Introduction
Being the highest creatures on earth, human beings are endowed with the power of language to verbally communicate with each other. It is a facility that enables each individual to bring out inner workings of his mind for others to respond to.
Main body
The myth that “Languages are learned mainly through imitation” is such a shallow concept of language learning and undermines the great researches that have been dedicated to its study. No doubt, language may be learned through imitation, but the language learner does not stop at imitating a language model. He goes beyond that.
Language acquisition and development has been a point of keen interest of educators, psychologists and researchers that numerous studies have been done to unveil more knowledge about it.There have been many theories conceptualized as to how language is acquired by human beings. A great deal of a child’s acquisition of linguistic structure occurs during the first five years of life. This is the period when he is most active in discerning a set of underlying organizational principles of language from the expression that surrounds him. It is amazing how at a very young age, he is capable of abstracting meaning from direct experience with other language users depending on his own context. Beaty (2009) explains that even at an infant stage, the baby’s early nonverbal communication helps in preparing her for the spoken and written language to follow and at 6 months, she has become a language specialist, based on the sounds she hears most frequently. At 20 months, she may possess a sizable vocabulary if she hears adults around her talk to one another and to her all the time. Of course good hearing and sensitive listening are paramount to language development.
Having Chinese as my first language (which, in my family, entails learning both Cantonese and Mandarin as two Chinese language strains), it was the language spoken at home and is the most natural one for me. English became my second language when I was enrolled in preschool as a three-year old. Although the curriculum was designed informally for young children, there were still behaviorist methods applied, as I learned to repeat certain conversational phrases like “Good Morning”, “Thank You”, “Hello”, etc. As I got to understand the meaning of these phrases, I eventually used them more often in practical life. Accordingly, my introduction to English at an early age is important, as “learner’s age is one of the characteristics which determine the way in which an individual approaches second language learning.” (Lightbown & Spada, 1999, p. 68).
Lindfors (1987) claims, “Virtually every child, without special training, exposed to surface structures of language in many interaction contexts, builds for himself – in a short period of time and at an early stage in his cognitive development – a deep-level, abstract, and highly complex system of linguistic structure and use. “( p. 90) This implies that every child is capable of learning language. Skinner’s Behaviorist Model of language acquisition is consistent with the rules of operant conditioning, based upon a stimulus-response model. Simply put, infants are presented with language which they imitate. They are rewarded for their imitations so they continue to repeat what they have heard. Their imitation does not have to be exact or immediate in order for them to make use of it in learning language (Brewer, 2001). However, as the child grows, imitation should approximate the accurate pronunciation of words.
According to the behaviorist view, an individual is reinforced (positively or negatively) for responses to various stimuli, hence, the external environment plays a great part in the formation of behaviors. By administering positive reinforcement such as praising or smiling when a desired behavior occurs and administering negative reinforcement such as scolding or correcting when an undesired behavior occurs, one is assumed to encourage the desired behavior and make it more likely that that behavior will recur (Lindfors, 1987).
The Behaviorist theory of language acquisition reigned supreme in the period of its introduction. However, it was unable to explain many things related to language development. One is the fact that much of children’s language is constructed in ways that have never been modeled by mature speakers. If adults talk to children without errors, howcome children’s language may still be filled with grammatical errors? It is also puzzling to behaviorists that they can offer no explanation as to how regressions in children’s language happen. An example is that a young child will use the past tense of the word “go” as “went” correctly, however, as he matures and generalizes the rules for constructing past-tense verbs, he replaces went with goed, not realizing that “go” is an irregular verb. (Brewer, 2001). This is “evidence that language learners do not simply internalize a great list of imitated and memorized sentences” (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 183). They need to learn ways on how others will be able to understand them better.
The Behaviorist theory is also criticized in the way it handles or fails to handle the patterning of language which can be described in linguistic science. He wrote almost as if linguistic science never existed, making little reference either to traditional grammar or to any other variety of grammar. He developed a sort of psychological grammar which conventionalized patterns of language play only a small part. The rules of transformations in grammar cannot be explained by this theory. It likewise could not provide for the role of memory, of “private behavior”, of intuition and of many other phenomena recognized but not directly accessible to public observation. “Finally, as a major criticism of the Skinnerian theory of language one could say that it is primarily a psychology of the production of language rather than of the reception of language. It talks about how people learn to produce language but it says little about how people learn to understand it.” (Carroll, 1962)
On the other hand, the behaviorist point of view is valid in terms of children learning to speak the languages of their homes. Much observation concludes that children learn to produce the sounds needed in their native languages and to eliminate the sounds that are not required. Children also learn to repeat words and phrases that they hear around them even when they do not know what they mean.
Ausubel’s Cognitive Learning theory contends that learning takes place through meaningful processes of relating new events to already existing cognitive concepts or propositions. He contrasts rote learning from meaningful learning in that rote learning is the acquisition of material as “discrete and relatively isolated entities that are relatable to cognitive structure only in an arbitrary and verbatim fashion, not permitting the establishment of meaningful relationships” (Ausubel, 1968, as qtd in Brown, 1987, p.65). Meaningful learning, in contrast, is a process of relating and anchoring new material to relevant established entities in cognitive structure. “Ausubel’s theory of learning has important implications for second language learning and teaching. Too much rote activity, at the expense of meaningful communication in language classes, could stifle the learning process.” (Brown, 1987, p. 69). According to Lev Vygotsky, social interaction stimulated by speech is essential for language development. He also mentions that a supportive interactive environment can help the child to reach a higher level of knowledge and performance compared to what might be reached through his or her ability to improve independently (Lightbown and Spada, 2006, p. 23). Taking together Skinner’s, Ausubel’s and Vygotsky’s theories, it can be summarized that language is learned through reinforcing successful imitations of language that is meaningful for the learner and enhanced in social interactions.
The old way of teaching a second language through grammar-based texts yield less meaningful results if content is not integrated into language. That was how it was for me in primary school. English was merely a subject among others, and it was isolated to focus mostly on grammar and phonetics taught three to four hours weekly. Learning the language made students rely mostly on the repetition of phrases and patterns, as they did not have the knowledge of the speech structure, and apparently, there was no need for it at that time.
There is a growing consensus that language can be more quickly and effectively learned if it is taught in context (Herrero, 2005), which is done by shifting the focus of instruction from the learning of language per se to the learning of language through the study of subject matter (Stryker & Leaver, 1997). High schools in Hong Kong put an increased emphasis on English as a second language, where all of the subjects, with the exception of Chinese and Chinese history, were taught in English. At this stage, the English learning process can be characterized by the realization of the structure of the sentences, where the practice of English through studying other subjects extended the duration through which we as students were exposed to hearing English language. Of course, our interactions while speaking the language strengthened our fluency of the language.
Reconciling the two languages, Chinese and English, was difficult for me at first because they had entirely different rules. The absence of an alphabet in Chinese was one of the issues in learning English. However, one of the most difficult problems that posed a problem to me and the rest of the student were the grammar and specifically the variety of tenses.
Among the available strategies in teaching and learning a foreign language, it has been found that those that focus on both content and language as the most effective. Students are more motivated to learn another language if they find the content interesting to them, and the teaching approach more exciting to engage their prolonged attention and retention of concepts. This is consistent with the theory of Ausubel, emphasizing meaning in learning a second language. Personally, I can attest to this, as I have learned more about the English language through experiences that I found meaningful. Learning English as a second language for me has been filled with meaningful experiences that motivated me to go on, despite the challenges that came with it. When I went to Australia to study, I was immersed in the English language because that was the native language of the people there. I chose to communicate with others, even my Chinese friends, to speak entirely in English, which positively influenced the process of learning my second language. In that regard, I became aware of the fact that the foreign environment can influence the learning process of the second language with the condition of a proper interaction, where according to the social network theory “personal relationships an individual shares with others such as relatives, friends, coworkers, and neighbors mediate variable linguistic behavior.” (Mantero, 2007, p. 192).
I took up learning Spanish last year. This time, having undergone difficulty in my second language, I found learning a third language easier. Despite the short period of learning Spanish, the similarity of the structure of some words, which facilitated learning new ones, the similarity of the grammar, compared to the Chinese, made it easier to learn Spanish as a third language. In that regard, I can say that reached that stage when I completely understand the spoken language in shorter terms than I did so learning English.
I am a living proof of the theories discussed, that is why I agree with the behaviorists’ concept of language learning through imitation, repetition and reinforcement; interactionists’ concept of social influence in language learning and Ausubel’s need for meaning in order to learn language.
Conclusion
In sum, I can apply the theories discussed in my learning English as my second language. Although these theories may overlap in its application to my case, I can personally delineate which was prevalent at each stage of my journey: The behaviorist theory (repetitions, reinforcement and positive feedback) was mainly employed when I was beginning to learn English. As I advanced, learning through social interaction seems to have had a great influence on my fluency, with the behaviorist theory as its basis, since I was positively encouraged by others through praises for my efforts at speaking the language. I know I have a long way to go and to learn. I am just proud to know that my journey has been successful so far, since the combination of different theories and learning methods used to teach me, not to mention my own motivation to learn, were indeed a great fit that was personally appropriate for me. So the myth of languages being learned mainly through imitation is totally untrue, as there are multiple avenues to reach the destination of being a fluent language learner.
References
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Brewer, J., (2001)Introduction to Early Childhood Education, Allyn & Bacon Brown, H.D. (1987) Principles of Language Learning and Teaching, 2nd Ed. NJ: Prentice Hall Regents
Carroll, J.B. (1962), The Critical Need in the Study of Language. College Composition and Communication, Vol. 13, No. 3, Annual Meeting, Chicago, 1962, pp. 23-26.
Herrero, A.H. (2005). “Content-Based Instruction in an English Oral Communication Course at the University of Costa Rica.” Actual Investigations in Education, Vol. 5, No. 4.
Lightbown, P.M. & Spada, N. (2006). How Languages Are Learned. New York: Oxford University Press.
Lindfors, J.W., (1987) Children’s Language and Learning, 2nd Ed. Prentice Hall,Inc.,
Mantero, M. (2007). Identity and second language learning : culture, inquiry, and dialogic activity in educational contexts. Charlotte, N.C.: IAP.
Stryker, S.N. & Leaver, B.L. (1997). “Content-Based Instruction in Foreign Language Education.” Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.