- Introduction
- Methodological problems
- Developing awareness
- Negative attitudes and beliefs
- Conclusion
- References
Studies of successful learners show that ‘good’ learners organize their learning, set their own goals and objectives, seek practice opportunities and monitor and evaluate themselves effectively (Oxford 1990: 137). But learners cannot develop these strategies unless they become aware of themselves as learners and of the factors that influence their learning. One way to raise awareness is by keeping a learning diary. Diary keeping not only encourages introspection and preserves valuable insights, but may also reveal negative attitudes and beliefs that are hindering the learning process.
The diary analysed here was written by a mature student from Spain following a beginners’ course in German at a south London college and shows how he develops over some two and a half months from an initial stage in which he overestimates his ability as a learner – and suffers anxiety and disappointment as a result – to a stage in which he has a far more realistic appraisal of his strengths and weaknesses and has actually started to enjoy the course despite poor teaching. To what extent keeping a diary contributed to this change is not clear. At any rate, he seems to have found the experience rewarding since he writes: "Next time I’ll write my diary AUF DEUTSCH (in German)".
Rubin (in Wenden and Rubin 1987) defines learning strategies as "any set of operations, steps, plans or routines used by the learner to facilitate the obtaining, storage, retrieval and use of information". However, as Ellis (1993:9) points out, there is no agreement on exactly what (…) learning strategies are, how many of them there are, what they consist of, etc." For example, while Ellis and Sinclair consider keeping a diary to be a primarily metacognitive strategy (1989: 151), Oxford regards it as an affective strategy. In fact, it could be either. Nevertheless, most writers do agree in making a distinction between direct and indirect strategies, i.e. between those that "require mental processing of the language" (Oxford 1990:37) and those that provide indirect support for language learning "without (in many instances) directly involving the target language" (ibid: 135).
This particular diary mainly reflects the writer’s use of indirect strategies and there are good reasons for this. Firstly, many direct strategies (e.g. cognitive and memory strategies) are difficult to observe since they are mental processes with little external behaviour. The learner himself may not be aware of using them. To study direct strategies, concurrent methods (e.g. "think-aloud" protocols) rather than retrospective methods (e.g. questionnaires, interviews, diary studies) are generally preferred. Secondly, some strategies such as compensation strategies, which are observable, may not be valued by the learner if, as in this case, he conceives of language mainly in terms of formal accuracy.
On the other hand, indirect strategies are the most difficult to classify. Because our ideas may affect our feelings and interactions with others, what might be seen metacognitively as "seeking practice opportunities", might also be classed affectively as "taking risks wisely" or socially as "cooperating with proficient users of L2" depending on whether we wish to emphasise rational planning, subjective emotion or social interaction.
The diary itself is handwritten on 19 pages of A4 and so is too long to reproduce here. In any case, I do not have the author's permission to do so. However, I shall quote short extracts from it to give a sense of the author’s voice .
Although the diarist seems to be an "authority-oriented learner" in that he would prefer teachers to explain everything, correct him constantly and set goals and objectives for him (see Nunan 1991:170) – his only objective for after the course is to keep his next diary in German – , he does attempt both to monitor and evaluate himself from the very beginning ("terribly disappointed with the language skills that I supposedly have") (p.1) and understand his learning difficulties ("my listening skills have never been good at all") (p.1) and also to solve them by resorting to alternative cognitive strategies in class ("have a look at my book") (p.1) and outside the classroom ("a few hours on the train") (p.1.). Later, he goes on to evaluate such things as the teaching methods and procedures used in the classroom, the quality of the teaching, the underlying view of language in the course book (functional/notional) and the workbook (structural) as well as the relative difficulty of the lessons for himself and his classmates.
At the same time, his desire to understand his learning difficulties drives him, at one point, to consult not only his teachers but also his wife in order to discover "whether German is a phonetic language or not" (p.2). Once he comes to realise that "German is a fairly structured language, therefore a systematic approach to teaching it would work" (p.3), he is only a small step from realising that "a systematic approach to learning would also help" (p.3). Indeed, he soon shows initiative in this respect ("I can do the exercises and then look up the answers") (p.4) and he seems to be fairly well organised ("I study a minimum of 45 mins. most days at least 4 days a week…") (p.5). However, perhaps his most valuable insight is when he realises that he is "the type of character that goes up and down" (p.14) and that this affects the way he learns German. Presumably, this insight helped him to become more independent and less disheartened each time he went through a ‘down" period ("German is really beginning to click in even though the teaching hasn’t improved very much") (p.15).
Negative attitudes and beliefs
As mentioned earlier, ideas affect feelings and relationships with others, and this can be seen clearly in the diary. Indeed, most of the learner’s affective problems can be traced to three underlying assumptions:
- that he is a gifted learner;
- that learning is a competitive activity; and
- that language learning is mainly about achieving formal accuracy.
His mistaken notion that he is a gifted learner causes him much disappointment when put to the test and even prevents him, occasionally, from writing his diary ("I didn’t feel I would sit down and write that I’m not doing very well") (p.2). Although he tries to be honest, one suspects that he would like to be seen as average (if not gifted) and so tends to dwell upon negative experiences in class (self-justification). Interestingly, he only quotes his classmates when they make negative comments about the teaching. The social desirability factor is always a danger in introspective studies of this kind.
People that need to impress others are often impressionable themselves. At one point, the diarist remarks: "I like translation exercises and I particularly like to do them with the Head of German who seems to be … very knowledgeable (educated)" (p.7). What her education has to do with her ability to teach elementary level German is not specified, but one suspects that the diarist rejects other teachers because they cannot satisfy his need for an authority figure. Interestingly, when his wife plays this role for him, his opinion of the Head of German changes: "She’s got no proper teaching techniques" (p.12). Typical of insecure people, his view of others is as variable as that of himself.
The diarist’s need to compete is a major source of anxiety for him ("every time we do something new I feel lost … they’ve done German before") (p.3). He attempts to compensate for his feelings of inadequacy with fantasies about an alleged superiority in grammar ("I’ve got an advantage over my classmates and that is that I know some grammar") (p.5). He does not seem to know much, however, since he admits: "I still don’t understand … the words accusative, dative, nominative, etc." (p.8). Also, he seems to have certain prejudices against German, at least initially. He finds the sound of the language "like barking dogs" (p.8) and complains of "long words with lots of consonants" (p.1) even though, at this stage, he has only learnt "how to introduce myself and ask someone else’s name" and "to spell my name" (p.1).
Low self-esteem is a problem that besets many learners and results from the learner placing the locus of control outside him or herself. Low self-esteem seems to be at the root of this diarist’s mood swings, his competitiveness, anxiety, disparagement of teachers – and the German language – and his need to compensate for perceived inadequacies in himself through fantasies about superiority in grammar (compensatory fantasies about control). As such, it works against the development of effective (i.e. realistic) metacognitive, social and affective strategies. Teachers are often surprised that what is taught is often so different from what is learnt or that learners seem to be following their own agenda. Diary studies such as this bring home the principle (accepted more in theory than in practice) that the learner is central to the learning process.
Obviously teachers need to set clear learning goals, explain the purpose of activities to students and help them to organise their learning. But this is not enough. Even if learners do not keep learning diaries, they need regular opportunities to discuss difficulties and feelings about learning (in their L1 if necessary) with teachers and other learners, to set realistic goals for themselves and to experiment with different ways of achieving them. The basis of self-esteem inside and outside the classroom lies in positive interactions with others. Thus, learners may also need explicit training in communication strategies (e.g. asking for repetition and clarification; confirming guesses) before undertaking extensive pairwork and groupwork activities.
Finally, I strongly recommend that trainee teachers keep a diary and discuss their insights and problems with colleagues for at least part of their course. We cannot teach others in any real sense what we have not learnt for ourselves.
Ellis, R. (1993). ‘Second language acquisition research: how does it help teachers? An interview with Rod Ellis’. ELT Journal Jan. 1993. Oxford: O.U.P.
Ellis, G. and Sinclair, B. (1989). Learning to learn English. Cambridge: C.U.P.
Nunan, D. (1991). Language Teaching Methodology. Prentice Hall (U.K.).
Oxford, R. (1990). Language Learning Strategies. New York: Newbury House Publishers.
Wenden, A.L. and Rubin, J. (1987) (Eds.) (1987). Learner strategies in language training. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Douglas Andrew TownBSc (Hons) Psychology, MA (English Language Teaching), Diploma in Translation (Spanish) Profesor de la Universidad de Belgrano, Argentina (Licenciatura en Inglés).