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CONTENTS
SAAL Quarterly is under the editorship of Dr T. Ruanni F. Tupas. Please address your correspondence and contributions to: Dr T. Ruanni F. Tupas (elcttr@nus.edu.sg), Centre for English Language Communication, National University of Singapore, 10 Kent Ridge Crescent, Singapore 119260. SAAL-STU COLLOQUIUM SURVEY REPORT The SAAL-STU Colloquium on "The English Language in Singapore: Changing Perspectives on Grammar in the Classroom" was held at the SEAMEO Regional Language Centre, Singapore, 27-28 November 2003. Fifty-three (53) participants took part in a survey to find out their views on various aspects of the colloquium. Based on the results, most survey participants were fairly satisfied with the quality and usefulness of both the plenary sessions and the workshops. Majority of the survey participants also found the venue reasonably suitable. The participants found the following five workshops the most useful:
Some suggestions from participants include (1) more practical workshops in future colloquia as some workshops tended to be theoretical, (2) inclusion of middle managers (HOD's) as they are also responsible for curricular decision-making in schools, (3) a venue which is closer to bus stops and MRT stations and with a bigger parking space, and (4) more sensitivity to Muslim dietary rules. The following are some relevant details of the survey results: 1. To what extent did the programme meet your needs as an English teacher?
2. How would you rate the plenary session of Professor Tom MacArthur on "Grammar and Fluency in Real-Life English" (Day 1)?
3. How would you rate the plenary session of Professor Tony Hung on "Where Grammar Syllabus Ends and the Teacher Begins" (Day 2)?
4. How would you rate the quality of workshops you attended?
Reported by T. Ruanni F. Tupas ↑ Top | ← Publications BOOK REVIEWS
Methodology and Materials Design in Language Teaching: Current Perceptions and Practices and their Implications (Anthology Series #44) I ordered the class to line up along the window with their middle-class, middle of the road course books in their right hands. We opened the windows and, on the command "throw", they threw their coursebooks away. (Tomlinson, 2003: 12) If you are a teacher who has ever felt as though you wanted to emulate Brian Tomlinson, then this anthology is an important read for you. This selection of seminar papers from the 2002 RELC International Seminar held in April 2002 draws strength from its wide-ranging representation of countries and mix of the theoretical and the practical. Collections of conference papers have the advantage of presenting the latest views and studies, even though they may lack the tight control of traditional collections. Editor Willy A. Renandya has done an excellent job of selection and organization. In the introduction, he introduces each selection with a brief description and then a major conclusion or valuable insight that each author contributes. The volume is divided into three sections: Materials Design and Evaluation in Language Teaching, Methodology and Text, and Materials in Use in Southeast Asia. The first section contains five articles including Tomlinson's paper from where the quote above was taken. Richard Day in 'Authenticity in the Design and Development of Materials' critiques the notion of authenticity. He favours the alternative 'appropriateness' and explains the crucial elements of difference between the concepts. Brian Tomlinson in 'Humanising the Coursebook' suggests replacing those inappropriate textbooks with a wide variety of tools that includes substitution with other books, student generated text and partial replacement. He gives suggestions and examples of how and what to include in humanistic coursebooks. New technologies cannot substitute for sound principles of materials development is the thesis of Denise Murray's 'Materials for New Technologies: Learning from Research and Practice'. A detailed and rich description of a new on-line grammar reference for primary teachers, Beverly Derewianka's 'Designing an On-Line Reference Grammar for Primary English Teachers', complements Murray's thesis. A. Mehdi Riazi's 'What do Textbook Evaluation Schemes Tell us? A Study of the Textbook Evaluation Schemes of Three Decades' takes us through the chronological development and a description of the correlation between language teaching methodologies and the various methods of evaluation and selection of textbooks. This article situates the evaluation of materials with the assumptions of SLA and provides a framework for choosing an evaluation scheme based on those underlying principles. The second section, Methodology and Text, contains three selections, again combining a good mix of theory and practice. 'Skill, Text and Register: Rethinking Grammar in the IT Age' by Erwin Tschirmer confronts language professionals with the changing nature of grammar instruction in the age of powerful computers. He draws distinctions between primary, literary and linguistic grammars; diagrams their dynamics, and gives advice on how to integrate them. Ronald Brown in 'Developing Academic Texts to Enhance Inference Use' takes the learning skill of drawing inferences that may be easy for native speakers, but problematic for ESL learners, as his topic. He explains how important the skill of inference is, and then gives helpful schemas of how it can be enhanced in the classroom. Following on from this cognitive skill to another, critical thinking, Amos Paran in 'Helping Learners to Become Critical: How Coursebooks Can Help' emphasizes the importance of critical thinking to the education of students as opposed to training them in language skills. The third and longest section, Materials in Use in Southeast Asia, has six articles, most of which are highly descriptive and firmly situated in a particular country or institutional setting. Andrew Gonzalez in 'ESL Materials for Philippine Use in Primary and Secondary Schools: Across Four Paradigmatic Generations' revisits a topic he covered previously. He points to the difficulties of the fit between theories of ESL and materials development and selection, and the political will to spend the necessary funds for education to implement new theories and methods. From the Philippines, the reader is taken to Indonesia, where Iwan Jazadi in 'Mandated English Teaching Materials and their Implications to Teaching and Learning: The Case of Indonesia' lets teachers speak for themselves. Jazadi includes analysis of textbooks as well as information on how teachers implement, or in many cases, do not implement, mandated materials. Malaysian teachers, as shown by Shanti Chandran in 'Where are the ELT Textbooks?' also eschew mandated textbooks in favour of materials deemed more suitable for their students. Bao Dat takes us to Vietnam in 'Localising ELT Materials in Vietnam: A Case Study' for an intimate view of one teacher struggling with new teaching methodologies. Rich description brings out the triumphs and failures of a very human enterprise. Gloria Poedjosoedarmo in 'Developing an Oral Communication Skills Training Package: Process and Product; Problems and Solutions' and Carmel Heah and Li Shu Yun in 'Collaborative Materials Design for Communication Skills Training in an Engineering Curriculum' give us descriptions of materials development firmly grounded in the reality of creating a set of materials that are primarily useable in particular situations. Both articles describe the dynamic possibilities of collaboration and teamwork and the importance of trial and refinement. The emphasis of both is on making materials fit the needs of the learners in accessible ways. Some of the strengths of this volume are also its weaknesses. One strength is the breadth of the coverage, by geographical area, subject matter, emphasis and so forth, but it also means that nothing is treated in depth. Another strength is the succinctness of the papers; none is over 22 pages in total. But therein also lies a weakness. Brevity may be the soul of wit, but it does not make for very good in-depth analysis. Another weakness is the lack of means of follow-up. If a reader wants to follow through with questions or advice, there is no indication of where the author might be found. Even though academics are notorious for moving on, it would have been helpful to have a biography of each person and their institutional affiliation. The editor could have used two or three pages to give the reader a set of short introductions so as to set the author and topic in context. Altogether, the graphs, charts, and appendices are very helpful and well done. There are a few typos, but they are not distracting overall. The cover is attractive, the font is readable and of good size. These things may appear to be trivial, but are important for a reader. And of course, comments like these are relevant to the topic of materials design. Rarely are remarks made in book reviews or critiques if all is well; it is the absence of well-designed materials that provokes grumbles and complaints. The major premise of the book, that teaching methodology and materials designs are important, relevant issues, is highlighted by many authors. For example, Tomlinson, in his story of throwing the coursebook out the window, emphasizes the core nature of teaching materials. The inappropriateness of the material to the group because of the second-class citizen status of the learners and outdated mandatory texts is highlighted on a number of occasions. These sensitive topics are all too often shied away from by researchers and teachers, ever mindful of the powers that be. It is heartily refreshing to see frank discussion in print about the inadequacies in teacher training and materials design brought about by government policies. Entrenched power needs confrontation in order to push change. I particularly like a good read, and while it may seem fatuous to liken an academic article to a novel, a page-turner in an academic collection gets high marks. On the other hand, at the end of an academic piece, I want to feel as though I've been given an idea, a contribution, or a morsel to chew on, otherwise I have wasted my time on pure description without analysis. So, as one article that fulfils both needs, I want to choose Bao Dat's 'Localising ELT Materials in Vietnam: A Case Study' as my favourite. The article starts off at a leisurely pace, building the suspense through a description of localisation, then going on to describe the chosen text and how it was localised. The pace picks up when Dat takes us into the classroom for a minute-by-minute description of how an experienced teacher gives a new methodology a try. Students' and the teacher's words drag us along as Dat intersperses evaluation and analyses of the teacher and his actions. It is a roller-coaster ride: will he or won't he engage the students or change his teaching methodology to convince the students that learning English is fun? We do not find out until the final analysis (you must read that for yourself) what happens. I was left emotionally and intellectually satisfied and wishing that more writing in this field was as interesting and intellectually rigorous. Well done, Bao Dat, and please write some more. This is a volume for teachers, who know that students are at the heart of their endeavour of teaching. Issues about teaching methodology and the nexus with materials design ultimately affect our learners and how well they acquire the language to do whatever they choose to do with it. Teachers are the facilitators of learning and so the burden of choosing lies with them, both methods and materials. "Learners do not learn from materials, whether print or electronic; rather they learn through thinking and using language to perform certain tasks" (Murray, p.40).
Reviewed by Phyllis Wachob ↑ Top | ← Publications
Studying the English Language This book is not a standard introductory textbook on English. Rather than the usual sections on grammar and phonetics, instead it starts with a look at language variation and a historical overview of how the different dialects of English arose, and this is followed by quite a substantial coverage of Saussurian linguistics, a thread which continues throughout the book. Next is a detailed discussion of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis and the influences of language in restricting and even controlling our thoughts. Consideration is then given to the role of English in perpetuating sex differences, to the ways that English has changed and continues to change, and to an analysis of communication breakdown, before the final chapter concludes with a discussion of the central role of symbols in the emergence of human language. It is rather unusual for an introductory book such as this to place so much emphasis on Saussurian linguistics and the nature of symbols in defining language and controlling our lives. While it is certainly true that Saussure's concepts of langue and parole and the contrast between the signifier (the symbol) and the signified (its referent) are seminal in modern linguistics, one might expect a little more emphasis on the thinking of more recent writers on language, such as Chomsky, Halliday or Labov. (In the index, there are 19 separate entries for Saussure, including many to multiple pages, in contrast to just two for Chomsky, one for Halliday, and three for Labov.) In fact, the most entries in the bibliography are to 14 separate works by William Seward Burroughs, the writer who believed that language is so constraining that it forms a kind of tyranny over our thoughts. Penhalluric describes (p.106) how Burroughs proposed various creative tricks for unlocking the chains imposed by language, such as 'cut-up', which uses collages of texts to create new, unexpected patterns, and 'fold-in', which involves splicing the left half of one newspaper article together with the right half of another. While such techniques may indeed be helpful in enabling students to understand some of the constraints of language, they seem to belong more to pop-art and maybe to avant-garde modernist literature than to a serious introduction to linguistics. Furthermore, it seems a pity for an introductory text on linguistics to dwell so much on the constraining power of language rather than focusing more on its facilitating power that enables us access to such a vast range of knowledge, offers us the chance to experience so many worlds that are radically different from our own, and allows us the opportunity to communicate with such a wide array of different people. It is more usual for books on linguistics to celebrate this empowering role of language, and also to rejoice in the incredible creative ability we humans have to adapt our language for the demands and opportunities of new modes of communication such as those offered by the Internet (Crystal 2001). Furthermore, it is generally accepted nowadays that the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis needs to be treated with some caution, for while it is certainly true that different languages reflect the beliefs of the societies in which they are used and also that they may to a certain extent influence the ways that we think, the degree to which they restrict and control our thoughts can be overstated (Pullum, 1991: 159-171). But Penhallurick seems to believe in the rather pervasive influence of different languages on our ways of thinking, and some of his claims might be questioned. For example, he suggests (p. 64) that as Italians do not have separate words for mouse and rat, they are less likely to pay attention to differences between these animals, and similarly because Welsh has a single word for frog and toad, people in Wales cannot conceive of the possibility of differentiating between them. But how many speakers of English can really tell the difference between a mouse and a rat, except that the first is probably smaller, or between a frog and a toad? Or, if we consider the matter further, we might note that English differentiates between crocodiles and alligators, but how many people know what the difference is? Most writers on language nowadays agree that language may influence our perceptions to a certain extent, but it does not restrict our thoughts as much as was once suggested. Another instance where a rather unorthodox theory is given quite a lot of space in this book involves the origins of language. It is often assumed that meat-eating gave rise to the emergence of language in humans because the extra protein resulted in the evolution of a larger brain, but Penhallurick proposes a rather different theory. He argues that meat-eating involved hunting, and while groups of men were away from the tribe, there was a danger that they would be cuckolded by those left behind, so there was a need for a sophisticated system of codified symbols in order to maintain the stability of a society that was based on men and women in monogamous relationships, and he summarises this argument as: meat + communal living + marriage = language (p.211). While this is fascinating and there is probably some truth in it, it is not usually regarded as the central instigating factor in the development of language, and furthermore it overlooks more established theories that are backed up by solid archeological evidence, such as the hypothesis that a cataclysmic change caused by a series of earthquakes in the Great Rift Valley in eastern Africa left our ancestors stranded in the relatively arid grasslands on the eastern side of the divide and created a sudden need for them to cooperate more closely to survive (Aitchison, 1996, p.55). But note that the theory espoused by Penhalluric fits in with the tenet that symbols are central to everything, for it claims that language was needed to establish the symbolic structure of social conventions, and not just as a means of collaborating in order to survive. This book certainly provides much interesting food for thought, all of which is presented in a lively fashion with lots of entertaining and helpful allusions to a wide range of different movies, but if it is to be used as an introductory linguistics textbook, the tutor will need to provide a healthy dose of counterbalancing skepticism. References
Reviewed by David Deterding ↑ Top | ← Publications In SQ issue no. 64, David Deterding reviewed the book Effects of the Second Language on the First (Cook, 2003). Below is a response to the review by one of the contributors in the book. Having just read the Deterding (2004) review of my paper in Cook (ed.), Effects of Second Language on the First, I feel a number of points need to be made. The reviewer has reported an interesting interpretation of the outcomes of the study and for this I am grateful. However, since this is included in a review of the book, and in the interests of balance and of those potential readers who may only ever be able to read the summary provided in this review, I think a number of observations are warranted. Firstly, it was particularly unfortunate that the reviewer did not include the information that all the subjects were and are experienced teachers of EFL at College level; it is precisely for this reason that any L1 deviance was of particular interest in this case. As I point out in the first paragraphs of the paper, if such erosion can be shown to be significantly affecting the L1, there may be a situation arising in classrooms whereby students' efforts at reproducing the TL are being formally evaluated by being matched for correctness or aptness against that of a potentially deficient NS teacher model. While, as the reviewer says, such deviance might be "expected" from these subjects, I would think it highly unwise to regard it as "appropriate" (as he puts it) considering their professional situation. It may, indeed, have been "bizarre" (as he claims) to condemn L1 use in other long-term residents if these did not have a vital interest in the continued acceptability of their authentic NS model of language proficiency. I am accused of "condemning" the occasional lapses into Spanish by these native speakers and of "regarding them as the first step in language attrition". The observation needs to be seen against the background of the above: "conspicuously deviant output", which goes unchallenged by similarly attrited professionals, is potentially an indication of the state of the L1 these teachers are speaking, writing and, eventually, evaluating. It would indeed be bizarre not to draw these professionals' attention to this. For them, there is indeed a "danger" that tacit acceptance of such deviance might lead to more unfortunate consequences. Finally, I do not conclude in the study that such deviance is necessarily the first step down the road to L1 attrition. Thus, I was also surprised to find the reviewer highlighting the "negative tone" of the results and conclusions. In fact, the conclusions state that there was NO evidence of significant L1 attrition in these subjects. I make a point of saying that L1/L2 manipulation such as is evidenced here is a positive sign of subjects' "new" status within the L2 community. The suggestion IS made that certain aspects of their output might predispose them to such attrition in the future but there is no finding that code-manipulation (not just "code-switching", as the reviewer states) currently has any negative effect on output. I thank you for an opportunity to provide some essential information with which your members may be better able to judge the outcomes of this research.
Graeme Porte ↑ Top | ← Publications
RHYTHM INDEXES:
Low Ee Ling, David Deterding, Fiona Ong Research on speech rhythm in the last 5 years has been largely concerned with attempting to search for the acoustic correlates of rhythmic classification. Researchers are interested to find out whether there is experimental evidence to support the traditional rhythmic classification of languages as being stress- or syllable- based (Low, 1998; Ramus, Nespor & Mehler, 1999; Low, Grabe & Nolan, 2000; Deterding, 2001; Grabe & Low, 2002; Cummins, 2002; Ramus, 2002). These studies have been able to provide some form of acoustic justification for the classification of languages into traditional rhythmic categories which hitherto had been considered a largely perceptual phenomenon. This paper focuses on the rhythm indexes developed by Ramus et al (1999), Low et al (2000) and Deterding (2001). Ramus et al's index showed that intervocalic intervals (which he calls %V) and the standard deviation of consonantal intervals (DC) provided good clues to rhythmic classification. Low et al used the pairwise variability index (PVI) to measure the variability in duration between successive vowels in the read speech of Singaporean English (SE) and British English (BE) speakers and found that successive vowels in what has often been labeled a syllable-timed language like SE exhibited less variability in duration than a so-called stress-timed language like BE. Deterding (2001) provided empirical support for lower variability in successive syllable durations in conversational speech for SE compared to BE. In this paper, we apply the 3 rhythm indexes on the conversational speech data of British and Singapore English speakers obtained from the National Institute of Education Corpus of Spoken Singapore English (NIECSSE). We aim to investigate the degree of variation in the results obtained by each index when the data is measured by two different researchers. Secondly, we study the correlation between the results generated by the different indexes and the rhythmic perception of the utterances by a group of listeners. References
THE USE OF LISTENER RESPONSES IN CHINESE AND ENGLISH CONVERSATION
Deng Xudong In recent cross-cultural studies of pragmatics, we have witnessed a rise in interest in the comparative study of phenomena beyond the level of single and decontextualised utterances encompassing those in the level of speech events such as casual conversations. The underlying premise for such studies is that different cultural groups may have different rules for participation in and interpretation of conversation that conflicts related to these rules are a major source of cross-cultural miscommunication. This study examines the use of listener responses by Chinese speakers in Chinese Mandarin conversations and by Australians in Australian English conversations. Following prior framework by Clancy et al. (1996), the study will examine similarities and differences in the use of listener responses by these two groups of people in terms of frequency of use, types of listener responses, and the positions of listener responses with respect to transition relevance place. Results will be discussed with respect to differences between the two cultural groups in the extent to which individual rights and obligations in social interaction are implicitly or explicitly stated.
NEGOTIATING CRISIS IN A FEMINISM CLASSROOM:
Chng Huang Hoon & Chitra Sankaran The issue of representation is central in gender studies and feminist classroom teaching. In this paper, we provide an account of an actual crisis in representation that surfaced in our classroom when two students attempted an oral presentation on the issue of sexuality that caused a stir among fellow classmates. The choice of graphics for the oral presentation caused some amount of offence especially for students with conservative outlooks. We detail how we proceeded to turn the management of this crisis into a lesson in feminist negotiation of the politics of representation. We believe that it is crucial to transform real crisis into concrete lessons in the classroom, and in this paper, we show how that is achieved. We also explain the implications such a crisis has on the presentation and representation of gender issues in a multicultural Singaporean classroom. ↑ Top | ← Publications
2005 CONFERENCE OF THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR LANGUAGE STUDIES The International Society for Language Studies (ISLS) encourages and promotes critical discourse and research in language matters, broadly conceived. Papers may be submitted for the following session strands: Discourse and Identity, Education, Interdisciplinary Foci, Language Professions, Pedagogy, Policy, Research Methodology, and Technology. As an international organization with members from every continent, ISLS encourages a multilingual event. Although the principal language of the conference will be English, authors may submit proposals and present papers in the language of their choice. In an effort to appeal to the broadest of audiences and to ensure both audience attendance and participation in conference sessions, authors are strongly encouraged to prepare support materials (hand-outs, overhead transparencies, slides, concurrent bilingual translation) in a language likely to be common to attendees. Sessions will be organized by topic, not language, unless a group of authors propose an entire session. (Website: www.isls-inc.org)
29TH ANNUAL CONGRESS OF THE APPLIED LINGUISTICS OF AUSTRALIA Linguistic understanding of our world has evolved through continuous applications in many of the spheres of our society -- from legal representation to forensics, from speech recognition technology to genetics, from language teaching and learning to intercultural communication and interaction in professional practice. As in any area of study and research, applying the research generated in applied linguistics, invites inquiry into the interrelationships of theory, practice, discourse, and ethics. (Website: www.unisa.edu.au/rclce/alaa2004)
THE 14th WORLD CONGRESS OF APPLIED LINGUISTICS Presentations at the World Congress will bring together applied linguists from diverse communities and from varied intellectual traditions to explore the future. The theme of the conference is "The Future is Now" -- a a future where language is a means to express ideas that were unthinkable, to cross boundaries that seemed to be unbridgeable, and to share our local realities with people who live continents away. (Website: www.aila2005.org)
THE 2ND ASIA TEFL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE The Asian Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language (Asia TEFL) serves as a forum that brings together ELT professionals in the Asian region to collect, disseminate, and discuss information on English language teaching and learning in the Asian context. Travel grants of up to US$300 are available for 40 concurrent session presenters. The awardees will be selected by the Asia TEFL International Conference Committee on the basis of proposal and travel grant application merit. Preference will be given to the 10 submissions dealing with the most innovative and affective means of teaching and learning. This funding is available for presenters based outside of Korea. (Website: www.asiatefl.org) ↑ Top | ← Publications
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