Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Tools to develop language
learner autonomy
David Little
Trinity College Dublin
Ireland
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
What autonomous learners can do in
their target language after four years
of learning: two examples
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Where do the examples come from?
• Leni Dam’s 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
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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 doesn’t mean that
we haven’t had a teacher to help us. Because we have, and she has helped us. But
the day she didn’t 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”
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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.
• 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”
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Learning tools and learning focus in
the autonomy classroom
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Learner logbooks −
record of learning
Posters −
stimulate, guide and
record learning of class
•
•
•
•
•
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
Tools
• Words and phrases
• Ideas for learning activities
and homework
• Results of brainstorming
(teacher translates from L1)
In due course learners
make their own posters
Learner-created
learning materials
Learner-generated
texts
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Word cards 
Dominoes 
Picture lotto 
Board games
About myself 
Picture + text 
Plays, stories, poems
Projects
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Creative text
production
Intentional learning
Activities that are
• Analytic
• Focus on language and
linguistic form
Can be very simple
• Beginners’ word cards
or complex & sophisticated
• Hanne Thomsen’s
vocabulary learning
project (Thomsen 2003)
A dual
focus
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
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
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Speaking and thinking in L2: a
Vygotskian perspective
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Vygotsky’s view of the relation between
speech and thought
Speech
Verbal
thinking
Thought
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Four kinds of speech (Vygotsky 1987)
Written
•
•
•
•
Designed for others
No interlocutor
No paralinguistic cues
Fully explicit and expanded
Egocentric
• Developmental bridge between
external and inner speech
• Evolving form
External
• Social function
• Dialogic form
• Abbreviation possible: shared
knowledge and assumptions
Inner
• Largely implicit and fragmentary
• Social interaction with oneself as
the basis of human consciousness
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Four kinds of speech (Vygotsky 1987)
The developmental process
External
speech
Egocentric
speech
Inner
speech
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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’ ”
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
Conclusion
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
A theoretical summary
•
Learners already know, at least implicitly, what it is to behave
autonomously: they are agents of their own lives outside school
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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)
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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, learnergenerated texts
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011
Developing learner autonomy in foreign language learning
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.29–46. 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.
•
IATEFL LASIG International Conference, Università Ca’Foscari Venezia, 9 September 2011