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Citizens of a Multilingual World: Key Issues

8. Use It or Lose It!

Putting the language to real use is vital for the acquisition of proficiency. Two types of real use are envisaged: for 'communication' and for 'handling information', e.g. in order to learn other subject-matter. This has implications for teachers in helping students develop the sorts of grammatical understanding and strategic awareness that will enable them not only to learn the language but also to use it effectively.

The principal reason for learning another language is to be able to use it.

Where language learners encounter a variety of opportunities to use the language they are studying in realistic contexts, they are more likely to develop an enhanced appreciation of the reasons why languages are valuable, to be motivated to improve their language skills, and therefore to learn more.

Young Scots benefit from the fact that English is a widely used world language. However, they can also be at a disadvantage compared with many of their counterparts in other countries in that opportunities for using the languages they are studying are usually very limited. Travel to countries where other languages are spoken is expensive and opportunities to meet speakers of the languages they are studying in situations in which they could use those languages are relatively infrequent. There are few opportunities or incentives for young learners to watch TV programmes, videos or films in other languages, or to read foreign books, magazines or newspapers.

Because Scotland lacks some of the 'natural' advantages of some other countries in this regard, it is necessary to create opportunities for language use within the education system and to encourage and equip young learners to take advantage of these and of existing opportunities outwith school.

Schools can find it difficult to resource opportunities for language use and to maintain the momentum such initiatives require, particularly because of the logistical demands and the perception that they are 'extra-curricular'. However, research and experience suggest that language learners who have no opportunities to use the languages they have been studying at any stage in their school careers are likely to become de-motivated and therefore to fail to develop appropriate levels of language proficiency. It is thus important that all pupils are offered opportunities to use the languages they are studying throughout the time in which they study languages.

Using a modern language for communication

Among the wide range of initiatives already or becoming available are:

• interacting with foreign language assistants, enabling students to practise oral skills with young native speakers of the languages they are studying;

• correspondence through the post or via e-mail with counterparts in the countries whose languages are studied;

• exchange visits with partner schools in various European countries;

• school trips abroad;

• invitations to local or visiting native speakers of the languages taught, to come into contact with school pupils in a variety of contexts;

• electronic links with partner schools, setting up opportunities for pupils to make regular e-mail or video-conferencing contact.

Using languages for processing information and for learning something else

Less attention has been devoted in the past to creating opportunities for gathering and disseminating information in another language, or to studying or working through the medium of another language. However, it is now becoming clear that such opportunities may offer more intense and sustained experience of using other languages. Consequently, the rewards, in terms of enhanced linguistic skills, higher motivation and greater valuing of languages, are more substantial.

There have been a number of experiments in Scotland and elsewhere, aimed at developing opportunities for pupils to gather and disseminate information in the language they are studying, or enabling pupils to study or work through the medium of another language. For example:

• projects involving the preparation in another language of information about the school, the local area, visitor attractions, local businesses etc., often tied in with work in other curriculum areas (e.g. environmental studies, business studies);

• projects where pupils make use of information available in other languages to support other curriculum work;

• partial immersion courses beginning at various points in primary or secondary education, where students study one curriculum area in whole or in part through the medium of the language they are learning;

• promoting work experience placements with employers whose workplaces are multilingual or organising work experience placements abroad for some pupils.

Teaching and learning

Putting languages to real use in the virtual and real ways proposed in this and the previous section has major implications for the processes not only of 'use' but also of 'teaching' and 'learning'. The Action Group is not the most appropriate body for preparing a text on the methodology of language-teaching, -learning and -use. We draw attention to the Guide for Teachers and Managers that will accompany the 5-14 Guidelines. This covers not only skills and strategies appropriate for language but also situates these within a range of more generic core, transferable life-skills. It illustrates much of the approach that we believe will go well with what we are proposing. We limit ourselves therefore to some brief points.

'Language use' as outlined in the present section will confront students with new sorts of challenge. When interacting 'for real' in their modern language with their peers in other countries, e.g. by video-conferencing or by e-mail, they will receive real language much of which they will not be able to predict in advance. What will help them to respond? We believe that a systematically developed explicit knowledge of grammar, vocabulary and strategy will be essential.

The explicit knowledge of grammar and vocabulary will be particularly helpful when they are engaged in comprehension (both reading and listening) and in writing, and when preparing for any planned language task. It will also be essential when they are monitoring and evaluating their own 'real' performance, both while it is taking place and once it is over. After a video-conferenced interaction with their partner abroad, for example, they may go over the recording by themselves or with their teacher and other students, including with their partners abroad, in order to analyse their performance in terms of the vocabulary and the grammar they used, e.g. its range, appropriateness and accuracy. This monitoring and evaluation of their own vocabulary and grammatical productions is an important ingredient in the further development of their language proficiency.

It will also be important that students are encouraged to reflect on and develop their own strategies for fulfilling the particular tasks in which they put their modern language to real use. While we believe that support from teachers in this area will prove both necessary and helpful, we are confident that students themselves will soon develop their own ideas on how for example to make the most of a regular video-conferencing session with a partner in another country. 'Learner diaries' may prove a useful means whereby students develop their own record of how they went about their various tasks, what they thought they learnt from their attempts, how they themselves think their language is developing and what they think they now need to do in order to push it further ahead. They may also be a useful record of the advice they received from their partners abroad and of the advice they gave them in turn in respect of their partner's English.

Implications for action

In summary we believe that:

• schools, local authorities and national bodies should develop and extend existing opportunities for using languages. Such developments might include partial immersion courses at primary or secondary school and other cross-curricular initiatives;

• foreign language assistants or other sorts of native speaker should be made regularly available, given their importance for motivation and for giving students the opportunity to try out their linguistic skills;

• schools (including languages teachers, guidance and careers staff and senior managers), local authorities and national bodies should seek to enhance pupils' awareness of opportunities for studying or working with languages in Scotland and abroad and to encourage pupils to think of the career benefits of maintaining and developing their language skills;

• support for such initiatives should come from the National Centre for Education for Work and Enterprise and from Education Business Partnerships;

• national bodies and Teacher Education Institutions should collaborate with teachers and local authorities in order to develop and refine a methodology for learning and using languages that is in keeping with the new opportunities that are becoming available.

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