JLLT Volume 12 (2021) Issue 1

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 JLLT Volume 12 (2021) Issue 1

JLLT is an academic organ designed for the worldwide publication of scientific findings which concern
the full range between linguistics on the one hand and language teaching on the other. At the same
time, it is a basis of discussion for linguists and practitioners of language teaching.

JLLT is a refereed journal. All manuscripts, apart from those having individually been requested by the
editor, have to be positively evaluated by two referees, this procedure being totally anonymous on both
sides (authors and referees). Only then will they be published.

Addressees of JLLT:

 linguists and foreign language methodologists - from university professors to PhD

students and teachers at universities and all types of schools;
 young scientists who will find a publication platform for their academic projects which
they can open up for discussion so as to get fruitful advice from the community of
readers and authors.

Which text types will be accepted?

 articles

 book reviews

 reports about scientific projects and conferences

 reports about innovative study programmes

 reports about Ph.D. projects (for the publication and the protection of intermediate
research results) as pre-publications.

The publication process can formally be described as follows:

1. Receipt of a manuscript

2. Pre-screening of the manuscript (editor)

3. Evaluation of the manuscript (editorial board)

4. Positive result: publication of the article on a separate page of the Journal's website. Thus,
quick publication of the manuscript (about six to eight weeks after receipt) and availability for
the academic world.

5. After receipt of all the parts of the given issue of the Journal: publication of the article in the
PDF format, the web page version of the text being kept. Completion of the publication
process.

Date of publication: July 31st , 2021

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 JLLT Volume 12 (2021) Issue 1

Editorial Advisory Board (in alphabetical order)

Prof. Dr. Klaus-Dieter Baumann - Universität Leipzig, Germany

Prof. Dr. Didi-Ionel Cenuser - Lucian Blaga University, Sibiu, Romania

Prof. Dr. Wai Meng Chan - National University of Singapore, Singapore

Prof. Dr. Shin-Lung Chen - National Kaohsiung First University of Science and
Technology (NKFUST), Taiwan

Dr Linda Fisher - University of Cambridge, United Kingdom

Prof. Dr. Inez De Florio-Hansen - Universität Kassel, Germany

Professor Gerald Delahunty, PhD - Colorado State University, Fort Collins (CO),
USA

Professor Frédérique Grim, PhD - Colorado State University, Fort Collins (CO),
USA

Professor Eli Hinkel, PhD - Seattle University, Seattle (WA), USA

Prof. Dr. Frank Kostrzewa - Pädagogische Hochschule Karlsruhe, Germany

Professor Terry Lamb - University of Westminster, United Kingdom

Prof. Dr. Heinz-Helmut Lüger - Universität Koblenz-Landau, Germany

Prof. em. Dr. Heiner Pürschel - Universität Duisburg-Essen, Germany

Prof. Dr. Günter Schmale - Université de Lorraine-Metz, France

Prof. Dr. Ulrich Schmitz - Universität Duisburg-Essen, Germany

Prof. Dr. Veronica Smith, M.A. - Alpen-Adria Universität Klagenfurt, Austria

Prof. Dr. Bernd Spillner - Universität Duisburg-Essen, Germany

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JLLT Volume 12 (2021) Issue 1

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Table of Contents

Foreword to the Issue ……...................................................................................... 9

Articles

Dallin D. Oaks (Brigham Young University, Provo (Utah) USA):

Mother Goose as a Resource in Teaching Historical Linguistic ............................ 11

Thomas Tinnefeld (Saarbrücken, Germany):

The Role of the Teacher in the Foreign Language Classroom –
Past, Recent and Modern Developments .............................................................. 39

Ángel Osle (Essex, United Kingdom):

Virtual Communities of Chinese Learners of Spanish: the Use of Mobile
Applications in the Development of Speaking Skills .............................................. 59

Sara Quintero Ramírez (Guadalajara, México) & Sonny A. Castro Yáñez

(Guadalajara, México):
El papel de la gramática en la enseñanza de lengua extranjera:
representaciones y prácticas docentes en México ................................................ 75

Ingela Holmström (Stockholm, Sweden):

Modality-Focused L2-Instruction in Swedish Sign Language ................................ 93

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Foreword to the Issue

The first issue of JLLT‘s 12th volume comes with five articles in two languages
(English and Spanish) and on three languages. The authors whose papers are pub-
lished in this issue come from the USA, the UK, Mexiko, Sweden, and Germany. The
fields covered are historical linguistics, foreign language methodology, mobile apps,
grammar, and sign language.

The issue is opened up by Dallin D. Oaks (Provo (Utah) USA), who presents Mother
Goose nursery rhymes as a suitable source for teaching historical linguistics. This
subject, which, as one might expect, is oftentimes regarded as ‘boring‘ by students is
presented here in such a way that it stands good chances of enhancing the latter‘s
interest in this field, also because it may evoke childhood memories. The fact that
these nursery rhymes are not so remote from modern English usage as no longer to
be intelligible makes them an attractive object of teaching language change. The
author gives an overview of some of the most important subfields of historical linguis-
tics, such as voicing, phonological change or changes in morphology, syntax and
semantics, to name but these, pedagogically supporting them by giving numerous
examples.

In an opinion article, Thomas Tinnefeld (Saarbrücken, Germany) describes and

analyses the development of the role of the teacher from the 1950s up to the present
day. This period of around seventy years has brought dramatic changes in the
teacher‘s role and in his or her practical work and importance in the classroom. The
grammar-translation method and the audio-lingual method required a totally different
type of teacher as compared to the subsequent communicative and constructivist ap-
proaches, not to mention the latest developments of virtual and / or hybrid or hyflex
teaching. The teachers‘ daily classroom work has not always reflected the complexity
of his or her work. Yet, the latest developments seem to be promising in this respect
because nowadays, it cannot be denied that the teaching profession is an extremely
complex and flexibility-oriented one so as to best respond to students‘ present and
future demands.

Within an action-research oriented approach, Ángel Osle (Exeter, UK) investigates

the use of mobile learning applications for developing learners' speaking skills, using
the Telegram app for a group of Chinese natives learning Spanish. Featuring the rela-
tively modern field of Virtual Learning Environments (VLE), the study - even if based
on a comparatively small sample of students - shows some positive outcome of VLE
for the learning of foreign languages, some of which may even lie in the use of the
corresponding app itself. The results also imply - this may be added - that in the
modern and virtual time we live in, it is as important as ever, if not even more
important, to offer students instruments that naturally belong to their lives and to make
the best use of these instruments for language teaching and learning.

In their Spanish contribution to the present issue, Sara Quintero Ramírez & Sonny A.
Castro Yáñez (both Guadalajara, México) research upon teachers' ideas and praxis
in the teaching of Spanish in Mexico. Their qualitative study aims to identify teachers'
ideas about teaching Spanish grammar and to compare them with the methodology

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they use in class. The consistency – and especially the inconsistencies – found
between these teachers' beliefs and the way they organise their instruction may make
any language teacher rethink his or her daily practice. Even if this is a qualitative study
with the numbers of teachers taking part in it being rather small, every reader is invited
to make some personal deductions from the findings presented in this paper so as to
reflect on his or her teaching practice from a different perspective.

The last but, of course, not least contribution made to the present issue is made by
Ingela Holmström (Stockholm, Sweden) and looks into a special type of language,
i.e. Swedish sign language. In this context, a central problem consists in the fact that
sign language communication does not happen in the same modality as verbal lan-
guages do. This means that, unlike a text orally expressed in a given language that is
interpreted into another language (e.g. French into English), in sign language, the
ideas that need to be expressed have to be transferred from the verbal / oral modality
(i.e. that of words) to the visual-gestural modality, with interlocutors using their hands,
their arms, their faces and their whole bodies to express what they would like to
communicate. On top of that, linguistic features that are different from spoken
language, such as spatiality, iconicity and simultaneity, need to be learnt. The author
describes and analyses the teaching of such features to a group of hearing L2-stu-
dents learning Swedish sign language at the university. Due to the specific require-
ments of sign language, a largely different teaching context and totally unfamiliar lan-
guage learning processes are presented.

Coming up with a relatively wide range of topics dealt with in the various articles, the
present issue promises to be a captivating read and might generate numerous ideas
that, in turn, might advance research in this way or that. Should this process be
triggered, this would not only make our authors happy, but also the members of our
Editorial Advisory Board, not to mention the editor.

Thomas Tinnefeld
JLLT
Editor

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Articles

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Mother Goose as a Resource in Teaching Historical

Linguistics

Dallin D. Oaks (Brigham Young University, Provo (Utah) USA)

Abstract

Mother Goose and other nursery rhymes as authentic texts are valuable resources that can
be used effectively to illustrate historical English language change. Even though these
nursery rhymes contain some forms, structures, and word meanings that differ from the
language of today, the texts are suf- ficiently recent that they are intelligible to modern
audiences. This article will illustrate the relevance and usefulness of nursery rhymes in
teaching about principles of language and language change, such as voicing, phonological
processes, factors motivating phonological change, as well as actual changes in the
phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and lexicon of English.
Keywords: Mother Goose, nursery rhymes, linguistic teaching, historical linguistics

1 Introduction

In his biography, A Roving Commission: My Early Life, Winston Churchill, who would
later become the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, recounts a humorous story
about his unsuccessful efforts as a very young boy to learn Latin. Shortly after enter-
ing a boarding school, he was given a list of the Latin case forms for mensa ('table')
and told to memorize them. Apparently, the teacher had not explained the purpose or
function of the different case forms for conveying the relationships between sentence
elements. Among the case forms young Winston was to memorize was the vocative
case. When he inquired what the vocative form mensa was used to express, his
teacher told him it was the form to use “in addressing a table” or “speaking to a table”.
Churchill then responded, “But I never do“. His teacher did not take this response well
(Churchill 1930: 10-11). For young Winston, however, the communicative value of
learning a form for addressing a table wasn’t clear.

Language teachers now generally recognize the value of authentic or real texts rather
than artificially contrived passages when teaching students a foreign language.
Perhaps it would be possible to imagine a poetic context in which someone could
address a table, but to the young Churchill, this was nonsense. The matter of speak-
ing to a table is not likely to be found in an authentic text, even a literary one.
Churchill’s reaction to an unnatural and contrived use of language occurred in a lan-
guage acquisition setting, where he was to learn Latin. But the use of authentic texts
can also be important in pedagogical settings where a course is not designed to teach
a language but instead to teach about a language. Such settings would include the
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linguistic and philological courses that teach about the forms, structures, varieties,
and historical development of languages. In some cases, the students in these
courses are even native speakers, or at least very fluent, in the modern version of the
language they are learning about.

This paper will look at some authentic texts in relation to instruction in the history of
the English language, whether as its own course or as a unit within an introductory
linguistics course. Although the use and application of authentic texts in this type of
pedagogical setting may be different in some ways from the language acquisition
setting, such texts can still play an important role as they provide for contextualization,
memorability, and capturing student interest.

When teaching about the history of the English language, instructors need to teach
about a variety of linguistic concepts and frameworks such as types of syntactic and
semantic changes, Grimm’s Law, and phonological processes that have shaped the
development of various forms. As instructors consider which kinds of authentic texts
could be used to illustrate such information effectively, they should not overlook one
perhaps seemingly unlikely resource: “Mother Goose rhymes,” as they are commonly
known in the United States – perhaps more commonly called “nursery rhymes” in
Great Britain (Delamar 1987: 2, Vocca 2001: 560). In this article, these labels will
generally be used interchangeably.1

Mother Goose rhymes or nursery rhymes are generally short, literary passages that
have traditionally and commonly been recited to young, native English-speaking
children or read to them in some of those quiet, shared moments between parents
and children, often at bedtime. The Mother Goose or nursery rhymes include such
texts as Jack and Jill and Humpty Dumpty. Although nursery rhyme texts often display
carefully constructed language features and sometimes fanciful content matters, they
are authentic texts that were generally not fashioned to teach the language but rather
to amuse and entertain. Of course, it is not suggested here that those who teach
about the history of the English language should rely exclusively or even primarily on
Mother Goose rhymes for their examples. But it is suggested that Mother Goose
rhymes be recognized as a valuable resource that teachers keep prominently in mind.

The use of Mother Goose or nursery rhymes to illustrate historical changes in the
English language carries some advantages. First, they are familiar. Although they
may not be as commonly transmitted between parents and children as they once were,
most students in history of the English language courses or introductory linguistics
courses will be acquainted with at least a few of them, or at least recognize the genre
or type of collection. And in the case of a few of the specific texts like Jack and Jill,
some students will even have near-verbatim knowledge of their wording. This allows
for a meaningful cognitive interaction between what is already familiar in these au-
thentic texts and the new information that the instructor wishes to share about the
language that is exemplified in these texts. When students can reflect on language
principles from a course involving the history of the language and recognize their
manifestation in nursery rhyme texts with which those students are already familiar,
the reality of what is taught can be made stronger in their minds.

1
Some might argue that Mother Goose rhymes are in fact a subset within the more general
category of ‘nursery rhymes‘ (e.g., Delamar 1987: 2-3).

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These familiar Mother Goose or nursery rhymes can also have the added advantage
of memorability. This memorability is not just found in the fact that students may
already have memorized some of the texts, but also in the fact that the Mother Goose
texts generally contain rhymes and sometimes rhythms and alliterations that will en-
hance their memorability, even for students who have previously not been acquainted
with them.2 In addition, as new concepts are linked to memorable nursery lines, those
new concepts are also made more memorable through association. Moreover,
because so many of the Mother Goose rhymes are widely known and referenced
throughout the culture, students will continue, even after their college course, to
occasionally encounter some of the specific texts that were used for exemplifying
different linguistic concepts and principles, thus reminding the students of and re-
inforcing course concepts and principles that have been taught.

Another advantage of the Mother Goose rhymes as authentic texts is that they are
often short, providing brief and completely self-contained passages. Even some of the
longer ones, like Old Mother Hubbard, are somewhat episodic, lending themselves
well to the use of shorter excerpts that still maintain their coherence.

One more advantage of the Mother Goose rhymes is that while they are generally
older texts, displaying some linguistic features that have since evolved in the lan-
guage, the texts are still linguistically understandable and accessible. In the forms by
which people know them, they generally don’t reach back more than a few centuries.
Opie & Opie put the percentage of nursery rhymes that are “definitely found recorded”
prior to 1600 at just 2.3%, and the percentage that are “probably identified” at 4.2%
(1997: 7). This would likely indicate that their forms, as they appear in published
sources, rarely if ever reach back further than the Early Modern English period (about
1500 to 1700). A significant result of this is that although they contain some
phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic differences from the language of
today, which can be discussed as examples of historical change, the texts themselves
remain largely intelligible. As a point of comparison, it is worth noting that the English
translation of the Bible known as the King James Version (hereafter referred to as the
KJV), with which many English speakers have some familiarity, was published in 1611.
Of course, in all of this, teachers and students alike should remember, as Vocca notes
(2001: 560), that the published nursery rhymes sometimes go back to earlier oral
traditions.3

Up to this point, this article has spoken of Mother Goose rhymes as if they were a
clearly delineated and discrete collection. Instead, there are various collections,

2
In the introduction to their article about mnemonics and alliteration, Lindstromberg & Boers
(2008: 200) explain that “it is widely believed that patterns of sound repetition such as
rhyme and alliteration are particularly noticeable and memorable”. For some research that
empirically examines the role of rhyming and alliteration in facilitating memory, cf. Rubin et
al. 1997, Copeland & Radvansky 2001 and Lindstromberg & Boers 2008. For an additional
discussion, cf. also Rubin 1995 (especially 72-89).
3
In fact, “based on internal evidence in the rhymes, and other relevant factors,” Opie & Opie
(1997: 7) believe that 27.1 % of the nursery rhymes precede 1600.
One important clarification worth making here is that published dates given next to nursery
rhymes later in this article are the dates in which a particular published collection of the
nursery rhymes appeared, not an ascribed date for a nursery rhyme itself or even its first
published appearance.

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published over a period of centuries,4 often sharing many of the most popular texts
but differing in some of the texts they contain, and with the shared texts sometimes
even differing somewhat in their wording.

In what follows, attention will be given to examples showing how the Mother Goose
rhymes can effectively illustrate various linguistic concepts and principles, specifically
in relation to the history of the English language. This focus on the Mother Goose
rhymes will generally not address some of the alleged stories about their origins.
These would be difficult to establish, but the historical language forms that are evident
are more easily and reliably established. Many of the linguistic concepts and prin-
ciples that will be introduced here are very familiar to those who have studied
linguistics, but some brief linguistic explanations will nonetheless be provided, not
only for those who may be less familiar with these concepts and principles, but also to
linguistically contextualize the Mother Goose examples that will be introduced. In do-
ing so, this article aims to show just how useful the corpus of Mother Goose rhymes
can be in illustrating various linguistic concepts and principles in an interesting,
memorable, and meaningful way.

2 Illustrating Some Introductory Principles about Sound Changes

An appropriate starting point for the current study will be to look at how Mother Goose
rhymes can illustrate some specific linguistic principles related to sound changes.

2.1 Voicing

In introductory linguistics courses and often in introductory material for courses

dealing with the history of the English language, instructors show that many con-
sonants that are otherwise similar in their place of articulation (where the airstream is
obstructed in producing the sounds) and manner of articulation (how the airstream is
obstructed) are distinguished through their voicing (whether or not the vocal cords vi-
brate in their production). Thus, the sounds /p/ and /b/ are both bilabial stops
(involving both lips in a complete but temporary blockage of the airstream), but /p/ is
voiceless, and /b/ is voiced. Similarly, /s/ and /z/ are both alveolar fricatives (produced
with the tongue near the hard ridge just behind the top teeth and only partially ob-
structing the airstream). But /s/ is voiceless, whereas /z/ is voiced. Sometimes the
difference in voicing is evident across dialects or across time. Some Southerners in
the U.S. differ from Northerners in pronouncing greasy as if the internal consonant
were a /z/. The 400-year-old KJV seems to display a historical voicing difference in
Exodus 25: 31-36, which uses knop / knops where English speakers would now say
knob / knobs (Elliott 1967: 99). Similarly, the respective distinction in voiceless and
voiced labiodental fricatives /f/ and /v/ is evident in Joel 2: 24 and 3: 13, which contain
the word fats (Elliott 1967: 65-66), where most would now say vats. Moreover, dif-
ferences in voicing can sometimes serve to distinguish related words from different

4
For a brief history of the collections of Mother Goose rhymes as well as discussions on the
development of some of the specific nursery rhymes, cf. Delamar 1987 and Opie & Opie
1997.

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languages that share a common origin. Spanish and Italian have both developed from
Latin. And their close historical relationship is well illustrated in their respective words
for 'friend'. Spanish uses amigo, while Italian uses amico (the 'c' being the spelling
representation for the /k/ sound). The pronunciation of the words differs from each
other only in the fact that Spanish uses the voiced velar stop /g/ (the tongue making a
complete but temporary blockage on the velum, or soft palate), whereas Italian uses
the voiceless velar stop /k/. Spanish and Italian would originally have been just
separate dialect forms of Latin. The two languages display great lexical similarity,
which is apparent when comparing many word pairs whose differences are some-
times evident in the voicing of certain consonants.

At this point it will be useful to look at an English example from the Mother Goose
rhyme, The Man in the Moon, and how it can contribute to an interesting discussion
about voicing5:

The man in the moon came tumbling down,

And asked his way to Norwich.
He went by the south
And burned his mouth
With eating hot pease porridge. (Lobel 1986: 96)

The juxtaposition of the words Norwich and porridge in the rhyming position of the two
lines is likely to be a bit puzzling to most American English speakers, who would
anticipate a rhyme and yet would expect the final consonant of Norwich to be
pronounced with a voiceless /č/ (as in the common pronunciation of the digraph 'ch')
rather than a voiced /ǰ/, like the final sound of the word porridge. In fact, the United
States has a city in Connecticut named Norwich, and it is pronounced with /č/. But the
juxtaposition of the two words in the Mother Goose text should at least make
American students wonder whether Norwich in this text is intended to use a voiced /ǰ/.
In fact, the Mother Goose rhyme seems to indicate that either historically or dialectally,
there is a voicing difference that has emerged between the current pronunciation
among American English speakers and the speakers whose pronunciation the Mother
Goose rhyme is representing.6 In fact, one textbook about the history of the English
language makes special mention of this pronunciation issue and the Mother Goose
rhyme that illustrates it:

Norwich [England] is traditionally pronounced to rhyme with porridge, as in a nursery

jingle about a man from Norwich who ate some porridge; the name of the city in
Connecticut is, however, pronounced as the spelling seems to indicate. (Algeo & Butcher
2014: 254)

An interesting, additional source confirms this customary difference between the two
cities named Norwich, showing that this difference goes back at least about 80 years
(and probably many more). The NBC Handbook of Pronunciation was first published
in the United States for the National Broadcasting Corporation in 1943 to provide a

5
In this next example and throughout this paper, italics have been added to highlight the
specific parts of the texts that are under discussion.
6
Of course, occasionally the Mother Goose passages use near-rhymes. But that possibility
has been taken into account when collecting and assessing examples for this paper.

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uniform set of prescribed pronunciations for its radio announcers. Although American
English speakers should not consider its prescriptions to be definitive, the handbook
does seem to provide a useful guide to pronunciations that were probably regarded as
normative and relatively prestigious (not merely descriptive) for the American English
of about 80 years ago, thus providing some historical perspective. That handbook
specifies that while the U.S. pronunciation of Norwich, Connecticut, is with /č/, the
consonant /ǰ/ is to be used when referring to the city in England (Bender 1943: 207).7

2.2 The Use of the Schwa Vowel on Unstressed Syllables

Each language has some distinctive phonological patterns that its native speakers
follow. One common pattern for English speakers is to pronounce the vowels in
unstressed syllables as the schwa vowel /ǝ/, like the vowel that English speakers
normally use in the first syllable of offend, for example. This use of the schwa is not a
recent development in the language. It is a systematic phenomenon that has been a
part of the language for centuries. In fact, many scholars believe that the reduction in
the forms and varieties of inflectional suffixes (such as earlier noun plurals and verb
tense suffixes), even as far back as the late Old English period,8 was strongly influ-
enced, at least in part, by the practice of native speakers to produce the schwa vowel
in the unstressed inflectional suffixes (Algeo & Butcher 2014: 137-139; Baugh &
Cable 1993: 154-155). Of course, this vowel behavior is not limited to inflectional
suffixes. And at least one Mother Goose text seems to confirm that this pattern has
influenced English vowels for centuries. Note the following excerpt from Simple Simon,
in which the words Simon and pie-man rhyme just because of the use of the schwa
vowel on unstressed syllables:

Simple Simon met a pie-man,

Going to the fair.
Said Simple Simon to the pie-man:
“Let me taste your ware.”

Said the pie-man to Simple Simon:

“Show me first your penny.”
Said Simple Simon to the pie-man:
“Indeed, I haven’t any.” (Miller 1971: 50)

In the first stanza, the words Simon and pieman (pie-man) are rhymes that are internal
to their own lines. But by the second stanza, the rhyming relationship between the two
words is even more overt, with the two words being placed at the ends of lines that are
tied together by the rhyme.

7
More recently, it appears that some British English speakers have begun to pronounce a
voiceless /č/ at the end of Norwich. Unlike the 1926 edition of An English Pronouncing
Dictionary, the later 2003 edition provides a variant British English pronunciation that uses a
word-final /č/ for the English city (Jones 1926 and 2003).
8
The end of the Old English period is commonly placed around 1100 A.D.

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2.3 Types of Phonological Processes

Languages display a variety of phonological processes by which sounds or se-

quences of sounds in various words are changed. Two of these will be discussed here:
metathesis and segment addition (intrusion). The Mother Goose rhymes provide
helpful illustrations of these processes that have occurred in English and that an
instructor can discuss with the class.

2.3.1 Metathesis

The first type of phonological process or change to be considered here is metathesis,

which occurs when sounds are inverted with each other. Metathesis frequently
involves an adjacent r-consonant and vowel (Arlotto 1972: 89). A notable example of
this is the word bird, which was once brid or bridd (Arlotto 1972: 89, Ayto 1990: 64,
Yule 2017: 258). Similarly, the ordinal number third used to be thrid (þridda) (Arlotto
1972: 89), with its historical sequence of the r-consonant and vowel more closely
matching the current sequence of the r-consonant and vowel in the related words
three and thrice. Historically, moreover, the word horse was once hros (Yule 2017:
258, Arlotto 1972: 89). Burridge (2005: 122) has noted that this earlier pronunciation
explains the rhyme scheme in the famous Mother Goose rhyme about Banbury Cross:

Ride a cock-horse to Banbury Cross,

To see a fine lady upon a white horse;
Rings on her fingers, and bells on her toes,
She shall make music wherever she goes. (Miller 1971: 28)

As the text currently appears, the words for horse and cross don’t present a rhyme.
But if people read horse as hros, as the word was earlier written and pronounced in
the language, the rhyme scheme falls into place. Another example of a Mother Goose
text whose rhyme scheme depends on this earlier form of horse as hros appears
below:

I went to the river—

No ship to get across,
I paid ten shillings
For an old blind horse. (Excerpt from a longer text in Opie & Opie 1955: 127)

2.3.2 Segment Addition

Another phonological process is segment addition. This manifests itself in English in

various ways. One very common manifestation of this occurs as speakers insert a
stop consonant (/p/, /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, or /g/) that has the same place of articulation as an
immediately preceding nasal consonant. This commonly occurs before consonant
sounds like /t/, /k/, /s/, /l/, or /θ/ (the latter being a voiceless sound corresponding to
the digraph th). This type of segment addition is evident, as Burridge notes, with a
word like mince, in which many speakers insert a /t/ before the /s/ because of the
preceding /n/. Both /n/ and /t/ share the same place of articulation, and, for a reason
related to a timing issue in the articulation of the /n/ and /s/ combination, avoiding the

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insertion of a /t/ in a word like mince can actually make it more difficult to pronounce
(Burridge 2004: 31-32). This common phonological tendency, to insert a stop conso-
nant in such an environment, occasionally results in homophonous pairs like mince /
mints, dense / dents, and sense / scents (or cents). In another example of this type of
segment addition, in one of Abraham Lincoln’s letters, he mentions Fort Sumter, the
site of the outbreak of the American Civil War, but he mistakenly spells it as Fort
“Sumpter” (Goodwin 2005: 343). Lincoln’s spelling is almost certainly an indication of
how he actually pronounced the word. In this case the bilabial stop /p/ is inserted
because of the preceding bilabial nasal /m/.

As might be expected from this discussion, Mother Goose texts contain words that
have undergone segment addition, though the words that will be identified here had
already altered their pronunciation and spelling by the time their respective nursery
rhyme texts were published. But the words’ appearance in these prominent nursery
rhyme texts still presents opportunities for discussion. Consider, for example, one
famous text:

Jack, be nimble,
Jack, be quick;
Jack, jump over
The candlestick. (Miller 1971: 39)

In this text, the word nimble features prominently, though not as part of its rhyme. And
as can be documented in earlier, unrelated texts, the adjective nimble didn’t always
have a /b/ in English (Entry for the adjective “nimble,” The Oxford English Dictionary,
2021, available at https://oed.com). The consonant seems to have been added be-
cause of the preceding bilabial /m/.9

This type of segment addition is also evident with the verb tumble in the famous
nursery rhyme about Jack and Jill. This verb apparently entered the language “from
Middle Low German tummelen, which has other relatives in modern German tummeln
‘bustle, hurry’ and taumeln ‘reel, stagger’” (Ayto 1990: 544). Although this word may
have entered the language without a /b/, it acquired one soon enough that The Oxford
English Dictionary, which endeavors to show the earliest documentable forms and
subsequent developments for a given word, has almost no early examples of tumble
that lack a /b/ (Entry for the verb “tumble,” The Oxford English Dictionary, 2021,
https://oed.com). Now note the rhythmic contribution that the word tumbling makes in
the nursery rhyme below, rendered even more dramatic by the additional sound sym-
bolism of /b/, with its association of impactful contact:

Jack and Jill went up the hill

To fetch a pail of water;
Jack fell down and broke his crown
And Jill came tumbling after. (Miller 1971: 40)

9
Barry has pointed out the sound change of nimble in relation to this nursery rhyme text
(2017: 166). Burridge (2004: 32) has provided analogous examples of words in which a /b/
has historically been inserted after the nasal /m/ and before /l/. These include thimble,
tremble, and humble. In the case of the latter two words, a contrast in forms can be seen
when those words are compared with related words she provides, such as tremulous and
humility, which have not added the /b/ (ibid.).

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2.4 Motivating Factors Behind Some Phonological Changes

Up to this point, examples from Mother Goose rhymes have been provided to illustrate
some types of sound change. But nursery rhymes also illustrate some of the factors
motivating different sound changes. In the previous discussions of voicing, segment
addition, and perhaps metathesis, it might be noted that some sound changes were
motivated by the tendency of speakers to adopt easier articulations. But there are
additional factors that seem to have prompted some sound changes.

2.4.1 Spelling Pronunciation

Some pronunciations develop as people try to make their pronunciation conform more
closely to the spelling they see for a particular word (Fromkin et al. 2014: 546-547;
Algeo & Butcher 2014: 49-50). It makes sense that many speakers would take their
cue about pronunciation from the spelling of words. But applying this standard
unconditionally can sometimes result in pronunciations that were never a part of the
language or which have not been customary in the language for a long time (Algeo &
Butcher 2014: 49-50). As Crystal explains, Shakespeare presents a comic character
in his play, Love’s Labour’s Lost, who insists that people should match their
pronunciation of particular words to their spelling, such as to pronounce the /b/ sound
in doubt and debt (Crystal 2004: 270). This character in his play gives insight into
some common pronunciations of that day, indicating, for example, that the normative
pronunciation for doubt and debt in Shakespeare’s time, as in the language of today,
would not actually have used a /b/. In fact, the words doubt and debt were borrowings
that entered English without a /b/ in the spelling or pronunciation. Later scribes and
others added a b in their spelling to reflect the words’ ultimate Latin origins (Wolman
2008: 55). This spelling change did not alter the customary pronunciation, but if
speakers of the language had subsequently altered their pronunciation to adopt the
/b/ sound in doubt and debt because of their spelling, the resulting forms would have
been spelling pronunciations.

Just as Shakespeare’s play provides an opportunity to discuss the phenomenon of

spelling pronunciation, Mother Goose does as well. One noteworthy spelling
pronunciation relates to how the double “e” in the spelling is sometimes rendered in
speech. For example, although some speakers pronounce the noun creek with /ɪ/, as
if the pronunciation corresponded to what could be spelled as crick (/krɪk/), others
scrupulously avoid that pronunciation, preferring instead to pronounce the word with
the /i/ sound as in the word see. This preference for the /krik/ pronunciation is likely
motivated in many cases by the spelling of the word and in such cases would be a
spelling pronunciation. Some students find it hard to believe that the crick
pronunciation with /ɪ/ could have any legitimacy. It would probably surprise them,
however, to see that sources such as both The Oxford English Dictionary and
Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary show /krɪk/ as a possible American
pronunciation (Entry for the noun “creek,” The Oxford English Dictionary, 2021,
https://oed.com; the noun “creek” in Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 2020).
Of course, those dictionaries are following a common practice of dictionaries in
describing rather than prescribing, but the presence of this form near the front of the
entry for the noun creek is a good reminder of its common use. Students can be
invited to consider the widespread American English pronunciation of been, with its /ɪ/

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vowel.10 Despite this, it can nonetheless seem counter-intuitive that some words with
the “ee” spelling would be pronounced with /ɪ/. But Mother Goose rhymes reveal that
this pronunciation can be the case and has been so for a long time. Some people who
are familiar with the written form britches may not realize that it is a spelling variant of
breeches, the latter word having traditionally been pronounced with the same vowel /ɪ/
in the middle of the word. More recently, however, it seems that some speakers in
America and England have been influenced by the spelling of breeches and have
begun to pronounce the middle part of that word as if it had the same /i/ vowel that is
commonly used in the word see. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (2020), in
fact, gives a variant pronunciation of breeches with this vowel, as does the Cambridge
English Pronouncing Dictionary (Jones 2003). It is worth noting, however, what
Mother Goose provides as a rhyme for breeches in the text, Little Jack Nory:

Little Jack Nory

Told me a story.
How he tried
Cock-horse to ride,
Sword and scabbard by his side,
Saddle, leaden spurs, and switches,
His pocket tight
With pence all bright,
Marbles, tops, puzzles, props,
Now he’s put in a jacket and breeches. (Favorite 1923: n.p.)

Another interesting case of spelling pronunciation involves the days of the week. It is
common, at least in American English, to pronounce each of the names of the days of
the week with its end part pronounced as speakers would normally pronounce the
word day (/dei/). But the widespread use and acceptance of this pronunciation
appears to be more recent, influenced by the spelling of the words. Indeed, judging
from earlier pronunciation guides, many speakers, likely even the most highly re-
garded speakers, pronounced a word like Sunday as if the ending were /di/, pro-
nounced as many would pronounce dee (or possibly with the closely related but lax
vowel variant /dɪ/). The NBC Handbook of Pronunciation, again from about 80 years
ago, shows the pronunciation of Sunday (and the other three days of the week that
are listed) as ending in /dɪ/ (Bender 1943: 247, 260, 272, 284). Similarly, in his 1935
edition of American Pronunciation, Kenyon explains that in both America and England
the word Monday is pronounced with the ending form /dɪ/, “and so with the other days
of the week” (1935: 168). Across the ocean, the 1926 British English guide, An
English Pronouncing Dictionary, which aims generally at describing a variety “used by
a considerable number of cultivated Southern English people in ordinary conver-
sation” (“Received Pronunciation”) (Jones 1926: vii-viii) shows all the days of the week
ending in the similar /di/, except for Saturday, which allows for an ending in either /di/

10
This also corresponds with a common historical pronunciation in British English. Barber
(1997: 34) indicates that at least in an “unstressed position,” the word been would
commonly have been pronounced as bin [/bɪn/] in the English of Shakespeare’s time.
Similarly, this pronunciation was apparently common for many years in British English. By
1791, it was still the pronunciation identified in a contemporary pronunciation dictionary
(Entry for “been,“ Walker 1791: n.p.). And it is still a possible variant in current British
English (Jones 2003).

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or /dei/ (ibid.). Kenyon indicates that the word-final pronunciation with /dɪ/ in Monday
[and presumably the other days of the week] is “as it has been for at least three
hundred years” (1935: 168). In a separate 1948 publication, Kenyon does acknowl-
edge some speakers’ pronunciation of the days of the week with the word-final /dei/
but refers to this pronunciation as “substandard” (1948: 26). The pronunciation with
/di/ (or /dɪ/) rather than /dei/ is consistent with the Mother Goose rhyme, Solomon
Grundy, in which the name Grundy is evidently shown to rhyme with the various days
of the week:

Solomon Grundy,
Born on Monday,
Christened on Tuesday,
Married on Wednesday,
Took ill on Thursday,
Worse on Friday,
Died on Saturday,
Buried on Sunday,
This is the end
Of Solomon Grundy. (Delamar 1987: 95)

The previous, traditional pronunciation of Saturday with /di/, before the more recent
spelling pronunciation gained wider acceptance, is also evident in the nursery rhyme,
Oh, Dear! What Can the Matter Be?:

Oh, dear! What can the matter be?

Two old women got up an apple-tree;
One came down,
And the other stayed till Saturday. (Favorite 1923: n.p.)11

Another example of how a nursery rhyme illustrates an older, more traditional

pronunciation prior to the subsequent spelling pronunciation, can be seen, as Algeo &
Butcher note, with the word forehead (2014: 50). The compound word forehead is
now frequently pronounced with two stressed syllables, with the second syllable being
pronounced as /hɛd/, in other words, as many speakers would pronounce the

11
As is evident from Kenyon’s (1948: 26) criticism of the “substandard” pronunciation of the
days of the week, even during the first half of the twentieth century, American English
speakers did not display a uniform pronunciation for these words. There would have been
some variation between word-final /di/ (or /dɪ/) and /dei/. Elster notes a pronunciation guide
from 1929 that prescribes the /dei/ pronunciation (1999: 98). Moreover, this kind of variation
has existed for a while. The nursery rhyme, How Many Days has my Baby to Play? contains
lines ending in words such as play, away, and day, as well as a couple of days of the week
(Opie & Opie 1997: 68-69). This rhyme scheme would seem to favor the word-final /dei/
pronunciation. A version of this nursery rhyme was published at least as early as 1805 (ibid.:
69). Elster (1999: 98) reports Frank H. Vizetelly’s claim that the pronunciation with /dei/
could be found in Scotland, northern England, and Ireland in the 1700s. Thus, the present
article’s claim that the current widespread pronunciation with /dei/ in the names of the days
of the week is a spelling pronunciation should not be understood to say that the word-final
/dei/ pronunciation did not previously exist. Rather, the claim is that the /dei/ pronunciation
in this lexical set has acquired a more widespread acceptance over what it had earlier had
for many years.

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independent word head. Algeo & Butcher explain, however, that the older
pronunciation for the compound was /ˈfɔrǝd/, a pronunciation that they note is evident
in the rhyme scheme of the text about “the little girl” (2014: 50), a version of which is
included below:

There was a little girl who wore a little hood,

And a curl down the middle of her forehead;
When she was good, she was very, very good,
But when she was bad, she was horrid. (Favorite 1923: n.p.)12

The last example of a spelling pronunciation that will be noted here involves an
inflectional suffix. Many assume that the 'correct' pronunciation of the suffix -ing, as on
the participial forms of verbs like dancing, must avoid what some people refer to as
“g-dropping.” Thus, there are people who are inclined towards avoiding a pronuncia-
tion like dancin’. The reference to “g-dropping,” however, is a mistaken characteriza-
tion of what is happening in that pronunciation, for it does not actually involve
dropping a consonant, but rather using an alveolar nasal instead of a velar one. The
-ng spelling is employed as a written convention for representing the velar nasal,
since the English spelling system has no single alphabetic symbol to represent that
sound. But even as the -ng spelling is an understandable convention for the pro-
nunciation of words like sing and rang, it should be recognized that its use in the
spelling of the suffix -ing to represent a velar nasal in participles such as dancing or
playing does not always match the actual pronunciation that some speakers have
traditionally used with such participles. In this regard, then, some speakers who con-
sider the spelling and adhere closely to maintaining a velar nasal (in their view by
saying playing rather than playin’) are promoting a spelling pronunciation that even
some respected literary authorities of the past would not always have maintained.
Algeo & Butcher, in fact, show that in at least a couple of his works, Jonathan Swift
used rhymes that depended upon the participial pronunciation with the alveolar nasal
/n/, despite the spelling. This is evident in one of the examples they provide from his
work:

See then what mortals place their bliss in!

Next morn betimes the bride was missing. (Algeo & Butcher 2014: 163-164)

Moreover, as Crystal (2007: 178) notes, some speakers in the past actually regarded
the pronunciation like playing (with a velar nasal) as less prestigious. Now consider
the example below from Old Mother Hubbard that shows what was apparently a wide-
spread pronunciation with the alveolar nasal /n/ in the participle:

She went to the seamstress

12
The NBC Handbook of Pronunciation gives the pronunciation of forehead slightly differently,
as /ˈfɑr ɪd/ (Bender 1943: 143). This would still rhyme with a common pronunciation of
horrid as /ˈhɑr ɪd/, which the handbook actually provides. In either event, the current, com-
mon spelling pronunciation of forehead with /hɛd/ is in contrast with what can be seen in the
Mother Goose rhyme. It should be noted, however, as Algeo & Butcher (2014: 50) indicate,
that the spelling pronunciation’s use of /hɛd/ within that word is a return to an even earlier
pronunciation than what is used in the /ˈfɔrǝd/ pronunciation. Indeed, Walker’s 1791
pronunciation dictionary provides just one pronunciation of forehead, and that uses /hɛd/ as
the last part of the compound (Entry for “forehead”, Walker 1791: n.p.).

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To buy him some linen;

But when she came back
The dog was a-spinning. (Opie & Opie 1955: 30)

2.4.2 Reinterpretation

Some pronunciation (and even spelling) can change when people reinterpret the
forms or meanings of particular words. This seems to have happened with the famous
Christmas folk song, The Twelve Days of Christmas. The song now commonly in-
cludes references to four calling birds. But it is useful to compare what is found in the
excerpt from the corresponding nursery rhyme below:

The twelfth day of Christmas

My true love sent to me
Twelve lords a-leaping,
Eleven ladies dancing,
Ten pipers piping,
Nine drummers drumming,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five gold rings,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves, and
A partridge in a pear tree. (Opie & Opie 1955: 198-199)

As might be concluded from the development of the lyrics to this song, speakers of
English probably became less familiar with the term colly (or collie), which had meant
'black', and did not realize that the lyrics referred to blackbirds. This led English
speakers to reinterpret what it was that they had heard or sung (e.g., Armenti 2016),
and they apparently assumed that since some birds “‘call out’ in song“, the type of
birds mentioned here must be calling birds (Armenti 2016). Armenti says that in The
Twelve Days of Christmas, the phrase “‘colly birds’ predates ‘calling birds’ by more
than a century,” though other variations have existed as well (Armenti 201613
(blogs.loc.gov/catbird/2016/12/is-it-four-calling-birds-or-four-colly-birds-a-twelve-days
-of-christmas-debate; 14-06-2021)).

One distinctive type of reinterpretation that can occur involves a back-formation, by

which speakers make “a new word from an older word that is mistakenly assumed to
be a derivative of it” (Algeo & Butcher 2014: 264). Mother Goose shows us a
memorable example of this. The modern word form of the vegetable known as pea is
actually the result of a back-formation from the singular word pease. People
eventually and mistakenly reinterpreted pease as a plural form and, through analogy
with other singular and plural forms, created the new singular word form pea (Algeo &

blogs.loc.gov/catbird/2016/12/is-it-four-calling-birds-or-four-colly-birds-a-twelve-days-of-christ
mas-debate; 14-06-2021.

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Butcher 2014: 264). The nursery rhyme about pease porridge, as Algeo & Butcher
note (2014: 264), shows the earlier use of pease as a singular:

Pease porridge hot,

Pease porridge cold,
Pease porridge in the pot
Nine days old.
Some like it hot,
Some like it cold,
Some like it in the pot
Nine days old. (Opie & Opie 1955: 9)

Another type of reinterpretation that is worth mentioning is related to word boundary

confusion. Speakers of English have sometimes misunderstood where word
boundaries occur and have adjusted them accordingly. One environment for word
boundary reinterpretation involves the indefinite articles a / an and the initial sound of
the following noun. Historically, the word nadder changed to adder, a development
that likely resulted, at least in part, from the fact that the pronunciation of a phrase like
“a nadder” could have sounded like “an adder.” A similar process occurred with
napron, becoming apron, where a noun lost its initial nasal consonant (Algeo &
Butcher 2014: 133, Burridge 2004: 20-21, also Stageberg & Oaks 2000: 72). The
opposite happened with nickname, which acquired a word-initial nasal consonant as it
developed from a phrase like an ekename, literally 'an also-name' (Algeo & Butcher
2014: 133, also Burridge 2004: 20), or an additional name that was applied to
someone. The old use of eke to mean 'also' can be seen in the following nursery
rhyme:

Ye Parents who have children dear,

And eke ye that have none,
If you would keep them safe abroad
Pray keep them all at home. (Delamar 1987: 65)

3 Illustrating Morphological Change

By the time the Mother Goose texts were formed, many of the most important
morphological developments that characterize the modern English language had
already occurred. In the transition from late Old English into early Middle English, the
language experienced an extensive loss of inflectional suffixes, the suffixes that show
such grammatical notions as plural, verb tense, etc. Although some inflectional suf-
fixes have remained in the language, the variety of forms has been greatly reduced. At
the time that the various nursery rhymes were fashioned, however, some distinctive
forms and behavior that are now archaic or obsolete still remained, not only with the
inflectional suffixes, but with some other prefixes and suffixes as well.

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3.1 Inflectional Suffixes

Historically, one plural noun inflectional suffix that competed with the inflectional -s (or
-es) for a lasting place in the English language was -n (or -en). A surviving but isolated
example of that suffix is still visible in the language today with the word oxen (Algeo &
Butcher 2014: 102, also Baugh & Cable 1993: 156). But that inflectional suffix was
much more common in earlier times. In fact, Old English had many nouns that used
that plural suffix (manifested earlier as -an) (Algeo & Butcher 2014: 101-102). Its limit-
ed use was still visible quite a while later such as with Shakespeare’s Early Modern
English writing, where eyes might occasionally appear as eyen, and shoes might
occasionally appear in a slightly different form as shoon (Baugh & Cable 1993: 235).
This plural is also evident in an excerpt from the nursery rhyme There was a Monkey:

There was a cobbler clouting shoon,

When they were mended, they were done. (Opie & Opie 1955: 144)

Another change among the inflectional suffixes of the language is also worth noting.
This involves the traditional Old English inflection -th or -eth (written in Old English as
-þ, -eþ, -ð, or -eð) for the third person singular present tense of the verb as in the word
maketh. This suffix has passed from the language, having been replaced by the
inflection -s (sometimes appearing as -es) as in the word makes. Of course, despite
its similar appearance, the newer inflection is different from the plural -s on nouns.
The old third person singular verb inflection -th (or -eth) regularly appears in such
prominent Early Modern English texts as the KJV, and Shakespeare’s writings. But it
is also visible in the well-known Mother Goose rhyme for remembering the number of
days in each month:

Thirty days hath September,

April, June, and November;
All the rest have thirty-one,
Excepting February alone,
And that has twenty-eight days clear
And twenty-nine in each leap year. (Lobel 1986: 60)

3.2 Other Prefixes and Suffixes

Changes to the morphological system of English have also occurred with derivational
prefixes and suffixes, those forms like un- or -ness, which, while often associated with
particular parts of speech, are not used for conveying grammatical notions like plural
or verb tense. One morphological characteristic that has changed since earlier times
is the use of the particle a- that preceded participial verbs in such forms as a-going.
This feature is no longer in common use in the standard variety of the language,
though it can still be found in some non-standard dialects like Appalachian English.
Most modern speakers’ encounter with the form is through older texts like the KJV, as
in the apostle Peter’s statement that he would go “a fishing” (John 21: 3). It is also
evident in nursery rhymes as in the earlier quoted lines from The Twelve Days of
Christmas that mention lords a-leaping, maids a-milking, swans a-swimming, and
geese a-laying. Interestingly enough, the actual participle a-fishing, whose biblical use

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has previously been noted, also occurs in the famous nursery rhyme about Simple
Simon and the pieman, as is shown in the example below:

Simple Simon went a-fishing,

For to catch a whale;
But all the water he could find
Was in his mother’s pail! (Miller 1971: 50)

The last morphological issue to consider here relates to the derivational suffix -ly that
often occurs on adverbs. It is a common expectation among modern English speakers
that most adverbs should use -ly. But earlier forms of the language often used “flat
adverbs” (adverbs sharing the same form as their corresponding adjectives – without
-ly), whether they functioned as “ordinary adverbs” or as “intensifiers” (Webster’s 1989:
451, also Algeo & Butcher 2014: 106-107).14 Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage
provides examples of flat adverbs from earlier writers, noting forms such as “mon-
strous fine” from Jonathan Swift, “violent hot” from Daniel Defoe, and “exceeding
good” from Jane Austen (1989: 451). In relation to this, the expression “wonderful hot”
in the following nursery rhyme is also illustrative:

Baby and I were baked in a pie,

The gravy was wonderful hot.
We had nothing to pay
To the baker that day
And so we crept out of the pot. (Lobel 1986: 32)

4 Illustrating Syntactic Developments

The syntactic developments in English since Old English times are quite significant.
The language previously relied on inflectional suffixes to convey case relationships
such as subject, direct object, indirect object, etc., which also allowed a greater free-
dom in its word order than what now prevails. With the loss of many of its inflections,
however, the language began to rely more heavily on certain word orders and
prepositions to signal such relationships (Baugh & Cable 1993: 54). The current im-
portance of word order can be illustrated by considering the difference in meaning
between the following sentences:

The farmer surprised the cow. vs The cow surprised the farmer.

It is also worth considering the importance of word order and prepositions in con-
veying the synonymy of the next two sentences:

The man brought the dog a bone. vs The man brought a bone to the dog.

The heaviest loss of inflectional complexity in the language and some of the resulting
changes in word order pre-date the first publications of the Mother Goose rhymes. But

14
Modern English uses a few flat adverbs like fast (such as “We spoke fast.”) and hard (“They
work hard.”), but the frequency and variety of the forms now in use are reduced in com-
parison to the past (Webster’s 1989: 451).

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other syntactic changes continued to occur later, and the Mother Goose rhymes thus
still reveal some older syntactic patterns and practices that vary from the language of
today. Anyone assessing this matter, however, should be careful because poetry
often inverts syntax, especially to achieve certain meters and rhyme. Still, some ex-
amples in the Mother Goose texts do seem to display genuine differences between
the syntactic possibilities of their time and those of more recent English. Such a dif-
ference is evident in the following nursery rhyme:

“Little maid, pretty maid, whither goest thou?”

“Down in the forest to milk my cow.”
“Shall I go with thee?” “No, not now;
When I send for thee, then come thou.” (Real 1916: 108)

This passage displays a prominent syntactic change in the historical development of

English that is worth noting. The end of the opening line shows an earlier possible
linguistic pattern of a wh-question that is formed with a wh-word (whither) followed by
a main verb, goest (in this case, with its now archaic second person singular in-
flection), and then the subject, rather than being followed by an auxiliary verb, subject,
and main verb, as would now generally occur in English (Where do you go? or Where
are you going?).15 Although Modern English has generally settled into the custom of
requiring an auxiliary verb in its wh-questions (unless someone is inquiring about the
grammatical subject of the sentence), it can instead use a form of the main verb be,
even when it is not serving as an auxiliary verb (Where are you?). Additionally, in
Modern English, unless inquiring about the subject, when no other auxiliary nor be
form would otherwise be present in a wh-question, the question uses do-support,
providing a form of the auxiliary verb do (such as Where do you go? or When does he
study?). Early Modern English (about 1500 to 1700 A.D.) sometimes applied
do-support. They could say both Whence doth he come? or Whence cometh he? In
fact, its options for question formation were more flexible than the language of today.
The Mother Goose text above shows a syntactic possibility that is generally no longer
in productive use in the language.

Elsewhere among the Mother Goose texts, another interesting syntactic development
may also be noted, this time regarding a relative pronoun. Standard Modern English
has settled into a limited set of relative pronouns that may be used to introduce
relative clauses, such as the word that in a sentence like The book that she studied
was interesting. Among the relative pronouns are some wh-words like who, whom,
which, and whose. But, significantly enough, the list of relative pronouns does not
include the word what. Like most of the relative pronouns, the word what can be an
interrogative that begins a wh-question. But it does not serve as a relative pronoun.
An example of such a use, if it were possible in the standard variety, would be evident
in a sentence like “He is the man what came“. The word what, however, actually did
occur as a relative pronoun in earlier varieties of English. In fact, Webster’s Dictionary
of English Usage (1989) indicates that “in the 13th century it appeared in natural
English idiom” (ibid.: 952). It can still be found in some non-standard varieties (some-

15
It should be noted, however, that this linguistic description of what “generally” occurs in
Modern English wh-questions needs to be adjusted somewhat for wh-questions that inquire
about the grammatical subject of the sentence. In those wh-questions, the initial wh-word
serves as the subject, and no auxiliary verb is needed (for example, Who goes to the
forest?).

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times represented in print as wot). The popular 1964 movie Mary Poppins represents
the Cockney dialect of London in its song, Chim Chim Cher-ee, when it has Burt, the
chimney sweep, sing, “Nowhere is there a more ’appier crew than them wot sings,
‘Chim chim cher-ee, chim cher-oo!’”16 One particular Mother Goose rhyme excerpt
contains the following example of the earlier use of what as a relative pronoun:

If I had a donkey wot wouldn’t go

I never would wollop him—no, no, no;
I’d give him some hay and cry gee O!
And come up Neddy. (Opie & Opie 1997: 180)17

This discussion has certainly not exhausted the possible syntactic observations that
could be made with regards to nursery rhymes and language change. For example,
an additional discussion might consider the older placement of a negative form after a
main verb rather than after an auxiliary verb, as in “knows not what to do” (e.g., Real
1916: 81); the omission of a relative pronoun when it represents the subject of its own
relative clause (Barber 1997: 215-216), as in “There was a little boy and a little girl [Ø]
lived in an alley” (e.g., Real 1916: 118)18; and the use of a form of the auxiliary be
rather than of the auxiliary have in the perfect verb constructions when verbs such
as come and go are involved, as evidenced in “They say the balloon is gone up to the
moon!“ (e.g., ibid.: 121).

5 Illustrating Lexical Borrowing and Historical Cognates

A historical consideration of the lexicon or vocabulary of a language will distinguish

between those words that have come into the language from outside influences (bor-
rowings) versus those that are inherited from the language’s distant origins. English is
a Germanic language, which, if traced back even more distantly, goes back to an
Indo-European proto-language. Nursery rhymes can provide useful examples related
to these lexical sources.

5.1 Borrowings

As English has evolved, it has borrowed significantly from other Indo-European

descendant languages, including Latin, French, Old Norse, Greek, and the Celtic
languages, among others. In the case of the Celtic languages, however, the early bor-
rowings into English are primarily limited to place names and names of the physical

16
The lyrics to this song can be found at https://www.musicalsandlyrics.com/mary-poppins/
chim-chim-cheree.html.
17
This text version is attributed by Opie & Opie (1997: 180) to a ditty created by Jacob Beuler
and “occasioned by The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act (1822).” But the first line
above is reportedly within a passage that was “already traditional” (ibid. 1997: 180), and it is
that first line which is relevant to the above linguistic discussion about relative pronouns.
18
Modern English now allows the omission of a relative pronoun when it would represent the
object (not the subject) of its own relative clause, as in “The birds used the nest [that] they
built.”

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landscape, such as the names of rivers or hills (Baugh & Cable 1993: 73-74). But
some old Celtic numbers from local varieties of that language group do seem to have
found their way into a couple of the Mother Goose texts. Opie & Opie (1997) explain
that the local Celtic varieties have had some alternative “sets of counting words” used
for tallying knitting stitches or sheep in the field (ibid.: 12). A few of these alternative
Celtic counting numbers from the Westmorland variety are listed below:

Hevera eight
Devera nine
dick ten (Opie & Opie 1997: 13)

As Opie & Opie note, one nursery rhyme displays similarities between these Celtic
numbers and its opening and closing words:

Hickory, dickory, dock,

The mouse ran up the clock.
The clock struck one,
The mouse ran down,
Hickory, dickory, dock. (Opie & Opie 1997: 244, also 13-14)

Although the words are not exactly the same, some similarities are evident, not only in
the sounds, but in the number of syllables, and presumably in the stress patterns. One
of this author’s students, upon learning the likely connection between the Celtic
numbers and this nursery rhyme involving a clock, made the interesting observation
that on the face of a clock, the numbers eight, nine, and ten, corresponding to hickory,
dickory, dock, are going up the clock, just as the nursery rhyme suggests about the
direction the mouse is going.

Opie & Opie provide another illustration of the alternative Celtic counting numbers that
seem to have made their way into nursery rhymes, in this case as part of a common
type of “counting-out rhymes” (Opie & Opie 1997: 11-14 provides a discussion of
counting-out rhymes). Counting-out rhymes are used “when children wish to play a
game in which one of their number must take a part different from, and therefore
usually disliked by, the rest” (Opie & Opie 1997: 11). The counting-out rhymes are
thus “used to choose who is ‘It’” (Kroupová 2014: 23).

Many English speakers are familiar with a counting-out rhyme that appears in various
forms, such as the following version, in which italics have been added:

Eena, meena, mina, mo,

Catch a tigger by his toe;
If he squeals, let him go,
Eena, meena, mina, mo. (Opie & Opie 1955: 111)

The italicized words in this counting-out rhyme may be compared with a version of the
alternative Celtic numbers, this time not from Westmorland but from Yarmouth:

ina one
mina two
tethera three

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methera four (Opie & Opie 1997: 13)

Opie and Opie, in speaking of the familiar counting out rhymes [such as those with
“eenie, meenie . . . .”], explain that “great antiquity was attached to these pieces well
before 1820. The tradition in England was that counting-out rhymes were remnants of
formulas used by the Druids for choosing human sacrifices” (Opie & Opie 1997: 12).
The proposed antiquity and purpose behind these little counting-out rhymes are
sobering to consider.

5.2 Cognates

When studying the lexical development in a language, it is sometimes important to

consider the cognates it shares with other languages. Cognates of course are “words
in related languages that developed from the same ancestral root” (Fromkin et al.
2014: 364). English and German, both from the Germanic branch of Indo-European
languages, share various cognates. For example, the English words hound and bread
closely resemble their German cognate equivalents (Hund and Brot, respectively).
One interesting cognate to compare with its counterpart in German is the word sore,
one of the older English modifying adverbs (the focus here not being on the adjective
sense that means 'painful' ), which was more widely used in the language before it
was replaced by other modifiers such as the French word very. The English word sore
is a cognate of the German sehr, which it resembles (though the initial consonant in
sehr is voiced), and it is documented in the KJV. It appears, for example, in Luke 2: 9,
where the nativity story describes the shepherds as “sore afraid,” in other words 'very
afraid' or 'greatly afraid‘. Algeo & Butcher (2014: 240) and Ayto (1990: 490) provide a
discussion of sore along these lines). Its use also appears in the following Mother
Goose text:

There dwelt an old woman at Exeter;

When visitors came it sore vexed her,
So for fear they should eat,
She locked up all her meat,
This stingy old woman of Exeter. (Real 1916: 128)

Cognate comparisons can also be made between English words of Germanic origin
and those from more distantly related languages on the Romance branch of
Indo-European, such as Latin, French, Spanish, or Italian. Given the extensive bor-
rowing that English has done from Latin and French, such cognate comparisons can
even occur between the Romance and Germanic vocabulary within the English
language. The cognate sets of inherited Germanic vocabulary and the Romance
borrowings will sometimes look quite different from each other. But even though their
cognate relationship is not as visibly apparent on the surface, many of their dif-
ferences can be accounted for through systematic sound correspondences that were
identified by Jacob Grimm.19 Grimm posited a series of sound changes that de-

19
Grimm was building on the work of others, notably Rasmus Rask (Fromkin et al. 2014:
362-363). It may interest some students to learn that Jacob Grimm is one of the famous
Grimm brothers, who are known for their collection of fairy tales. Grimm, however, is
famous among linguists for his work in Germanic linguistics. It is humorous here to note that
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veloped between Indo-European and its descendant branch of Germanic, thus often
serving to account for some of the differences between Germanic languages (such as
English, German, or Dutch) versus other non-Germanic Indo-European descendant
languages, which did not undergo those same sound changes described by Grimm’s
Law. For example, he showed that while Indo-European /p/ came down as /p/ in many
of the descendant languages of Indo-European, it was altered to /f/ in the Germanic
branch of languages (thus subsequently affecting English and German). This explains
how Latin pater, Spanish padre, and Italian padre with their initial /p/ are related to
English father and to German Vater (pronounced with an initial /f/). Within the English
language, the Germanic-based word fatherly can be compared with its
Romance-based cognate paternal (Claiborne 1983: 46), which was a later borrowing
into English. The correspondence of /p/ and /f/ is just one of the systematic sound
correspondences identified by Grimm (Claiborne 1983: 46; Algeo & Butcher 2014:
76-78; and Fromkin et al. 2014: 363-365). And there are many cognate comparisons
in relation to Grimm’s Law that can be made within the English language itself
because of the Germanic words it has inherited from its Germanic heritage and
because of the extensive number of Romance borrowings it has acquired along the
way.

Such cognate pairs, of course, are not likely to be found together in Mother Goose
texts. How likely, for example, would both father and paternal occur together in these
folk texts? But this does not mean that there are no words within the text that could
lead to an interesting discussion about cognates and the kinds of systematic sound
correspondences outlined in Grimm’s Law. Consider the opening lines of Little Boy
Blue:

Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn;

The sheep’s in the meadow, the cow’s in the corn. (Miller 1971: 33)

The two lines above both end in words that can be effectively used to illustrate two
separate sound developments from Indo-European to the Germanic branch (and
subsequently English) that were identified by Grimm:

Indo-European /k/ became /h/.20

Indo-European /g/ became /k/.

Thus, the Germanic-based English word horn in the rhyme may be compared with the
Romance cognate corn that we have in English (or corne, as in licorne; not to be
confused with the coincidentally similar form concluding the next line of the text). The
Indo-European /k/ had changed to the /h/ of English but remained /k/ in the Romance
languages from which the language would subsequently borrow some words. This is

at this point in the paper, a linguistic intersection of sorts occurs between Mother Goose
rhymes and fairy tales.
20
The Indo-European /k/ actually became the Germanic /x/, a sound like the middle
consonant sound in the modern German word Nacht. In English this /x/ sound often de-
veloped into /h/ (Fromkin et al. 2014: 363). Since the focus here is on English, a type of
shorthand description will be used to speak of the Indo-European /k/ becoming /h/.
For a listing of the sound correspondences of Grimm’s Law, as well as a discussion of a few
of the upcoming examples in this paragraph and their contextualization within Grimm’s Law:
Claiborne 1983, 46; Algeo & Butcher 2014, 76-78; and Fromkin et al. 2014: 363-365.

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evident in the Romance root cognate, corn, in borrowed words like unicorn (literally a
creature with “one horn”) and cornet (literally, a small horn). Now moving to the
second line of the Mother Goose text, the Germanic-based English word corn may be
compared with its Romance-based cognate grain, which was later borrowed
(Indo-European /g/ became the /k/ of English but remained /g/ in the Romance
languages from which the English language borrowed words). By the way, the English
word corn is also distinct in appearance from the borrowed cognate grain because the
English word has apparently also undergone metathesis (switching the order of the
r-consonant and vowel) in its development from the Indo-European root (Watkins
2000: 33 for the reconstructed Indo-European root gr̥ǝ-no-).

One other cognate example involving the sound correspondence of /g/ becoming /k/
may be discussed in relation to a now distinctive word in a nursery rhyme about Robin
Hood, an excerpt of which is provided below:

Robin Hood, Robin Hood,

Is in the mickle wood;
Little John, Little John,
He to the town is gone. (Delamar 1987: 109)

In this text the word mickle (meaning 'great' [or 'large']), with its /k/ sound, is a cognate
with Romance words like the Latin magnus, with its /g/ sound, and the Romance
borrowings of magnificent and magnify. It may also be compared with the Greek form
mega- (Watkins 2000: 52 for the Indo-European root meg- ). The adjective word
mickle has been preserved in regional varieties in Scotland and northern England
(The Oxford English Dictionary, 2021 (https://oed.com), entry “mickle“). But it has
largely disappeared from many other varieties of English (Entry for “mickle,” The
Oxford English Dictionary, 2021, https://oed.com), though a related form, as Watkins
(2000: 52) notes, is found in the English word much, now subsequently pronounced
very differently in its final consonant sound.

6 Illustrating Semantic Change

Another development to consider within the Mother Goose rhymes involves semantic
changes that have affected various words. Words can go a variety of directions in their
meanings through time. Historical linguistics courses commonly consider such
changes as generalization, by which a word takes on a broader or more general
meaning; as specialization, by which a word takes on a narrower or more specialized
meaning; as amelioration, by which a word takes on a more positive meaning; and
pejoration, by which a word takes on a more negative meaning. It would take too
much time here to explore each of these, but some examples from Mother Goose
rhymes will be examined with regards to specialization. Specialization is well illus-
trated in the same excerpt that was previously shown from Little Boy Blue. This time
the excerpt will be used to illustrate a historical change in semantics rather than
sounds:

Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn;

The sheep’s in the meadow, the cow’s in the corn. (Miller 1971: 33)

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This excerpt shows that the word corn had a more generalized meaning from what it
now denotes, at least in current American English, where it has narrowed to refer to
the particular type of grain that some call “maize“. But with regards to the earlier time
period and setting of this nursery rhyme, Barry (2017: 187) explains that “British
English used ‘corn’ to mean any cereal grain, such as wheat, barley, rye, or maize,
until fairly recent times”.

A similar specialization of the word corn can be evident to readers of the KJV (Elliott
1967: 42), which was published in England in 1611. The biblical passage in Matthew
12:1 explains that “Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn.” This verse has
perhaps perplexed some modern readers, since the plant that is so commonly
referred to as corn today was discovered in America and did not come to the Old
World until after Columbus’s voyage. But the Scripture is not anachronistic, since the
term is part of a translation, and to the extent that the semantic narrowing being
considered here occurred in British English, it appears not to have become wide-
spread in that variety until well after the KJV was prepared (First noun entry for “corn”
[subentry about “maize”], The Oxford English Dictionary, 2021, https://oed.com). One
Bible Dictionary, in fact, is careful to clarify that “Indian corn (maize) ... is not the corn
of the Bible” (“Bible Dictionary” 1979: 650).

Specialization does not just operate to narrow one specific meaning but can instead
narrow a range of meanings, reducing the number of potential senses (Barber 1997:
247). This type of specialization occurred in the meanings of the word meat, which in
the Early Modern English period conveyed the general meaning of 'food', as well as its
more particular meaning of animal flesh, but which has since narrowed that range of
meanings to indicate primarily the latter, specialized sense (Barber 1997: 247-248).
Without an understanding of the earlier possible meaning, however, the following
Mother Goose lullaby, which speaks of grinding wheat in order to provide meat, does
not make sense:

Hush thee, my babby,

Lie still with thy daddy,
Thy mammy has gone to the mill,
To grind thee some wheat
To make thee some meat,
So hush-a-bye, babby, lie still. (Opie & Opie 1955: 18)

The same kind of older meaning for meat is evident in the KJV in Matthew 25:35,
where the general use of meat is juxtaposed with drink. It is also apparent in Leviticus
2:1, where the meat offering for the Lord is identified as consisting of oil, flour, and
frankincense.21

A narrowing in the range of possible meanings has also affected the verb tell. Among
its senses that were possible in an earlier time was the meaning 'to count' (Elliott 1967:
194), which explains why banks have the occupational title of teller, a carryover from

21
The older meaning of meat and some illustrative references are briefly noted in the “Bible
Dictionary” (1979: 729-730) of The Holy Bible, published by The Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints. Unlike many English-speaking members of some other Christian
churches, who now regularly use newer English translations of the Bible, the
English-speaking Latter-day Saints continue to use the King James Version of the Bible.

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the earlier meaning. The occupational title is not referring to someone who shares
information, but instead to someone who counts money. Similarly, in the KJV, when
the Lord promises the prophet Abram (Abraham) a large posterity and wants him to
understand the scope of that promise, the Lord directs him to “tell the stars” (Genesis
15: 5, Elliott 1967: 194). Here, the Lord is not commanding Abraham to talk to the
stars but instead to count them. This older meaning, which has since largely
disappeared from the language, is also available in the following excerpt from the
previously mentioned Mother Goose rhyme about Robin Hood:

Robin Hood, Robin Hood,

Is telling his beads,
All in the green wood,
Among the green weeds. (Delamar 1987: 109)

In this excerpt, Robin Hood is counting his beads, certainly not talking to them. The
same use of tell to mean 'count' also seems to be used in the following nursery rhyme:

If I’d as much money

As I could tell,
I never would cry,
Old clothes to sell!
Old clothes to sell!
Old clothes to sell!
I never would cry,
Old clothes to sell! (Opie & Opie 1955: 73)

In the above text, although the verb tell could possibly be used to mean 'report on an
amount of money', it is more likely being used with the meaning of 'counting'. In other
words, if the person in the poem had as much money as he or she could count, then it
would not be necessary to sell old clothes.

7 Conclusion

Mother Goose and other nursery rhymes are valuable authentic texts that can be
usefully applied pedagogically in a variety of ways. Some previous research has
indicated that they help small children develop phonological awareness, which
benefits them later when they begin to learn to read (e.g., Harper 2011 and Bryant et
al. 1989). Moreover, taken as a group, they are linguistically rich examples of word
play and cover an impressive array of topics, genres, and language artistry. In the
conclusion to her article about Mother Goose rhymes, Vocca (2001) notes Walter de
La Mare’s observation that many of the nursery rhymes are “tiny masterpieces of
verbal craftsmanship.”22 But as it turns out, they are also memorable texts that can

22
Vocca 2001: 561-562. De La Mare’s statement is found in an introduction he provided for
Nursery Rhymes for Certain Times. The brief quotation here from De La Mare, which differs
slightly from the way Vocca reports it, is taken from page 7 of an earlier edition than what
Vocca consulted.

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effectively illustrate particular historical aspects of language structure, behavior, and

change.

References

Algeo, John, & Carmen Acevedo Butcher (2014). The Origins and Development of the English
Language, 7th ed. Boston: Wadsworth / Cengage Learning.
Arlotto, Anthony (1972). Introduction to Historical Linguistics. Lanham, MD: University Press
of America.
Armenti, Peter (2016). “Is it ‘Four Calling Birds’ or ‘Four Colly Birds’? A ‘Twelve Days of
Christmas’ Debate.” 21 Dec. 2016. From the Catbird Seat: Poetry & Literature at the
Library of Congress. (blogs.loc.gov/catbird/2016/12/is-it-four-calling-birds-or-four-colly-
birds-a-twelve-days-of-christmas-debate; 15-03-2021).
Ayto, John (1990). Dictionary of Word Origins. New York: Arcade Publishing.
Barber, Charles (1997). Early Modern English. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP.
Barry, Debbie (2017). What Mother Goose Meant: Deconstructing Popular Nursery Rhymes
in English. Clarkston, MI: n.p.
Baugh, Albert C., & Thomas Cable (1993). A History of the English Language, 4th ed.
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Bender, James F., compiler (1943). NBC Handbook of Pronunciation. New York: Thomas Y.
Crowell Co.
“Bible Dictionary” (1979). Appendix to The Holy Bible. Authorized King James Version. Salt
Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Bryant, P. E., L. Bradley, M. Maclean, & J. Crossland (1989). “Nursery Rhymes, Phonological
Skills and Reading.” Journal of Child Language 16: 2, 407-428.
Burridge, Kate (2004). Blooming English: Observations on the Roots, Cultivation and Hybrids
of the English Language. Cambridge: Cambridge UP.
Burridge, Kate (2005). Weeds in the Garden of Words: Further Observations on the Tangled
History of the English Language. Cambridge: Cambridge UP.
Churchill, Winston S. (1930). A Roving Commission: My Early Life. New York: Charles
Scribner’s Sons.
Claiborne, Robert (1983). Our Marvelous Native Tongue: The Life and Times of the English
Language. New York: Times Books.
Copeland, David E., & Gabriel A. Radvansky (2001). “Phonological Similarity in Working
Memory.” Memory & Cognition 29: 5, 774-776.
Crystal, David (2004). The Stories of English. Woodstock, NY & New York: The Overlook
Press.
Crystal, David (2007). The Fight for English: How Language Pundits Ate, Shot, and Left.
Oxford & New York: Oxford UP.

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Delamar, Gloria T. (1987). Mother Goose: From Nursery to Literature. Jefferson, N.C. &
London: McFarland & Company, Inc.
Elliott, Melvin E. (1967). The Language of the King James Bible: A Glossary Explaining its
Words and Expressions. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co.
Elster, Charles Harrington (1999). The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations: The Complete
Opinionated Guide for the Careful Speaker. Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin Co.
Favorite Rhymes of Mother Goose (1923). Illus., M. L. Kirk. New York: Cupples & Leon Co.
Fromkin, Victoria, Robert Rodman, & Nina Hyams (2014). An Introduction to Language, 10th
ed. Boston: Wadsworth / Cengage Learning.
Goodwin, Doris Kearns (2005). Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. New
York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.
Harper, Laurie J. (2011). “Nursery Rhyme Knowledge and Phonological Awareness in
Preschool Children.” The Journal of Language and Literacy Education 7:1, 65-78.
Jones, Daniel (1926). An English Pronouncing Dictionary, Revised ed. London & Toronto: J.
M. Dent & Sons Ltd.
Jones, Daniel (2003). Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 16th ed., edited by Peter
Roach, James Hartman, & Jane Setter. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge UP.
Kenyon, John Samuel (1935). American Pronunciation: A Textbook of Phonetics for Students
of English, 6th ed., Revised. Ann Arbor, MI: George Wahr.
Kenyon, John S. (1948). “Levels of Speech and Colloquial English.” The English Journal 37:
1, 25-31.
Kroupová, Iva (2014). Linguistic (and Methodological) Aspects of English Nursery Rhymes.
Masters Thesis. Masaryk University.
Lindstromberg, Seth, & Frank Boers (2008). “The Mnemonic Effect of Noticing Alliteration in
Lexical Chunks.” Applied Linguistics 29: 2, 200-222.
Lobel, Arnold, ed. and illustrator (1986). The Random House Book of Mother Goose. New
York: Random House.
Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed. (2020). Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster,
Inc.
Miller, Olive Beaupré, ed. (1971). In the Nursery of My Book House. Lake Bluff, IL: The Book
House for Children.
Nursery Rhymes for Certain Times (1946). With drawings by Elinor Darwin and an introduc-
tion by Walter de La Mare. London: Faber & Faber Ltd.
Opie, Iona, & Peter Opie, compilers (1955). The Oxford Nursery Rhyme Book. Oxford: Oxford
UP.
Opie, Iona, & Peter Opie, eds. (1997). The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, 2nd ed.
Oxford & New York: Oxford UP.
The Oxford English Dictionary (2021). Oxford: Oxford UP. (https://oed.com).
The Real Mother Goose (1916). Illus., Blanche Fisher Wright. Chicago: Rand McNally & Co.
Rubin, David C. (1995). Memory in Oral Traditions: The Cognitive Psychology of Epic, Ballads,
and Counting-out Rhymes. New York & Oxford: Oxford UP.

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Rubin, David C., Violeta Ciobanu, & William Langston (1997). “Children’s Memory for
Counting-out Rhymes: A Cross-language Comparison.” Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 4:
3, 421-424.
Stageberg, Norman C., & Dallin D. Oaks (2000). An Introductory English Grammar, 5th ed.
Fort Worth: Harcourt College Publishers.
Vocca, Donarita (2001). “Mother Goose.” In Cullinan, Bernice E., & Diane G. Person (eds.).
The Continuum Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature. New York & London: Continuum,
560-562.
Walker, John (1791). A Critical Pronouncing Dictionary and Expositor of the English
Language. London: G. G. J. & J. Robinson; and T. Cadell. [Accessed through a Scolar
Press Facsimile edition (1968). Menston, England: The Scolar Press Ltd.].
Watkins, Calvert, ed. (2000). The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, 2nd
ed. Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin.
Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage (1989). Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster Inc.
Wolman, David (2008). Righting the Mother Tongue: From Olde English to Email, the Tangled
Story of English Spelling. New York: Smithsonian Books.
Yule, George (2017). The Study of Language, 6th ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP.

Author:

Dallin D. Oaks
Associate Professor of Linguistics
Brigham Young University
College of Humanities
Provo (Utah)
USA
Email: dallin_oaks@byu.edu

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The Role of the Teacher in the Foreign Language

Classroom – Past, Recent and Modern Developments

Thomas Tinnefeld (Saarbrücken, Germany)

Abstract

In the present article, the teacher‘s role in the foreign general language and the LSP class-
room is analysed with reference to the past seventy years, and modern developments, which
cover the period from March 2020 to the near future, are taken into account. In retrospective,
a glace is cast on the grammar-translation method and the audio-lingual method. The recent
developments dealt with cover the communicative approach and the constructivist approach,
both of which are still widely used nowadays. The modern developments described refer to
the virtual classroom and online teaching. In the article, it is shown that the teacher‘s role in
the foreign language classroom from the 1950s to the present day (and certainly further into
the future) has changed drastically: whereas up to the late 1970s, the teacher lived a relatively
calm and steady life, with his or her role in the classroom being well-defined and stable, his or
her role has undergone rapid changes ever since, with the latest developments speeding up
this process even more. In accordance with this development, the teacher‘s importance has
shown a certain volatility, starting from a relatively high level, then going down and now rising
again. Inversely proportional, the complexity of his or her work has constantly increased and
will continue doing so. This implies that the teaching profession has become a highly complex,
dynamic and future-oriented field of activity.
Keywords: Teacher, teacher‘s role, foreign languages, languages for specific purposes gram-
mar-translation method, audio-lingual method, communicative approach, con-
structivist approach, virtual classroom, job complexity

1 Introduction

The role of the teacher has changed drastically in the past seventy years. This is what
is shown in the present paper.

From a macro-structural perspective, the teacher has the following functions and
roles:

 Mediator of learning
 Disciplinarian or controller of student behaviour
 Parent substitute
 Confidant to students
 Judge of achievement
 Organizer of curriculum

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 Bureaucrat
 Scholar and research specialist
 Member of teachers’ organization
 Roles in the community
 Public servant
 Surrogate of middle-class morality
 Expert in some area of knowledge or skills
 Community leader
 Agent of social change
(Havighurst 2021)

In the following, the focus will be on the micro-structural perspective. On this level, the
teacher’s role has constantly been questioned or redefined through time (e.g. Ed-
wards 2005, Block 2015 or Johnson 2019 for the 21st century). It is not our purpose to
“rewrite” the history of recent language methodology. This is why many aspects of
what is dealt with in the following is common methodological knowledge. Instead, our
purpose is to show how drastically the role of the teacher in the foreign language
classroom has changed over time.

Whereas he or she used to be the only source of knowledge in the foreign-language

classroom, nowadays, his or her1 role has been reduced to that of a language advisor
23

and learning facilitator.

We will take a closer look at this development and analyse the question of whether
there has really been such a drastic reduction in his role (and also in his importance),
and what the situation is like inclusive of the latest developments, i.e. virtual teaching.

The focus of the reflections to be made here is on the general language. The teaching
of languages for specific purposes (LSP) is, however, dealt with as well, especially in
those cases where the teacher's role differs from that of teaching general English,
French, German, etc.

In doing so, we start from the situation that presented itself in Germany in the different
periods that will be taken into consideration. In many respects, however, this situation
was and is not limited to this country only; in other respects, it was and may have
been.

2 The Teacher's Role in the Past

The teacher’s role in the past concerns the two approaches which were widely used
between the 1950s and the 1970s, i.e. the grammar-translation approach and the
audio-lingual approach. These two approaches will be dealt with first.

123
For reasons of reader friendliness, we will use the masculine form from now on, yet in-
cluding all the other genders.

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2.1 Grammar-Translation Method

The grammar-translation method (Weihua 2004: 250ff) was based on the teaching of
the ancient languages Latin and Greek and consisted in students learning the
underlying gram- matical rules and applying them by translating sentences from their
mother tongue into the foreign language and vice versa. This method was and has
been criticized for its downsides (Zhou & Niu 2015: 798). In the framework of the
gram- mar-translation method (e.g. Howatt 204: 151ff), which was predominantly in
use from the 1840s to the 1940s and is still not out of use today (Richards & Rodgers
2001: 6), the teacher was the only expert in class. He incited learners to speak, giving
them clear guidelines of what they had to say. The focus was on the training of the
respective grammar chapter to be learnt. After the presentation of the rules and
relevant features of a given construction, which was, of course, done by the teacher
himself, that construction needed to be further practised, and there again, the teacher
was in the "limelight", closely guiding students in how they had to organise the
sentences they produced.

Instructions like the following one are an example of the teachers role and behaviour
back then:

Imagine you are at a German train station and you would like to buy a ticket to Frankfurt.
What would you say?

Learners were expected to come up with the respective German sentence and were
either praised or corrected. As the very sentence was in the centre of interest, and not
the situation – neither the general nor the learner's one – every single mistake made
by learners was corrected by the teacher immediately. The teacher was the only
authority to decide what was right and what was wrong. The pupils’ role was only a
passive one; they did nothing but respond to their teacher.

The interaction that took place in the classroom was authority-oriented, the teacher
being in a situation of “absolute power”. Communication did not take place and was
not even desirable. In the grammar-translation method, the teacher’s role was
well-defined. He
 was the authority in terms of his position, being “the boss in the classroom”,
 determined what was being done and, even more precisely, what was being
said,
 was uncontested in his position,
 decided what was right and what was wrong,
 was the only person to give input,
 was the only active part, the learners being the passive ones.

This role of his, then, may have been the strongest one in the language classroom
ever. Since then, it has never been as authoritative as that.

In the grammar-translation era, the teaching of LSP was only a marginal phenomenon
and was limited to people who needed some additional qualification or skills for their
jobs.

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2.2 The Teacher's Role in the Audio-Lingual Method

As there are several realisations of what is generally called the ‘audio-lingual method’,
developed after World War II by Charles Fries (e.g. Richards & Rogers 2001: 58ff,
Mukalel 1998: 78ff, Larsen-Freeman 2000: 35ff) and which was based on the be-
haviourist principle of stimulus, response and reinforcement (Reimann 2018), and
which focused on imitation and repetition, one specific aspect will be used as an
example here: pattern drill.

Pattern drill consists in modifying a given grammatical or sentence structure according

to an underlying example (‘pattern’). Its immediate effects can be described as follows.
Pattern drill:
 represents a (mechanical) training of a given linguistic structure which re-
mains the same within one and the same exercise,
 resides in intended repetition, which is to lead to learning,
 follows a learning style which is more or less equivalent to rote learning,
 gives learners the feeling of ‘producing’ correct sentences, as the variations
they are expected to perform remain within a well-defined linguistic range,
 can – in optimal cases – enable learners to acquire grammar without learning
any explicit rules,
 may – although this has not really been acknowledged in the literature – incite
learners to form their own grammar, by (explicitly or implicitly) making their
own rules on the basis of the sentences they transform.

The following example may illustrate this:

Peter will go to London in June. (be) – He has never been to London.

Make sentences, starting from this example:

Jane will buy a car soon. (have)

Mary is looking forward to wearing her new mini-dress. (wear)

Paul will certainly enjoy the late night show. (watch)

This example can be a written one, figuring in a textbook, or a spoken one,

constituting the so-called four-phase drill.

In the context of the audio-lingual method, the role of the teacher was rather limited as
well. Unlike the audio-lingual method, he would not even set the thematic frame of
what was said, as this frame was given by the learning material. What was important
for him to do, however, was to supervise learners and give them feedback with
respect to the “guided” sentences they made. In this vein, he was the ‘corrector’ in a
way rather similar to what he did in the context of the grammar-translation method. In
detail, the teachers’ role consisted in:
 supervising the learners’ sentence(s);
 providing correction feedback to learners, however, within very narrow,
well-defined margins;

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 giving students information about grammar (written) or pronunciation (oral) ,

which does, however, not necessarily have to be as deep as it is the case in
the realm of the audiolingual approach;
 being a learning guide rather than an “omniscient” expert;
 still being the expert in the room, who can, however, show off his expertise
within a relatively small range only.

With regards to the language variety taught, LSP then became more important and
was taught in Business English, commercial correspondence or technical English
courses, for example. The teacher's role was more or less the same as in the general
foreign language classroom.
What was taught in LSP was the specific language variety in question, i.e.
predominantly vocabulary. Other linguistic levels like syntax were also taken into con-
sideration, but they were of secondary importance only.
Content was taught by defining the respective technical terms to be taught. Sound
background knowledge was not considered highly necessary as long as students
roughly knew what these technical terms meant. Students working in the field could
bring in their professional knowledge, but did not have to, and teachers oftentimes
could not check anyway because they were not experts in that field. The teacher's
expertise, then, predominantly was on language as was the case in the general
language classroom, the specific field just representing the "background" against
which language was taught.
It is obvious, then, that the teacher’s role was more limited in the audio-lingual
approach as compared to the grammar-translation method. He was still the expert in
the classroom, but no longer the authoritative master whom learners totally depended
on. Yet, he was still far away from being a learning partner.
It is clear, then, that in these stages of language teaching, the role of the teacher was
rather simple and easy to perform.

3 The Teacher's Role in Recent Language Teaching

The role of the teacher in recent developments, i.e. in modern language instruction,
concerns the communicative approach and the constructivist approach. These two
approaches represent the most important currents which were widely employed in
foreign language teaching and had the biggest impact in this phase which covers the
period up to 2020. In comparison with the grammar translation method and the
audio-lingual method, the teacher’s role was gradually becoming more complex.

3.1 The Communicative Approach

The most prevalent aspect within the communicative approach (e.g. Larsen-Freeman
2000: 121ff, Richards 2006, Richards & Rodgers 2001: 83ff, Farrell & Jacobs 2020:
1ff), which emphasises interaction, is the fact that it is no longer the correctness of
what learners say or write, but the content they utter and the interaction this content
triggers which are of importance. In the 1970s in Germany, for example, the so-called

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“communicative change” (e.g. Piepho 1974) revolutionized the whole paradigm of

language methodology and teaching, shifting the focus away from language towards
communication and interaction. One of the consequences of this shift was that learn-
ers, who had up to then been afraid of uttering sentences or even longer statements
because of the sanctions they had to endure for mistakes they made (e.g. immediate
correction and loss of face), then interacted a lot more in class and felt a lot more
freedom, knowing that there would not be any sanctions for errors, but their ut-
terances became extremely faulty at times and the number of the mistakes they made
doubled or even tripled. Whereas there had been relative silence in the classroom
before, with this shift, there was liveliness but learners’ mistakes oftentimes
represented considerable obstacles for communication.

The teacher’s role changed in accordance with these modifications. He was the very
person in class to elicit learner's utterances and discussions, but his linguistic exper-
tise was no longer in the foreground. In detail, the teacher’s role was to:
 generally elicit student interaction and discussions,
 have a concrete idea about the content to be taught so as to elicit and
maintain classroom discussions,
 constantly motivate students to be active in class,
 praise them for their contributions to interaction and discussions,
 correct their mistakes, but only those which really would represent obstacles
to communication and even make fruitful interaction impossible, with smaller
mistakes remaining uncorrected and even unnoticed,
 disguise his own language expertise and only have it show when this would
be really necessary, thus seeing his role of an expert reduced to a minimum,
 play a interactive role comparable to that of a “show host” on TV, and
 to “endure” the fact that nonlinguistic factors like students’ ability to communi-
cate and their interaction capacity were much more important than linguistic
factors like students’ mastery of grammar and vocabulary and their system-
atic understanding of the language.

The role of the teacher in the LSP classroom was exactly the same. Whereas the
general language teacher needed to have rather a concrete idea about the content of
the extralinguistic topics he dealt with in class, the LSP teacher had to master his
subject (e.g. business, law or engineering) much better than had been the case in the
contexts of the previous two methods. Yet, he remained a pure language teacher, his
subject expertise not in the least being comparable to that of a content teacher.
Within this approach, the LSP teacher took the role of a content-course teacher as
much as that of a language teacher, integrating both language and content, thus fol-
lowing CLIL, to a certain extent. Within this approach, he was much more of a subject
expert than he had ever been before. His foreign language expertise was functionally
complemented by his, mostly self-taught, content knowledge. In some cases where
schools or universities were financially well-equipped, the option of team teaching was
put into practice, with the language teacher and a content course teacher acting in the
classroom together or taking turns, sharing half of the teaching hours in a given class
or university course each.
This phase can be seen in parallel and in accordance with the question of whether it
should be the language teacher or the content-course teacher who should be the in-

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structor in LSP classes, which was asked as a logical consequence of the fact that
there was an increasing demand of expert knowledge in terms of the content to be
taught. Back then, the answer given to this question was that this work should be
done by the language teacher. Thus, language and linguistic expertise were valued
higher than expertise in content.
Clearly, within this new method, the teacher’s role changed drastically, his ‘impor-
tance‘ in class war belittled and he was a kind of primus inter pares, the first among
his peers, but no longer the expert, the ‘administrator of knowledge‘ who determined
students’ behaviour and the interaction taking place in the classroom.

3.2 The Constructivist Approach

“Constructivism represents the shift from education based on behaviorism, to

education based on cognitive theory” (Aljonahi 2017: 97). As there are several types
of constructivist approaches and, inside them, different settings of classroom activities,
it is necessary to narrow these down. Constructivist classroom activities (e.g.
Kaufman 2004: 303ff, Roberts 2016: 25ff) are action-oriented, one of the prominent
examples being projects and tasks to be performed by students. Thus, a highly
important activity type which will be considered in the following is task-based learning.
The stress on learning is intentionally put because it is learning which is in the focus of
this approach, not so much teaching. Students are expected to work on projects or
tasks which are characterised by a certain complexity. Language production is of high
importance, but on the surface level only; the problems posed or the project to be
realised are in the foreground. Thus, as was the case in the communicative approach,
language correctness is not the most important factor and only gains importance
when communication might be hindered.
In this approach again, the teacher’s role has changed:
The day-to-day job of a teacher, rather than broadcasting content, is becoming one of
designing and guiding students through engaging learning opportunities. An educator's
most important responsibility is to search out and construct meaningful educational ex-
periences that allow students to solve real-world problems and show they have learned
the big ideas, powerful skills, and habits of mind and heart that meet agreed-on educa-
tional standards. The result is that the abstract, inert knowledge that students used to
memorize from dusty textbooks comes alive as they participate in the creation and exten-
sion of new knowledge. (Taack Lanier 1997)

The teacher, then, is no longer the moderator or ‘show host‘, but performs a function
in class which is that of enabling students to learn or facilitating their learning. In this
approach, the teacher's role is to:
 find and define tasks or projects that students have to work on;
 set the rules to be followed so as to reach the target set by the teacher;
 supervise students’ interaction, mostly in group work and hopefully performed
using the foreign language;
 judge their project- or task-based performance and decides when working on
it is completed;
 comment on students’ presentations in which they report their findings to the
class;

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 have a precise idea about the extra-linguistic content to be taught – not really
expert knowledge, but close to it;
 possibly correct linguistic errors, but predominantly only those which may
lead to confusion or misunderstandings;
 work in a content- rather than a language based context;
 no longer be the authority or the expert in the classroom but a learning
partner who suggests guidelines which can or need not be followed, and
hierarchically act sightly above students, with not much of a difference
existing between them and himself.

As far as the LSP teacher is concerned, the constructivist approach can be seen in
connection with a relatively new development, which consists in CLIL, i.e. Content and
Language Integrated Learning2 (Richards & Rogers 2001: 116ff). Although there are
24

different subtypes of CLIL, its main feature is the fact that the respective language for
specific purposes is no longer the very centre of interest, but has become no more
than a side product of teaching, the main focus now residing on the content itself.
Accordingly, the LSP teacher has lost much of his importance because the very LSP
‘teaching’ has been taken over by the content instructor. This shift from the language
teacher to the content-course instructor represents an unprecedented paradigm
change. It implies a re-orientation away from linguistic competence towards the nearly
exclusively important, factual competence which can be situated in the logics of the
constructivist approach. In reality, this often means that the linguistically competent
LSP teacher has been replaced by the content-oriented expert whose foreign
language competence is oftentimes more than limited – a statement which is even
more true at universities than at grammar schools, where it is more often than not the
con-tent-course teacher who, for example, also is a biologist, who teaches biology
through English.
In courses in which the language expert still teaches LSP, his importance corresponds
exactly to what was said about the general-language teacher. In (CLIL) contexts,
however, in which it is the content-course instructor who teaches LSP ‘in passing’, the
language teacher has lost his function. In many cases, this constellation means the
end of (fruitful LSP) teaching. If this counterproductive paradigm change is not cor-
rected soon by defining clear guidelines, this loss in LSP teaching will be perpetuated.
The only way of getting back to the right path would be to define clear guidelines
between the (factual and administrative) competence of the language teacher and the
content teacher, and to employ both in terms of their respective forte.
It is obvious, then, that in the framework of this approach, the teacher’s role has
continued changing and that his ‘importance‘ in class has been reduced even more.
Yet, the complexity of his role has increased considerably, which is also due to the
reduction of his (authoritative) importance in class: he has to be very cautious with his
pupils or students, even walking on his tiptoes at times. This means that his reduced
importance and the complexity of his task are inversely proportional.

2 24
To facilitate our approach to CLIL, we treat it as an umbrella term for immersion, con-
tent-based instruction (CBI), content-based language teaching (CBLT), and English as a
medium of instruction (EMI).

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4 The Teacher’s Role Today

4.1 The Virtual Classroom

With the pandemic that began taking effect on all our lives in March 2020 and which is
still going on, (language) instructors have faced and – in more positive words – ex-
perienced dramatic changes in our daily teaching practices. From one week to the
next, numerous instructors switched from traditional on-site teaching to on-line
teaching. In some cases, this process was rather smooth, in others it represented a
considerable challenge. This means that the modern era of foreign language teaching
began in 2020.
Never mind the individual problems they had, never mind the potential advantages
they saw, the role of instructors has changed drastically ever since, and it may never
be back to its former status quo. With this new phase, the importance of the com-
plexity of the teacher’s role has seen a boost.
Obviously, the 'virtual teacher' can act within all the four methods dealt with before. As,
however, only the communicative and the constructivist approach are based on inter-
action, we will only consider those two as far as on-line teaching is concerned. Due to
this highly important common basis, they can be dealt with together here, as the
differences which exist between them and which affect on-line instruction are minimal.
The teacher's role as described for both of them beforehand can certainly be trans-
ferred to on-line instruction. In this context, however, the question of what comes extra
needs to be clarified. This question will be the object of our upcoming reflections.
Being ‘together‘ in a virtual room in Zoom, Teams or any comparable video-confer-
encing or educational platform obviously is not the same as genuinely being together
in a 'real' classroom. Whereas in this on-site setting, togetherness can be physically
felt, making the group that interacts into an undeniable entity, in a virtual classroom,
students appear to be a loose group, i.e. clearly separated individuals, who are not
only geographically apart from each other, but who can evade the situation at any time
by muting their cameras and / or microphones. This chance of getting out of the
situation and still appearing to ‘be there‘, just because their names are still on the list
of participants who, presumably, are present, may constitute a comfortable situation
for students – for teachers, however, it is a most unpleasant and even problematic
one. The same is true when students claim they are having bandwidth or any other
kind of technical problems and, thus, may just be 'gone'. Be it that such problems are
real, be it that they are invented or faked, they do not make the teacher's life easier.
The only way teachers can master problems of this type, which are not caused by
technology, is to make their instruction as interesting and as attractive as possible.
The only remaining question is: how?
More than ever before, the virtual teacher ideally is a rapport-builder. Using his own
personality, the teacher has to do his utmost to establish a constructive relationship
with his students. He has to try to bridge the geographical gap between himself and
his students, and among students themselves. For doing so, there are several options
which can possibly be combined and then reinforce each other's effect.

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One of these options for teachers is to start their classes informally, asking students to
bring in some general ideas or questions that are not related to the very class. Those
may be personal anecdotes, which the teacher himself can, of course, also come up
with, student's feelings about the general (on-line or Corona) situation, or any positive
or negative experience gained since the previous session. The effect of such a begin-
ning can be to give students the idea that they are taken seriously as individuals. Of
course, the same beginning of a given class was and hopefully will be possible again
in the traditional classroom (though presumably put into practice rather rarely). In the
virtual classroom, however, it is more relevant, more of a necessity than ever before.
The virtual teacher's role, then, is that of being the integrative person in the (virtual)
room, with the teacher's personality gaining weight as compared to former times.
In a situation which can dysfunctionally be dominated by audio rather than video par-
ticipation (both by teachers and students), it is of great importance for the teacher to
show presence. This can be done in several ways, of which making himself visible is
the most important one. A teacher who can only be heard but not seen is of limited
impact and of limited ‘physical’ presence (Pearson 2021). And a teacher who cannot
be seen is oftentimes not taken seriously. Students can then get out of the situation
much more easily than is the case when they see and ‘feel’ their teacher’s presence.
In turn, they will find it more difficult to evade the situation, for example by doing
something else or by only pretending to be there although, in fact, they are not. Mak-
ing himself visible, whether he likes the camera to be on all the time or not, is
therefore of utmost importance for the virtual teacher. In turn, the instructor should
invite students to make themselves visible as well, if not all the time, then whenever
they make contributions to classroom interaction. It needs to be kept in mind that mere
audio presence kills the atmosphere in class. Students’ being visible makes it nearly
impossible for them to be absent for some time here and then, and they will feel the
necessity to also be mentally present. Increasing each other‘s visibility, then, is the
utmost prerequisite for a good virtual teacher to make his lessons a success.
In order to ensure students’ active participation in class in view of the former’s
chances to just ‘be away’ physically or mentally, virtual teachers will find that they
have to call on them more frequently than is the case in the traditional classroom. As
via the screen, it is impossible to look at one student individually, which is good peda-
gogical practice in class where teachers can educate or discipline students by merely
looking at them, visual communication is rather limited on-line. Students, in turn, might
not see the necessity to always respond to their teacher and his demands in the same
way as they would in the on-site classroom, where it can be very embarrassing not to
answer once a certain question has been raised. In such situations, the teacher has to
be very precise: as asking general questions like “Who would like to start?” of “Who
knows what is meant by this phrase?” is very likely not to have the desired effect, i.e.
may not elicit any responses, a more direct strategy will have to be applied. The
teacher therefore has to call on students much more frequently than will ever be ne-
cessary in an on-site classroom. Students, in fear of losing face if they do not answer,
will then react fruitfully and make their contributions to classroom interaction. This
combination of the teacher’s precision (by asking con- crete and informed questions)
and his authoritative behaviour (by calling on students) represents promising inter-
action which is goal-oriented.
Another important aspect of a virtual teacher’s role is to be well informed, methodo-
logically flexible, and versatile. There are various points to this aspect, three of which
will be highlighted here. The first point is to change classroom activities more

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frequently than in the on-site classroom. As experience shows that anyone’s attention
span is reduced in comparison with ‘real’ situations, more variation is needed when
on-line teaching is concerned. Many instructors may have noticed that the same lapse
of time, e.g. five minutes, appears to be much longer on-line than on-site. If this
different perception of time is true both for teachers and students, students may feel
this even more as they do not need to always be active in class (the teacher has to!).
So they may perceive one and the same activity as more ‘boring‘ when seated in front
of the screen than when sitting at their classroom desk. Therefore, tasks and activities
provided by the teacher should change more quickly to give students the impression
of a frequent ‘change of air’. Only then will they not drift away mentally and remain
active in their on-line behaviour.
An easy possibility to make this frequent change happen is to provide different forms
of action at shorter intervals. Frequent task distribution in the form of teacher-centred
instruction now, followed pair work, individual work, and group work afterwards will
keep students tuned and give them the impression that time ‘flies’. What is attractive
in the real classroom therefore becomes an urgent necessity in the on-line classroom.
Just pursuing one single activity in an on-line class or language course, however,
means that students’ boredom is guaranteed.
Another way to ensure students' active participation, which can, of course, be
combined with the former point, is to work on the four basic language skills differently
as compared to the ‘normal‘ classroom. In traditional classroom teaching, writing acti-
vities, especially those that involve several students working on one and the same text,
may not be made frequent use of. In the virtual classroom, however, they should be
used frequently. If the class is run using computers anyway, using Google Docs, for
example, is only one tiny step further to allow writing activities and written group work
to happen. Of course, this option is also possible in the on-site classroom, but there, it
would represent a paradigm change from the on-site to the virtual world. Such an
activity integrates harmoniously into the virtual world and can thus be employed
fruitfully. The same goes for listening comprehension activities that include YouTube,
which also integrate perfectly into virtual teaching and may give students more of a
feeling of change than is the case in the traditional classroom. We see, then, that the
teacher’s flexibility and versatility can make a positive change and do not need a
miracle to be made happen.
The virtual teacher is the conductor of his own orchestra, organising his own learning
environment (Weinberger & Kolling 2018). This aspect refers to the ultimate need for
the teacher to know the technical gadgets and the potential of the conferencing plat-
form he works with. Be it Zoom, Teams, Webex or any other platform, the prerequisite
of any online instruction is the mastery of this tool.
The virtual teacher is a realistically ambitious instructor. If he, in an informed way,
never does group work in his classes, to give a (doubtful) example, he will not need
any knowledge about channels or breakout rooms. This means that he has to know
those settings and gadgets he needs to practice the methodology he thinks fits. In this
vein, a methodologically ambitious teacher may also be more ambitious technically. A
teacher should therefore do regular introspection, reflecting on whether and how he
can methodologically achieve his teaching goals and with the help of what technology
he will get there. If one and the same desirable result can be achieved in a highbrow
or in a down-to-earth way, the latter may do just as well as the former.

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That said, it may be useful to vary technology-based methods in such a way that they
provide a fruitful change for students. When it is about student presentations, for ex-
ample, it may be nice to realise some of them live and others in a pre-recorded way,
depending on the result that needs to be achieved:
 If students may have Internet or bandwidth problems, recorded presentations
are the method of choice. If this problem does not exist, the live one should
be practised;
 If precious class time is to be saved, recorded presentations can hardly be
topped; if presentations are to be used to incite classroom discussion, they
will have to be live;
 If presentations include Q&A sessions, they must be live;
 If they are expected to be top-notch technologically, they will have to be
thoroughly prepared, i.e. recorded;
 and so forth.

This means that media need to be used functionally, which also implies that if is not
always the highest technological standard which automatically is the best. YouTube
can be quoted as an example in this context. If the two options are to present a video
on a topic dealt with in class, by way of sharing the teacher's screen or by giving
students the corresponding link so that they can watch the video on their own, the
latter should be the option of choice. There are two important reasons for this sug-
gestion:
 Technically, students can play the video using the most fundamental settings,
which can be adapted to their bandwidth. With such small bandwidth, he
might not be able to watch the video presented by the teacher, at all;
 Methodologically, students can watch the video at their own speed, thus
optimising their reception of it.

In this way, technological and methodological advantages are combined.

From this perspective, the teacher, though being excellently informed, must not be too
proud to make use of those technical solutions which are not the most advanced ones,
but which respond best to students’ technical surroundings or avoid potential technical
problems.
With regards to the LSP teacher, more or less the same developments can be stated
as for the general-language teacher. However, there is at least one highly important
point which may come to fruition in the virtual classroom even more frequently than in
the traditional language classroom, although it is also possible in the former, if this one
is well-equipped. This strong point concerns the opportunities the LSP teacher has to
visualise complex concepts that are relevant to the respective language for specific
purposes. As all the students are online anyway, it is possible without any problems to
provide pupils or students with pictures, graphs or even videos which explain the LSP
content in question. This is also possible in the traditional classroom, as has just been
mentioned, and it is also possible in a general-language online course, but this
possibility is of the highest possible relevance in the virtual LSP classroom. It is, then,
especially the virtual LSP teacher who is a gap-bridger between the LSP content to be
taught and students' prior LSP knowledge.

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In the context of the previously discussed LSP teacher's loss of competence and
importance, in making the best use of the new media and the nearly unlimited com-
bination of resources they offer, it is possible for the LSP teacher to gain ground and
improve his standing as compared to the content-course instructor. If the LSP teacher
benefits from this tremendous chance and if, as stipulated above, the competencies
between himself and the content-course teacher are clearly delimited, then the LPS
teacher will win this ‘competition‘ and simultaneously boost the teaching of LSP. Then,
optimism for himself and for LSP teaching in general will again be justified.

4.2 Modern Developments

In view of the speedy development and spread of the virtual classroom with all the
changes in the teaching of foreign languages it entailed within a few months, at least
much less than a year, it is extremely difficult to predict the changes that might
happen even in the next two or three years. Yet, the basis of these developments has
already been laid. In order to imagine the teacher’s role in this new world, it is neces-
sary to first describe the developments in the near post-Corona period as we expect
them to happen:

● The modern teacher is an expert user of (one of) the most important conferencing
platform(s) like Zoom or Teams, being aware of and able to functionally use their
most important functions.
One of the important developments of the modern era of (foreign language)
teaching will be for teachers to keep themselves updated about the latest de-
velopments of the different platforms which offer them the prerequisites for their
work or facilitate their job. Platforms like Teams, Zoom, Webex or BigBlueButton,
which are in the market already, will continue getting adapted to the new world of
education and come up with new features every now and then, not only to im-
prove the general conditions of teachers and students, but also, of course, to be
one step ahead of their competitors.
For teachers, this means that they will constantly have to be on the cutting edge of
development and try to include the respective new features in their virtual
classroom. In Teams, for example, one of these latest developments was the
visual representation of participants in the form of the Large-Gallery and the
Together Mode. These two modes enable the whole group (teacher and students)
to feel a little bit more togetherness and to overcome the feeling of each one of
them being isolated in front of their respective screens. A new, playful develop-
ment is the Bitmoji classroom, which every teacher can design on his own and
which is individual (Minero 2020).
Another feature is the option of breakout rooms, which allow teachers to form
groups very easily and which complement the opportunities offered by channels,
which can also be used in a similar way. Teachers will then have to decide
whether they need such new gadgets or not, and whether they find them attractive
for their classrooms. What is more (and must be recognised by teachers), these
new opportunities may even inspire them and help them to modify their ways of in-
struction for the best of their students.

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● The modern teacher makes the best possible use of social media to keep himself
updated on the latest methodological findings and the best practices of
experienced teachers presented there.
Unlike the situation in the past, in which he only had his textbook to worry about,
the modern teacher has to deal with various platforms and always follows the
latest developments discussed there. Thus, he will constantly have to leave his
comfort zone and never have the feeling of really mastering his tools to the full,
because once he has this feeling, these tools will have made another step forward.
More than ever before, then, the modern teacher is a constant learner, which may
also give him a feeling of humbleness.
A high level of information will be another important prerequisite for the modern
teacher‘s success. The modern teacher therefore will have to be even more pre-
sent in social networks than is the case today. Professional groups on Facebook
and other social media will help teachers to stay updated in a playful way, i.e. not
by reading scientific books or articles but by following other teachers‘ professional
experience. In this vein, the importance of academic literature on language
methodology may go down, and that of informal communication based on indi-
vidual teachers‘ personal ‘findings’ will go up. The result will be a spread of indi-
vidual knowledge which will go viral by imitation and adaptation by other teachers.
This will be a ‘wikipediasation’ of methodological knowledge and, thus, an
unprecedented grass-root movement in this field. This will then lead to a demo-
cratisation of foreign language methodology, in which it is not ‘the one‘ approach
which will be valid for teaching, but a set of a nearly unlimited number of ap-
proaches each of which will work in their own way.
The modern teacher has and will have more chances of finding information about
teaching and of pursuing continued education than ever before. The Internet in
general, but especially social media like Facebook or LinkedIn already have
provided users with methodological materials and tips, and will continue doing so
on a much wider scale than ever. Thus, every teacher will have the opportunity –
and the obligation – to keep himself continuously updated on the latest develop-
ments in teaching. This being true for all subjects, it is especially true for English
as a foreign language, as the tips to be found online are legion. This also applies
to conferences on language teaching whose number has increased exponentially,
with online formats becoming more and more prevalent. This configuration of
sources represents a huge chance for any teacher to make teaching attractive,
the only real problem being the bombardment of information all this entails. This
also means that in the course of an individual teacher‘s career, the impact of
formal teacher training will become less and less. Whereas in former times, many
teachers taught their subjects in the same way they had learnt it at university,
during their whole professional lives, nowadays, their pedagogy and methods are
inclined to change within rather short intervals, which will help them to keep
themselves updated. This constant self-(re)education – which has been on for a
certain while, but which will be intensified in the modern era of language teaching
– represents a considerable progress as far as the practical outcome of (informal)
teacher training is concerned. These online opportunities also hint at the fact that
life-long teacher education will change more and more from hierarchical com-
munication, i.e. from teacher trainer to teacher trainee, and develop more and
more towards democratic, peer-to-peer training, with all the members of social

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media platforms or all the audience in online conferences hierarchically being on

the same level, learning by way of an exchange of opinions and not ‘by order‘.

● The modern teacher is a highly flexible and internationally oriented instructor.

With information sources being provided by teachers from the whole world
through the Internet and social media, as has just been described, informal teach-
er education will also become more internationalised. It will no longer be the range
of a national approach towards teaching, but the whole range of opportunities
used in different countries, which can be taken into consideration by instructors.
The modern teacher will thus become a more and more international teacher.

● The modern teacher instructs learners in countries that are not his own and in
which he does not reside permanently.
Should virtual language teaching at (grammar-)schools and universities continue
being prevalent after Corona, which will certainly be the case to this or that extent,
teacher recruitment will certainly change as well. In this reinforced trend towards
internationalisation and globalisation, the modern teacher will be able (and
welcome) to apply for posts in another country, without the urgent necessity to live
there for the duration of his post. In turn, university students can be recruited
world-wide, being enrolled at universities they have never seen in reality – a de-
velopment which would create a modern type of multilingual classroom (Lochtman
2018). Should this vision of teaching and learning mobility (Traxler 2018) come
true, it will revolutionise the job market for teachers (and not only for them). It is to
be expected that this prediction will come true for universities, but not so much for
schools.

● The modern teacher is an active and competent agent in the educational village.
With these developments, the world will become an educational village, which will
make interculturality in language teaching a very practical matter: what had in for-
mer times been taught theoretically only, will then become part of teachers’ and
learners’ personal experience.

● The modern teacher constantly keeps himself updated in terms of the latest apps
to be used for teaching and his own educational purposes.
What is true for platforms is also true for learning apps. The modern teacher will
constantly have to find information about the latest developments of new apps. Be
it Cahoot, Edpuzzle or Quizlet, to name just a few, the methodological potential of
these apps and the development of new apps of a similar or even more innovative
type will need to be taken into consideration by the new teacher who wants to stay
competitive. Teaching, which, as mentioned above, formerly was a very static
matter, with one and the same textbook being used for quite a number of years,
will become a highly dynamic one. This development calls for go-getting teachers
and, thus, a drastic shift in their personality.

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● The modern teacher is a hybrid or even a hyflex (CTL 2021) instructor who is able
to integrate on-site and on-line teaching, knowing about its advantages and incon-
veniences.
In the post-Corona period, hybrid teaching – i.e. „learning that integrates comple-
mentary face-to-face (synchronous) and online learning (asynchronous) experi-
ences“ (ibid.) – or even hyflex learning – with students participating “in face-to-
face synchronous class sessions in-person (in a classroom)“, “in face-to-face
class sessions via video conference (e.g., Zoom)“ or “fully asynchronously via
CourseWorks“ (ibid.) – will be the way, most probably not so much at schools, but
definitely at universities. Whereas it may not be much of a problem to give more or
less uni-directional, content-oriented lectures in a hybrid way, offering language
courses in this format is not as evident as that. A problematic aspect certainly is
the way the teacher includes the virtual group of students in his on-site classroom,
giving these students the feeling that they belong to the group just like the ones
who are physically present. Both subgroups will have to get the same chances of
interaction and participation in the two (on-site and on-line) classrooms. This
danger of a ‘two-class audience‘ represents a considerable problem and will have
to be researched upon empirically.

● The modern teacher will be open towards teaching in a setting dominated by

virtual reality.
The modern teacher will certainly become a virtual-reality (university) language
teacher. This will be true for his classes to be constituted on a world-wide basis,
with students being based in different countries but taking part in the same course.
Against this background, it will no longer be necessary to be in the same on-site
classroom, and world-wide student and teacher recruitment will lead to genuinely
international classes. On the screen, these classrooms will appear to be like
on-site ones – which is the case with Teams, for example, even now -, but this im-
pression of an on-site classroom will be much more realistic than today, with
every person in the group wearing VR headsets.
Virtual reality will also make trips to one of the countries in which the foreign
language taught is spoken, more or less unnecessary. Getting to know the culture
of this country will be possible on-line. Thus the term language immersion will
undergo a redefinition. In the modern era of language teaching, it will be possible
to go to other countries for virtual trips to practice the foreign language and to
even gain intercultural experience. Going abroad just for this purpose will be
luxury, but not really a must. Learners will have the same feelings walking and
looking around with their VR headsets on as if they were really in the foreign place.
For this purpose, however, the teacher will need to have an excellent knowledge
about the foreign country and its culture – much more and much deeper infor-
mation on it than was necessary in former times – because learners will ask him
detailed and informed questions which he can only answer if he is excellently
informed. Virtual reality, then, will not replace the teacher’s expert knowledge, but
ask for even more of it.

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● In the second half of this decade, the modern teacher will be ready to redefine his
role in competition with machine translation.
The progressive development of machine translation, as symbolised by Google
Translator or DeepL, represents a highly challenging aspect. In this context, the
question would be what the modern teacher should teach if it is so easy to pro-
duce rather correct texts in any language one can think of. As this question would
be the topic of another paper, it will be neglected here. Yet, this is one of the
urgent issues to be dealt with in foreign language teaching in the next few years.
For the modern LSP teacher, these new developments will represent a chance rath-
er than an obstacle. If he uses sources like YouTube for the content background of his
classes, he can combine the factual background of the LSP he teaches, with his own
language-oriented approach. This configuration hints to no less than the fact that the
conflict and the competition between either CLIL teaching and traditional LSP
teaching will be overcome. By using sources like YouTube for the CLIL part and his
own approach for the language part, he will integrate both dimensions into his classes
and, thus, offer much more attractive instruction than a mere CLIL teacher could ever
do. What is more, he could make use of highly reputed content-teachers whose
videos are on-line and would then offer his students much more authentic English
input (to use English as an example) than the one provided by his German, French,
Spanish (etc.) colleagues whose mother tongue is not English. The result of this way
of teaching will be inspiring – and highly competitive.

The modern teacher, then, is or will be:

● a technical expert (user),
● a methodologically oriented social media user,
● a flexible instructor,
● an active and competent agent in the educational village (= the world),
● a modernist, open to the latest methodological developments of his time,
● an on-site and an on-line instructor,
● a ‘virtual realist‘, and
● a constant re-definer of his role, i.e. with regards to machine translation.

The role of the modern teacher, then, will be defined by much more complexity than
ever before, which comes with a totally different set of challenges.

5 Conclusions

Even if it has only been possible to give a relatively short overview of the evolution of
the teacher's role since the middle of the twentieth century up to the present day, and
even if this overview is far from being exhaustive, the following developments can be
stated from a micro-structural perspective.

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The foreign language teacher:

● having seen a development in which he continuously became less of an au-

thority in the classroom, is presently becoming more and more important and
also more dominant again;
● is still his students' learning partner and oftentimes much more than that;
● is expected to organise his virtual lessons in a more stringent and consistent
way than he did in traditional on-site teaching. For doing so, he also has to be a
more efficient time manager than ever before;
● was, from the 1950s on, oftentimes expected to master the use of the language
lab. The upgrade of the traditional language lab to a computer language lab
also upgraded his mastery and made it more complex. Nowadays, the teacher
is expected to deal with conferencing platforms in an informed way, which lifts
his desired technical mastery to an even more complex level;
● has seen a constant modification of his role in the classroom, making him very
important first, then less important and, presently, highly important again, but
all these developments have not changed the fact that he and his own per-
sonality have always been the decisive factor of students' success in learning.
Belittling him as the central eminence in class did not work and may never
work;
● will face new, major changes in the context of virtual teaching and its new
forms to be developed in this decade;
● as an LSP teacher, is widely comparable to a general teacher. Yet, in some re-
spects, such as his increased competition with content-course teachers in the
field of CLIL, he faces a number of highly different challenges.

It is obvious, then, that the role of the modern teacher will be characterised by as high
a complexity as has never been the case in the teaching profession. This means that
the teacher’s job will be as demanding as never before and ask for a personality that
is totally different from the one required in large parts of the 20th century. On top of
that, the modern teacher will need a huge motivation, a lot of enthusiasm and a strong
feeling of responsibility.

References

Aljohani, Muna (2017). Principles of “Constructivism” in Foreign Language Teaching. In:

Journal of Literature and Art Studies, 2017, 7/1 97-107. (https://www. academia.edu/3494
7955/Principles_of_Constructivism_in_Foreign_Language_Teaching; 25-01-2021).
Block, Joshua (2015). 5 PBL Best Practices for Redefining the Teacher's Role. In: Edutopia,
26-02-2015 (https://www.edutopia.org/blog/pbl-practices-redefining-teachers-role-josh-
block; 23-01-2021).

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Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL 2021): Hybrid/HyFlex Teaching & Learning. New York:
Columbia University. (https://ctl.columbia.edu/resources-and-technology/teaching-with-
technology/teaching-online/hyflex/; 25-06-2021).
Edwards, Owen (2005). Editor's Note: The Multifaceted Role of a Teacher. In: Edutopia
20-10-2005 (https://www.edutopia.org/editors-note-3; 23-01-2021).
Farrell, Thomas S.C. & George M. Jacobs (2020). Essentials for Successful English Lan-
guage Teaching. Second Edition. London et al: Bloomsbury Academic.
Havighurst, Robert, J. (2021): Functions and Roles of Teachers. In: Britannica. (https://www.
britannica.com/topic/teaching/Functions-and-roles-of-teachers; 23-01-2021).
Howatt, A.P.R. (with H.G. Widdowson) (2004). A History of English Language Teaching. Sec-
ond Edition. Oxford & New York: OUP.
Johnson, Ben (2019). Rethinking the Teacher’s Role. In: Edutopia 24.06.2019. (https://www.
edutopia.org/article/rethinking-teachers-role; 23-01-2021).
Kaufman, Dorit (2004): Constructivist Issues In Language Learning And Teaching. In: Annual
Review of Applied Linguistics 24/2004, 303-319
Larsen-Freeman, Diane (2000). Techniques and Principles in Language Teaching. Second
Edition. Oxford: OUP 2000.
Lochtman, Katja (2018). Internationalization in Higher Education: the multilingual Classroom.
In: Tinnefeld, Thomas (Ed.): Challenges of Modern Foreign Language Teaching – Re-
flections and Analyses. Saarbrücken, 81-90.
Minero, Emelina (2020). Educators Turn to Bitmoji to Build Community and Engagement. In:
Edutopia, 14-08-2020. (https://www.edutopia.org/article/educators-turn-bitmoji-build-com
munity-and-engagement; 22-01-2021)
Mukalel, Joseph C. (1998). Approaches to English Language Teaching. New Delhi: Dis-
covery.
Pearson, Alex (2021). Bringing more of a Classroom Feel o Distance Learning. In: Edutopia,
21-01-2021. (https://www.edutopia.org/article/bringing-more-classroom-feel-distance-learn
ing; 22-01-2021).
Hans-Eberhard Piepho (1974): Kommunikative Kompetenz als übergeordnetes Lernziel im
Englischunterricht. Frankonius: Limburg.
Reimann, Andrew (2018). Behaviorist Learning Theory. In: The TESOL Encyclopedia of
English Language Teaching, 1/6.
Richards, Jack C. & Theodore S. Rodgers (2001). Approaches and Methods in Language
Teaching. Cambridge & New York: CUP.
Richards, Jack C. (2006) Communicative Language Teaching Today. Cambridge & New York:
CUP.
Roberts, Jon (2016). Language Teacher Education. London & New York: Routledge.
Taack Lanier, Judith (1997). Redefining the Role of the Teacher: It’s a Multifaceted Profession.
In: Edutopia 01-07-1997. (https://www.edutopia.org/redefining-role-teacher; 23-01-2021).
Traxler, John (218): Language, Learning and Mobility. In: Tinnefeld, Thomas (Ed.):
Challenges of Modern Foreign Language Teaching – Reflections and Analyses. Saar-
brücken, 11-24

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Weinberger, Armin & Allison Kolling (2018). The Orchestration of Technology-Enhanced

Learning Environments. In: Tinnefeld, Thomas (Ed.): Challenges of Modern Foreign Lan-
guage Teaching – Reflections and Analyses. Saarbrücken, 25-39.
Weihua, Yu: Grammar-Translation Method (2004). In: Byram, Michael (ed.): Routledge Ency-
clopedia of Language Teaching and Learning. London & New York: Routledge.
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guage Teaching and Research, 6 (4), 798-802.

Author:

Dr. Thomas Tinnefeld

Full Professor of Applied Languages
Saarland University of Applied Sciences
Business School
14, Waldhausweg
66123 Saarbrücken
Germany
E-Mail: thomas.tinnefeld@htwsaar.de

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Virtual Communities of Chinese Learners of Spanish:

the Use of Mobile Applications in the Development of
Speaking Skills

Ángel Osle (Essex, United Kingdom)

Abstract

The present study explores the impact of using Telegram – a relatively new mobile application
- on the development of speaking skills in a group of Chinese learners of Spanish. A total of
16 participants who were following a non-credited online Spanish course in a British university
were recruited. Students were randomly allocated to a control and an experimental group.
This study is an example of action research in the specific context of Virtual Learning Environ-
ments (VLEs). From a methodological point of view, quantitative and qualitative elements of
analysis were combined by making effective use of triangulation. Through various question-
naires and the completion of two language tasks via Telegram, the effectiveness of a pedago-
gical intervention was assessed. In spite of certain methodological limitations, results highlight
the potential benefits of using mobile applications in VLEs settings.
Keywords: Virtual Learning Environments, Telegram, mobile learning, Spanish as a Second
Language.

1 Introduction

The use of modern technology has changed the study habits of foreign language
learners around the world. Numerous learning platforms, Virtual Learning Environ-
ments (VLEs) and mobile applications1 have come and gone in the past decade. In
25

foreign language courses, instructors are now making use of digital materials and
learning platforms, either to supplement face-to-face instruction or as a replacement
altogether. VLEs and virtual communities therefore emerge as a response to the in-
tegration and generalisation in the use of ICT learning tools.

The use of mobile applications as part of VLEs has received increasing attention from
researchers in the field. The effect of mobile apps on vocabulary acquisition has, inter
alia, been examined by Ghobadi & Taki (2018). Studies have also explored the
potential impact on additional areas such as grammar (Nabati 2018), reading com-
prehension (Azadi & Azad 2017) or integrated skills (Faramarzi 2018). Attitudes

1
25
In this paper, app will be used as an abbreviation of the noun application, regardless of the
target platform.

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towards mobile apps have been the subject of several studies (e.g. Karimov & Kim
2017).

In the author’s own teaching practice, the introduction and development of VLEs in the
delivery of our Spanish language courses could be witnessed. In fact, the idea behind
the present study arose as a result of analysing the performance of a subgroup of
students undertaking a Spanish course in a VLE. Specifically, it became apparent that
Chinese learners of Spanish usually underperform in oral assessments, especially
when compared to students with different linguistic backgrounds. After considerable
discussion of issues such as cultural differences, the distance between L1 and L2,
and the lack of real opportunities for interaction in VLEs, the decision was made to
implement a pedagogical intervention consisting of two oral tasks that propose an
effective use of Spanish via a mobile app.

This study will therefore attempt to fulfil the following goals:

 Increasing the possibilities of oral interaction of Chinese students in order to

develop their communicative competence in Spanish.
 Fostering socialisation among members of the group outside of the foreign
language classroom and in real-life settings.
 Exploring the learning potential offered by mobile apps, such as Telegram,
and assess its potential use in foreign language instruction.
These goals can be articulated in the following research question:

Does the use of a mobile app such as Telegram contribute to the development of
students’ speaking ability in Spanish and thus, improve their performance in an
oral assessment?

From a methodological point of view, this study is an example of an action research

project in the specific context of VLEs. It combines quantitative and qualitative ele-
ments of analysis by making effective use of triangulation whenever possible.

The following sections will offer a succinct review of the literature on VLEs, as well as
on the use of mobile apps in foreign language learning. Section 3 will touch on some
methodological considerations by providing information on participants, setting, instru-
ments of data collection, procedures and the use of a mixed methods approach within
the overall framework offered by Action Research. Section 4 will focus on data analy-
sis and present an overview of results. Finally, some conclusions, limitations and sug-
gestions for future research will be put forward.

2 Literature Review

The use of the Internet and Web 2.0 resources has represented a tremendous boost
to e-learning platforms. According to Majó & Marqués (2001), this new sociocultural
reality has resulted in the development of new technological and cultural skills, the
emergence of multiple online learning environments, as well as the expansion of
traditional learning beyond the classroom walls. Nowadays, it is frequent to be able to

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develop fully virtualised training environments through platforms specifically designed

for this purpose. A Virtual Language Environment can be defined as

a web-based communications platform, that allows students, without limitation of

time and place, to access different learning tools, such as program information,
course content, teacher assistance, discussion boards, document sharing sys-
tems, and learning resources. (Raaij and Schepers 2008: 839)

VLEs are therefore supposed to promote group participation and enhance communi-
cation and social interaction (Cano Ginés & Rodríguez Gómez 2015).

Since the early 1990s, VLEs have featured on commercial platforms such as WebCT
or Blackboard, or through free and open source software such as Moodle, where dif-
ferent teaching institutions hosted their virtual classrooms, courses, and campuses.

According to Martín Monje (2012), VLEs are evolving into Personalised Learning
Environments (PLEs) thanks to the emergence of mobile technology. PLEs are based
on a high degree of flexibility, student autonomy and the idea of lifelong learning.
PLEs can be defined as

a set of tools, information sources, connections and activities that every person uses to
learn assiduously’ (Castañeda and Soto 2010:10).

Learners themselves manage and organise their own learning based on a set of pro-
cesses and strategies.

Glasserman, Monge & Santiago (2014: 6) highlight some of the advantages of VLEs
versus a more traditional, face to face teaching delivery: VLEs represent a flexible
working tool for interaction through synchronous and asynchronous activities. They
promote the integration of learning networks, develop student autonomy and allow for
the establishment of teaching methods that promote collaboration among participants.
In addition, students can access the learning environment at any time they deem most
appropriate. Student autonomy is, without a doubt, one of their main advantages of
VLEs: students are encouraged to take ownership of their own learning process
(García-Peñalbo & Ramírez Montoya 2017).

On the other hand, disadvantages of VLEs mainly relate to potential feelings of

loneliness and isolation of the student body. Although many of these virtual platforms
have enabled forums or chats, the communicative exchanges among students are far
less frequent than in traditional classrooms. There are also potential issues related to
the technological requirements necessary to implement this type of programme.
Students need certain technical resources such as computer, tablet or mobile, and a
good internet connection. Likewise, instructors will have to adjust their teaching to the
functionalities of the virtual learning platform.

2.1 Mobile Learning

It is useful to establish an initial distinction between Computer Assisted Language
Learning (CALL) and Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL). CALL refers to any
process through which a student uses a computer to improve language use (Jarvis &

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Archileos 2013). The term CALL became trendy in language education in the late
1980s. At first, CALL was mainly limited to desktop computers with a few rudimentary
software programmes. Over the years, this area has expanded to include virtual
learning environments, blogs, online courses and the like. The development of mobile
devices has, in turn, led to the creation of a new area of research called Mobile
Assisted Language Learning (MALL). MALL differs from CALL in its degree of portabi-
lity, flexibility, and spontaneity, allowing for new ways of learning and accessing
content.

In the last 20 years, researchers have therefore begun to take an interest in mobile
technology and its apps to foreign language teaching. Authors such as Lara (2012)
characterise mobile learning as

 spontaneous - it can happen any time,

 ubiquitous - it can occur anywhere,
 portable - mobile devices are easily transportable, and
 flexible - it can give students the option of choosing what to learn.

Based on all of the above, it appears that the word mobile has a double implication: on
the one hand, it refers to the idea of being able to learn at any time and place by
abolishing physical and temporal barriers. On the other hand, it applies to electronic
devices, given that these are portable, easy to transport and provided with internet
access.

Since the end of the 20th century, we have witnessed a constant stream of new
electronic devices being released onto the market. Although these devices were
initially susceptible of being used as an aide to foreign language teaching, it is clear
that they had a series of technological limitations - such as a poor battery life or small
screens - which made them very difficult to use for this purpose. In addition, due to an
intrinsic lack of speed, their use was mainly restricted to sending and receiving emails
and browsing the internet (Stockwell & Hubbard 2013). Today, electronic devices
have undergone a radical transformation, and a wide range of portable devices can be
purchased at very accessible prices: personal computers, electronic book readers,
MP3 / MP4 players, or the ubiquitous smartphones and tablets. In addition to having
an Internet connection, the limitations of the first generation of mobile devices have
been vastly improved (Stockwell and Hubbard, 2013). It should also be noted that
their use has been enhanced by improvements in bandwidth, lower costs of internet
connections and the proliferation of wireless networks.

As a result of these technological advances, the number of studies in this area has
grown exponentially. Most of them are related to the use of a particular app to learn a
foreign language, or to the development of linguistic skills through a mobile app.
Interesting literature reviews can be found in Burston (2013), Bozdogan (2015) and
Shadiev et al. (2017). Specific reviews of mobile apps can be found, inter alia, in Heil
et al. (2016).

From a methodological point of view, researchers have made use of case studies
within a predominantly quantitative (Duman, Orhon & Gedik 2015) and a descriptive
approach (Burston 2013). Some of these studies can be criticised on methodological
grounds due to an insufficient number of subjects, the app of an inadequate

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methodology or serious issues with regards to the instruments of data collection. Spe-
cifically, several studies have reported on small sample sizes of fewer than twelve
participants, the difficulty in discerning the effects of short-term pedagogical inter-
ventions (Cheng 2016), the absence of a control group or the inequality of of both treatment

control and experimental groups (Huang et al. 2012).

2.2 Telegram as a Social Media Network

Telegram2 is a popular social media network, instant messaging system and

26

voice-over service compatible with different platforms and operating systems. This
mobile app was originally launched in 2013 and supports seven languages other than
English. Creating an account is straightforward, as the system only requires a mobile
number and a verification code. Telegram can be highly customised and is offered
free of charge.

Telegram supports a wide range of file formats and has no restrictions over the size of
files that can be exchanged. In addition, Telegram users have access to a variety of
groups and channels. Channels and groups can be easily created, searched and
accessed. By using a group, a wide range of tasks and materials can be offered to
language learners.

From a research point of view, the use of Telegram in the foreign language classroom
has generated an increasing interest in the past five years. The effects of Telegram on
vocabulary acquisition have, among others, been studied by Elekaei (2018). Re-
searchers have also examined the potential effects of using Telegram on additional
areas such as grammar (Nabati 2018), reading comprehension (Azadi & Azad 2017)
or integrated skills (Faramarzi 2018).

The use of Telegram aims to encourage collaborative learning and negotiation of

meaning. It can also be used as a tool to develop a student-centred approach to
language teaching. Its capacity to present a wide range of different file formats can be
tremendously appealing to both language educators and curriculum designers. More-
over, ongoing formative and summative assessment can be made available to
language learners (Faramarzi 2018), due to the highly interactive nature of this mobile
app.

3 Methodology

The present study uses a mixed-methods approach within the general framework
provided by Action Research (AR). It can be described as a quantitative, exploratory
and empirical study but with a strong qualitative component motivated by the intrinsic
nature of AR. It is hoped that this study will provide teachers with some possible
solutions for improving L2 students’ oral skills, as well as optimising available
resources that may favour L2 practice. Although an attempt has been made to find a
balance in the process of data collection, collected data is predominantly quantitative

2 26
This paper will only consider the use of Telegram as a pedagogical tool. Its potential use in
any other area will not be analysed here.

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in nature; the qualitative data obtained, in general, seeks to refute, validate and com-
plement the quantitative information gained.

Kemmis & McTaggart (1988) note that AR is a form of research which is used by
teachers in an attempt to analyse what is happening around them by taking into
account all the actors involved in the teaching/learning process. AR is eminently a
participatory, collaborative process oriented towards praxis (Kemmis, McTaggart and
Nixon 2014). This study can be described as participatory, since it involves a group of
teachers whose ultimate goal is the improvement of their own teaching practice. It is
collaborative and oriented to praxis, given that our main goal is the development of
oral skills in Chinese learners of Spanish.

The idea behind the present study is therefore based on anecdotal evidence from our
teaching teams over the past five years. It became apparent that Chinese learners of
Spanish seem to underperform in their oral exams. This may be due to a wide array of
factors, such as the linguistic distance between the L1 and L2, their previous ex-
perience in foreign language learning, their educational background or (inter)cultural
factors. A pedagogical intervention was therefore designed in an attempt to improve
Chinese students’ overall results.

3.1 Participants

18 Mandarin learners of Spanish following a non-credited online Spanish course in a

British university were recruited in the spring term of 2020. Only 16 of those 18
students completed the module. Using a virtual platform, learners were able to study
Spanish at any level from beginner to advanced. An initial induction session gave
students the chance to meet their tutor and learn how to use the virtual platform.
Students were expected to do between three and six hours of online exercises per
week in order to progress to a sufficient standard. Lessons were assigned on a weekly
basis. The course was assessed through a written examination, an individual oral
exam and a portfolio of online work completed on the platform.

Students completed a preliminary questionnaire requesting information on their

linguistic background, their previous experience in foreign language learning, their
degree studies, their gender and their previous experience using Telegram. Partici-
pants’ average age is 23.5. Ten of the students identified as female, and 60% of them
were undertaking postgraduate courses at the university. It is important to note that
we only recruited students having an A2 level of proficiency in Spanish according to
the result of the placement test completed in the first week of term. All participants had
previously studied English as a second language. In addition, six of them had studied
additional languages such as French, Japanese or German. 80% of the participants
had some experience using Telegram as a mobile app.

3.2 Ethical Considerations

The researcher provided participants with information and consent forms. Information
included the purpose of the study, its expected benefits as well as information about
confidentiality. Participation was voluntary and withdrawal from the study was possible

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at any stage. The Data Protection Act (1998) guidelines were followed: information
gained from the data collection process was kept confidential. Additional ethical
issues were carefully considered throughout this study, such as the potential negative
effects of a pedagogical intervention with a control and an experimental group. In
order to compensate for the potential gains for only a subgroup of students, the peda-
gogical treatment was offered to all students at the end of term. Another potential
disadvantage, centred on the unequal power dynamics between the participants,
involved and the tutor. An explicit point was made of emphasising that participation in
the study was purely voluntary and with no impact whatsoever on students’ asses-
sment in the module.

3.3 Research Design

AR is fundamentally characterised by its cyclical nature, its flexibility and interactivity

at all stages. According to Elliott (1993), this ‘cycle’ model consists of different stages:
researchers identify a problem that they wish to solve. The problem usually arises as
a result of classroom practice, aided by the contribution of ideas from the students
themselves or other colleagues. Once a problem is identified, an action strategy must
be planned. These are practical and concrete decisions about a general plan of action.
Following on from this, the action plan is put into practice. Results lead to a reanalysis
of the original issue, thus beginning a spiral of reflection and action. In addition to
making a detailed description of what happens during the development of the action
plan, an attempt should be made to reflect on the contrast between what was planned
and what was actually achieved.

Teachers initially identified a specific issue related to the performance in oral

assessments of Chinese learners of Spanish undertaking a Spanish course in a VLE.
A preliminary questionnaire and a placement test were used to obtain information on
students’ level of proficiency as well as their general linguistic background. A
pedagogical intervention consisting of an oral task to be carried out through a mobile
app (Telegram) was initially planned; a description of the oral tasks can be found in
Section 3.4. A follow-up questionnaire was administered to gather information on stu-
dents’ opinions on the first Telegram task. The first cycle of enquiry was completed
with an analysis and reflection of results. A second cycle was initiated with the design
of the second Telegram task. A follow-up questionnaire provided insights into stu-
dents’ perceptions of Task 2. A final oral assessment was used as a post-test for the
purposes of our statistical analyses.

3.4 Instruments of Data Collection

Two questionnaires were prepared as main instruments of data collection: a pre-

liminary questionnaire and a task assessment questionnaire. In addition, two lan-
guage tasks and one assessment rubric were designed. The language used in the
questionnaires was English in order to avoid the linguistic limitations that might
eventually arise in a group with an A2 level of proficiency in Spanish. A diary was also
kept, in which details and observations were recorded throughout the process.

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3.4.1 Preliminary Questionnaire

The preliminary questionnaire served to collect background information of our group

of participants: their age, linguistic background, gender, previous experience in
Spanish, degree studies and previous experience in the use of Telegram. In this
questionnaire, a combination of open and closed questions, and collected data of a
descriptive nature were used. The questionnaire was presented in English.

3.4.2 Telegram Tasks

Two language tasks were designed to be completed via the Telegram mobile app.
Both tasks were aligned with the curriculum objectives of the A2 level of the CEFR. In
general, these tasks allowed students to interact orally on selected everyday topics:
work, studies, celebrations, travel, personal experiences to name but a few. In addi-
tion, they were also required to express opinions, request information, tell anecdotes
or describe the plot of a film.

Tutors marked students’ performance through an analytical assessment rubric. The

scale included a matrix with four descriptors. The matrix followed the criteria set forth
by the Council of Europe in the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR
2002), in which four basic descriptors are used in relation to four qualitative aspects of
spoken language: coherence, fluency, accuracy, and scope.

Regarding the assessment rubric, a scale ranging from 1 to 3 was used to score each
descriptor. Oral productions that did not reach the required level were rated with a 1. A
score of 2 was used for those productions that were within the expectations outlined
for each descriptor at the A2 level of proficiency. A score of 3 was used for those
productions that were above the A2 level.

3.4.3 Task Assessment Questionnaire

This questionnaire contained a series of questions assessing the level of interest

generated by the task, whether students found the task useful, the skills that they had
practised and an open-ended question requesting general feedback. It was ad-
ministered in English via the VLE immediately after each task. The information ob-
tained offered some qualitative insights into students’ perceptions on both tasks.

3.4.4 Pre-Test and Post-Test

The oral section of the placement test was used as a pre-test in this study. A specific
task was designed and administered at the end of the module to check the effects of
the pedagogical intervention.

The pre-test was administered at the beginning of Term 1. The task consisted of a
presentation on a selected topic and follow-up questions by the researcher. Students
had an estimated preparation time of about five minutes and were not allowed to take
notes. The presentation lasted approximately two minutes and was recorded via
Zoom.

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The post-test was carried out in pairs via Zoom. The test consisted of a presentation
with subsequent questions on a topic and a role-play activity. The first part of the
post-test involved a presentation randomly selected by students. Note-taking was not
allowed, and preparation time was approximately five minutes. Participants were
supposed to speak about a proposed topic for a maximum of two minutes without any
interruption. In the second task of the post-test, students had to start a conversation
with a partner, following specific roles. They selected one of the two situations
proposed. Students were not allowed to take notes, but they had five minutes of pre-
paration time, during which they could agree on some general points to be covered in
the roleplay.

The marking scale used in both the pre- and post-test was similar to the one used in
the marking of the Telegram tasks: four descriptors including accuracy, fluency, co-
herence and scope, and a score of 1 to 3 for each descriptor

4 Results and Discussion

As pointed out above, students completed an online placement test at the beginning
of Term 1. The oral component of the placement test was used as a pre-test in this
study. Results seemed to confirm and validate the initial reason for this pedagogical
intervention: a generalised underperformance of Chinese students when compared to
learners from other linguistic backgrounds. A wide range of factors could potentially
account for this difference: the linguistic distance between L1 and L2, students’ previ-
ous linguistic background, opportunities for language use or cultural differences in the
use of learning strategies.

The participants in this study were randomly allocated to a control group and
experimental group. Students in the experimental group completed two tasks using
the Telegram mobile app. It is important to note that, according to Judd, Tan & Wall-
berg (2002), the activities, tasks and exercises used in the foreign language class-
room should encourage communicative exchanges through the use of natural and
meaningful language. In order to achieve this goal, teachers need to create
opportunities for real practice amongst students. In the design of the Telegram tasks,
an attempt was made to recreate real life situations as far as possible.

Students' oral productions in both tasks were assessed in a corresponding rubric. The
maximum score that an individual participant could achieve was twelve points, while
the minimum score was four points. A grade equal to or greater than eight was re-
quired to consider the task completed.

Table 1 below presents the scores for each participant in Task 1.

The descriptive statistics for this data set are as follows: Mean=8.62, SD= 1.40, Mode
= 9,7,8. The learning objectives for this task were met in the majority of cases, only
two students scoring under eight points. After completing the first task, participants
had to fill out a questionnaire. The questionnaire provided a general assessment of
the usefulness of the task through a Likert scale. Students were also asked for a pe-

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Participant Task 1: Scores

1 9
2 7
3 8
4 11
5 10
6 7
7 8
8 9

Table 1: Results in Task 1 – Experimental Group

dagogical reflection, and they were offered a space to provide feedback. The goal was
to obtain qualitative information that would provide some insights into learners’ per-
ceptions, which might be useful for our reflective phase of the AR cycle.

Overall, the possibility of additional practice of oral skills was positively highlighted by
all participants. 85% of the students noted the advantage of integrating the practice of
speaking and listening skills in the one and the same task. Feedback also highlighted
the novel aspect of the pedagogical intervention, despite the fact that some parti-
cipants had previous experience in the use of technology in the classroom. They also
made comments regarding the need to minimise the use of the L1 in student inter-
actions. The overall evaluation of Task 1 was made through a 5-point Likert scale
ranging from ‘very boring’ to ‘very interesting’. Despite the fact that some scores fell
within band 3, the holistic evaluation of this task is quite positive – the average score
in the Likert scale being 4.35.

Participants reported some useful observations that were of help for the design of the
second Telegram task. There were comments regarding the fact that preparation for
this task was more time consuming than had been anticipated. Some students ex-
pressed the need for feedback in the form of immediate correction of their productions
via Telegram. As a result of this, it was decided to explain that general feedback -
including a report on student performance - would be provided at the end of the
second task. As part of our general reflective process on Task 1, it became clear that
some participants used several voice memos to complete the same task, which
sometimes generated an excessive number of short messages on the mobile app. It
was decided to restrict the number of voice memos in the second task. Based on
students’ feedback, it was also agreed to try to align even more the nature of the sec-
ond task to a real-life situation.

In general, student feedback was highly positive and served as an encouragement to

follow through with the pedagogical intervention. It is also worth mentioning that we
did encounter logistical issues in the implementation of this task, such as technical dif-
ficulties with the software itself. Due to these difficulties plus additional time con-
straints, the option of using a third Telegram task was discarded.

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There was a four-week gap between the first and the second task. The assessment
rubric and the actual implementation was the same for both tasks. Table 2 below re-
ports the raw scores for Task 2.

Participant Task 2: Scores

1 10
2 8
3 8
4 12
5 11
6 9
7 8
8 10

Table 2: Results in Zask 2 – Experimental Group

Descriptive statistics are as follows: Mean= 9.5, SD 1.51 and Mode was 8. It is im-
portant to point out that the mean increased from 8.65 to 9.50. This improvement in
student performance can be attributed to different factors, for example:
● an increase in students’ general proficiency level,
● a higher degree of ability when using the mobile app,
● a higher degree of familiarity with the type of task.

None of the students scored below eight points.

A second task questionnaire was completed 48 hours after the task. Students
confirmed some of the comments from the first task: the beneficial use of Telegram as
a pedagogical tool, given that the app offered them the possibility of getting to know
other participants. This is especially relevant considering the isolating features of
VLEs. Students' feedback also highlighted the possibility of using both grammar and
vocabulary in a meaningful context. Other comments underlined the creative aspect of
the task. Along these lines, participants pointed out that the proposed task allowed for
a revision of the course content with an emphasis on oral skills. Their feedback
seemed to highlight the importance of affective factors in foreign language learning.
As Krashen (1985) notes, success in L2 acquisition is linked to a high degree of
motivation, low anxiety and a reinforced self-esteem.

There were also observations regarding the lack of quality and the background noise
of some of the posts. Students specifically commented on the difficulty experienced in
understanding some of the posts

In order to measure the success of the pedagogical intervention and to answer our
original research question, a statistical analysis comparing participants’ scores in the
pre- and post-tests was carried out. Tables 3 and 4 below present students’ scores in
the pre and post-tests for the control and the experimental group:

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Participant Pre-Test Post-Test

1 7 8
2 8 8
3 8 8
4 10 11
5 11 11
6 9 10
7 8 8
8 7 7

Table 3: Participants’ Scores in the Pre and Post-Tests (Control Group)

The mean and mode values for the pre-test are 8.5 and 8.0, respectively. The mean
slightly increased to 8.85 for the post-test. Three students marginally improved their
overall scores and in five cases, no variation in scores was reported:

Participant Pre-Test Post-Test

1 8 10
2 7 8
3 7 10
4 9 10
5 10 12
6 8 11
7 9 9
8 8 12

Table 4: Participants’ Scores in the Pre- and Post-Tests (Experimental Group)

In the case of the experimental group, the mean score improved from 8.25 to 10.25. A
total of seven students improved their overall score. Using a t-test, a one-tailed mean
comparison of the null hypothesis showed that the means of the experimental and
control group was equal at 0.05. Results indicate that the difference is significant: t =
-1.87, p>0.041.

It is important to point out that improvements in the experimental group may be due to
a wide range of variables:

● a general improvement in the level of fluency,

● language practice outside of the course,
● the impact of individual differences on the learning process such as motivation
or aptitude, or
● affective differences in general.

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The pedagogical intervention proposed here could potentially account for one of those
variables. As will be pointed out in the conclusion, a follow-up study could potentially
centre on the interaction of additional variables on student scores.

It is worth noting the positive feedback received from students throughout the study.
The level of acceptance and participation was relatively high, creating a true learning
community and exceeding our initial expectations. The flexibility and interactivity of
resources, in addition to the motivating effect caused by the use of mobile technology,
contributed to the success of the pedagogical intervention.

Literature on the development of oral skills underscores the importance of exposure,

practice and repetition in the L2. The use of Telegram contributed to the creation of a
sense of belonging to a virtual learning community, as the number of spontaneous
communicative exchanges among students grew. The increasing levels of motivation
resulted in a decrease in the use of the L1 until it became practically non-existent.

The lack of opportunities to use the target language is a contributing factor to levels of
low confidence in L2 learners (Mirhadizadeh 2016). It is common practice for students
to try and avoid making mistakes when interacting in the L2, thus limiting their own
participation in class activities. Furthermore, as Horwitz (1986: 559) points out, the
anxiety experienced by L2 learners causes a chain of negative emotional reactions
and, generally speaking, inhibits the learning process. In order to improve their oral
skills, L2 learners need to develop their speaking ability outside of the classroom. With
the advancement of technology, mobile apps offer opportunities for teachers to design
activities that better align with real-life situations.

5 Conclusions

Mobile apps can be utilised in very different learning environments. Methodological

proposals centred on the use of mobile apps in the area of foreign language
teaching​ are increasingly common. The possibility of using mobile devices is not
only limited to the field of distance education, but it is also included in other educa-
tional settings such as VLEs, blended learning or autonomous learning. Optimising
the multiple possibilities offered by mobile apps is one of the challenges that instruc-
tors and educational institutions are presently facing.

Although most pedagogical interventions regarding the use of mobile apps have fo-
cused on the development of written skills, Telegram offers opportunities for oral prac-
tice and interaction. Telegram represents an app that encourages collaborative work
as well as the development of communicative skills. Moreover, the use of mobile apps
could also serve to reduce the general level of student anxiety and therefore increase
the rate of success in foreign language learning.

The results of this study suggest that Telegram is an effective tool for the development
of the oral skills of Chinese learners of Spanish, at least in the context of a VLE. Given
that mobile devices are widely used these days, they could certainly be utilised in the
foreign language classroom. In the author’s teaching experience, the use of tech-
nology has represented a motivating factor for students. Despite the fact that the
participants of this study were frequent users of a wide range of mobile apps in their

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daily lives, this was their first experience of using a mobile app for pedagogical pur-
poses. They appreciated the possibility of using the target language outside of the
classroom. In addition, as reflected in their rating of the Telegram tasks, they found
the actual tasks highly engaging.

Some limitations to this study centre on the small sample of participants, which may
affect the reliability of our statistical analyses. In addition, due to the wide range of
variables affecting L2 acquisition, it is certainly difficult to pinpoint whether the differ-
ences found between the experimental and control group appear as a consequence
of the pedagogical intervention or as a result of individual differences among the
learners. The present study did account for participants’ proficiency level at the be-
ginning of the experiment, but no measurement was undertaken of their level of mo-
tivation, aptitude or anxiety, to mention but a few of those variables that, according to
the literature, have shown to impact the learning process (Ortega 2009 for a review).

Future lines of research could focus on the potential interaction between individual dif-
ferences and the rate of success in the use of mobile app. Moreover, it is also
important to gain a better understanding of the type of learning strategies used by
learners when facing tasks presented via mobile apps. Further studies covering a
different population of L2 learners, different language combinations, different profi-
ciency levels and different types of oral tasks may shed more light on the reliability of
some of our conclusions.

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Author:
Dr Ángel Osle
Department of Language and Linguistics
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park, Colchester
United Kingdom
CO4 3SQ
Email: a.osle@essex.ac.uk

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El papel de la gramática en la enseñanza de lengua

extranjera: representaciones y prácticas docentes en
México

Sara Quintero Ramírez (Guadalajara, México) & Sonny A. Castro Yáñez

(Guadalajara, México)

Resumen (español)

En el presente estudio cualitativo, tenemos el objetivo de identificar las representaciones que

tienen tres profesores en activo de inglés como lengua extranjera respecto de la enseñanza
de la gramática, así como examinar su práctica docente real en relación con este mismo
tema. Con base en lo anterior, nos proponemos establecer un parangón entre las representa-
ciones de los profesores y su verdadera práctica docente. A fin de conocer las representa-
ciones, concebimos un cuestionario que aplicamos a los sujetos del estudio. Para examinar
la práctica docente de los mismos, creamos una rejilla de observación con diferentes rubros
concernientes a la enseñanza de la gramática. Llenamos dicha rejilla con base en las
observaciones llevadas a cabo en diferentes sesiones. Los resultados de ambos instru-
mentos son comparados y nos permiten advertir tanto las correspondencias como las discre-
pancias respecto de las ideas preconcebidas que tienen los profesores de inglés y su prác-
tica docente en términos reales.
Palabras clave: Enseñanza de lenguas extranjeras, gramáticas, gramática tridimensional,
representaciones docentes, prácticas docentes.

Abstract (English)

The aim of this research was to identify three English language teachers’ representations
about the role of grammar in language teaching and analyze their teaching practice according
to the same topic. Based on this, we intended to establish a comparison between teachers’
representations and their real teaching practice. In order to know teachers’ representations, a
questionnaire was applied to our subjects of study. In order to examine their teaching
practices, we observed teachers, filling up an observation grid which presented different
rubrics referring to the teaching of grammar. A comparison of the results of both instruments
allowed us to determine correspondences and inconsistencies between teachers’ represen-
tations and their teaching practice in actual terms.
Keywords: Foreign language teaching, grammars, tridimensional grammar, teachers’ repre-
sentations, teaching practices.

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1 Introduccion

Si bien la gramática solamente se refiere a una parte de un todo más complejo, esta
juega un rol sumamente trascendental en el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje de
lenguas extranjeras y la importancia que se le concede en dicho proceso es alta-
mente controversial (Martín Sánchez 2008: 29, Baleghizadeh & Mozaheb 2011: 364).

Ciertamente, no existe una sola gramática, pues dependiendo del criterio del que se
parta, podemos encontrar toda una diversidad de gramáticas en el marco de una
misma lengua (Delahunty & Garvey 2010: 12). Al respecto, Matei (2012: 128)
advierte la necesidad de que tanto profesores como estudiantes de lenguas extran-
jeras sean conscientes de la diversidad lingüística y de las distintas gramáticas que
constituyen una lengua.

Desde una perspectiva general, la gramática es definida como un conjunto de reglas

de una lengua con las que cada individuo puede formar oraciones en la misma
(Baleghizadeh & Mozaheb 2011: 363). Al ser una parte de la lengua que permite la
producción de oraciones, su enseñanza en el aula de clases es una parte funda-
mental en el aprendizaje de una lengua extranjera, ya que la falta de conocimiento de
esta competencia causa problemas en la comunicación efectiva, por ejemplo, en la
producción oral o escrita (Azar 2007: 3, Martín Sánchez, 2008: 30).

Existen diferentes propuestas metodológicas en las que la gramática desempeña un

papel más o menos protagónico en la enseñanza de lenguas extranjeras. En efecto,
en ciertas propuestas, como aquella de Azar (2007), Grammar-Based Teaching,
parece ocupar un lugar central; mientras que, en otras metodologías de enfoque más
comunicativo, se le confiere un rol secundario e instrumental para alcanzar el
objetivo principal que es justamente la comunicación (Pastor Cesteros 2004:
158-160). Hay planteamientos, como el de Larsen-Freeman (2001), que buscan un
equilibrio entre la gramática y la comunicación al momento de enseñar una lengua
extranjera o segunda.

Por el protagonismo que despliega la gramática en el proceso de enseñanza-apren-

dizaje de lenguas extranjeras, en el presente estudio nos hemos propuesto el
objetivo de identificar las representaciones que tienen tres profesores de inglés como
lengua extranjera respecto de la enseñanza de la gramática de dicha lengua en el
marco de su experiencia docente.

Asimismo, pretendemos determinar la coherencia que existe entre estas

representaciones y sus prácticas reales en el aula de clases. En otras palabras, me-
diante este estudio pretendemos tener un primer acercamiento del estado actual de
la enseñanza de la gramática en la clase de inglés como lengua extranjera desde la
perspectiva del profesor de lengua a nivel preparatoria en el sector privado en
Guadalajara, México.

Consideramos que el trabajo es relevante, ya que abona al conocimiento sobre la

enseñanza del inglés en México, más particularmente en el sector privado a nivel
preuniversitario. El estudio permite conocer la importancia que el profesor le concede
a la enseñanza de la gramática en su práctica docente, así como las distintas

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actividades que propone el profesor en el aula a fin de enseñar diferentes temas

gramaticales a sus estudiantes.

Si bien no se llevó a cabo un estudio cuantitativo que habría podido tener un mayor
impacto y nos habría permitido generalizar y extrapolar los resultados al conjunto de
la población en cuestión, consideramos que la presente investigación presenta un
primer acercamiento del fenómeno analizado. De tal manera, los resultados de dicha
investigación nos brindan una pauta para continuar con estudios en esta misma di-
rección con base en muestra representativas de la población examinada.

El estudio se encuentra dividido de la siguiente manera. En primer lugar,

presentamos los fundamentos teóricos en los que elucidamos conceptos importantes
respecto de la enseñanza de la gramática en clase de lenguas extranjeras. En-
seguida, exponemos la metodología donde describimos a los sujetos del estudio, los
instrumentos para recolectar los datos y el procedimiento que seguimos para
examinar los resultados de dichos instrumentos. Posteriormente, damos lugar al
análisis en el que organizamos e interpretamos los resultados obtenidos de los
instrumentos aludidos. Por último, mostramos los hallazgos más importantes de este
estudio en el apartado de las conclusiones.

2 Fundamentos teóricos

2.1 Gramática pedagógica

Como hemos mencionado anteriormente, existe una diversidad de gramáticas. A

manera de ejemplo, Crystal (2004: 88) enumera seis tipos, a saber: descriptiva,
prescriptiva, referencial, teórica, tradicional y pedagógica. La gramática que tiene un
propósito para la enseñanza-aprendizaje ha sido denominada gramática pedagógica
(Burner 2005: 21) y tiene la característica de ser una gramática especialmente
diseñada para aprendices con base en sus particularidades, esto es tomando en
consideración aspectos como sus habilidades lingüísticas, edad o el tipo de input
recibido.

La gramática pedagógica se escinde en tres grandes rubros: a) el aprendizaje, b) la

enseñanza y c) la descripción gramatical. La omisión de uno de estos rubros o
componentes puede dar lugar a un aprendizaje incompleto de la gramática de la len-
gua que se está estudiado (Takala 2016: 9). En efecto, la enseñanza de gramática se
ve sujeta a distintas circunstancias que determinan su uso en clase y que parten
desde la edad y las necesidades lingüísticas de los estudiantes hasta la perspectiva
con base en la cual se pretende enseñar (Larsen-Freeman 2001, Phipps & Borg 2009,
Baleghizadeh & Mozaheb 2011).

La gramática pedagógica no constituye una finalidad en sí misma en la clase de

lengua extranjera (Moreno García 1998: 118, Ruiz Martínez & Martí Sánchez 2018:
108). Mulroy (2003: 118) advierte que el aprendizaje de la gramática provee al
alumno de un mejor conocimiento y capacidad de uso de la lengua que si se care-
ciera de dicho aprendizaje. Y es que las competencias de producción o comprensión
siempre incluyen el componente gramatical, por lo que no podemos negar su impor-
tancia y necesidad en la clase de lengua.

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2.2 Constitución de la gramática y su rol en la clase de lengua extranjera

La gramática desempeña un importante papel en la clase de LE. Por ejemplo, en

métodos tradicionalistas la gramática constituye el componente alrededor del cual
gira el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje, en los cuales el profesor se enfoca en la
forma presentada fuera de contexto (Nunan, 1998: 102). Algunos profesores y alum-
nos creen que la prueba de aprendizaje exitoso y de dominio de la lengua consiste en
aprender y memorizar las reglas gramaticales junto con la realización de ejercicios
frásticos, y que con ello se llega a “comunicar” en LE (Ceramella 2009: 57-71).

En la actualidad, si bien esta postura no se ha erradicado por completo, sí se ha

modificado con la implementación de otros métodos como el enfoque comunicativo y
la perspectiva accional (Baleghizadeh & Mozaheb 2011). Muchas escuelas promo-
cionan, dentro de sus valores, el uso de un método comunicativo que omite la
enseñanza de gramática, asignándole una etiqueta negativa en el proceso de
aprendizaje de la lengua extranjera. Existen otros métodos que proponen una postura
más conciliadora, como el método nocional-funcional que plantea un balance en las
competencias enseñadas en clase y persigue un fin comunicativo. Ruiz Martínez y
Martí Sánchez (2008: 108) advierten justamente que, luego de “los excesos anti-
gramaticales del enfoque comunicativo”, se ha vuelto a incluir la gramática en el pro-
ceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje de lenguas extranjeras, lo que enriquece dicho pro-
ceso.

Ante este panorama de enfoques y métodos con diversas propuestas didácticas,

surgen diferentes tipos de profesores de lenguas extranjeras, aunque con dos
posturas principales que a la vez resultan un tanto dicotómicas. Por un lado, están
aquellos profesores que no le asignan valor a la inclusión de la gramática en el aula y
que creen que debería ser omitida en clase. Por otro lado, se encuentran aquellos
que dedican tiempo considerable de clase a la enseñanza de una gramática prescrip-
tiva con reglas inalterables, creyendo que dichas reglas les permitirán a los estu-
diantes hablar “correcta y formalmente” (Ceramella 2009: 57).

A pesar de este panorama dicotómico, la gramática puede enseñarse desde la forma

y el uso, en un péndulo que corre en ambos extremos. Para Larsen-Freeman (2001:
251), este péndulo puede posicionarse en un extremo enfocándose en la forma (mor-
fosintaxis), donde se enseñan solamente las reglas de la gramática teniendo, por lo
tanto, alumnos que aprenden elementos de la lengua. El otro extremo del péndulo es
aquel en el cual la enseñanza de gramática no tiene como propósito enseñar sola-
mente reglas y formas, sino que los alumnos sean capaces de utilizarlas con el fin de
comunicarse en la lengua extranjera.

Para Nunan (1998: 102-103), una implementación exitosa de la enseñanza de

gramática se logra a través de la explicación de esta en contexto con el propósito de
que el estudiante pueda entender el significado comunicativo de la gramática apren-
dida. Para Nunan (1998: 104), las estructuras gramaticales se pueden analizar en su
relación con el discurso, sobre todo, mediante el uso de material auténtico desde una
postura descriptivista.

Una perspectiva muy cercana a la de Nunan (1998) es aquella de Celce-Murcia

(1991), en la que la enseñanza de la gramática debe interactuar con los significados y
las funciones socio-discursivas, en lugar de considerarse como un ente autónomo

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que constituye un objetivo de enseñanza en sí mismo (Moreno García 1998: 118,

Ruiz Martínez & Martí Sánchez 2018: 108). Asimismo, para Larsen-Freeman (2001),
la gramática no consiste en elementos aislados o descontextualizados, sino que las
estructuras gramaticales, además de la forma, se componen de un significado que es
expresado (semántica) con una intención de acuerdo con normas de uso adecuadas
a una situación comunicativa (pragmática), tal como se advierte en la figura 1:

Figura 1: Marco gramatical adaptado de Larsen-Freeman (2001: 252-253)

La perspectiva de Larsen-Freeman (2001), esquematizada en la figura 1, nos

muestra una enseñanza gramatical tridimensional en la cual las estructuras gramati-
cales no son estructuras descontextualizadas, sino que se presentan en relación con
la función discursiva, tal como lo manifiestan las propuestas de Celce-Murcia (1991),
por un lado, y Nunan (1998), por otro lado. Hinkel (2002: 181) coincide con las per-
spectivas de los autores anteriores y añade que existe una variedad de actividades
que buscan el uso de estructuras gramaticales en contexto a fin de promover la
aplicación del conocimiento gramatical en situaciones comunicativas que les resulten
significativas a los estudiantes. Algunas de estas actividades son juegos de rol, si-
mulaciones, solución de problemas y juegos diversos.

Finalmente, la gramática requiere enseñarse de manera apropiada, precisa y

significativa, algo que Larsen-Freeman denomina la enseñanza de grammaring (Lar-
sen-Freeman 2001: 2003). Dicho concepto implica que la gramática no es un cono-
cimiento acumulable que se memoriza, sino una competencia que los alumnos van
desarrollando:

By thinking of grammar as a skill to be mastered, rather than a set of rules to be me-

morized, we will be helping ESL/EFL students go a long way toward the goal of being
able to accurately convey meaning in the manner they deem appropriate. (Larsen-Free-
man 2001: 255)

2.3 Representaciones y Prácticas Docentes

Como hemos mencionado anteriormente, el propósito de este trabajo consiste en

identificar las representaciones y prácticas de los profesores de inglés. Partimos del
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concepto de representaciones, porque consideramos que las concepciones que los

profesores tienen de un tema en específico, en este caso la gramática, y de sí
mismos, en el marco de sus experiencias, influyen en sus prácticas docentes, en sus
perspectivas del proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje e incluso en su crecimiento pro-
fesional (Santos Gonçalves 2011: 124).

Las representaciones constituyen un primer acercamiento a las prácticas de los

profesores, así como las prácticas en clase son un reflejo de las representaciones
que los profesores tienen sobre este tema. Ambos aspectos, representaciones y
prácticas, pueden mostrarnos una suerte de mapa de lo que es la gramática para
ellos:

if teachers’ ways of teaching grammar reflect what they think of it (or what their teachers
have thought of it), focusing on their thoughts and ideas might well shed light on the
methodology that they prefer to use in their lessons. The questions of how teachers
define grammar, how important they think that grammar is in language learning and
teaching, and what their goal of teaching grammar and/or language is, all help
understanding their personal theories and possibly their instructional decisions. (Keck &
Kim 2014: 1)

Como mencionan Keck & Kim (2014), las representaciones y las prácticas docentes
son codependientes. Los profesores pueden expresar una representación; sin
embargo, esta será definitiva cuando sea coherente con la práctica en clase. Pueden
existir discrepancias entre ambas cuando el profesor no es consciente de la práctica
realizada en clase, por lo que nos proponemos examinar las representaciones de los
profesores, sus prácticas reales, así como las correspondencias entre ambas.

3 Metodología

3.1 Sujetos de estudio y contexto de investigación

Los participantes del presente estudio cualitativo son tres profesores que enseñan la
asignatura de lengua extranjera a nivel bachillerato en el sector privado en la ciudad
de Guadalajara, México. Los tres profesores tienen una formación distinta y enseñan
en semestres diferentes de preparatoria.

El primer sujeto del estudio (D1) tiene una licenciatura en administración, y durante
tres años recibió una formación de inglés en una escuela de idiomas de la Univers-
idad de Guadalajara. El profesor tiene 28 años de edad y cuenta con tres años de
experiencia como docente de inglés, especialmente a nivel bachillerato.

El segundo profesor (D2) no cuenta con una licenciatura en enseñanza de lenguas o

en otra área, sino que ha estudiado varios cursos en escuelas de inglés de Gua-
dalajara, vivió un tiempo en Estados Unidos y afirma haber acreditado una capa-
citación docente como certificado de enseñanza en un instituto de idiomas. El pro-
fesor tiene 55 años de edad y cuenta con 21 años de experiencia docente. Actual-
mente, labora en secundaria y bachillerato.

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El tercer docente (D3) cuenta con una licenciatura en lenguas, así como con
certificaciones de lengua inglesa por parte del Instituto Cambridge. El profesor tiene
27 años de edad y cuenta con dos años de experiencia como profesor de lengua,
especialmente a nivel bachillerato y licenciatura.

El contexto donde se realizó el estudio es una escuela preparatoria que pertenece al

sector privado. Dicha institución se encuentra ubicada en el oriente de la ciudad de
Guadalajara y cuenta con alrededor de 400 estudiantes. El bachillerato está incor-
porado al Sistema de Educación Media Superior (SEMS) de la Universidad de Gua-
dalajara y se encuentra en operaciones desde 1979. El número de los estudiantes es
muy variado, pues hay salones con solo cinco estudiantes y otros con hasta 30.

Por último, cabe mencionar que la escuela se encuentra en una zona de la ciudad
con gran migración, donde la mayoría de los alumnos tiene contacto frecuente con
familiares que viven en Estados Unidos, y que generalmente regresan de visita una o
dos veces al año. Por consiguiente, el inglés es en algunos casos una lengua que se
utiliza en el círculo familiar.

Por último, cabe señalar que hemos seleccionado un corpus modesto de únicamente
tres profesores a fin de obtener un primer acercamiento del fenómeno analizado. Este
acercamiento nos permitirá establecer ciertas guías y pautas para continuar con
posteriores estudios en la misma línea de investigación.

Así pues, somos conscientes de que los resultados que nos brinde esta investigación
tienen un alcance limitado. No obstante, su importancia yace en contrastar las repre-
sentaciones sobre la enseñanza de la gramática con la práctica docente real de
profesores a nivel bachillerato en el sector privado en Guadalajara, México. De tal
manera, podemos determinar la congruencia que existe entre ambos fenómenos
respecto de los profesores antes aludidos.

3.2 Instrumentos de recolección de datos

Con la finalidad de alcanzar el objetivo planteado al inicio del artículo, hemos con-
cebido dos instrumentos para la recolección de datos: un cuestionario y una rejilla de
observación. El primer instrumento está constituido de trece preguntas que cuestio-
nan a los sujetos de nuestro estudio respecto de las representaciones que tienen
sobre la gramática. Las primeras preguntas versan sobre qué es la gramática para
los profesores encuestados y el rol que esta desempeña tanto en sus clases de
lengua como en su evaluación. Los demás cuestionamientos indagan sobre los fac-
tores que determinan la enseñanza de temas gramaticales, las actividades solicitadas
y los materiales explotados para enseñar dichos temas, así como la práctica del
profesor en su aula de clases. El cuestionario se llevó a cabo de manera oral a fin de
poder hacer precisiones y aclarar las respuestas de los sujetos de estudio.

El segundo instrumento para la recolección de datos es una rejilla de observación

que concebimos con base en las elucidaciones de estudiosos del tema (Celce-Mur-
cia 1991, Nunan 1998, Larsen-Freeman 2001) para realizar un informe exhaustivo de
las observaciones que hemos llevado a cabo en el aula de clases de los sujetos de
nuestro estudio. La rejilla está constituida de dos grandes apartados. El primer

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apartado está escindido en cuatro rubros: a) presentación y explicación de la

gramática en clase, b) actividades propuestas para el aprendizaje de la gramática, c)
materiales explotados para la enseñanza de la gramática y d) retroalimentación a la
clase. Asimismo, este apartado cuenta con pequeños espacios vacíos para llenarse
mediante un criterio de una escala que va desde nunca o no demostrado hasta
siempre o logrado.

El segundo apartado está constituido de 14 rubros que le permiten al observador

hacer anotaciones descriptivas y detalladas de lo que sucede en el marco de la
observación. Dichos rubros enfocan la atención en los tipos de objetivos, la
asociación que hace el profesor de la gramática con otros contenidos, los tipos de
explicaciones, actividades, ejercicios, materiales, revisión y retroalimentación, así
como el tiempo dedicado a la gramática, entre otros.

Cabe señalar que llevamos a cabo observaciones de tres diferentes sesiones de

cada profesor a fin de poder contrastar sus representaciones con al menos tres de
sus prácticas reales. Por último, consideramos que ambos instrumentos nos per-
miten contrastar sus respectivos resultados y presentar conclusiones concretas
sobre la enseñanza de gramática en clases de inglés como lengua extranjera en el
sector privado a nivel bachillerato en Guadalajara, México.

Es importante hacer hincapié en que nuestro estudio es de corte cualitativo y se

enfoca única y exclusivamente en las representaciones sobre la enseñanza de la gra-
mática del inglés como lengua extranjera, así como en la práctica docente de tres
profesores. Somos conscientes de que los resultados obtenidos no nos permiten ha-
cer generalizaciones de ningún tipo.

3.3 Procedimiento de análisis

A fin de presentar e interpretar los resultados de los dos instrumentos antes aludidos,
damos inicio con los resultados arrojados en el primer instrumento, esto es el
cuestionario. Procedemos presentando las representaciones de los tres profesores
tanto cuando estas coinciden entre ellos como cuando estas discrepan.

En segundo lugar, exponemos los resultados del segundo instrumento, es decir la

rejilla de observación. Para la exposición de dichos resultados, hacemos una suerte
de síntesis de las tres observaciones realizadas a fin de dar cuenta de lo más
representativo en las prácticas de los tres sujetos de nuestro estudio. Asimismo,
cuando lo consideramos necesario, hacemos hincapié en una práctica que fue
advertida o no advertida en las tres sesiones en las que estuvimos observando a
cada docente.

Finalmente, procedemos a hacer un parangón entre los resultados del primer

instrumento y aquellos del segundo, a fin de establecer congruencias e incon-
gruencias entre las representaciones de los profesores y sus prácticas docentes
reales respecto del papel que juega la gramática en sus clases de inglés como
lengua extranjera. Igualmente, para la interpretación de nuestros datos, nos valemos
de las elucidaciones de los autores que conforman nuestros fundamentos teóricos,
especialmente de aquellos que insisten en la enseñanza de una gramática en con-

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texto socio-discursivo (Nunan 1998, Celce-Murcia 1991) y una gramática que

considere dimensiones morfosintácticas, semánticas y pragmáticas (Larsen-Free-
man 2001).

4 Análisis

4.1 Resultados de los cuestionarios

A fin de mostrar los aspectos fundamentales de las respuestas del cuestionario que
aplicamos, procedemos, primeramente, con las ideas respecto de lo que es la
gramática y el lugar que esta ocupa en el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje de una
lengua extranjera para los sujetos del estudio. Enseguida, exponemos las respuestas
que dan cuenta de los factores que intervienen en la enseñanza de temas gramati-
cales, así como las actividades, los ejercicios y los materiales explotados para en-
señar dichos temas.

De acuerdo con los tres docentes entrevistados, la gramática es definida como un

conjunto de estructuras de la lengua. D1 advierte que estas estructuras se estudian
para usar la lengua “correctamente” y se enfoca en una gramática “estándar”. D2
compara las estructuras lingüísticas con fórmulas matemáticas que les permitirán a
los estudiantes “hablar bien”, este profesor también se centra en una gramática
“estándar”. D3 señala que estas estructuras forman parte de la morfología y la
sintaxis de una lengua y que buscan la comunicación.

Con base en las respuestas de nuestros sujetos, advertimos que tanto D1 como D2
manifiestan enfocarse no solamente en una gramática en la que imperan las reglas
“prescriptivas” para hablar “correctamente” (Ceramella, 2009: 57, Delahunty & Garvey
2010: 43, Pullum, 2010: 16), sino también en una gramática supuestamente
“estándar”. Respecto de este último punto, Pullum (2010: 17) advierte que hay profe-
sores que consideran la gramática estándar como una manera cómoda de enseñar
una lengua. Empero, no son conscientes de lo que realmente enseñan, ya que dicha
gramática está llena de pequeñas complejidades e irregularidades.

Cabe hacer énfasis en que los tres docentes centran la definición de gramática en el
marco de la forma, esto es a nivel de las estructuras, sin mencionar explícitamente el
significado y el uso de estas, es decir contrariamente a lo que recomiendan Nunan
(1998: 104), Celce-Murcia (1991) y Larsen-Freeman (2001: 252-253). Y es que una
gramática que solamente se enfoca en la forma, puede resultar contraproducente:

Grammar is about form and one way to teach form is to give students rules; however,
grammar is about much more than form, and its teaching is ill served if students are
simply given rules. (Larsen-Freeman: 2001: 251).

Para los tres profesores, la gramática es importante en el proceso de enseñan-

za-aprendizaje de una lengua extranjera. D1 la ubica al mismo nivel que el voca-
bulario, pues estas dos herramientas son esenciales en el aprendizaje de una lengua
para este sujeto de estudio. D2 también pondera la gramática y la considera el centro
de su práctica docente. D3 advierte que el objetivo de la gramática es que el alumno
pueda comunicarse. Consideramos que D3 tiende a orientar su proceso de ense-

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ñanza-aprendizaje a una gramática más descriptiva que busca la comunicación,

como aquella que aconseja Nunan (1998: 104). Asimismo, D3 añade que los
estudiantes se sienten más confiados cuando se les enseña gramática porque sien-
ten que aprenden algo concreto, tal como señala Ceramella (2009: 57-71) respecto
de la representación de un aprendizaje exitoso basado en el dominio de aspectos
gramaticales.

En cuanto a la reflexión de sus prácticas, los docentes nos revelan datos un tanto
contrastantes. Por un lado, D1 enseña la gramática del inglés en español, pues su
objetivo es que sus estudiantes aprendan lo básico. Para ello, utiliza mayormente
ejercicios estructurales, lecturas y juegos en clase. Por otro lado, D2 enseña
gramática traduciendo y haciendo preguntas a sus estudiantes, incluso les solicita
investigar sobre los temas de la clase, pues su objetivo es hacer reflexionar a sus
alumnos. Finalmente, D3 enseña gramática mediante un enfoque ecléctico con expli-
caciones, ejemplos y ejercicios, en los que la gramática sea empleada para la
adquisición de las competencias tanto orales como escritas. Su objetivo es proveer a
los estudiantes de herramientas que les sirvan para comunicar en lengua extranjera.

De acuerdo con las respuestas de los docentes, los materiales utilizados por D1 son
esencialmente el libro de texto, juegos clásicos, así como medios didácticos tecno-
lógicos. D2, por su parte, refiere que únicamente utiliza el libro de texto. D3, además
de recurrir al libro de texto, explota materiales auténticos como canciones, lecturas
complementarias, ejercicios de audio, entre otros. En el marco de la evaluación del
aprendizaje de la lengua, los profesores consideran que la gramática ocupa entre un
20% y un 30% de la calificación final, aunque estos porcentajes dependen en gran
medida de las imposiciones institucionales.

En cuanto a los aspectos que a los sujetos de estudio les resultan más fáciles de
enseñar en el marco de la gramática, los docentes 1 y 2 refieren que relacionar las
estructuras que se estudian en inglés con aquellas del español es lo más sencillo en
su práctica, especialmente en cuanto a hacer hincapié en las semejanzas gramati-
cales entre ambas lenguas. Los dos profesores manifiestan que el uso del meta-
lenguaje en clase es necesario para preparar bien a los estudiantes en el aprendizaje
de un idioma. D3, por su parte, señala que enfocarse en las formas de la lengua
resulta lo más fácil de la enseñanza de la gramática. Asimismo, refiere que el uso de
metalenguaje le parece innecesario en la enseñanza de la gramática del inglés y que
existen otras maneras más sencillas para su adecuado aprendizaje.

Cuando a los profesores se les preguntó respecto del mayor reto que enfrentan al
enseñar gramática, D1 respondió que los verbos y su configuración en la oración
resultan el tema más difícil de enseñar. D2 contestó que, independientemente de
cualquier tema gramatical, motivar a sus estudiantes a aprender la gramática del
inglés constituye el reto más grande. Mientras que D3 manifestó que lo más
complicado es hacer entender qué sentido tienen estas estructuras y cuándo, cómo y
por qué se utilizan más allá de los ejercicios. Si bien este último sujeto coincide con la
propuesta de Larsen-Freeman (2001) de enseñar una gramática en la que se
estudien morfosintaxis, semántica y pragmática, advierte que la mayor dificultad re-
side en incluir estas dos últimas en el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje.

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4.2 Resultados de las observaciones de clases

Ahora bien, en lo que se refiere a las observaciones que llevamos a cabo, escindimos
nuestras explicaciones en dos grandes rubros: en el primero, nos enfocamos en la
práctica del profesor para presentar y explicar temas gramaticales, esto es el tiempo
dedicado a esta actividad, tipo de elucidaciones y ejemplificaciones, relación con
otros temas u otras competencias, así como materiales explotados. En el segundo
rubro, nos centramos en las actividades solicitadas a los estudiantes, esto es tipo de
prácticas durante la clase, tareas específicas fuera del aula, actividades individuales
o en equipo, así como su respectiva retroalimentación o revisión.

En lo que concierne a las explicaciones de los profesores, advertimos que los tres do-
centes observados dedican un tiempo considerable a la enseñanza de temas
gramaticales en sus clases, pues la mayoría de la clase gira en torno al tema
gramatical que corresponde a la unidad didáctica del libro de texto. Si bien el tiempo
que dedican los profesores a las diferentes etapas de la clase varía de un sujeto a
otro, los tres conceden aproximadamente de 10 a 20 minutos a la explicación del
punto gramatical, dejando otras actividades para el resto de la clase. En lo particular,
D1 dedica 10 minutos (de 40 que dura su clase) a la explicación. D2 asigna de 10 a
15 minutos (de 50 que dura su clase) a esta etapa. D3, por su parte, le adjudica de 15
a 20 minutos (de 60 que dura su clase)1 . 27

Los tres docentes centran sus explicaciones a nivel de la oración y recurren en mayor
o menor medida al español, lengua materna de alumnos y maestros, a fin de hacer
más transparentes y entendibles sus dilucidaciones. Asimismo, los tres profesores re-
curren a ejemplos frásticos y descontextualizados para que los estudiantes cuenten
con ilustraciones claras respecto de las estructuras presentadas.

Por un lado, tanto D1 como D2 comparan las estructuras del inglés con aquellas del
español para hacer hincapié en las semejanzas que existen entre ambas lenguas.
Empero, D1 no emplea metalenguaje; mientras que D2 lo utiliza constantemente. Por
otro lado, cabe hacer hincapié en que D2 recurre total y abiertamente a la traducción
de los ejemplos oracionales para explicar tanto las estructuras en inglés como sus
respectivas equivalencias en español. Por último, D3 hace uso de la traducción sola-
mente de manera esporádica con el objetivo de explicar formas, significados y en al-
gunas ocasiones normas de uso sin recurrir al metalenguaje, relacionando el tema
estudiado con otros previamente vistos. Tanto D1 como D3 recurren a las gramáticas
inductiva y deductiva; mientras que D2 solamente explota la gramática deductiva.

Los tres profesores trabajan con base en el libro de texto. Sin embargo, solamente D3
explota otros documentos complementarios como videos, imágenes y audios, aunque
la mayoría de las veces dichos materiales no son auténticos, contrariamente a lo que
recomienda Nunan (1998: 104). Asimismo, cabe señalar que tanto D1 como D3
aprovechan el vocabulario correspondiente a la unidad didáctica para incluirlo en los
ejemplos presentados respecto del punto gramatical analizado. Por su parte, D2 no
relaciona el vocabulario de la unidad con sus ejemplos; lo que hace es exponer gra-
mática y vocabulario de manera aislada.

1 27
Es importante advertir que la duración de las clases es diferente en el caso de cada pro-
fesor, porque es una disposición por parte de las instituciones donde labora cada uno de
ellos.

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En cuanto a las actividades solicitadas a los estudiantes, los tres profesores

proponen ejercicios estructurales frásticos. Tanto D1 como D2 prefieren que dichos
ejercicios se realicen a nivel individual; mientras que D3 propone los ejercicios tanto a
nivel individual como por equipo. Asimismo, D2 y D3 piden a sus estudiantes escribir
de manera semiespontánea durante la clase a fin de practicar el punto gramatical
analizado. Dichos escritos no se solicitan con base en instrucciones precisas
respecto del género discursivo, la tipología textual, el objetivo comunicativo ni el
número de palabras. Además, ambos profesores dejan ejercicios estructurales para
realizar en casa. Cabe señalar que D2 también solicita la realización de ejercicios de
traducción en clase. Si bien los tres docentes proponen ejercicios estructurales en el
aula, D1 no los revisa ni provee retroalimentación alguna; mientras que D2 los revisa
de forma general y D3 lo hace monitoreando la actividad individualmente y revisando
los ejercicios a nivel grupal.

Es importante comentar que D1 y D2 trabajan exclusivamente con base en objetivos

gramaticales; mientras que D3 integra la gramática a cuestiones más comunicativas
e incluso culturales en algunos momentos de la clase, aunque no de manera
sistemática. Asimismo, D1 y D2 no anuncian explícitamente los objetivos de la clase,
aunque estos se infieren a partir de las explicaciones de los profesores; mientras que
D3 sí anuncia los objetivos de forma clara. Esto lo advertimos en las tres sesiones
que lo observamos, como si se tratara de una actividad común en su práctica do-
cente.

4.3 Contraste de los resultados de ambos instrumentos

Al contrastar los resultados del cuestionario con aquellos de las observaciones,

encontramos tanto congruencias como incongruencias respecto de lo que señalan
los profesores sujetos de nuestro estudio y lo que observamos en su práctica docente
real. Para llevar a cabo este contraste, procedemos con el análisis de cada uno de los
tres profesores examinados.

Por un lado, entre los aspectos congruentes de los resultados de ambos instrumentos
respecto de D1, advertimos que este profesor señala que enseña el inglés mediante
explicaciones en español, situación que siempre observamos en sus clases. Además,
no solamente recurre al español para explicar, sino que también lo utiliza recurrente-
mente como punto de comparación con la lengua que está enseñando, tal como lo
afirma en el cuestionario. Asimismo, constatamos que la gramática y el vocabulario
constituyen los dos aspectos más importantes de su clase, ya que en las sesiones
que observamos las explicaciones y ejemplificaciones ofrecidas por el docente rela-
cionaban el tema gramatical con el vocabulario correspondiente a la unidad didáctica.

Por otro lado, en lo concerniente a las incongruencias de los resultados de los dos
instrumentos en relación con D1, advertimos que, si bien el profesor señala que uti-
liza el metalenguaje para acostumbrar a sus estudiantes a este tipo de discurso y
prepararlos para futuras clases de lengua extranjera, en las tres sesiones en las que
observamos al sujeto en cuestión, nunca hizo uso del metalenguaje en sus
explicaciones, instrucciones o ejemplificaciones. Asimismo, D1 refiere que utiliza jue-
gos y que explota medios didácticos tecnológicos para facilitar el aprendizaje de sus
estudiantes; sin embargo, en las clases que observamos nunca se recurrió a otros
materiales que no fueran el libro de texto y el pizarrón.
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En cuanto a D2, los aspectos que concuerdan en los dos instrumentos de nuestro
estudio son que el profesor recurre constantemente al metalenguaje y a la traducción
en sus explicaciones, comparando las estructuras lingüísticas con fórmulas mate-
máticas. La traducción también es un recurso explotado en los ejercicios y activi-
dades que solicita a sus alumnos, pues a través de la traducción, el profesor asegura
que los estudiantes no solamente adquieren las estructuras enseñadas, sino también
el significado de estas. Asimismo, como bien señala en el cuestionario, D2 solamente
recurre al libro de texto en clase.,

En lo que se refiere a las incongruencias de los resultados respecto de D2, notamos

que, si bien el profesor cuestiona frecuentemente a sus estudiantes al momento de
explicar el tema gramatical, estos cuestionamientos no forzosamente promueven la
reflexión en ellos, como lo pretende el docente. Y es que algunas veces dichas pre-
guntas son meramente retóricas o no están claramente formuladas; de tal manera
que los estudiantes no responden a ellas.

Finalmente, con respecto a los resultados congruentes de los instrumentos referentes

a D3, identificamos que este profesor busca enseñar una gramática tridimensional,
como lo propone Larsen-Freeman (2001), en donde convivan formas, significados y
usos. No obstante, el énfasis se produce mayormente en las formas. Asimismo,
advertimos que el profesor no hace uso del metalenguaje en sus explicaciones, tal
como lo señala en el cuestionario, en su lugar utiliza términos más cotidianos que re-
sultan más claros para los estudiantes y algunas veces incluso recurre a la traduc-
ción.

En relación con las cuestiones incongruentes identificadas en los resultados de los

instrumentos, encontramos que, aunque D3 recurre a materiales complementarios al
libro de texto como videos, audios y textos escritos, estos no resultan documentos
auténticos, como recomienda Nunan (1998: 104), sino más bien materiales híbridos o
fabricados. Asimismo, nos percatamos de que, si bien el profesor señala que trabaja
tanto competencias orales como escritas en la enseñanza de la gramática, en las se-
siones observamos que las actividades solicitadas a sus estudiantes tienden mucho
más a la escritura.

Por último, cabe mencionar que, en los cuestionarios, los tres profesores concuerdan
en señalar que la gramática juega un papel preponderante en su práctica docente,
cuestión que ratificamos con base en nuestras observaciones. En efecto, gran parte
de las clases, algunas veces incluso toda la clase, se dedica a la enseñanza de la
gramática. En términos generales, 25-30% de la clase se dedica a la explicación, otro
25-30% a que los estudiantes tomen notas de lo expuesto por el maestro, otro
20-30% a la realización de ejercicios estructurales o producciones escritas semi-
espontáneas y 20% a la revisión o retroalimentación, cuando esta se produce.

A fin de determinar si los resultados aquí obtenidos pudieran considerarse proto-

típicos de la situación metodológica de los profesores de inglés como lengua extran-
jera en México, es imperante realizar otros estudios que tomen en consideración
nuestras representativas de la población analizada.

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5 Conclusiones

A lo largo del presente texto, hemos advertido la importancia que tres profesores de
inglés como lengua extranjera le conceden a la gramática en el proceso de ense-
ñanza-aprendizaje. Constatamos que los profesores tienden a concebir la gramática
de una lengua como un conjunto de reglas que les permitirán a los estudiantes crear
estructuras; en otras palabras, los profesores examinados se enfocan en la forma. En
efecto, en su práctica docente, los tres sujetos del estudio basan sus explicaciones
en unidades frásticas y no textuales. Igualmente, dichas unidades resultan descon-
textualizadas; de tal suerte que solamente se hace hincapié en las cuestiones morfo-
sintácticas de la lengua y no en aspectos semánticos ni pragmático-discursivos.

Lo anterior nos lleva a concluir que, como las unidades enseñadas son frásticas, las
unidades producidas por los estudiantes también son frásticas, pues no se puede
solicitar la producción de textos cuando estos resultan prácticamente inexistentes en
la clase. Consideramos que, independientemente del nivel impartido, si los profe-
sores partieran de unidades textuales, podrían explotar una gramática más real que
integrara formas, significados y usos, y a su vez, los estudiantes serían capaces de
producir géneros discursivos diversos y no solamente oraciones “gramaticalmente
correctas” como es el objetivo que persiguen D1 y D2.

Asimismo, tanto D1 como D2 se enfocan en enseñar una gramática prescriptiva con

el objetivo de que sus estudiantes aprendan la lengua 'correctamente'. Solamente,
D3 manifiesta ser consciente de una gramática más descriptiva que busque una
verdadera comunicación. Consideramos que las diferencias identificadas en D3
respecto de los otros dos profesores evidencian su formación tanto didáctica como
lingüística. No obstante, en su práctica docente, no siempre están presentes los
aspectos semánticos y pragmáticos. En efecto, observamos que no en todos los
momentos de la clase, el profesor se enfoca en la enseñanza de la gramática tri-
dimensional que advierte Larsen-Freeman (2001), pues tanto en las explicaciones
como en las ejemplificaciones, el profesor trabaja con unidades frásticas que se en-
focan únicamente en la dimensión de la forma.

Con base en los resultados de este estudio, advertimos la necesidad de crear

conciencia en los profesores de inglés como lengua extranjera, al menos en aquellos
que hemos examinado aquí, respecto de la enseñanza tridimensional de la gramática,
donde se estudien las estructuras y su respectiva configuración junto con los signifi-
cados y las condiciones pragmáticas que rigen el uso de dichas estructuras (Lar-
sen-Freeman 2001: 252). Para ello, se pueden concebir cursos y talleres de
actualización basados en estas ideas a fin de que el profesor se replantee el papel
que juega la gramática en la enseñanza de una lengua extranjera y que integre dicha
gramática en un todo comunicativo.

Por último, volvemos a hacer hincapié que este estudio no nos permite generalizar y
extrapolar los resultados al conjunto de la población de profesores de inglés como
lengua extranjera de bachillerato. Empero, dichos resultados nos ofrecen una pri-
mera aproximación del fenómeno que hemos estudiado. Con base en estos resul-
tados, contamos con guías más precisas para continuar con investigaciones con
corpus más vastos de la población examinada.

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Por lo anterior, nos parece importante que se realicen más investigaciones en torno a
las representaciones de profesores de lenguas extranjeras respecto del papel que
juega la gramática en el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje y que se analicen las
correspondencias de dichas representaciones con sus prácticas docentes reales.
Consideramos que dichos resultados pueden utilizarse para llevar a cabo acciones
puntuales que mejoren las prácticas de los profesores en las que el objetivo que se
persiga sea más integrador y que considere no solo aspectos morfosintácticos, sino
también semánticos y pragmáticos.

Bibliografía

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Ceramella, Nick (2009): Exploring Grammar in ELT: The Challenge of Prescriptivism vs
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serija 2, 55-78.
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Moreno García, Concha (1999): Gramática para hablar. En: Español como lengua extranjera,
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Autores:

Sara Quintero Ramírez

Doctora en Estudios Literarios y Lingüísticos
Universidad de Guadalajara
Departamento de Lenguas Modernas
Calle Guanajuato 1045
Col. Alcalde Barranquitas. C. P. 44260
Guadalajara, Jalisco
México
E-mail: sara.quintero@academicos.udg.mx

Sonny Ángelo Castro Yáñez

Candidato a doctor en Lingüística Aplicada
Maestro en Lingüística Aplicada
Universidad de Guadalajara
Sistema de Universidad Virtual

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Av. de la Paz 2453,

Col. Arcos Sur. C. P. 44130
Guadalajara, Jalisco
México
E-mail: sonny.yanez@udgvirtual.udg.mx

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Modality-Focused L2-Instruction
in Swedish Sign Language

Ingela Holmström (Stockholm, Sweden)

Abstract (English)

Most second language (L2) learning happens in the same modality, i.e., a learner who has a
spoken language as the first language most commonly learns additional spoken languages as
L2. In such language acquisition cases, learners can build on what they already physically
know about how to express language. But, if they begin to learn a sign language, they have to
learn how to express language in a new modality, i.e. the visual-gestural one. It requires
expressing the language using hands, arms, face, and body instead of the speech organs,
and this is very unfamiliar for them. Furthermore, learners need to learn specific linguistic
features that largely differ from those of spoken languages, such as spatiality, iconicity and
simultaneity. In this paper, the teaching of such modality-specific features in a cohort of first-
year hearing L2 students, who are learning Swedish Sign Language at the university level, is
examined and described. This empirical study shows a language teaching context that largely
differs from other language teaching contexts and how students experience this new lan-
guage learning process.
Keywords: Sign language, visual modality, second language, instruction, action research

Abstract (Svenska)

Det vanligaste är att andraspråksinlärning sker inom samma modalitet som förstaspråket. Det
betyder att inlärare som har ett talat språk som förstaspråk (L1) oftast lär sig andra talade
språk som andraspråk (L2). I sådana fall av språktillägnande kan inlärarna utgå ifrån vad de
redan vet om hur man uttrycker språk rent fysiologiskt. Men om inlärarna som har ett talat
språk som L1 istället börjar lära sig ett teckenspråk som L2 måste de samtidigt lära sig att
uttrycka språket i en ny modalitet, dvs. den visuellt-gestuella. Detta innebär att de istället för
att använda talorganen uttrycker språket med händerna, armarna, ansiktet och kroppen, vilket
kan upplevas som väldigt annorlunda och främmande. Inlärarna måste också lära sig tecken-
språkets specifika särdrag som till stor del skiljer sig från det talade språkets, såsom
spatialitet, ikonicitet och simultanitet. I föreliggande empiriskpå universitetsnivå. Studien
skildrar en form av andraspråkundervisning som till stor del skiljer sig från annan sådan
undervisning och beskriver också hur inlärarna själva upplever denna nya språkinlärnings-
process.a studie undersöks och beskrivs hur undervisningen av sådana modalitetsspecifika
särdrag ser ut med utgångspunkt i en årskull förstaårsstudenter som läser svenskt tecken-
språk som L2.
Nyckelord: Teckenspråk, visuell modalitet, andraspråk, undervisning, aktionforskning

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1 Introduction

“It was extremely difficult! It’s something brand new!” the student responded in a
written interview regarding her initial experience from learning Swedish Sign Lan-
guage (STS) at the beginner level in a university class. This utterance captures the
common perception among sign language teachers and researchers that one of the
most unfamiliar things with learning a sign language (when having a spoken language
as the first language) is to learn to express the language with hands, arms, face, and
body instead of the speech organs (e.g. Chen Pichler & Koulidobrova 2015, Woll
2013). This is described as learning to express a language in a new modality, i.e. the
visual-gestural modality.

The most common case is that learning additional languages after the first language
(L1) has been acquired happens in the same modality. In other words, a learner who
has a spoken language as his or her L1 most commonly learns additional spoken
languages as second languages (L2). Also, signers with sign language as the L1 may
learn an additional sign language as their L2. In such language acquisition cases,
learners can build on what they already physically know about how to express
language. This is not the case when having a spoken language as L1 and learning a
sign language as L2, and vice versa. In order to differentiate between L2 learning in
the same modality (unimodal L2 learning) and the learning of an L2 expressed in
another modality (bimodal L2 learning), it is usual to use the abbreviation M2-L2,
where M2 stands for ‘second modality’ (e.g. Chen Pichler & Koulidobrova 2015).

The last decade has seen an increasing interest in M2-L2 learning with different foci.
Studies have, among other things, focused on phonological features (e.g. Ortega &
Morgan 2015, Rosen 2004), on learning to use space in front of the body (e.g.
Boers-Visker 2020, Ferrara & Nilsson 2017, Shield & Meier 2018), and on language
acquisition and developmental patterns (Mesch & Schönström 2021, Williams, Darcy
& Newman 2017). However, studies that focus on the teaching of sign language as
M2-L2 are sparse (e.g., Boers-Visker 2020 for an overview). For example, Quinto-Po-
zos (2011) points out a lack of studies that examine the efficacy of teaching strategies
and curricula. He also states that sign language teachers have mostly had to use trial
and error approaches, which means that they continuously adjust and improve their
teaching through their experiences, due to the lack of guiding research. Nevertheless,
indications of interest in the field of sign language pedagogy have begun to emerge in
the past few years. For example, the Routledge Handbook on Sign Language
Pedagogy (Rosen 2020) has just been published. Its third part specifically focuses on
the teaching of sign language as L2. Among other things, it covers, teacher
preparation, qualifications, and development, teaching approaches and strategies,
tests and assessments, and teaching specific features such as fingerspelling, voca-
bulary and grammar. This handbook contributes to giving L2 sign language teachers
more reliable scientific knowledge to base their teaching on. However, more empirical
studies are needed that examine different parts of language instruction.

One such empirical study was conducted by Boers-Visker (2020), who examined the
effects of form-focused interventions in three groups learning Sign Language of the
Netherlands. Her focus was on the L2 learning of the agreement verb system, and the
three groups examined were instructed through different teaching strategies, each
one using different degrees of explicitness. One of the groups was a control group
that did not receive input focused on the agreement verb system, at all. Boers-Visker
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(2020: 298) concludes that the form-focused intervention was beneficial for the two
groups who had received more explicit instruction in the form of input flood only, or
input flood together with rule presentation and explicit corrective feedback.

The overall aim in Boers-Visker’s doctoral thesis was to study how hearing L2
learners of sign language learn how to use a specific modality characteristic of sign
languagee: the space in front of the body. This characteristic has been identified as
particularly difficult for M2-L2 learners and has engaged several researchers in the
sign-language L2-field on different linguistic levels. For example, Shield & Meier
(2018), who focused on the phonological level of single signs, suggest that sign
language learners have four imitation strategies at their disposal when learning to sign
and use space:
● anatomical strategy: they activate the same muscles as the signer, and thus,
they may produce the sign with their non-dominant hand instead of their domi-
nant as is correct);
● mirroring strategy (they produce a sign that is a mirror of the signer’s, leading
to incorrect reversal movements)
● visual matching strategy: they incorrectly produce the sign as perceived from
their own perspective, which leads to the use of incorrect inward or outward
movements or palm orientations), and
● reversing strategy: they correctly produce the sign from the signer’s perspec-
tive.

Shield & Meier (2018 15) found that adults learning a sign language typically tend to
use the mirroring strategy but also use the visual matching strategy and sometimes
the anatomical strategy. More skilled signers instead employ the (correct) reversing
strategy.

The fact that adult sign language learners struggle with the learning of spatial features
has also been found by Ferrara & Nilsson (2017). They examined a group of students
learning Norwegian Sign Language and found, among other things, that students had
difficulties placing signs in the signing space, and coordinating and positioning their
hands in relation to each other. Ferrara & Nilsson also found another feature among
their students that can be related to modality: the latter preferred to use more lexical
signs (in line with how spoken language is expressed) rather than depicting signs i.e.
signs that are part of the productive lexicon and dependent on the context, which can
depict a movement, a shape, a location or the handling of an object. These findings
can inform sign-language teachers in their teaching of M2-L2 learners.

Morett (2015) also touches on the field of sign language pedagogy. She found that
hearing adults’ acquisition of sign language can be enhanced through a teaching
method that combines mental imagery, i.e. explicit instruction that students create a
mental image of the meaning of a given sign in their minds, and enactment, i.e.
students were asked to re-enact new signs that they learned. Morett argues that such
a teaching method “strengthens the conceptual links between sign referents, resulting
in improved encoding and recall of signs by novice adult hearing L2 sign learners”
(Morett 2015: 272).

The research presented here represents a contribution to the field of sign language
pedagogy and is an empirical study focusing on the M2-L2 acquisition of
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modality-specific features. The study examines the approaches used by STS-in-

structors to teach modality-specific features to hearing beginners during the first eight
weeks of instruction.

In the next section, the characteristics of sign language modality will be described
more closely.

2 Characteristics of the Sign Language Modality

There are many shared properties between sign languages and spoken languages
the most important of which are the following ones:
● They both have conventional vocabularies, which are productive; new vocabu-
lary is added through borrowing and compounding, for example
● They have similar syntactic structures, e.g. the same parts of speech), and
● They have the same language acquisition milestones). (Meier 2002, 2006).

There are, however, also several differences between the languages, which primarily
depend on the fact that they are expressed in different modalities, e.g. the visual-ges-
tural vs. the oral-aural. Meier (2002) suggests four possible sources of modality ef-
fects on linguistic structure:
1. the articulators’ different properties,
2. the different perceptual system,
3. the visual-gestural system’s greater potential to iconic / indexic representation,
and
4. the youth of sign languages and their non-linguistic roots in gestures
(Meier 2002: 6f).

Thus, sign languages build on what can be expressed through hands, face and body,
and on what can be perceived through the eyes. The signs are composed through a
combination of the parameters of handshape, movement, location and orientation and
can be combined into sentences and inflected for various purposes.

Three particular characteristics of sign languages are their iconicity, spatiality, and
simultaneity. Iconicity means that a large proportion of the signs are visually motivated,
having a resemblance between form and meaning. In other words, iconic signs look
like what they mean, and thus, it is possible to figure out their meaning (Taub 2012:
389ff). These iconic signs consist of fixed, conventionalized signs and depicting signs.
The former are lexemes that resemble enactment (e.g. write , swim) or show a feature
of size or shape of an object (e.g. ball), while the latter are signs that depend on the
context and do not have any fixed forms, e.g. signs which show how entities move or
are handled as in ‘open’ that depends on whether the object being opened is a door, a
bottle or a water tap. Depicting signs are often used in situations where the signer
describes the environment, as seen by him or herself or by a character, or takes on
the role of a character who is handling objects.

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Spatiality means that sign languages use the place in front of the signer’s body to
produce signs. This space is used for the articulation of lexical signs, but also for
grammatical and discourse purposes (Boers-Visker 2020, Perniss 2012). For example,
the direction of a sign can indicate the subject and object in an utterance, and the
placing of signs at different locations can organize information or referents in a given
narrative.

Simultaneity is about the fact that sign languages favor producing different features or
structures at the same time, while the oral-aural modality of spoken languages entails
sequential structures (Meier 2002, 2006). Simultaneity can be found in that the two
hands can express different signs in tandem, but also through the fact that the signer's
hands can express manual signs with lexical content while the face at the same time
adds grammatical content to the utterances.

Another characteristic of sign languages is the manner in which the interaction takes
place. For example, eye contact is essential for sign language communication
because if the interlocutors do not look at each other, they cannot communicate. The
addressee thus needs to pay visual attention to the signer, and this also regulates
how turn-taking takes place in sign language communication. While in the oral-aural
modality, it is possible to just take the turn, it must be obtained in the visual-gestural
one. As a consequence, the signer has to seek the addressee’s attention in visual or
tactile ways. For example, the signer can touch the addressee, wave with the hand in
the addressee’s field of vision, bang on a surface (to create vibrations), or switch the
light on and off (Baker & van den Bogaerde 2012).

As shown in the description here, the properties of the sign language modality thus
occur at different levels, from phonological to discourse and conversational levels. It is,
therefore, not sufficient to simply point out to what “modality-specific” instruction
should contain. In this article, however, exercises that aim to train the four specific as-
pects mentioned here (iconicity, spatiality, simultaneity, and visual attention) will be
examined.

3 The Study

In 2016, a project was initiated at Stockholm University, whose aim was to enhance
teachers’ knowledge about effective ways of teaching STS as an L2. The project,
UTL2 (Teaching Swedish Sign Language as a second language), was initiated by two
deaf STS teachers, who experienced a lack of scientific knowledge to rely on in their
teaching. Together with a (deaf) researcher (the author of the present paper), they
began to prepare for the project. The project group decided to use action research as
their method, because this method takes its point of departure in the teachers’ own
teaching practice and provides opportunities for teachers to learn more about it and
give them prerequisites to improve it (e.g. McAteer 2013). It has also been used in
sign language teaching research previously (Rosen et al. 2015) and inspired the team
to use this approach.

The action research process (McAteer 2013, Rönnerman 2004) can be seen as a
cycle (Figure 1) which starts with the identification of a problem to be examined in
depth:

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Figure 1: The Cycle of Action Research

After identification, a plan is made for the examination before the action takes place.
This action can, for example, consist of testing teaching methods, evaluating different
assessments or developing new exercises. Simultaneously, it is crucial to observe
what actually happens, for example, through video recordings or field notes. After
these phases, the process, results and outcomes are reflected on, for example, within
the teacher team. After conducting a project in such a cycle, the knowledge generated
from the project is implemented in the practice, and informs further development work,
for example, in a new study on the practice.

The project group followed these phases and planned and prepared a first sub-study
that aimed to examine whether students benefited more from initial teaching con-
ducted in mainly spoken Swedish or mainly STS (Holmström 2018a, 2018b). The
students were divided into two groups. In group A, teaching was primarily conducted
by deaf teachers, in STS, and in group B, it was conducted with hearing teachers. The
primary language was spoken Swedish. After three weeks of such initial teaching,
both groups became instructed in STS and spoken Swedish in parallel (in different
lessons). Students’ outcomes were examined through an elicited imitation task,
SignRepL2, which consisted in watching a recording of an STS signer producing
single signs, two-sign sentences, and three-sign sentences, and in imitating these as
exactly as possible (Holmström 2018a). In addition, participant observations and
video recordings of the classroom interaction were made to study how the teaching
was conducted and to discover recurring patterns and phenomena in each form of
instruction. This sub-study revealed that there were no differences in the students’
outcomes regarding their signing skills, but that the group which had received initial
instruction through mainly spoken Swedish obtained better metalinguistic knowledge
and obtained higher grades in the theoretical classes (Holmström 2018a, 2018b,
2019). The outcomes were discussed and analysed in a team of teachers at the uni-
versity, and resulted, among other things, in changes in the curriculum.

The teacher team, consisting of five deaf L1 teachers (including the two project-team
teachers) and two hearing teachers (one fluent L2 signer and one L1 signer), con-
cluded that students who had been instructed mainly through spoken Swedish show-
ed a lack of visual attention and a lack of visual-gestural modality-behaviour in their
social interaction. As a consequence, the deaf teachers experienced students as
less motivated and a bit ignorant in class. Another finding which was revealed in the
reflection phase was that there were several modality-specific aspects which were
trained but not mentioned in the learning outcomes expressed in the curriculum. Thus,

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some skills which students developed were not paid attention to when the teachers
rated their outcomes in the exams. The ensuing changes in the curriculum were made
in order to cover more adequately what students learned in the courses and to include
visual attention training. The new curriculum was first used with the cohort of students
who start their STS education in the fall semester 2018.

In parallel with the changes in the curriculum, the project group decided to conduct a
new sub-study on the new cohort of students, with an emphasis laid on modality-fo-
cused instruction. This paper builds on data from this new sub-study, which is de-
scribed in the next section.

4 A Study on the Teaching of Modality-Specific Features

The whole teacher team, consisting of seven teachers, was involved in the planning
and preparation of this sub-study. Its main focus was the question of how the instruc-
tors should teach modality-specific features to students. As preparation, the teachers
read and discussed selected research articles on L2-signers, and attended a seminar
with a researcher in the child-sign-language acquisition field to learn about the dif-
ferent phases of development in sign language as the L1 in children.

Initially, the project team intended to use processability theory (Pienemann 1998),
which addresses how L2 learners acquire grammatical structures. However, as there
are no studies that have identified stages for STS development and as teachers dis-
cussed whether modality was a factor lacking in this theory, the team decided not to
use it. In a series of seminars, the teacher team instead constructed a “developmental
ladder” describing the main focus of each level of teaching during two years of STS-in-
struction (Balkstam et al. 2018):

Figure 2: The developmental ladder constructed by the teacher team

(reproduced from Balkstam et al. 2018)

The work with this ladder informed the planning of the teaching for the cohort of first-
year students in fall 2018.

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As illustrated in Figure 2, level 1 focuses on modality. This means that instruction

initially should mainly train students to be familiar with modality-specific features. In
the lesson plan for the first eight weeks of instruction (i.e. the first STS-course in the
program), it was decided that the three first weeks (approximately 36 hours of in-class
instruction) would mainly have such a focus. This phase covered different exercises,
such as training to use face and body, learning about the space in front of the body,
and training of visual attention. After the first three weeks, some lessons still had mo-
dality-specific training in focus, but instruction continued further into level 2.

The cohort of students was divided into three groups, each group consisting of appro-
ximately 10 students (in total, 30 students participated in the first weeks of instruction).
26 students were women and four were men, with a mean age of 23 years. Students
either had no previous knowledge of STS, at all, or were early beginners.

17 lessons (1,5 hours each) from the whole period of eight weeks with a
modality-specific focus were video-recorded with two cameras (one directed at the
teacher and one at students), and the data amounted to 30 hours of recordings. Four
teachers were involved in the teaching (they had different lessons with the groups,
one at a time), of which three were deaf L1 signers (here called Nina, Jenny and
Anders) and one, a hearing L2 signer (called Anna). After each lesson, the teachers
made a reflection on how the teaching had gone, documented either in STS or written
Swedish. Besides, students were asked to participate in a written interview after the
first eight weeks of instruction in order to share how they had experienced the teach-
ing and content.

Both STS and spoken Swedish were used in the teaching process. Primarily, explana-
tions and shorter lectures were provided in spoken Swedish. In these cases, the
hearing teacher herself spoke, and the deaf teachers used STS-interpreters. In the
practical exercises, STS was primarily used by all teachers.

5 Modality-Focused Instruction

The video-recordings from the 17 lessons were analyzed with a focus on modal-
ity-specific instruction. In this section, the results of this analysis will be described and
illustrated. The lessons possibly consisted of several exercises, each of which trained
different modality features; it was not the case that one lesson trained one feature only.
However, the exercises could also train several modality features simultaneously. For
example, the training of visual attention could happen in tandem with training to use
space or simultaneity. However in the following, the focus is on each of the four mo-
dality-specific characteristics in separate sections, although a given exercise may also
have trained other features.

5.1 Visual Attention

As described above, visual attention is a fundamental feature in sign language com-

munication. Hearing people use primarily auditive attention, for example, they call
each other by their names when addressing a message or asking for attention. They
may also react to sounds in the environment and look in a certain direction while

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speaking and listening. Thus in the sign language classes of this study, the training of
visual attention was essential, both in specific exercises and as an underlying, con-
stant training during all the lessons, particularly in the lessons with deaf L1 teachers
(because it was possible to acoustically call for attention or use the voice with the
hearing teachers). The deaf teachers in the study required that all students look at
them before they started signing and that they all looked at each other when one
student was signing. Deaf teachers also regularly used hand wavings to catch stu-
dents’ attention. During the exercises, they switched the light on and off to signal stu-
dents that they should stop the activity and look at them. An interesting fact is that in
the previous sub-study described above, the researcher found that some of the deaf
teachers used auditive attention strategies, such as hand-clapping or knocking at ta-
bles or walls, to get students' attention. Afterwards this was discussed in the teacher
team, as is usual in action research processes, and the team decided to stop this
behaviour because all agreed that students needed to train their visual attention in
particular. Thus, in the data for this study, only visual attention-markers were used by
deaf teachers.

Some exercises were, however, explicitly conducted in order to train students' visual
attention and eye contact. Two of these exercises will be described more closely. The
first one took place in the second lesson after the semester had started. The teacher,
Nina, had an interpreter at her disposal, because this, was one of the first sessions,
and students had just begun to learn STS. Nina explained that it was crucial to direct
the eyes to the person in focus and that they would train such visual attention with the
help of a small ball. The students and Nina stoof in a circle, and Nina explained that
the one that was holding the ball should direct her (only female students were present
on this occasion) eyes toward the other students and choose one of them. After that,
she should raise her eyebrows as a signal to this student, and then throw the ball to
her. This student should then do the same thing, and so on. The other students, who
did not have the ball, were instructed to follow the student holding the ball, with their
eyes, and switch to the new one once the ball was been thrown. After a while, Nina
asked the students to add an eye blink before throwing the ball, and the exercise went
on:

Figure 3: Training of Eye Contact Through Throwing a Ball

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When all students had thrown the ball several times, Nina asked them to also move
their arms in circles with the palm forward, while continuing making eye contact. This,
however, did not work well: students started giggling, missing the ball, making mis-
takes and forgetting to use all the signals. In her reflections afterward, Nina concluded
that she should not have added the last movement of the arm because students were
not ready to control so many features simultaneously.

The second example of visual-attention training comes from Jenny’s class. The les-
son was students' third. Jenny began with a lecture on visual attention, mediated
through an STS interpreter, using a PowerPoint presentation. She explained the
differences between aural and visual attention and the characteristics of STS visual
attention. After the lecture, Jenny asked students to leave their chairs and stand to-
gether in the middle of the room. She asked them to walk around in the room, make
eye contact with each other and sign hello. After a while, Jenny switched the light on
and off, and students stopped walking around. Jenny then asked them to do the
same thing, but instead approach each other from behind and tap each other's
shoulder to get attention before signing hello:

Figure 4: Visual-Attention Training

This exercise was followed by a similar one in which students were instead asked to
strike their hands on the other students’ arms, and to sign hello after getting eye con
tact.

In this exercise, students trained different ways to make contact with their interlocutors
and to dare to touch each other to get attention. Jenny’s reflections from the lesson
were that the exercises were essential to train visual attention and that students were
not used to doing so in communication. She also noted that students quickly caught
on to the switching of light to get attention and that in fact, they started using this mea-
sure themselves.

The examples given here illustrate a very different way to L2-teaching, compared to
the teaching of other spoken languages. The exercises are not meant to train the lan-
guage per se, but rather to train fundamental behaviours for the language to be used
at all. And this is grounded in the fact that students were learning to express the lan-
guage in the visual modality.
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5.2 Iconicity

Iconicity in sign languages differs largely from iconicity in spoken languages, and
several studies on M2-L2 acquisition have focused on this characteristic. There are
disagreements about whether iconicity in sign languages facilitates their acquisition or
not. For example, some researchers (e.g. Mayberry 2006) mention that it may be
easier for learners to remember iconic signs because it is simple to reveal their
meaning as they look like what they mean. Other researchers (e.g. Ortega & Morgan
2015) argue that learners perceive iconic signs as more accessible; therefore, they do
not pay in-depth attention to them, and may perform them, making more phonological
errors. However, regardless of whether iconicity facilitates the learning of a sign lan-
guage or not for M2-L2 learners, it is an apparent characteristic that is more frequent
and common in sign languages. Thus, it is also a prominent part of the content taught
and was therefore focused on in several exercises in this study.

An example from teaching, focusing on iconicity comes from Anna’s lessons. Anna, a
hearing L2 teacher, used spoken Swedish when she introduced topics, explained
concepts or features, or had discussions with her students. During the exercises, how-
ever, students were required to use STS exclusively.

Anna informed her students that they would learn how to depict verbs, and asked
them to think about activities or events, and how they should talk about them in STS.
She mentioned that the signs they would use did not have to be established signs and
that they did not have to sign in sentences but rather show what it might look like
when they would handle an object or conduct an activity. In-class discussions
revealed that students did not understand the purpose of depicting signs. They asked
why it was not just to combine different lexical signs into sentences. Anna told them
that this was the usual way in the visual-gestural modality and explained that depicting
signs got their meanings in specific contexts. After that, one student suggested a sign
that indicated how she held the handle of a shopping cart, and Anna asked the
students to find out more activities that could be produced in the same way. Another
student suggested the use of a rolling pin, and Anna agreed. She explained that in
these cases, the context was essential because otherwise, it would be impossible to
understand what the sign meant. After these clarifications, students continued dis-
covering activities in which they used their hands in different ways.

This lesson was followed up by another exercise one week later. When the students
arrived in the classroom, they found that Anna had put different objects on the tables:
food boxes, bottles, bowls, jugs, kitchen utensils, and several other things. Anna
walked from table to table and explained and showed that students handle the
objects on the tables in pairs in different ways. While one student was to handle the
real objects, the other, standing opposite, was to mirror his classmates' handling with-
out using real objects. After a while, they switched roles.

Initially, students were confused, and Anna walked around and explained the exercise
several times in Swedish. Finally, all the students stood opposite each other, pouring
liquid in bowls, hanging up laundry, picking fruit, etc. (Figure 5). The students
switched between their roles and between different tables, performing the different ex-
ercises. After a long while, Anna requested them to sit down and asked them what the
exercise had to do with sign language:

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Figure 5: Handling Objects in Reality and Fictitiously

The students appeared not to be entirely clear about what they had been trained, and
suggested that they had learned to express things with their faces. For example, if a
bottle was heavy, it should be visible in the face by blowing out the cheeks like when
lifting something heavier (maybe suggested because students had trained this with
Jenny and Nina in previous lessons).1 Another student suggested that they had been
28

trained to read signs, and a third suggested that the exercise was about the use of the
right or left hand.2 Anna disagreed and explained that what they had done was to
29

train different handshapes and how the choice of different handshapes is informed by
the form of the respective object and how we handle it. She told them that they had
learned many different signs for 'open' because the sign depends on the object that
should be opened: a bottle, a door, a box, or a washing machine. But as these signs
are contextual, they need to be produced together with a lexical sign that expresses
what the object is. Anna also explained that in sign languages, the extra-linguistic
reality is commonly used in the creation of signs: signs are produced in a similar way
so as to how we handle objects in reality.

These examples illustrate how sign language M2-L2 teaching differs significantly from
other L2 language instruction. While in spoken languages, in general, fixed lexemes
are used, sign languages use a combination of fixed lexemes and depicting signs.
Thus, in class, the connection between real objects and activities and the way signs
are performed in STS is made explicit to students. They learn to see the connections
and become conscious of their hands and bodies and of the fact that what they do
with their hands in reality can be transferred into the performance of depicting signs in
STS.

1 28
In STS, adverbial content is expressed primarily through facial expressions (Section 5.4).
2 29
The use of the right or left hand has no meaning in STS, but rather it is about which side a
sign is performed on. If the signer is right-handed and wants to perform the sign for ‘power’,
she starts the sign on her chest’s opposite side. If the signer is left-handed, she also starts
the sign from her opposite side. This is often difficult for STS beginners to understand.
However, right and left can be important in other contexts, for example, when telling where
things are located. Then the recipient must perceive that, for example, a car is parked at the
right side of the signer (Section 5.3).

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5.3 Spatiality

As mentioned above, a signer mainly expresses the signs with hands and arms
moving in front of the body, a place called the signing space. However, hearing
beginners do initially not know that there is a signing space, and thus, they need to
become conscious of it. Space is used in a range of ways, and at different linguistic
levels, with different purposes. Thus, almost everything students in sign language
classes learn is to use this space. However, there are exercises that more explicitly
focus on particular parts of the space and how it should be used. As this study focuses
on modality training in the first eight weeks of instruction, the examples described
here come from lessons with an explicit focus on spatiality training for beginners.

In one of the students’ very first lessons, Nina, mediated through an STS-interpreter,
told students that they would practice “thinking reversely”:

You will learn to think about how you read a sign and what it looks like from your
perspective when you perform it yourself. Your signing, the direction, and the shape of
your hands look different from the recipient’s perspective. When you perform the sign
yourself, it is perceived in the opposite way by recipients. If I sign 'write', the movement is
outward from my body, but you see it as I do a movement that goes towards you, and
then you might want to sign 'write' with an inward movement because it is how you per-
ceived it. But it is not so, and thus, you have to think reversely.

Nina turned half around so that she had her back partly to the class and showed how
the sign looked from this perspective. She stressed that the exercise was aimed to
train students to think reversely. Nina asked students to stand up in a circle in the
classroom and started moving one hand in circles. Students imitate her. The student
standing opposite Nina mirrored her and performed the sign with the wrong arm. Nina
stopped and directed all the students’ attention to this case and explained that this
was the moment when they should think reversely to produce the same movement
and not just perform mirroring. Nina then divided the students so that they would work
in pairs and, standing in front of each other, they were trained to make different move-
ments with their hands, arms and legs that the other student was to create similarly:

Figure 6: Training to Think in Reverse

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This exercise continued on for about 30 minutes, and students switched pairs at
times.

One week later, the deaf teacher Anders also taught the class to think about places
and directions. He introduced an exercise in which students (working in pairs) would
create their own simple crosswords, and then, without looking at each other's papers,
one student would try to explain where the other student would start writing words,
such as in the top right corner and continue downward, filling in letters in the boxes. All
this would be explained entirely by using the signing space and, in other words, the
student should point in the air to indicate where the respective classmate would write
the words. Anders mentioned (mediated by an STS interpreter), using explicit arm
movements:

My right is your right. My left is your left. My up is your up. My down is your down.

Anders repeated this several times, and also drew a square on the board, showing
how he could illustrate, for example, the left corner using his hands, first showing this
with his hands in front of the drawing at the board (Figure 7a), and thereafter, he turn-
ed around while still holding his hands in this constellation (Figure 7b):

Figures 7a and 7b: Showing Perception of Hands’ Placement from Signer’s

and Recipients’ Perspectives, respectively.

This helped students to understand the different perception of places, directions, and
signs from the signers’ and the addressees’ perspectives.

Another example of training to use space comes from Anna’s lesson. Here, students
baked chocolate balls. In a quite similar way as in the exercises illustrated in the si-
multaneity-section below, students perform the exercise to bake chocolate balls ficti-
tiously in groups. One student in turn (per group) did the baking, while the other two
were watching, noticing hand shapes, directions, placement in the space of the baking
cup, pearl sugar, refrigerator, etc. Students were trained to remember the process and
created a visual story of what they were doing when baking the chocolate balls. They
also had to remember where they had placed the cup, where they were to put the
balls (refrigerator), and how they were to take them out again after they were finished.

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Obviously, spatiality is another characteristic of sign languages which is trained in a

way that is unlike other language instruction and which requires students to create
topographic maps in their minds in order to use the language correctly. In short, stu-
dents learn to express the language in a 3D-format rather than in a linear or sequen-
tial way.

5.4 Simultaneity

In sign languages, many processes happen in parallel. M2-L2 students not only need
to learn to express what they want to say, using their hands and their arms, but also to
add different facial features (”non-manuals”) simultaneously. This can be quite com-
plex because students need to control many new features in parallel. While their
hands often express lexical content, their faces often add grammatical features. For
example, the sentence 'want coffee you' can be manually produced by the signer's
hands, but it is the facial expressions that signal if this sentence is declarative or
interrogative. Similarly, in a narrative of a hiking tour, it is the signer's facial expres-
sions that indicate if it is a relaxed, joyful, or strenuous tour, i.e. her face adds
adverbial content to the lexical signs produced by her hands. As mentioned above,
simultaneity also includes the fact that signers can express two signs using two dif-
ferent hands simultaneously, but in the examples here, the focus lies on the simul-
taneity of manual signs and non-manuals.

Several exercises in the first weeks of STS instruction has simultaneity in focus
through training students to combine manuals and non-manuals in different ways.
Teacher Jenny had several exercises that covered such training sequences. For ex-
ample, in her third lesson, students learned signs for animals, and thereafter, they
learned that they could add different facial expressions to signal if it was a small or big
animal, if the animal was tired or alert, etc. In this exercise students also learned that
they could use small or large movements, which also signalled more than the mere
lexical sign. One week later, Jenny expanded this exercise. The lesson began with a
lecture, mediated through an STS interpreter. Jenny explained different parts in STS,
and then, she focused on prosody. She showed how different parts of face and body
interact and create STS’s prosody. So, if the signer signs 'happy' or 'angry', these
feelings can be strengthened through his or her facial expressions. After that, Jenny
had the class do pantomime exercises in order to train students to use their face and
body in different ways. She mentioned that it was not the same as playing, but that it
represented an essential part of the training in order to connect the use of face and
body to signing STS. Students were asked one after another to stand in front of the
class, pick up a small paper from a pile showing different animals, and perform the
movement of these animals using their face and body. The other students guessed
which animal the student was portraying. After that, they did the same exercise, which
was then focused on feelings. Finally, students picked one animal and one feeling and
performed these in combination. Figure 8 illustrates a student portraying a happy bird:

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Figure 8: Training to Express Several Parts Simultaneously

by Combining an Animal with a Feeling.

Some days later, Anna did a similar exercise with the same student group, but the
point of departure was spoken Swedish. She wrote four words on the blackboard:
senap ‘mustard’, ketchup, majonnäs ‘mayonnaise’, and ankskit ‘duck poop’. Anna ex-
plained that all these words can be expressed with a tone of voice expressing feelings.
Students were asked to work in pairs and pronounce these four words to each other
with different feelings added to their voices, for example, by pronouncing ketchup with
a happy, angry or curious voice, and the interlocutor had to guess the feeling ex-
pressed. Students interrupted this exercise again and again, mostly giggling. One stu-
dent said that it was not possible to take this exercise seriously. Anna underlined that
it was essential and asked them to continue, which they did, trying their best to sup-
press their giggles.

After the exercise, students said that it actually was quite easy to perform feelings to-
gether with a word. The students were asked to do the exercise again, using their
faces and bodies to add meaning to their utterances. Anna informed them that this
was the same thing in STS, but that, instead using their voice, the words were ex-
pressed with their hands and the feelings with their faces and bodies. She showed
students the sign equivalents for the Swedish words and asked them to exercise them
in pairs again.

In her instruction, Anna departed from the language modality that students usually
express themselves in, and used it as a bridge to STS. This contrastive method may
have helped students to understand that the exercises (also those with Jenny), were
not like playing, but important exercises to learn the new way to express visually what
they would usually express in Swedish orally.

In the previous sections, four modality-specific features in sign languages have been
separated in order to illustrate the complexity of features that M2-L2 learners have to
learn in order to acquire a sign language. However, in natural communication, these
features occur simultaneously. In one of the final exercises with a particular focus on
modality training, Anna showed a narrative in STS, using a projector. In the move, she
added circles, crosses and arrows to point out different features in the signing. Then,
the move stopped, but the symbols lasted. Anna pointed and told students that this

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looks like a map and that they had to remember several phenomena simultaneously
because in sign languages, iconicity, simultaneity, and spatiality occur simulta-
neously.

6 Students’ Experiences

After having described the modality-specific training planned and conducted by the
teachers, we will now focus on students’ experiences. When conducting research on
L2 signers’ learning or sign language L2 pedagogy, students' experiences are rarely
examined (e.g. McKee & McKee 1992). In our UTL2 project, we also wanted to
include students’ perspectives, and therefore, several interviews were carried out. In
this sub-study, written interviews were conducted with 19 of the 30 students who parti-
cipated in the exercises described above. It was of primary interest how they ex-
perienced the modality-focused exercises.

In one of the questions, students were asked to describe how they experienced the
exercises that trained them to use face and body. The answers revealed that they per-
ceived it as a strange experience: “It was extremely difficult! It’s something brand
new!”. Below, further answers from students are exemplified:

Initially, it feels strange

It never feels really comfortable, but you understand that is precisely why the exercises
are done, and gradually, you become more accustomed to expressing yourself in this
way.
It’s fun, but hard – you usually don’t express yourself in this way.
We have learned more about our own body language and mimicry and got to develop it.
It has been good and fun exercises like imitating each other’s movements and animals.
At first, we did not understand why we should do these exercises, but in retrospect, we
see how important they were.
A little contradictory sometimes - to play and make charades and then be told that sign
language is not charades.

Taken together, students learned a new way to express language that they had ini-
tially experienced as unfamiliar, but gradually, they became more and more comfort-
able with the use of face and body.

As mentioned above, L2 signers are not initially conscious that there is a “signing
space” in front of their bodies. Therefore, another question focused on the exercises
that trained students to use this space. Their answers revealed that this was also
experienced as difficult and new:

It has been difficult, and it takes time to make it feel normal.

At first, we did not know how much space to use and that we should stand still.
We have been taught that there is a space in front of us that can be used and therefore
we should use it, too.

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The most important thing was to learn how to use references in the space and how to
deploy different entities.
Baking chocolate balls with Anna and watching “Tuffa Viktor” and “Uttern Otto” was in-
structive.
It’s fun to create images in my head and put things in the space.
It was good to learn that it should be comfortable when using the space.
It is important to learn that we start from the signer’s own perspective when placing
things or pointing in the space.

One of the most important insights that students took from the training to use the
space in front of them can be summarized as follows: they understood that STS are
not expressed in a linear and sequential way as in spoken Swedish, but rather in a
spatial and simultaneous way, and that they needed to build their STS utterances
more on what they could perceive with their eyes than on how words are combined
into sentences.

However, students did not always understand why they should perform the different
exercises. Eight students said that they did not understand their purpose, at all. As
one student put it:

I understood what we were going to do in the majority of the exercises, but did not under-
stand why we did as we did. There was a little too much focus on how to hold things and
how to move.

Another student mentioned that, in a later phase of the instruction (i.e. days or even
weeks later), they often came to realize why they had done the exercises:

In retrospect, I have understood the purpose and could link everything together.

Seven students mentioned that initially, they did not understand the purpose of dif-
ferent exercises, but that, after a while, they came into insight, at least in the final
phase of the lesson, as one student describes:

The experience from all the lessons we have had is that you know that at least at the end
of the lesson, you get the whole or a small explanation that makes you understand why.

The remaining four students stated that they had understood the purpose at once.

Overall, students mentioned some aspects that were particularly difficult in the learn-
ing of STS. These were simultaneity, using the space adequately, knowing when their
eyebrows should be raised or lowered (i.e., non-manuals), negations, and finger-
spelling.

7 Discussion

In this paper, a range of examples from STS instruction have been described, fo-
cusing on visual-gestural modality. One might get the impression that initial
STS-teaching at the university is highly focused on non-linguistic features, realised

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through pantomimic exercises. This, however, is not the case. Although the first three
weeks of instruction had such a focus, students also learned lexical signs, numbers
and fingerspelling. And after the first three weeks, there remained some moda-
lity-focused lessons, while more lessons were about grammar and structure, as well
as teaching students to have simple conversations in STS.

As mentioned above, the teacher team consisted of five deaf teachers, who have STS
as their L1, and two hearing teachers one of whom has STS as her L2. Previous
studies in the UTL2 project have revealed that teachers contributed to the instruction
with different important elements (Holmström 2018a, 2019). Deaf teachers generally
have great skills and knowledge of the language, and students tend to trust them
more regarding the signs and sentences that need to be performed. In our study,
students are forced to use STS with them, and they were trained to express them-
selves in different ways in order to communicate with their deaf teachers. They
learned essential visual behaviour from them and experienced them as STS role
models. The L2 teacher, in turn, had learned STS as a young adult and knew many of
the difficulties hearing people meet with when learning a sign language. She was also
able to compare students’ L1 with STS and to explain important features and discuss
them with students. The students found it easier to ask questions and to get descrip-
tions of different parts of STS when meeting the L2 teacher. In other institutions inside
and outside Sweden, this has not always been the preferred way of teaching.
Oftentimes, the opinion is expressed that in STS classes, one should just sign and not
use any spoken language, at all. Some studies in general second-language learning
support such a view, while others do not (e.g. Ellis 2012). In the UTL2 project, we
have found that it is facilitative to have a combination of lessons with STS only and
those in which spoken language occurs in instructions, lectures, and explanations.
Therefore, in several of the exercises described in this paper, the deaf teachers had
an STS interpreter at their disposal. This was most usual in the first weeks of instruc-
tion, and the interpreters did not interpret every single word; for example, they did not
do any interpretation when students performed their exercises in pairs.

Students mentioned that they did not always understand the purpose of the exercises,
and when there are no interpreters at hand, as in a previous study, the pace is even
slower, and students are even more confused about what they are expected to do.
This also indicates that teachers need to be more explicit in their instructions and ex-
plain the purpose of the exercises even better. This is something to take into account
when making further improvements to the courses.

Another aspect which needs to be examined and developed further is the question of
how interpreters can be employed best by deaf teachers. Our study revealed that they
are not conscious of what the interpreters really mediate. For example, in a given
situation, Anders tried to joke with students, but failed, and implied that the interpreter
might have misinterpreted what he had said. But in fact, the interpreter told the
researcher (when consulted during the analysis) that she had been confused and not
realized that it was a joke. Likewise, Jenny realised that she had meant the interpreter
to be silent in some cases when they trained visual attention, but she was not sure if
the interpreter had mediated what she tried to tell students only visually because she
had not collaborated with the interpreter in advance.

The teaching method which concentrates particularly on modality-specific features

that have been in the focus in this study is not a brand new method in the actual con-

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text. The teachers had previously trained students in different modality-specific

features, but not to the same extent, and not in such a conscious way as was the case
here. The decision to give students time to understand and train the use of face and
body to express language, the process to learn how to transfer actions from the reality
into STS handshapes and signs, and the large training of visual attention initially led to
the situation that students not had learned enough lexical signs to express them-
selves in STS sentences. On the other hand, students were more comfortable using
face and body, improvising, seeing connections between places in the space and
handshapes in signs, with the real world, and using visual attention strategies. And
when the instruction went further during the first year, they quickly increased their
vocabulary and ability to express sentences in STS, and thus picked up what they had
not initially acquired.

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Author:
Ingela Holmström, PhD
Associate Professor
Stockholm University
Department of Linguistics
SE-106 91 Stockholm
Sweden
E-mail: ingela.holmstrom@ling.su.se

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