Tools to develop language learner autonomy

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Tools to develop language learner autonomy

• David Little
• Trinity College Dublin
• Ireland

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Overview

• What autonomous learners can do in their target
  language after four years of learning two
  examples
• Learning tools and learning focus in the autonomy
  classroom
• Speaking and thinking in L2 a Vygotskian
  perspective
• A concluding theoretical view of language learner
  autonomy

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What autonomous learners can do in their target
language after four years of learning two
examples
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Where do the examples come from?

• Leni Dams classroom
• Learners at the end of their fourth year of
  learning English Grade 8 / 15 years old
• The question After four years of learning
  English, how would you assess your overall
  progress?
• The task to write a short self-evaluation
• The immediate nature of the task
• Learners must reflect briefly on the question and
  then write their response in their logbooks
• They have no time for elaborate preparation, use
  of dictionaries, etc.
• They must activate the same psycholinguistic
  mechanisms as underlie fluent speech

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Example 1
Most important is probably the way we have
worked. That we were expected to and given the
chance to decide ourselves what to do. That we
worked independently And we have learned much
more because we have worked with different
things. In this way we could help each other
because some of us had learned something and
others had learned something else. It doesnt
mean that we havent had a teacher to help us.
Because we have, and she has helped us. But the
day she didnt have the time, we could manage on
our own.

• Impressive combination of fluency and competence
• Relation between proficiency in English and
  awareness of the learning process the way we
  have worked the chance to decide ourselves
  we worked independently we have worked with
  different things
• Learner self-direction and control benefits the
  individual learner but also the class as a whole
  in this way we could help each other

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Example 2
I already make use of the fixed procedures from
our diaries when trying to get something done at
home. Then I make a list of what to do or
remember the following day. That makes things
much easier. I have also via English learned to
start a conversation with a stranger and ask good
questions. And I think that our together
session has helped me to become better at
listening to other people and to be interested in
them. I feel that I have learned to believe in
myself and to be independent.
The target language as medium of communication
and instrument of reflection

• Again a combination of fluency and competence
• The capacity of the autonomy classroom to
• create continuities between learning at school
  and life outside the classroom I already make
  use of the fixed procedures from our diaries when
  trying to get something done at home
• have an impact on general attitudes and
  behaviour I think that our together session
  has helped me to become better at listening to
  other people and to be interested in them
• develop learners confidence and self-esteem I
  have learned to believe in myself and to be
  independent

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Learning tools and learning focus in the autonomy
classroom
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• Learner logbooks - record of learning
• Content of lessons
• Words etc. to be memorized
• Plans for homework
• Evaluation of own progress
• Especially in the early stages, the texts they
  compose
• As far as possible in TL

• Posters - stimulate, guide and record learning
  of class
• Words and phrases
• Ideas for learning activities and homework
• Results of brainstorming (teacher translates from
  L1)
• In due course learners make their own posters

Tools

• Learner-created learning materials
• Word cards ?
• Dominoes ?
• Picture lotto ?
• Board games

• Learner-generated texts
• About myself ?
• Picture text ?
• Plays, stories, poems
• Projects

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• Creative text production
• Activities that
• gradually become more complex and ambitious from
  a very simple start
• usually involve working in pairs or small groups
• give language learning a here and how purpose

• Intentional learning
• Activities that are
• Analytic
• Focus on language and linguistic form
• Can be very simple
• Beginners word cards
• or complex sophisticated
• Hanne Thomsens vocabulary learning project
  (Thomsen 2003)

A dual focus
Logbooks, posters, intentional learning
activities and creative text production are all
second-order tools

• Three points to note
• Because everything is communicated in the TL, the
  boundaries between intentional learning and
  creative text production are fuzzy
• Traditional distinctions between
  listening/speaking and reading/writing are
  difficult to maintain
• The dynamic of the classroom depends on writing
  in order to speak and speaking in order to write

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Speaking and thinking in L2 a Vygotskian
perspective
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Vygotskys view of the relation between speech
and thought
Verbal thinking
Speech
Thought
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Four kinds of speech (Vygotsky 1987)

• Written
• Designed for others
• No interlocutor
• No paralinguistic cues
• Fully explicit and expanded

• External
• Social function
• Dialogic form
• Abbreviation possible shared knowledge and
  assumptions

• Egocentric
• Developmental bridge between external and inner
  speech
• Evolving form

• Inner
• Largely implicit and fragmentary
• Social interaction with oneself as the basis of
  human consciousness

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Four kinds of speech (Vygotsky 1987)
The developmental process
External speech
Egocentric speech
Inner speech
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Four kinds of speech (Vygotsky 1987)

• The relation between external and inner speech is
  complex and dynamic
• External speech a process of transforming
  thought into word (Vygotsky 1987 257)
• Inner speech a process that involves the
  evaporation of speech in thought (ibid. 257)
• Where external speech involves the embodiment of
  thought in the word, in inner speech the word
  dies away and gives birth to thought (ibid.
  280)
• Miller (2011 195) on the transient function of
  egocentric speech
• as children develop into adults they discard
  their external auxiliary crutches and replace
  them with internal mental representations
• they become fully autonomous agents with motives
  that give birth to thought

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In the autonomy classroom

• All activity is mediated, embedded and realized
  in external speech
• External speech is captured in writing
  (logbooks, posters)
• Creative activities entail the production of
  written speech (About myself, Picture text,
  plays, stories, poems, etc.)
• Constant engagement with the target language -
  communicating but also reflecting - generates a
  capacity for inner speech (thinking on the basis
  of the target language)
• The capacity for inner speech in the target
  language explains learners ability to produce
  discursive text spontaneously and fluently
• As learning progresses, learners are able to
  abandon some of their second-order tools (word
  cards, lotto, picture dominoes) as they become
  increasingly autonomous agents in the target
  language

The target language itself is the first-order
tool of learning in the autonomy classroom
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Conclusion
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A theoretical summary

• Learners already know, at least implicitly, what
  it is to behave autonomously they are agents of
  their own lives outside school

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The joys of family life
To parents, even babies seem to have a will of
their own they are hardly passive creatures to
be easily moulded by the actions of others. From
their earliest years, boys and girls make their
active presence, their wilful agency, their
demands and protests, very vividly felt. In every
household that has children, negotiations must be
made with young family members their personal
agendas have somehow to be accommodated (Salmon
1998 24)
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A theoretical summary

• Learners already know, at least implicitly, what
  it is to behave autonomously they are agents of
  their own lives outside school

• Our task is to help our learners extend their
  existing capacity for autonomous behaviour to the
  business of learning/using and using/learning the
  target language
• This entails helping them to make their autonomy
  explicit
• Giving them co-responsibility for planning,
  monitoring and evaluating
• Ensuring that all learning activity embedded in
  reflection ? metalinguistic talk in the target
  language
• Our first-order tool spontaneous and authentic
  target language use ? from the first the target
  language is a channel of learners agency
• Our second-order tools (which mediate the
  first-order tool) logbooks, posters,
  learner-created learning materials,
  learner-generated texts

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References

• Miller, R., 2011 Vygotsky in Perspective.
  Cambridge Cambridge University Press.
• Thomsen, H., 2003 Scaffolding target language
  use. In D. Little, J. Ridley and E. Ushioda
  (eds), Learner Autonomy in the Foreign Language
  Classroom Teacher, Learner, Curriculum and
  Assessment, pp.2946. Dublin Authentik.
• Vygotsky, L. S., 1987 Thinking and Speech. In R.
  W. Rieber and A. S. Carton, The Collected Works
  of L. S. Vygotsky. Volume 1 Problems of General
  Psychology. New York and London Plenum.