applications of cl to flt

ENG 420C: Seminar in Language (Corpus Linguistics)

Pascual Pérez-Paredes

Overview of applications of corpus linguistics to second language teaching

ENG 420C: Seminar in Language (Corpus Linguistics)Overview of applications of corpus linguistics to second language teaching

• Overview of applications of corpus linguistics to second language teaching• A little bit of background • Some issues in CL and second language teaching• Introducing SACODEYL


A little bit of background


A little bit of background

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A little bit of background http://www.um.es/dp-filologia-inglesa/paredes/index.phphttp://www.um.es/docencia/perez-paredes/http://perezparedes.wordpress.com/

Direct applications of CL: SACODEYL: EUROPEAN YOUTH LANGUAGEBACKBONE: Corpora for Content & Language Integrated

Learning

Indirect applications: The Louvain International Database of Spoken English

Interlanguage – LINDSEI The International Corpus of Crosslinguistic Interlanguage (ICCI)


A little bit of background Ideas and contents for this presentation based on:

Pascual Pérez-Paredes & Belén Díez Bedmar. (Forthcoming). Materiales de formación del profesorado de lengua extranjera (Inglés): Language corpora and the language classroom. CARM.

Pascual Pérez-Paredes & J. M. Alcaraz. 2009. Developing annotation solutions for online Data Driven Learning. ReCALL, 21,1, 2009, 55-75

Mike Scott, Pascual Pérez-Paredes & Purificación Sánchez. 2008. Software-aided analysis of language. IJES (International Journal of English Studies), volume 8, 1.

Pascual Pérez-Paredes (Forthcoming). Appropriation and integration issues in corpus methods and mainstream language education. In Corpus Linguistics in Language Teaching, Harris, T. & Pérez Basanta, C. (Eds), Linguistic Insights series. Berlin: Peter Lang.


Some issues in CL and second language teaching• Direct and indirect applications


Some issues in CL and second language teaching• Direct and indirect applications

L1 corpora

Learner corpora


Indirect applications


Indirect applications

The authors of the LGSWE claim that this work “describes the actual use of grammatical features in different varieties of English: mainly conversation, fiction, newspaper language, and academic prose […] The LGSWE adopts a corpus-based approach, which means that the grammatical descriptions are based on the patterns of structure and use found in a large collection of spoken and written texts, stored electronically, and searchable by computer” (Biber et al. 1999: 4). So the idea here is that a well-designed corpus can be useful in learning more about how language works. This is useful for both native and non-native speakers as even the latter cannot rely on pure intuition to determine how language works across every single register and communicative domain.


By using a corpus as a tool to find out language, learners are given the chance to empower their inductive skills to learn about language, which is highly instrumental for further learning.

Sinclair (2004:288) is definitely optimistic about the unmediated use of reference corpora in the language classroom:


Direct applications ...both teacher and student can make use of a corpus right away, with only a modest few hours orientation; there is no need to wait for the new textbooks and reference books. Only fairly simple queries can be handled at this stage, but the results can be illuminating and very helpful. For this, you will need a computer of normal performance, a corpus and some query software. Will the corpus be 100% reliable, comprehensive and representative? Of course not, but do your present books match these targets? Or your reference grammars and dictionaries? Or any native speaker models? Or any combination of these? Of course not.


Direct applications

1. Select a small group of learners. Using technology is cumbersome at times and computers tend to crash in multimedia LANs which are often used by many. If your LAN restricts IPs or domains, make sure before hand that the sites you plan to use are availble. 2. Avoid meta-language, such as linguistics, node or principled corpus. It is language, real language that your learners will be more interested in.


Direct applications3. Before getting your students to use a concordancer or a similar tool, distribute activities where they can get used to reading vertically rather than horizontally. Make sure they get used to interpreting the context and making hypothesis about contexts of use and prosodies, that is, whether the line is used in a derogatory way or positively. 4. Select what you want your students will be looking up well beforehand. Examples or activities that are over the top easily discourage students. 5. Try to put interesting questions to your students. Motivate them and make them become interested in turning themselves into researchers or, better, detectives. 6. Select carefully the corpus you want to use. You may consider building your own corpus.


Spoken multimedia corpora for pedagogical purposes (next)

applications of cl to flt

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