Group items tagged

Grammar-Translation Method (1890s-1930s): Around the turn-of-the-century, language students often translated cumbersome volumes from Classical Greek or Latin into English vía this approach. It consisted mainly of exhaustive use of dictionaries, explanations of grammatical rules (in English), some sample sentences, and exercise drills to practice the new structures. Little opportunity for real second-language acquisition existed then. Cognitive Approach (1940s-1950s): This approach introduced the four principle language skills for the first time: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Oral communicative competence became the focus. Comprehensible auditory input became important and speaking in the target language began to occur. Learning about the language was overemphasized. Audio-Lingüal Method (1950s-1960s): With the advent and popularity of audio tapes, this approach ushered in the first recordings wherein the language learner could actually hear and mimic native speakers on reel-to-reel audio tapes, often used with earphones in a language lab setting. Lessons often began with a sample dialogue to be recited and memorized. This was followed up with substitution pattern and saturation drills in which the grammatical structure previously introduced was reinforced, with emphasis given to rapid fire student response. Repetition, substitution, transformation, and translation became the order of the day. This method was strongly influenced by B.F. Skinner's behaviorist view toward learning which favored habit-forming drill techniques. Unfortunately, most students couldn’t transfer these dialogues into their own real-life experiences.