Task and play in the words and minds of children
Issue: Vol 3 No. 1 (2006) JAL Vol 3, No 1 (2006)
Journal: Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice
Subject Areas: Writing and Composition Linguistics
DOI: 10.1558/japl.v3i1.25
Abstract:
This paper is a critical appreciation of the increasingly common practice of using tasks which focus on the pragmatics of language use rather than the semantics of language usage in primary level foreign language learning. We examine, sympathetically, the reasoning behind it but find that the language classroom is no place to try to differentiate strictly between a focus on form and a focus on meaning. The same thing holds true for the playground. We contend that rote-play, role-play and rule-based games form a recognizable sequence of development, and we use a modest body of data to demonstrate noticeable cross-sectional differences: the same group of children will use more complete utterances in chants and songs compared to role-play, rule-based games and a questionnaire survey task. Our task-based activity gives even less complete structures and turns out to be rather heavily teacher-centred, and we attribute this to the necessity of presenting both rules that are constitutive of the activity (such as game rules) and precepts oriented towards a single, specific result. On this basis, we argue that play may offer more scope for creativity as well as a more psychological realistic model for primary language learning.
Author: Yongho Kim, David Kellogg
References :
Bakhtin, M.M. (1986) Speech Genres and Other Late Essays. Austin: University of Texas
Press.
Belz, J.A. (2002) Second language play as a representation of the multicompetent self in
foreign language study. Journal for Language Identity and Education 1(1): 13–39.
Belz, J.A. and Reinhart, J.A. (2004) Aspects of advanced foreign language proficiency:
Internet-mediated German language play. International Journal of Applied Linguistics
14(3): 324–62.
Block, D. (2003) The Social Turn in Second Language Acquisition. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press.
Broner, M. and Tarone, E. (2001) Is it fun? Language play in a fifth-grade Spanish immersion
classroom. Modern Language Journal 85(3): 363–79.
Bygate, M., Skehan, P. and Swain, M. (2001) Researching Pedagogic Tasks. London:
Longman.
Chaiklin, S. (2003) The ZPD in Vygotsky’s analysis of learning and instruction. In A.
Kozulin, B. Gindis, V.S. Ageyev and S.M. Miller (eds) Vygotsky’s Educational Theory in
Cultural Context 39–64. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Cook, G. (2000) Language Play, Language Learning. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ellis, R. (2003) Task Based Language Learning and Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Fichtner, B. (2003) Reflective learning: problems and questions concerning a current
contextualization of the Vygotskian approach. In M.H.G. Hoffmann, J. Lenhard, and
F. Seeger (eds) Activity and Sign 179–90. Boston, Dordrecht, Moscow and London:
Kluwer.
Harris, R. (1990) Making sense of communicative competence. In N. Love (ed.) The
Foundations of Linguistic Theory 112–35. London and New York: Routledge.
Harris, R. (2003) English: How not to teach it. Integrationist Notes and Papers No. 2.
Halliday, M.A.K. (2002) On Grammar. London: Continuum.
Halliday, M.A.K. and Matthiessen, C.M.I.M. (2004) Introduction to Functional Grammar.
(Third edition.) London: Arnold.
Johnson, K. (2003) Designing Language Teaching Tasks. Basingstoke and New York:
Palgrave Macmillan.
Kim, Y.-H., and Kellogg, D. (2007) Rules out of roles: Differences in play language and
their developmental significance. Applied Linguistics 28(1):25-45.
Kinginger, C. (2002) Defining the zone of proximal development in US foreign language
education. Applied Linguistics 23(2): 240–61.
Kramsch, C. (2006) From communicative competence to symbolic competence. Modern
Language Journal 90(2): 249–52.
Larsen-Freeman, D. (1997) Chaos/complexity science and second language acquisition.
Applied Linguistics 18(2): 141–65.
Leung, C. (2005) Convivial communication: recontextualizing communicative competence.
International Journal of Applied Linguistics 15(2): 119–44.
McLoyd, V.C., Ray, S.A. and Etter-Lewis, G. (1985) Being and becoming: the interface of
language and family role knowledge in the pretend play of young African American
girls. In L. Galda and A.D. Pelligrini (eds) Play, Language and Stories 29–44. Norwood:
Ablex.
Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (1993) Lev Vygotsky: revolutionary scientist. London:
Routledge.
Piaget, J. (1962) Play, Dreams and Imitation in Childhood. New York: Norton.
Piaget, J. and Inhelder, B. ([1969] 2000) The Psychology of the Child. New York: Basic
Books.
Pomerantz, A. and Bell, N. (2007) Learning to Play, Playing to Learn: FL learners as multicompetent
language users. Paper presented at AAAL07: Costa Mesa.
Prabhu, N. (1987) Second Language Pedagogy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Scollon, R. (1976) Conversations with a One Year Old. Honolulu: University of Hawaii
Press.
Sinclair, J. McH. and Coulthard, R.M. (1975) Towards an Analysis of Discourse. London:
Oxford University Press.
Sullivan, P. (2000) Playfulness as mediation in communicative language teaching in a
Vietnamese classroom. In J.P. Lantolf (ed.) Sociocultural Theory and Second Language
Learning 115–31. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tarone, E. (2000) Getting serious about language play: language play, interlanguage variation
and second language acquisition. In B. Swierzbin, F. Morris, M.E. Anderson, C.
Klee and E. Tarone (eds) Social and Cognitive Factors in Second Language Acquisition:
selected proceedings of the 1999 Second Language Research Forum 31–54. Somerville,
MA: Cascadilla Press.
Vygotsky, L.S. (1978) Mind in Society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Vygotsky, L.S. (1987) Collected Works, Vol. 1. London and New York: Plenum.
Widdowson, H.G. (1978) Teaching Language as Communication. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Willis, J. (1996) A Framework for Task Based Learning. London: Longman.
Wilkins, D.A. (1972) Linguistics in Language Teaching. London: Edward Arnold.