What is language? Language is merely a tool that facilitates something. That something in the first instance is communication! Language is not that important, the communication is!
Imagine a world where we could communicate using telepathy without using words. If we could transmit ideas without words as intermediaries, we wouldn’t even bother learning a language. Language is a means to an end, and in the process of language learning we’ve forgotten about the end.
Since communication is the most important, I am convinced that we must put this focus back at the heart, in primary position. Many traditional teaching methods prioritise the language, and not the communication. I believe this is paradoxically a mistake.
If you have nothing you want to communicate to the person in front of you or to an audience, then really there is no direct and immediate motivation to use language.
Motivation and your connection to it is key. Even learning English and being able to communicate in the language may be a means to an end for you.
What will learning English allow you to do?
Perhaps it’s advancement in your career, accessing the wealth of information available in the language, or simply being able to travel more easily. Once you get to the real reason you want to learn English, you will be better able to align your language learning to your desire.
Any method that is distanced from the desire and motivation to learn will be difficult to sustain. Part of the teacher’s job is to keep a close connection between the two.
This is why, in my opinion, students often find courses designed to help them pass certifications tedious and struggle to maintain motivation. The focus and orientation of the course becomes the piece of paper, and the student becomes alienated from the reason they wanted to learn English. This was certainly my experience when learning Spanish.
I think that a language teacher’s job is to generate or connect the student to their desire to learn and communicate, and to use that as a vehicle for language learning.
I’ve learnt languages and in fact everything using this idea. For example, I wanted to design and make furniture, so I learnt the skills, including carpentry, to do it. I work on a “need to know basis”, learning what I need to know, to do what I want to do!
I’ve done this with languages. When I first arrived in Spain, I really didn’t speak a word of Spanish. I signed up for the official government sponsored language school. After the level test, as expected, they put me in the lowest level. Two weeks later, I insisted that they move me to the next level up, because I felt unchallenged and frankly bored as hell!
I passed level 2 at the end of the first semester, and then decided to quit the course. I went to the bar/café instead, engaged people in conversation, and learnt the skills I needed to communicate in less than half the time it would have taken me otherwise.
I am an English tutor to professionals for whom time is at a premium. Working mostly one-to-one, with many of my students, we often use a conversational class to prepare tasks that they need to do in their work. This might be a presentation, brainstorming ideas, writing a report or considering strategies and relational issues etc. In this manner, the class optimises their time, serving a dual purpose, getting something useful done, while learning the language.
As teachers, we can engage students in conversations that are real, fun and provide value apart from the language. We can give them opportunities to have the kinds of conversations they’d already love to have in their own language, about all the topics that they find meaningful and fascinating.
Language is just the tool, after all; it’s the connections and possibilities it opens up that really matter.
Tap into your intrinsic motivation for using the language and make sure you connect it to a way of learning that takes that into account, which is engaging and enjoyable, and watch how your learning takes off!
