Tesol Theories

  The Behaviorist Approach to Second Language Acquisition The Innatist Perspective on Language Learning Cognitive Theories of Second Language Acquisition Sociocultural Theory and Language Learning Interactionist Approaches to Second Language Acquisition Input Hypothesis in Language Acquisition Affective Filter Hypothesis in Language Learning The Role of Motivation in Second Language Acquisition Individual Differences in Language Learning Practical Implications of Second Language Acquisition Theories The behaviorist approach to second language acquisition focuses on the role of conditioning and reinforcement in learning a new language. According to behaviorists, language learning occurs through imitation, repetition, and practice. Behaviorist principles have been applied in language...  [Read more]

  The Behaviorist Approach to Language Acquisition The Innatist Perspective on Language Development The Interactionist View of Language Learning The Cognitive Theory of Language Acquisition The Sociocultural Theory in Language Learning The Importance of Understanding Language Acquisition Theories in TEFL Applying Language Acquisition Theories in ESL Teaching Challenges and Criticisms of Language Acquisition Theories Integrating Multiple Theories in Language Teaching Future Directions in Language Acquisition Research The Behaviorist approach to language acquisition, popularized by B.F. Skinner, emphasizes the role of environmental stimuli and reinforcement in shaping language development. In this view, language is learned through imitation, repetition, and conditioning. Behaviorists...  [Read more]

  This presentation is going to focus on the theories, methods and techniques of teaching and we're going to start with a quote. This is an interesting quotation because it contains within it a philosophical argument and it's a philosophical argument in the way in which we learn. Basically, this one is saying that the intelligence of their own children comes about due to a natural process. So this one could be said to be due to nature. This is exactly the opposite of this one, which is saying that they're teaching the environment that we create, creates that intelligence. So this one can be said to be due to nurture and this argument 'nature versus nurture' has been going on for thousands of years. These two viewpoints are two ends of a scale, or a continuum if you like, and every...  [Read more]

One of the key qualities of a successful TESOL teacher is a strong understanding of second language acquisition theories. Teachers should be familiar with theories such as the Input Hypothesis, the Affective Filter Hypothesis, and the Monitor Model. This knowledge helps teachers design appropriate lesson plans, activities, and assessments that cater to the diverse learning styles and needs of ESL students. By understanding how languages are learned, teachers can effectively help students acquire new language skills in a supportive and engaging environment. Successful TESOL teachers possess effective classroom management skills to create a positive and productive learning environment. Classroom management techniques such as establishing clear expectations, providing consistent routines, and...  [Read more]

TESOL teachers are well-equipped to develop and deliver language teaching workshops and seminars for other educators due to their specialized training and experience in teaching English to speakers of other languages. TESOL teachers typically have a strong foundation in language teaching methodologies, linguistics, and second language acquisition theories, which are essential for designing effective professional development programs. Additionally, many TESOL teachers have experience working with diverse groups of language learners, allowing them to offer valuable insights and practical strategies to fellow educators. When planning language teaching workshops and seminars, TESOL teachers should first identify the specific needs and goals of the participants. This may involve conducting...  [Read more]

TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) certification can indeed lead to various opportunities in curriculum development. While the primary focus of TEFL certification is to prepare individuals to teach English to non-native speakers, the skills and knowledge gained through this certification can be valuable in other areas, such as curriculum design and development. One of the key ways in which TEFL certification can open doors to curriculum development opportunities is by providing individuals with a solid foundation in language teaching methodologies and principles. Understanding how to effectively teach English to non-native speakers requires knowledge of curriculum design, lesson planning, assessment strategies, and materials development - all of which are essential components of...  [Read more]

  So let's take an example of what those drills might involve. So here is an example of a repetition drill. I will model the language and then my class will repeat after me. So "This is a cup." "Spoon" ? "This is a spoon." "Knife" - "his is a knife." Thank you. The reason that it's called or also called the army method is that it was the method adopted by the United States military who had personnel stationed around the world at the end of Second World War and they realized that they needed those personnel to pick up the language very quickly and one of the positive things about this particular methodology is that you do very quickly learn vocabulary. Another positive thing about it is that you quickly learn the correct pronunciation of that vocabulary. However, there are some...  [Read more]

  Also in the 1970s la señal came up with a new methodology called "Suggestopedia". As psychological theory was developing, one of the ideas that came up was something called ?the effective filter?. Basically, the effective filter is a barrier to learning. It's the reasons why we inhibit our learning of a particular language. There are two main elements to the effective filter, two sets of factors, if you like, those are known as internal and external factors. The external factors to learning, the reasons why we have barriers to learning, may be just simple things such as external noise. So, people talking to us while we're trying to learn and so on and so forth. Perhaps more important are these internal factors and the internal factors one of the main things here is our previous...  [Read more]

  Our final methodology is accredited to Jeremy Harmer and it's known by the letters ESA. Around 1998, Jeremy Harmer produced a book called "How to teach English" and basically what Harmer did, is a background to this book is to do what we have done today and to work through all of the different methodologies that have come about over the last 300 years. He highlighted for each of those methodologies what was good about it, what was positive and what didn't appear to work and then put all of the positive things into a melting pot and came out with this methodology, which he called ESA. It's a three-stage methodology, where each of the letters represents a particular phase of the lesson. The first one being called the engage phase, the second the study phase and the final one the...  [Read more]

  Our next particular methodology is accredited to James Asher around 1965 and is called total physical response. Asher looked at the way in which we learn our native language and he saw that most children, before they even went to school, have picked up a very large percentage of both the grammar and the vocabulary that they would use in their native language before any type of formal schooling. So Asher started to have a look at ideas of how to use the whole of our brain in language learning in the way that we do when we're very young. It's accepted that within our brain there are two hemispheres, one is the left hemisphere the other is the right hemisphere, and one of the functions of the left hemisphere is language learning. One of the major functions of the right hemisphere is...  [Read more]

  Before looking at the methods or approaches themselves, there are some terms that we need to define. These are the approach, the method or the technique. Basically, these are hierarchical. The approach is an overriding set of principles that a method can actually make use of, whereas the technique are the things that we actually do in the classroom to approach that method. So, these three words are going to appear during the presentation. Again, for each of either the approaches all the methodologies we're going to ask four questions. So be it an approach or a method for each of those things: Where did it come from? What's its background? What does it involve when we're talking about actually in the classroom, in other words techniques? What is positive about it? What appears to...  [Read more]

  The purpose of grammar translation then is to basically translate between L1 and L2 and vice versa. So, we could take a simple example. Let's imagine that our native language was English and our target language was French and let's assume that we want to translate a document from French into English. Let's take a simple sentence. Here's a sentence in French "Ouvre la fenêtre" and we'll add "s'il vous plaît" at the end. What we want to do is to take this L2 and translate it back into English. Now, if we have a reasonable knowledge of French then we may well know that this particular verb "ouvre" "to open" translates directly and this female form of the and finally the fenêtre "Open the window" and this polite form of "please". This is all very well if the two structures that...  [Read more]

  Before we move on to the final methodology for today, let's just recap and see where we are at this point in time. We're looking at different learning methodologies. Each of those methodologies takes its premise from being somewhere on this particular spectrum of ?nature versus nurture? and where we are on this spectrum gives us a starting point for the background or theory to that particular methodology. So, we?ve had a look starting in the 17th century and the classical method and moving on as the ideas of psychology developed to various methods, such as audiolingualism, the silent way, Suggestopedia and TPR. Each of these showing a development as knowledge about learning increased and each of these takes a different starting point on our English spectrum. Below you can read...  [Read more]

  "In terms of the things that are negative about it, we've already said that it doesn't develop speaking but perhaps the biggest negative point about this particular methodology is that it's very unnatural. Ok, so despite the criticisms of this particular method, and particularly the fact that is unnatural, this particular methodology was in use all the way through the 17th, 18th and 19th century and indeed it's still in use today. However, Gouin in the 1880s and Berlitz in the early 1900s decided that this particular methodology was so unnatural that they wanted to come up with something new. The method that they came up with, they called the direct method. You will also sometimes see it as the natural method. What these two people were saying is that if we wish to learn a...  [Read more]

  So what we're going to do is to run through a series of methodologies that were created mainly in the 1900s that adopted the idea that language learning should be much more communicative, much more natural. The first one is called audiolingualism and it's also called the army method because of where it was developed. Basically, psychology, during the 1950s and 60s, was building up new theories about behaviorism. Perhaps the most famous experiments that were done in this particular area were by Pavlov, where he was showing that most animals undergo a stimulus response mechanism and he had a series of famous experiments, where by ringing a bell, he could cause a dog to salivate, that would be his response, in the expectation of getting some food. This behaviorist idea of stimulus...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in France? Are you interested in teaching English in Bourg-en-Bresse, France? Check out our opportunities in Bourg-en-Bresse, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT! This unit covered the various theories associated with language learning in the past and their flaws, but also suggested theories and methods that may work for different situations. The...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in Brazil? Are you interested in teaching English in Sao Paulo, Brazil? Check out our opportunities in Sao Paulo, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT! This unit provides an exposition of the flow of the process of teaching starting from prominent theories through a more practically-oriented methods and techniques. The sub-sections emphasize...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in India? Are you interested in teaching English in Faridabad, India? Check out our opportunities in Faridabad, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT! Theories, Methodologies and Techniques was the focus of this unit. The start of the unit talks about many theories used in the past and present. Then many examples of how to elicit language from...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in Poland? Are you interested in teaching English in Szczecin, Poland? Check out our opportunities in Szczecin, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT! As we know, everybody has diferent ways of learning so that, we have to use all of the differents theories at the teaching moment. This content help us to know that we can do more things with our...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in India? Are you interested in teaching English in Chandannagar, India? Check out our opportunities in Chandannagar, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT! Brief overview: We read about the different theories that exist on how to teach students. Some theories works better on lower level students and some work on higher level students. The main...  [Read more]