Traditional ELT Standards: a brief discussion of people’s views toward the two main inner circle varieties (British and American English)

English is used as a lingua franca (ELF) between speakers from different L1 backgrounds, and in fact this type of communication is much more common than communication between a NS and NNS or between two NS. In the past, we usually assumed that the English Language Learner (ELL) was trying to communicate with a native speaker of English, but this is less often the case in today’s society, which encourages mobility and globalization. Nowadays, fewer interactions in English involve native speakers. According to Crystal, the number of native speakers (NS) of English in the world is estimated to be less than 350 million, while non-native speakers (NNS) are estimated to be in the ballpark of 450 to 1350 million (Crystal 1997).

These English as a Native Language (ENL) speakers have been the ones who arbitrated what was right or wrong, what acceptable usage was, and also were the main characters in ELT books, made ELT materials, and wrote tests. In this way, they have been a hegemonic measuring stick and decision makers. Non-native speakers (teachers included) thus often have an inferiority complex because they are told and believe that they can never attain the innate language skills of a native speaker.

Oftentimes, current second language acquisition theories hypothesize that most English language learners aim to develop native speaker standards in terms of grammatical standards, phonological patterns, and discourse competence; however, there are several reasons, according to Sandra McKay, why current bilingual English users may have different goals:

1.They may only need English in certain situations, for example in formal area, in which case they would not need the full range of registers of a native speaker.

2.They may not want to acquire native speaker pronunciation and pragmatics for attitudinal reasons.

3.English as an International Language is owned by those who use it and does not grant more privilege to some speakers.

4.English does not belong to any one culture any more, and therefore should be culturally sensitive to the diverse contexts in which it is used and taught. Instead of using exclusively Western cultural content, as has been done in the past, there are definite advantages to using source culture content, which do not marginalize the learners and embrace the non-native speaker as a knower instead of an interpreter teaching a foreign culture.

5.Westerners often think communicative language teaching (CLT) is one methodology that will work everywhere, but this is not the case as Confucian values in Asia differ greatly, we must reconsider other teaching methodologies that are appropriate in other cultures. (ideas paraphrased from McKay 2003)

Читайте також:

<== попередня сторінка	\|	наступна сторінка ==>
Guidelines for extensive reading of texts on the use of ESP in European transnational education	\|	Why a new concept of English?

Не знайшли потрібну інформацію? Скористайтесь пошуком google:

Генерація сторінки за: 0.003 сек.