References: Cary, S. "How do I build learning strategies?", Anthology Chapters 11 and 12
In Chapter 11, "Language Learning Strategies in a Nutshell: Update and ESL Suggestions", Oxford gives a detailed list of learning strategies to employ in any classroom but with an emphasis on ESL. I found it very interesting that language learners learn better from "affective and social strategies to control their emotions, to stay motivated, cooperate"; I was kind of surprised at this but I let it digest and realized that doing things like positive reinforcement in your head or self-reward is beneficial for ESL students because it will lower their affective filter and therefore allow for more speaking opportunities for that language (pg. 125). It is definitely an issue in all ESL classrooms, the issue of affective filter; students who are more naturally extroverted do better in speaking or presentational activities because they are less afraid already, but naturally shy students need these affective strategies to motivate themselves to get up and do it, even if that means when completing their homework, they say to themselves, "Well, I think I did a great job on that today. It took me less time than yesterday" or something along those lines to keep them motivated. It is also important for us as teachers to say these similar things to them so that their emotions are validated. It is a two-way street, to speak metaphorically. We as teachers need to support them if that learning strategy works for them. We must also work to make students aware of what learning styles and strategies are going to work best for them by being explicit in class and talking about many different strategies to use. "Learners are told overtly that a particular behavior or strategy is likely to be helpful, and they are taught how to use it and how to transfer it to new situations." (pg. 126). This according to Oxford is the most effective way to approach learning strategies with students. It is especially important that the teacher model this behavior too by employing different learning strategies themselves or employing their own metacognition about their own learning strategies they use when they approach different tasks, and then sharing that with students. We have to use the same kind of thinking that they will use!
An interesting section of this chapter was the suggestions for language learning strategy use, and I felt that a couple of them were the most important/effective of all that were given. One is the use of "strategy diaries" for the students (pg. 128). It is a win-win situation in this case; teachers get to see what their students are doing and how they are learning best, and the students get to use their metacognition and find out more about themselves and their own learning process. I think using this would be really beneficial, but the problem is that it could get time-consuming for students, and can be difficult for those who are behind in their metacognitive strategies. If that is a problem, then the teacher would have to address it. Another suggestion is to "be concerned about a wide range of strategies" and teach the students about all these different strategies (pg. 128). Well, this one is sort of a no-brainer, because students should be aware of the vast opportunities there are for learning strategies, and maybe they can find one that works even better than the one that they were previously using. It is also helpful, as I said before, for the teacher to talk about their own learning strategies and the situations to best apply them to in class. This goes along with the suggestion that we should "give explicit directions about strategy use and offer practice in transferring the strategies to new situations and tasks" (pg. 129).
I thought that Cary's article was really interesting and actually the most reader-friendly we have read so far in this course. I liked the personal element of describing the classroom and that it read more like a story than a journal article, which although they have a lot of intelligent and observant things to discuss, I much prefer to read an article that adds personal detail. After reading the article, I wanted to actually be there and observe Mrs. Chen's classroom so that I could see this taking place, because it is totally different than anything I have read about or observed during my time at ISU. Mrs. Chen's students were from four very different speaking groups, "Spanish, Cantonese, Punjabi, and Farsi" (pg. 115). I cannot imagine how difficult it would be to try to figure out the differences or similarities in all these languages and relate them to English, because I honestly do not even know where they speak Punjabi or what it sounds like. That is one of my worries of being an ESL teacher is that I have no knowledge of these other languages and that I will not be able to help my students understand the comparisons between their native language and English. It's a ton of work! What I really liked about Mrs. Chen's classroom was that she was scaffolding the students into understanding what their reading strategies were and recognizing them as they were doing them. It's a very metacognitive kind of strategy for teaching and that is something that I can only hope for when I teach. Teaching metacognition in a first language is hard enough as it is without adding the L2 element to it. Once she had described the activity, she then had them work in pairs "deciding which organizer to use" (pg. 118) and walked around, asking them to describe their learning process. She explicitly asked them what strategies they could use, like "visualization: 'this time, stop a couple times in the section and try to make a picture in your head about what you're reading.'" (pg. 119) which I know always worked for me as a student. And she asked follow-up questions about the images, what words they were stuck on and helped them by clarifying the images.
"Besides English proficiency, academic competence demands lavish amounts of declarative knowledge - the what of learning...and procedural knowledge - the how of learning - all the operations and processes, the higher-order thinking..." (pg. 121). It is important for us as ESL teachers to remember that these skills are necessary in L1 classrooms and even more so in L2 classrooms because the way that students use declarative or procedural knowledge may have been taught differently in their native country, which is something we have to face in any scenario. Every student is unique in the way that they learn best, and it is important for us to help them realize their potential and use their skills to their best advantage. In the end, that will boost their confidence and hopefully this confidence in perhaps listening or reading strategies will then spill over into speaking strategies, because that is the hardest to accomplish in any L2 classroom.
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