Teaching by Principles
H. Douglas Brown
The 12 Principles
 Part of every language lesson
 Foundation for good, strong pedagogy
 Preliminary guides to inform your observations
#1 – Automaticity
 Efficient 2nd language learning involves a timely movement of the control of a few
language forms into the automatic processing of a relatively unlimited number of
language forms.
 Automaticity – the road to fluency
#2 – Meaningful Learning
 Meaningful learning will lead toward better long-term retention than rote learning.
 Appeals to student interests
 Connects new info to old info (good schemata building)
Meaningful Learning – Don’ts
 Too much grammar explanation
 Abstract principles and theories
 Too many drills and memories
 Activities with unclear purposes
 Extraneous activities
 Distractions that take the focus off of meaning
#3 – The Anticipation of Reward
 Human beings are universally driven to act, or “behave,” by the anticipation of some sort
of reward – tangible or intangible, short term or long term – that will ensue as a result of
the behavior
 Anticipation of Reward
 Encourage for confidence, not an Oscar
 Encourage students to encourage students
 Be excited and enthusiastic!!
 It’s a long and winding road – keep an eye on the end rewards – get your students to look
there, too
#4 – Intrinsic Motivation Principle
 The most powerful rewards are those that are intrinsically motivated within the learner.
 What is motivation?
o It is the extent to which you make choices about (a) goals to pursue and (b) the
effort you will devote to that pursuit
 Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic
o Intrinsic brings feeling of competence and self-determination
o Extrinsic is all about gaining an award or avoiding punishment
#5 – Strategic Investment
 Successful mastery of the 2nd language will be due to a large extent to a learner’s own
personal “investment” of time, effort, and attention to the 2nd language.
 Strategic Investment
 Strategic Investment
 Multiplicity of learning styles and strategies = multiplicity of techniques
 Group and individual; oral, written, bubbles, maps, graphics, etc
 Not everyone has to comfortable at every single moment of every lesson, so push people!
#6 – Language Ego
 As human beings learn to use a 2nd language, they also develop a new mode of thinking,
feeling, and acting – a 2nd identity.
 Language Ego – Student TLC
 Be supportive because adult learners often feel stupid!
 Be challenging but kind in activities
 Think about LEs in planning class logistics (who to call on, correct, “volunteer”, how to
pair or group etc)
#7 – Self-Confidence
 The eventual success that learners attain in a task is at least partially a factor of their
belief that they indeed are fully capable of accomplishing the task.
 Self- Confidence
 Build/sequence activities to build confidence.
 Encourage students – let them know that you know they can do the work
 You should have it, too!
#8 -- Risk-Taking
 Successful language learners, in their realistic appraisal of themselves as vulnerable
beings yet capable of accomplishing tasks, must be willing to gamble.
o Ashima in The Namesake!
 Create an atmosphere in the classroom that encourages students to try out language,
venture a response
 Provide reasonable challenges
 Return students’ risky attempts with positive affirmation
#9 -- The Language-Culture Connection
 Whenever you teach a language, you also teach a complex system of cultural customs,
values, and ways of thinking, feeling, and acting.
 Discuss cultural differences without being judgmental
 Consciously connect culture and language
 Don’t be culturally offensive in the class – that’s so easy!
 Be ready to discuss your cultural blind spots and assumptions
 Pay attention to possible culture shock
#10 – The Native Language Effect
 The NL of learners will be a highly significant system on which learners will rely to
predict the target language system.
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Errors are windows to interlanguage; is it the native language?!?!
Help students to hold onto the helpful aspects of their NL
Stop translation in its tracks! Think in the target language!!!
#11 -- Interlanguage
 2nd language learners tend to go through a systematic or quasi-systematic developmental
process as they progress to full competence in the TL.
 Distinguish between interlanguage errors and all others
 Tolerate interlanguage forms that make sense and show learning
 Don’t make the Ss feel stupid
 Treat mistakes like an oil dipstick
 Encourage self-correction
 Don’t let your corrections make students afraid of speaking
#12 -- Communicative Competence
 Since CC is the goal of a language class, instruction needs to point toward all of its
components: organizational, pragmatic, and psychomotor.
 Communicative goals are best achieved by giving due attention to:
o language use and not just usage
o fluency and not just accuracy
o authentic language and contexts
o students’ eventual need to apply classroom learning to unrehearsed contexts in the
real world.
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Communicative Competence is:
 A combo plate of:
o Organizational competence = grammatical and discourse
o Pragmatic competence = functional and sociolinguistic
o Psychomotor skills (pronunciation, intonation)
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Grammar is just one part of a lesson
Functional & sociolinguistic aspects of language are fun, but don’t forget the
psychomotor skills
Allow students to become fluent
Be real – in your materials
Help students become independent learners and users of language
Why the 12?
o Keep your lessons honest
o Keep your lessons about student learning and not teacher entertainment
o Provide a form of evaluation that allows you to assess a lesson, adapt it and be ready
for a better next-go-round