics of speech and adjusting it to various contextual, social and cultural variables is typically beyond their reach.

It is obvious that there is a ceiling effect for interlanguage development, even for learners endowed with exceptional language aptitude, and thus their speaking skills are unlikely to ever mirror those of native speakers, and perhaps there is little reason why they should. Nonetheless, oral communication is such an important goal for most learners, irrespective of their level of proficiency, that effective instruction in this area should be at the top of the agenda for all foreign language teachers. Sadly, there are still situations where learners have virtually no opportunities for developing this skill due to frequent reliance on the L1, teacher-fronted classes with rigid control over all classroom discourse or excessive preoccupation with other skills and subsystems. Even when efforts are made to teach spoken language, they are either aimed at preparing students for specific examination formats or simply misguided since the activities, such as role-plays that students recite from memory or exchanges that require minimal output, have little to do with authentic communication. When it comes to specialized foreign language instruction in institutions of higher education, although students have the benefit of separate speaking classes in which opportunities for oral communication abound, a major woe of such classes is that they seldom, if ever, focus upon such issues as colloquial, situation-specific phrases, appropriateness of expression, levels of formality, turn-taking mechanisms, negotiation of meaning, communication strategies and so on. As a consequence, students who c...