101 Ways to Work with Communicative Skills (9788245026597) by Fagbokforlaget

THE EDITORS

Aud Solbjørg Skulstad (Dr.art.) is a Professor of English at the University of Bergen. Her main research interests are the teaching and learning of writing, the development of genre awareness, multimodality, English for specific purposes, and genre analysis. Skulstad is head of the research group “Textbased English Language Learning” (TELL) and is co-editor of Teaching English in the 21st Century (2018).

Tony Burner (PhD) is a Professor of English Education at the University of South-Eastern Norway (USN) and OsloMet – Oslo Metropolitan University. His main research interests are multilingualism, assessment, R&D work, and teacher professional development. Burner has led the research group Kompetanse for mangfold and he is also co-author of the textbook Global Visions for Vg2/3 International English.

Ulrikke Rindal (PhD) is an Associate Professor of English Education at the University of Oslo. Her research interests relate mainly to sociolinguistic aspects of learning and teaching English, focusing specifically on oral communication. She teaches English didactics to teacher education students at BA and MA levels and supervices the course.

Magne Dypedahl is an Associate Professor of English at the University of South-Eastern Norway. One of his areas of focus is pre-service teacher education. His main research interests are intercultural communication and American studies. Dypedahl has co-authored and co-edited many books on foreign language learning and teaching, most recently Metacognition in Language Learning and Teaching. Hilde Brox is an Assistant Professor of English. She teaches English literature and English education to pre-service and in-service teachers at the Arctic University of Norway. Her professional interests include creative approaches to teaching literature, practical and aesthetic methods in language teaching and learning, and web 2.0 technologies. She has published several articles and book chapters. Holger Pötzsch (PhD) is an Associate Professor of Media and Documentation Studies at the Arctic University of Norway. His main research interests are the representation of war and violent conflict in audio-visual media, critical and materialist approaches to digital technologies, and the role of culture and technology in processes of bordering. He has worked on several European research projects.

These are some of the subject-specific questions raised in this book. It contains practical teaching ideas and theoretical perspectives on communicative skills in English. Part I consists of seven peer-reviewed articles on central aspects of communicative skills in English. Part II presents 101 practical teaching activities to enhance students’ communicative skills in English. The suggestions connect theory and practice based on empirical experiences and key insights from classroom research. 101 Ways to work with Communicative Skills offers fresh research about English education in Norway. It is a treasure trove for every practising teacher working with English in years 1-13. The target group for this book comprises teachers, students, teacher educators, and researchers. Other books in the 101 series: 101 måter å lese leseleksa på (2012) 101 skrivegrep (2014) 101 måter å fremme muntlige ferdigheter på (2016) 101 litteraturdidaktiske grep (2018) 101 digitale grep (2018) 101 grep for å aktivisere elever i matematikk (2019)

ISBN 978-82-450-2659-7

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Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen and Kåre Kverndokken (Eds.)

Henrik Bøhn (PhD) is an Associate Professor of English Education at the University of South-Eastern Norway. He has also worked as an English teacher in upper secondary school. His research interests include language assessment, language learning, and intercultural communication. He is co-editor of Teaching and Learning English.

How can English teachers work in up-to-date and inspirational ways to enhance students’ communicative skills? Which English skills do students need in an increasingly diverse and globalised society? How can teachers explore key areas such as digital skills, multicultural topics, and multilingual resources in the English subject in practical and engaging ways?

Ways to Work with Communicative Skills

OTHER AUTHORS OF PEER-REVIEWED ARTICLES

101

Ways to Work with Communicative Skills – Theoretical and Practical Approaches in the English Classroom

Tony Burner Christian Carlsen Kåre Kverndokken (Eds.)

Christian Carlsen (PhD) is an Associate Professor of English and teaches language studies, teacher training, and further education programmes at the University of South-Eastern Norway. His research interests include multilingualism in education, literature in English teaching, and medieval English and Scandinavian literature. Kåre Kverndokken is a Professor Emeritus of Norwegian Education at the University of South-Eastern Norway. His teaching and research focus on the fields of basic skills, teaching resources, and children’s literature. Kverndokken has published numerous textbooks for use in basic education and scientific articles. He is the series editor of the 101 book series.

CONTRIBUTORS TO 101 TEACHING ACTIVITIES Aleksander Andersen, teacher at Ringshaug Lower Secondary School Charlotte Ferborg Beal, teacher at Ringshaug Lower Secondary School Morten Oddvik, Nettskolen Vestfold, Horten Upper Secondary School, USN Therese Borkenhagen, Assistant Professor, USN James Coburn, Associate Professor, USN Ole Petter Riksaasen Dahl, teacher at Skrim Lower Secondary School Toril Ebbesberg, teacher at Sigdal Lower Secondary School Jonas Iversen, PhD student, INN Fride Lindstøl, Associate Professor, USN Jannike Ohrem Bakke, Associate Professor, USN Ragnhild Elisabeth Lund, Professor, USN Karina Rose Mahan, PhD student, USN Patrick Murphy, Associate Professor, Nord University Mari Norås, Assistant Professor, USN Ann Kristin Stustad Nybø, teacher at Skoger School Ulrikke Rindal, Associate Professor, UiO Jon Olav Sørhaug, teacher at Tangen Upper Secondary School, affiliated with UiA Therese Marie Tishakov, Assistant Professor, OsloMet Maria Casado Villanueva, Associate Professor, USN

101 Ways to Work with Communicative Skills

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Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen, KĂĽre Kverndokken (eds.)

101 Ways to Work with Communicative Skills Theoretical and Practical Approaches in the English Classroom

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Copyright © 2019 by Vigmostad & Bjørke AS All Rights Reserved 1.utgave / 1. opplag ISBN: 9788245026597 Forsidefoto: © shutterstock / Rawpixel.com Design og omslag ved forlaget Sats: Bøk Oslo A/S Spørsmål om denne boken kan rettes til: Fagbokforlaget Kanalveien 51 5068 Bergen Tlf.: 55 38 88 00 Faks: 55 38 88 01 e-post: fagbokforlaget@fagbokforlaget.no www.fagbokforlaget.no Materialet er vernet etter åndsverkloven. Uten uttrykkelig samtykke er eksemplarfremstilling bare tillatt når det er hjemlet i lov eller avtale med Kopinor.

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Preface As teachers and teacher educators, we have found that pre- and in-service teachers of English at various levels in the education system in Norway have expressed a need for research-based texts that provide them with practical methodologies of teaching. This book is the first book in the 101 series devoted to English instruction. Like the other books in the series, it contains scientific articles followed by 101 research-based practical teaching activities. In the most recent education reforms and changes in assessment practices during the last twenty years, the emphasis in the subject of English in Norway has changed radically toward communication. Instead of communicating in certain ways, for example with a specific accent, students are first and foremost simply expected to communicate. The English language is supposed to be used to obtain meaningful and successful communication. Typically, communicative skills are developed in meaningful and authentic situations where students are involved and participate actively. Our aim is to provide everyone interested in the English classroom with insight into theoretical and practical approaches to working with communicative skills.

Structure and content

Part I consists of seven peer-reviewed scientific articles that contribute new knowledge to the field of English education and communicative skills. In the first article, Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen and Kåre Kverndokken discuss communicative skills in the English classroom, starting with the concept of communicative competence and communicative performance, then examine the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approach dominating English language teaching in the 1980s and onwards, and end with the current reforms and English teachers’ practices in classrooms in Norway. Following Dell Hymes’s definition and descriptions of communicative competence from 1972, Canale and Swain proposed a framework for communicative competence in 1980 that includes three main competencies: grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence and strategic competence. The linguistic elements of grammatical competence – vocabulary, grammar and phonology – are often dealt with as basics in English studies. Sociolinguistic and strategic competence, on the other hand, are more slippery concepts, and might be difficult both to describe and to apply in the classroom. In the article by Ulrikke Rindal on communicative oral skills, sociolinguistic and strategic competencies in spoken language are discussed using examples from the English language learning context in Norway. She presents research related to

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spoken English among Norwegian learners, showing how spoken English can vary according to communicative purposes for second language users. Furthermore, the article shows how knowledge from this research can be used to develop teaching activities in English. In order to investigate and discuss such appropriateness, Rindal uses theoretical perspectives from sociolinguistics, especially those related to identity and language attitude research. Such perspectives are concerned with language use in authentic contexts, patterned language variation and speaker agency, and are thus highly relevant in combination with a communicative approach to second language teaching. In the next article, Aud Solbjørg Skulstad explores the notion of communicative writing skills by discussing tasks within the communicative paradigm. She discusses how this notion has evolved from the mid-1970s to the present day, starting with Hymes’s concept of communicative competence and continuing with Nunan’s classic concept of communicative task from 1989, and goes on to examine Samuda and Bygate’s term “holistic task” (2008). The article also looks at the future of the concept of communicative writing tasks in the 21st century, viewing this concept in relation to a multimodal view of communication. Authentic examples of writing tasks in Norwegian textbooks for the teaching of English are an important part of the discussion. The topic of the article by Hilde Brox and Holger Pötzsch is communicative digital skills in the English classroom. In the field of education, we tend to focus on digital technologies as facilitators of teaching and learning practices and of interactions between teachers, subjects and learners. Like technology in general, however, digital technologies are never neutral means to an end. They not only enable but also alter and potentially even hamper communication. Communicative digital skills must therefore not only include the ability to use digital technologies properly, but also demand an understanding of the varying implications of different technologies in specific communicative situations. This means recognizing that technological affordances both support and constrain communication. Through practical examples, the article suggests ways in which teachers can support and develop their students’ digital communicative skills by exploring some of these “difficult” technologies. The article by Tony Burner and Christian Carlsen focuses on communicative skills in multilingual classrooms. They present and discuss recent research on English instruction in multilingual classrooms, with special emphasis on the challenges and opportunities English teachers face in such contexts. The article highlights the importance of recognizing students’ diverse language skills as a resource in their further language learning. Considering and involving students’ mother tongue(s) is especially crucial in working with communicative competencies. The benefits of multilingualism when learning a new language, teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism and how to work with communicative skills in multilingual classes, students’ use of their existing language skills in their own language learning, and the way

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Preface

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English textbooks for recently immigrated students address communicative skills are some of the questions discussed in this article. Magne Dypedahl explores the role of intercultural competence in communicative skills. He argues that there are many reasons for regarding intercultural competence as an integral part of communicative competence. Integrating these two concepts could make it easier to comprehend how language and culture are closely interrelated. Furthermore, this may open the door to new ways of making the learning of intercultural competence a natural part of English subject curriculum, which in turn can increase the learner’s ability to communicate successfully in different contexts. The article addresses the following questions: Why should intercultural competence be regarded as a dimension of communicative competence, what does intercultural competence mean in light of recent trends and central documents published by the Council of Europe, and how can students develop intercultural communicative skills? In this article, Dypedahl makes use of research on metacognition and meta-knowledge of culture. In the last article, Henrik Bøhn outlines some essential characteristics of assessing communicative skills. He discusses the quality of language assessment in the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approach, regarding both formative and summative assessment. The main focus is on what should be assessed and how it should be assessed. Important aspects such as validity, reliability and how to operationalize constructs are considered, and examples are given of how models of communicative competence and rating scales can be used to develop students’ communicative competence and to ensure valid and reliable assessment of such competence. Part II offers 101 teaching activities to be used in the English classroom. The purpose is to create a synthesis of theoretical fundaments and a practical teaching repertoire. In the 101 activities, theory and practice are intertwined on the basis of empirical research studies and classroom observations. Several teachers in schools and teacher educators contribute to Part II of the book. Teaching concerns what, why and how: what is taught, why is it taught and how does the teacher teach that particular topic? The 101 teaching activities provide teachers of English with an invaluable toolkit.

Acknowledgements

The idea for this book has been sparked by the editors’ ongoing participation in the research group Classroom Research – Quality in Teaching at the University of South-Eastern Norway. The overall aim of the research group is to highlight the characteristics of quality and creativity in teaching in schools and teacher education. The editors and several of the authors are members of the research group. Colleagues from other universities have also contributed scientific articles. Moreover, the editors, the authors and teachers in schools have written the 101 teaching activities. We would like to thank you all.

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This is the seventh book in the 101 series. The books combine practical approaches with didactical research, and they have become very popular with teachers and students. Previous books in the 101 series are about reading, writing, oral skills, literature, mathematics and digital skills. KĂĽre Kverndokken is the series editor. Kristin Eliassen has been the editor at the publishing house, Fagbokforlaget, and her professionalism and dependability have ensured that the book projects have been completed. She deserves our sincere gratitude. University of South-Eastern Norway, Campus Vestfold/Drammen, June 2019 Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen, KĂĽre Kverndokken

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Content Part I

Communicative competence in the English classroom. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

An introduction and an overview By Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen, and Kåre Kverndokken

Communicative oral skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

By Ulrikke Rindal

Communicative writing skills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

By Aud Solbjørg Skulstad

Communicative digital skills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 By Hilde Brox and Holger Pötzsch

Communicative skills in multilingual classrooms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

By Tony Burner and Christian Carlsen

Intercultural communicative skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

By Magne Dypedahl

Assessing communicative skills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

113

By Henrik Bøhn

Part II

101 Teaching activities By Aleksander Andersen and Charlotte Ferborg Beal: 8, 10–11, 17, 19, 29, 59–62, 98; Aleksander Andersen, Charlotte Ferborg Beal and Morten Oddvik: 58, 70–71, 73 ; Therese Borkenhagen: 25–26, 28, 32; Tony Burner: 51, 55, 82, 87–89, 91–94; Christian Carlsen: 9, 47, 63, 75–80, 100; Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen and Kåre Kverndokken: 95; James Coburn: 57, 74, 97; Ole Petter Riksaasen Dahl: 38; Toril Ebbesberg: 12, 90; Jonas Iversen: 81, 85; Kåre Kverndokken: 3, 7, 23, 43, 96; Fride Lindstøl and Jannike Ohrem Bakke: 30–31, 33, 44–46; Ragnhild Elisabeth Lund: 5–6, 34–37; Karina Rose Mahan: 48–49; Patrick Murphy: 24, 40, 54, 64, 99; Mari Norås: 2, 15; Ann Kristin Stustad Nybø: 4, 13–14, 16, 18, 20–22, 72; Ulrikke Rindal: 1; Jon Olav Sørhaug: 52, 56, 65–69; Therese Marie Tishakov: 83–84, 86; Maria Casado Villanueva: 27, 39, 41–42, 50, 53, 101

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The majority of the teaching activities presented in this part of the book are suitable for most age groups, depending on how they are adjusted by the teacher. We have chosen to indicate the approximate age group each activity is most relevant for. – Primary school – Primary and lower secondary school – Lower and upper secondary school – Upper secondary school – All levels

Oral skills 1 Working with speaking strategies (1) 2 Working with speaking strategies (2) 3 Quality questioning 4 Asking and answering questions with young learners 5 Practising everyday phrases 6 Class conversations with early learners 7 Conversation rules 8 Collaborative mind maps 9 Getting the most out of group work 10 Speed dating 11 In the process of speaking 12 Using the talk show concept to promote oral skills 13 What is the word? 14 Who is it? 15 What are you implying? 16 Can you copy my picture? 17 Networking activities 18 LEGO building – oral exercises 19 Information gap activities – oral exercises 20 City sightseeing 21 Walking in central London 22 Riding the London Tube 23 “Doing a tellback” as a comprehension strategy 24 The fortune teller 25 Role-play (1): Blank dialogue 26 Role-play (2): Given circumstances 27 Role-play (3): Spontaneous role-play with story cubes 28 Four people 29 Using drama to work with language learning in context 30 Is that you, Petey? Improvised dialogues

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31 32 33 34 35 36 37

The hot seat Meisner’s repetition The five-finger technique: practising oral presentations Working with pronunciation (1): Sounds Working with pronunciation (2): Stress, rhythm and intonation Using songs and rhymes Jazz chants

Writing and reading 38 Pre-writing activities and structuring paragraphs 39 Information gap activities – writing exercises 40 LEGO building – writing exercises 41 Collaborative writing (1): creating fairy tales 42 Collaborative writing (2): The Chinese perfume 43 The writer’s block 44 The witness voice 45 First-time stories 46 A journey of the senses 47 Climbing the registers: language and context 48 Remediation between genres: from Shakespeare to SMS 49 Venn diagrams 50 Moving English beyond the classroom: treasure hunts 51 Understanding a text 52 Designing a narrative timeline 53 Jigsaw reading 54 The police report: close reading and visualising a text 55 Teacher in role 56 Instant poetry 57 Using song lyrics Digital skills 58 Assessing digital tools and resources 59 The web cafe: exploring English language experiences on the web 60 Interactive brainstorming 61 Online chatting with peers 62 Communication through emoticons 63 Digital storytelling 64 The action reporter: using digital tools to practise spontaneous speech 65 Working with wikis in a jigsaw classroom 66 Catch the tweet 67 Classroom tweeting 68 Exploring blogs and online journals

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69 Collaborative writing with online tools (1): The six stages 70 Collaborative writing with online tools (2): Basic principles for teachers to consider 71 Collaborative writing with online tools (3): text to speech 72 Collaborative writing with online tools (4): Non-fiction texts 73 Take a stand: critical thinking and discussions with digital tools 74 Giving screencast video feedback on written assignments Multilingualism and intercultural skills 75 Questioning language stereotypes 76 Activating the language repertoire 77 Multilingual English: exploring word origins and relationships 78 A language survey 79 The language expert 80 Putting Google translate to a test 81 Language portraits 82 Code-switching 83 Meeting a “new culture” 84 Multiple identities 85 Identity texts (1) 86 Identity texts (2): Some variations 87 Cultural shock 88 Hate speech on social media 89 Take a stand: Learning to reason 90 Promoting intercultural skills through role-play Assessment 91 Peer assessment 92 Reflecting on feedback 93 Self-assessment 94 Assessing intercultural competence 95 Assessing communicative oral skills 96 Recorded reading Project work 97 eTwinning projects 98 This just in: Broadcasting the result of creative collaborative processes 99 A storyline project Literature suggestions for the English classroom 100 Book presentations 101 Literature suggestions: Years 1–7

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Part I Peer-reviewed scientific articles

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Communicative competence in the English classroom An introduction and an overview By Professor Tony Burner, Associate Professor Christian Carlsen and Professor Kåre Kverndokken, University of South-Eastern Norway

This article defines the term communicative competence based on the arguments made by the linguist and anthropologist Dell Hymes in 1972. The term was expanded to include communicative performance in 1980 by the linguists Michael Canale and Merill Swain. Based on their ideas, which were further developed by others, the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approach dominated and developed English language teaching (ELT) from the 1980s onwards. Firstly, the article provides a brief history of language teaching methods that have had an impact on ELT. History helps us understand where the ideas about how we teach come from. Secondly, the theories will be related to empirical research from language learning classrooms, focusing on the place and role of grammatical and pragmatic competence in CLT and on conversation and listening skills.

A brief history of methods that have influenced ELT

Developments in psycholinguistics (how we learn languages) and linguistics (knowledge of languages) influence theories and methods of language learning. From the 1840s to the 1940s, the Grammar-Translation Method was the main approach to language learning. English was taught and learnt the same way as the classical languages Greek and Latin, i.e. deductively and through the use of first language (L1). This was how scholars thought languages were learnt the best way. Grammar rules were explained by the tutor in the learners’ L1, before learners were asked to do tasks based on the rules that were explained, i.e. the deductive approach to language teaching. Accuracy was the aim of language learning, and consequently the written skills were emphasised. Languages were learnt not to enhance one’s communicative competence, but to read and thus gain access to the ideas and thoughts expressed in classical literature. Translation, bilingual word lists and dictionaries were used to teach the language. The grammatical unit for language learning was the sentence, not the text (Richards & Rodgers, 1986).

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The Reform Movement at the end of the nineteenth century challenged the Grammar-Translation Method. Furthermore, the International Phonetics Association (IPA) was established in 1886, making it possible to transcribe the sounds of all languages. The IPA advocated the study of the spoken language, phonetic training, the use of conversation and dialogues, inductive ways of teaching languages where rules of grammar were deduced from the use of language presented in context, and the use of the target language rather than L1 as the point of reference for learning (Richards & Rodgers, 1986). It was claimed that language should be presented in context. Inductive ways of teaching language were encouraged. The new method of language learning was called the Direct Method. English as a second language (ESL) was to be taught and learnt through the use of English, not learners’ L1. Everyday words were in focus, since the use of language became more prominent than before. Oral skills were to be practised before the written skills. Word lists were made in order for learners to prioritise the most frequent words in the target language. For example, a list of 850 words were compiled for English in 1930 for basic command of the language (Richards & Rodgers, 1986; Stern, 1983). In the 1940s, applied linguistics was recognised as a scientific discipline within the branch called structuralism (1930s-1960s), with proponents such as Charles Fries and Robert Lado. The question was how languages are built and the belief was that it is important to understand the various components (structures) of a language to be able to learn the language. Substitution tables were used in order to illustrate parts and pieces of sentences. In this era, where emphasis was on oral language, also referred to as the Oral Approach, repeating language in context was common. This could manifest itself in instructors saying, for example, “This is a chair” and the learners repeating after him. Figure 1 gives an example of teaching material influenced by the Oral Approach.

Questions 1) Is this fountain pen yours? Yes, it is mine. 2) Are these books yours? Yes, they are mine. 3) Is that your desk? No, it is not mine. 4) Are those your books? No, they are not mine. Commands 1) Point to your desk. 2) Point to my table. 3) Draw a brown square. 4) Draw a purple circle. 5) Bring me something purple. 6) Show me some paper.

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7) Write your name slowly. 8) Write mine carefully. 9) Show me my pen. 10) Show me yours.

Figure 1. Teaching matwerial from 1933 (Howatt & Widdowson, 2004, p. 239)

As the reader can tell from Figure 1, teaching materials were rather inauthentic despite the fact that they emphasised context more than before. In the Norwegian school setting, the curriculum from 1939 called “Normalplanen” stated that “the conversation in English should be the most important teaching method” (our translation),1 and the term Direct Method was introduced. As the reader can tell, the various methods that have influenced the ways English has been taught were introduced somewhat later in Norway than in the country where they originated. Translation as a method of learning was opposed. Thus, students were now supposed to use the foreign language directly and not go through their L1 (in this case Norwegian), also referred to as a monolingual approach to language learning. As pointed out by Simensen (2007), the method was sometimes referred to as “the back-pack method” since the teacher brought objects/artefacts with her to the classroom, pointing and naming them for the students. World War II played a significant role in the development of the Oral Approach in the United States, known as Audiolingualism. American soldiers travelled overseas to countries such as Japan and had the urgent need to learn chunks of practical language quickly. Intensive drilling of oral segments of language in language laboratories proved to be efficient (Howatt & Widdowson, 2004), which was supported by the American psychologist B.F. Skinner’s stimulus-reponse-reinforcement theories. An example of drill exercises is given in Figure 2.

Repetition: This is the seventh month. – This is the seventh month. Inflection: I bought the ticket. – I bought the tickets. Replacement: He bought this house cheap. – He bought it cheap. Restatement: Tell him to wait for you. – Wait for me. Completion: I’ll go my way and you go…. – I’ll go my way and you go yours. Transposition: I’m hungry. (so). – So am I. Expansion: I know him. (hardly). – I hardly know him.

“samtalen på engelsk bør være den viktigste undervisningsform” (Normalplanen, 1939, pp. 227–232).

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Contraction: Put your hand on the table. – Put your hand there. Transformation: He knows my address. – He doesn’t know my address. Restoration: students/waiting/bus. – The students are waiting for the bus.

Figure 2. Example of drill exercises (Richards & Rodgers, 1986, pp. 54–56)

This way of language learning, even though it could be efficient, seemed boring and did not equip learners in schools with knowledge to use language in new and different contexts. Furthermore, the focus was on differences between the target language and L1. Making mistakes was considered negative and had to be avoided at all costs. The Norwegian curricula were influenced by these ideas somewhat later than those of the US. The curriculum from 1974 (M74) in Norway adopted a clear structuralist-behaviourist view of language learning. Interestingly, the curriculum told teachers that students should avoid any mistakes when learning English: “mistakes have to be avoided by all means” (sic!), and underscored the importance of repetition and context for language learning: “learning the language patterns occurs through the use of the same pattern in different and expanded contexts” (our translation).2 Grammar was again at the centre of language learning, but only in shorter sentences and not before they were practised orally. A catch-phrase was “Teach the language, not about the language” (Burner, 2005). In contrast to the structuralist-behaviourist view of language learning, Pit Corder, professor of applied linguistics, developed the theory of error analysis (Corder, 1967, 1973), which led to a shift where making mistakes was regarded as a natural process of language learning. Corder also made a distinction between errors and mistakes, which later has been useful when working with communicative skills, in that mistakes (“slips of the pen”) may be overlooked by the teacher, whereas errors (systematic mistakes) should be examined and explained by the teacher. Some errors were categorised as interlingual transfer errors, i.e. words from L1 that were used in the second language (L2); some were described as intralingual errors (errors that cannot be due to the L1, for example false analogy like *sheeps); and some errors were unique, i.e. they cannot be explained easily (for example *wiht). In 1972, Larry Selinker, professor of linguistics, introduced the term interlanguage (Selinker, 1972), viewing the system of language between L1 and the target language as a system of its own, with its own grammatical structures, inconsistencies and developmental stages. The interlanguage of Spanish learners of English has been researched extensively. An example is the learning of the relative pronoun. A Spanish learner of English is prone to go through the following developmental stages in her interlanguage: 2 “feil må så vidt som mulig unngås”, “innlæringen av språkmønstrene skjer ved at samme mønster behandles i ulike variasjoner og i stadig utvidet sammenheng” (M74, pp. 147–149).

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*I got a friend speaks Spanish (no relative pronoun) *I got a friend he speaks Spanish (personal pronoun) I got a friend who speaks Spanish (relative pronoun) (Berggreen & Tenfjord, 1999, p. 191) In general, morphological simplicity – for example He *say to me that…, the overuse of core vocabulary – for example the overuse of big when enormous, great, huge or other synonyms could have been used, shorter sentences and inconsistencies are some of the characteristics of interlanguages. Moreover, the concepts of communication strategies – verbal, non-verbal and visual, and avoidance strategies – avoiding certain topics due to lack of vocabulary in L2 – are central in understanding and analysing interlanguage. In the following, we will take a closer look at the concept of communicative competence.

Communicative competence

Typically, communicative skills are developed in meaningful and authentic situations where students are involved and participate actively. They need to have a purpose for communicating. Precisely this was the background for Hymes’ argument in 1972 when he claimed that what is grammatically the same sentence may be a statement, a command, or a request, and what are grammatically two different sentences may both be requests (p. 278). Communicative competence consists, according to Hymes (1972, p. 281), of the knowledge of whether and to what degree something is possible (grammar), whether and to what degree something is feasible (psycholinguistics), whether and to what degree something is appropriate (sociocultural), and whether and to what degree something is actually done – or performed (pragmatics). For example, *breakfast good a was it is ungrammatical, the string the cheese the rat the cat the dog saw chased ate was green (example taken from Canale & Swain, 1980, p. 16) is not perceived as a feasible language strategy, and saying bless you instead of hello when you meet someone is inappropriate. Moreover, when a policeman asks you May I see your driving licence? and you respond Yes without showing it – the pragmatics of the situation has not been understood – the policeman did not ask a yes/ no question even though the utterance was grammatically formed as a question. Thus, one thing is what is possible to do with a language, decided by grammar, whereas another thing is what is acceptable and appropriate. Consequently, cultural and contextual factors were taken into consideration in relation to language learning. Canale and Swain (1980) extended Hymes’ ideas and defined communicative competence as including grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence and strategic competence (communication strategies as mentioned earlier). It should be noted that the terms competence and performance had earlier been used by Noam Chomsky (1965) and Hymes (1972), but Canale and Swain (1980) added to and elaborated on communicative performance to describe the realisation of the above-mentioned competencies. Grammatical competence is knowledge about

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morphology, syntax, semantics at sentence level and phonology. Sociolinguistic competence deals with how utterances are produced and understood appropriately, in other words what kind of language you use in various settings. Cultural norms and level of formality play a role in the type of language used. For example, it is expected that you use formal and polite language when speaking to your boss at a firm meeting, in contrast to the language you would use when speaking to your 8-year-old brother. Canale and Swain (1980) call for a more clear-cut definition of discourse competence, but mention that cohesion (grammatical links between sentences, for example the use of linking words or pronouns) and coherence (the communicative functions in the text) are appropriate and logical, and are part of discourse competence. Finally, strategic competence consists of verbal and non-verbal communication strategies the learner uses for effective learning and communication. For example, when the learner lacks language knowledge in L2, the learner could use a dictionary, ask someone, use words from the L1 or change topic of conversation. In the worst case, failure to use effective strategies can lead to breakdown in communication. The communicative approach described above laid the foundation for CLT, which has been the most influential teaching method since the 1980s. Cultural and contextual factors meant that semantics and pragmatics became more important than before, and the use of authentic texts became widespread. The focus shifted more towards the learners, their communicative needs, aptitude and interests for language learning. The Norwegian curriculum from 1987 (M87) emphasised language functions. The following formulations from the curriculum illustrate the influence of CLT: “as much real communication with others as possible”, “different pupils have different aptitudes”, “interpreting unfamiliar words and concepts from the context” (M87, pp. 226–227). Some of the most crucial theories of second language acquisition have been developed by Stephen Krashen, professor of linguistics (Krashen, 1982, 1988). The most prominent one, for which he has met criticism for being too dichotomous, is his theory of acquisition and learning. Krashen claimed that we learn a new language primarily by being exposed to it subconsciously in natural contexts of language use, and not being taught the language consciously. He referred to the former as acquisition and the latter as learning, two distinct systems, and he believed that learning could not become acquisition. In other words, the best way to learn English for Norwegian learners would be to be exposed to English, preferably in an English-speaking context, and not be taught about English in the classroom: “The goal of the natural approach is communication skills. The general goal is the ability to communicate with native speakers of the target language” (Krashen & Terrell, 1988, p. 58). A second hypothesis relevant to teachers of English in Norway is Krashen’s monitor hypothesis, describing the relationship between acquisition and learning. A second or foreign language learner will have a monitor linked to the conscious learning system that has a planning, editing and correcting function, monitoring the language learner’s use of the language. This is, according to Krashen, what you experience when you think a second time about what you say in a language which is not your first language.

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Communicative competence in the English classroom

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In recent education reforms and changes in assessment practices in the last 25 years, the emphasis in the English subject in Norway has changed radically towards communication, influenced heavily by the Council of Europe’s Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (Council of Europe, 2001). Instead of certain ways of communicating, for example with a certain accent – typically American or British – students are first and foremost expected to communicate. The English language is supposed to be used to obtain meaningful and successful communication. The recent curricula (Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training, 2006, 2020) make use of action verbs to express different ways to communicate and act with the language, for example that the students should be able to identify, to use, to choose, to listen, to understand, to express, to discuss, etc. The next section will take a closer look at CLT.

Communicative language teaching

The term Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is often used to refer to a classroom approach associated with the communicative turn discussed in the previous section. As even experienced promoters of CLT admit, however, it is not clear what this approach entails. The educational specialist Jeremy Harmer (2015, p. 57), for instance, says that “there is a problem when attempting to define communicative language teaching ... because it means different things to different people”. Two fundamentally diverging perspectives have existed since the infancy of the communicative approach. On the one hand, there are those who see communication as the essential condition for language learning and the main ingredient in CLT. On the other hand, there are educators who understand communicative competence as the desired outcome of language teaching, but who do not necessarily view communicative learning as the only or main way to reach that objective (Howatt & Widdowson, 2004). Educators such as N. S. Prabhu, writing in the 1970s, and later Peter Skehan, are representatives of the former perspective. With them and others the attention turned to the importance of meaningful language practice and authenticity in CLT. They use the term task to describe learning activities that place the learner at the centre of attention, with the aim that students engage in language activities that are meaningful beyond the mere purpose of practising language. According to Skehan (1998, p. 258), the defining elements of Task Based Learning (TBL) are: 1. 2. 3. 4.

meaning is primary there is a goal which needs to be worked towards the activity is outcome evaluated there is a real-world relationship

As these criteria suggest, the function of language takes precedence over form in the design of activities within this framework. Task-based activities could aim to practise any skill, strategy or language topic. However, a fundamental idea is that

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students are motivated to practise language in order to complete the task, and that the outcome provides a basis for examining language forms used in the process. The following example, described in more detail in Part II of this book (see Teaching activities 40, 18), helps to illustrate the point: Each student group is handed two identical sets of Lego bricks. They use one of the sets to build a statue or figure of their own choice. After building the figure, the group writes down instructions on how to build the figure, and then shares these with a second group. Based on the instructions received, each group then builds a figure with the second set of bricks, with the aim of copying the original figure as closely as possible.

In this task, meaning takes centre stage because the aim is for the students to create a set of instructions which enables another group to solve a second task. The aim partly revolves around linguistic precision, using vocabulary that is clear and precise enough to be useful for other readers, in this case their co-students. The task is completed when the groups have created their copy based on the instructions received and compared the result with the original figure. In this task, language errors occurring along the way do not matter. It might even be useful to construct new words or compounds to describe the shape of an unusual Lego brick. The overall objective is to communicate efficiently. After completing the main task, the instructions could be used as a basis for language awareness activities or analysis of language items such as imperative statements, prepositions and relevant vocabulary. In terms of this order, from function to form, TBL is related to the principle of inductive language teaching, based on the idea that students learn language points better if they look for and articulate them themselves. This view has much in common with the educational philosopher John Deweyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s notion that children are naturally inquisitive and that our teaching should as far as possible aim to trigger this inborn curiosity. A deductive approach, on the other hand, focuses on applying established rules of language. It often takes the form referred to as PPP: presentation of rules, followed by practice of the language point, and resulting in production of a text in which the language structures ought to be integrated (see Vold, 2018). The place of grammar in CLT The place of explicit grammar teaching within CLT has not been well defined, and is still not a matter of consensus, especially among practitioners. Followers of Krashenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s input hypothesis based their approach on the belief that language is acquired through extensive exposure, thus paying minimal attention to form. Considering the Norwegian context, in which students are exposed to a large amount of English outside of school, this perspective is more valid for English than for other foreign languages. Some student groups spend much time using English language media in a range of communicative situations such as social media and gaming in addition to exposure to other cultural influences. Interestingly, a recent study on reading

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skills among 16-year-olds (Brevik, Olsen & Hellekjær, 2016) identified a significant sub-group of Norwegian students – largely boys – who demonstrate markedly higher competence in English than in Norwegian. As the authors suggest, it seems likely that these students’ spare time use of English is the main factor behind their better English skills. A further argument in favour of function rather than form is the well-documented insight that students may well learn grammar topics in theory and in controlled exercises, such as gap-filling tasks, without being able to integrate these skills into other contexts (see Vold, 2018). Influential voices in the development of CLT, such as Prabhu (1987), even claimed that grammar teaching is harmful to language learning. More recently, attitudes towards grammar in language instruction have grown more positive. Some educators assert: “The question for the teacher of English should not be whether to teach grammar, but how to teach grammar” (Hestnes, 2011, p. 20). One growing emphasis in recent debates about language acquisition is the role of language awareness, defined as “explicit knowledge about language, and conscious perception and sensitivity in language learning, language teaching and language use.”3 Research on the relationship between language awareness and second language acquisition indicates that learners with a more highly developed knowledge about language are more confident in communicative contexts, and better able to register the input they receive. In answer to the question of how to teach grammar, some studies on language awareness explicitly underline the importance of an inductive, discovery-based approach, as mentioned earlier in this article. The following features are characteristics of language instruction with a language awareness focus: 1. It involves an ongoing investigation of language as a dynamic phenomenon rather than awareness of a fixed body of established facts. 2. It involves learners in talking analytically about language, often to each other. 3. It considers essential the involvement of learners in exploration and discovery. 4. It aims to develop not only the learners’ knowledge about and understanding of language but also their learning skills, thus promoting learner independence. 5. The aim is to involve learners on both a cognitive and an affective level. (Svalberg, 2007, pp. 290–291)

How grammar should be taught, is, of course, also dependent on the age group in question. While it may be less natural to focus on explicit linguistic knowledge in early years, students in lower and upper secondary school have a better developed ability to recognise characteristics in the structure of a language. A second tendency in research and curricula over the past decades is the broadening definition of the term grammar. In line with the Common European Framework of 3

This definition is taken from the Association for Language Awareness: https://www.languageawareness.org/

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Reference (CEFR, 2001, 2018), some argue that grammar should be seen as involving not only knowledge of linguistic structures, but also sociolinguistic and pragmatic dimensions of language use. Based on this broader understanding of grammar, all parts of the English curriculum should be recognised as aspects of language learning (Helland, 2014). The division of competence areas presented in the 2006 and 2020 curricula, where communication, language learning and cultural topics are presented in separate rubrics, may thus be unhelpful as it creates artificial boundaries between intimately related competencies. Despite this expansion of the boundaries of grammar in educational research and curricula, empirical studies suggest that the earlier, narrow understanding of grammar dominates among language teachers in Norway. Based on interviews with 12 English teachers in Norwegian lower secondary schools, a study (Chvala, 2018) found that there was a tendency among the teachers to interpret culture, communication and language skills as separate components instead of interrelated competences. Furthermore, linguistic knowledge was associated with “the technical part of language teaching” and “logical grunt work”. Teachers showed little awareness of the communicative value of linguistic knowledge and relationships between language form and use in different contexts. Yet, the author argues, pragmatic awareness becomes more important as communicative modes and contexts grow increasingly complex. Other studies in recent years indicate that language teachers often hold a negative view of grammar and its place in CLT, and trace this tendency to a narrow, old-fashioned view of linguistic competence (see Heimark, 2013). There are some shared tendencies in these teachers’ perceptions of grammar and grammar teaching and how grammar is presented in English textbooks. Some studies have looked at grammar tasks in some of the most widely used English textbooks in secondary school with special reference to their communicative framework (Askeland, 2013; Espeland, 2017). The findings suggest that grammar-related exercises often follow a traditional pattern in which language topics are mostly presented in a deductive format, focused on writing, decontextualised from dimensions of language use, and students are predominantly intended to work alone rather than in a communicative setting. To this, one could add the fact that many textbooks still prefer to introduce grammar topics in separate sections, either at the end of chapters or at the end of the book. Examples include Connect (Madsen & Mohammad-Roe, 2016) and Stairs 5–7 (Thorsen & Unnerud, 2010). Rather than facilitating a holistic view, the way grammar is presented in textbooks means that it is up to teachers to make connections between content and language topics. Pragmatic competence The CEFR refers to sociolinguistic competence as knowledge about social norms of interaction in different social or cultural contexts, including politeness conventions and sensitivity towards variables such as class and age. Pragmatic competence

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involves the ability to adjust language to different genres or differing communicative objectives (CEFR, 2001, pp. 13–14). These curricula guidelines presented in the CEFR reflect the understanding that communication involves more than a transaction of information. Meaning develops through cooperation among the participants. Depending on the language competence of the person(s) we communicate with, our social relationship with them and the communicative purpose of the interaction, we need to adapt our language and mediate information in a suitable way. Together with reception and production, interaction and mediation are thus described as two basic communicative strategies in the CEFR (CEFR, 2018). A search for empirical research on how English teachers in Norway work with pragmatic competence reveals that there is little to find. The few studies that exist focus mainly on students’ ability to adjust language between informal and formal contexts. One study asked students in their first year of upper secondary school to make requests in situations with varying degrees of formality (Brubæk, 2012). The author’s starting point is the 2006 curriculum, which, without using the term pragmatics, highlights this component of communicative competence: Knowing how to be polite and taking social conventions into consideration in any number of linguistic situations are (...) important skills to master. This goes hand in hand with adapting the language to the recipient and the situation, including distinguishing between formal and informal, written and spoken registers. (Norwegian Directory for Education and Training, 2006)

The ability to adapt language to different communicative situation is also highlighted in the core skills areas of the 2020 curriculum. Brubæk’s findings indicate that students have little experience and awareness of these competence areas. One student, instructed to make a request for a pay rise to his boss, suggested the formulation: “In the last time I have been working my ass off. Personally, I think that I deserve a pay raise after all the work I’ve done.” Although this is a bolder approach to the issue than some others in this particular study, the response reflects a tendency identified in other studies, too. Mismatches between word choice and appropriate register count among the most common vocabulary mistakes in written assignments among high school and university students (Mahan & Brevik, 2013). These results indicate perhaps the one-sided language input students experience through mainstream media, and the fact that pragmatics has received little attention in English classrooms thus far (Brubæk, 2012). A further possible clue may lie in the comparatively egalitarian social structures in Norway, in which the need to modulate between registers and politeness conventions is less familiar to students in their everyday lives than it is in other societies in Europe and beyond. The studies described above raise the question of to what extent English instruction in schools prepares students for professional life beyond the classroom. Another study has examined the use of English in professional settings in which

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THE EDITORS

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Tony Burner, Christian Carlsen and Kåre Kverndokken (Eds.)

Ways to Work with Communicative Skills