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Second Language Observation

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In order to increase my understanding of how students acquire a second language, I observed four class sessions of students learning a foreign language. These classes included French 102, ASL 102, and two consecutive sessions of Engl 99R. The first two classes listed are students learning French and American Sign Language, while the third class is an ESL class. In these classes I observed interactions and methods as a non-participant in order to add to my knowledge of second language acquisition. Reflecting on the sessions, I noticed comparable themes emerging. Second language classroom teachers utilize a combination of language acquisition theories such as Vygotsky’s Sociocultural theory and B.F. Skinner’s Behaviorism theory along with aspects …show more content…

Skinner’s Behaviorism theory of language development. Repetition is a vital part of this theory wherein students imitate a correct version of a statement back to the interlocutor with positive feedback given to begin to form habits. Instructors used the method of repetition in various circumstances throughout the class sessions. For example, in French 102, the instructor introduced vocabulary words by having students imitate the words back to her one by one after she had said them correctly. When the students accurately repeated the words back, the instructor would give positive feedback such as nodding her head yes and saying “oui!” In ASL 102, students would watch the professor sign a word or sentence, and then imitate it to practice learning the correct …show more content…

She would also speak about the information on the slides as she went through them. This technique is advantageous to someone who is a visual and/or auditory learner. Similarly, near the end of the class the students pulled out their course readings and talked about the homework the instructor had assigned for that night. Students could look at at assignment and hear what they were expected to do to successfully complete the tasks. In Engl 99R the professor would draw pictures on the chalkboard that accompany his lessons. For instance, when the professor was teaching about topic sentences, he drew a piece of paper on the board and marked where the topic sentence goes in an essay. This took in consideration for students to learn both visually and

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I observed the ELL class on Friday October 11th, 2015. The observation was done at Strawberry Point School in the Mill Valley District for 30 minutes with three English Learners from Kindergarten, which one child is Danish and two children are Koreans. I spoke with Monica who is the person responsible for the ELL program at this school. • What placement options are available to ELLs in the district?

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1081 Words | 5 Pages

The article 'Mother Tongue ' by author Amy Tan is about the variations in the English language the author uses in her life. She describes her English when giving a speech to a other people, English she uses when speaking to her mother, and English she uses in her writing. She tells of difficulties faced by both her mother and herself from these many differences. Amy 's goal in this article is to show that a person does not have to speak proper English to be seen as smart or intelligent.

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936 Words | 4 Pages

The Socio-behaviorist theory (behaviorism) Socio-behaviorists often study how children 's experiences model their behaviors (Nolan & Raban, 2015). Behaviorism believes that what matters is not the development itself, but the external factors that shape children 's behaviors (Nolan & Raban, 2015). This theory demonstrates that teachers and mentors dominate and instruct child-related activities, and they decide what children should learn and how to learn (Nolan & Raban, 2015). Reinforcement, which is an essential factor that helps children to learn particular behaviors, generally refers to rewards and punishments (Nolan & Raban, 2015). Children are more likely to repeat actions that result in receiving praise; in contrast, they may ignore or abandon behaviors that make them get punishment.

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1054 Words | 5 Pages

Ghuman captures her way of teaching by describing the teacher being the ““academic” instructor who stood or sat at a distance from” the students, and the students are “asked to refer to instructions written on the board or to listen carefully to what they said” (2009). From being a student myself, I personally do not find learning beneficial when it is simply told to me. Instead of reinforcing the traditional teaching methods, I believe that students need to be active learners. Most people learn best when they are part of the learning process, have a voice in the discussion and can evaluate and reflect on their own learning. Furthermore, I also found it difficult to prepare and lead a lesson that was appropriate for the age group, yet not too difficult.

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2548 Words | 11 Pages

Introduction Learning enables you as an individual, to gain more knowledge about something which you have never learned about. Learning also has to do with past experiences which are influenced by behavioural changes (Weiten, 2016). There are different types of ways to learn; through, classical conditioning, operant conditioning and observational learning which will be discussed and analysed in the essay.   Behaviourism Behaviourism is considered one of the main subjects in psychology and the two main people who founded behaviourism were, Burrhus Frederic Skinner, also known as B.F Skinner and Ivan Pavlov who were famous for the work they did on classical and operant conditioning (Moderato & Presti, 2006). According to Moderato and Presti

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1261 Words | 6 Pages

Paper 1: BEHAVIOR MODIFICATION Becky Templin Clovis Community College February 17, 2018 Introduction The theory behind behavior modification ethics has a reputation for its accomplishments and disappointments. In addition to this, there are many dangers in using physical punishment as behavior modification with the two primary modifiers of behavior being Classical conditioning and Operant conditioning. The outcome of using negative reinforcement has its share of benefits and downfalls in human behavior whereas; positive reinforcement seems to win over.

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In contrast to Redl and Wattenberg 's theories about teachers; Skinner 's theory states that behaving students will continue to demonstrate positive behavior. The misbehaving students, desiring the positive reinforcement, will begin to behave appropriately. Redl and Wattenberg 's (1959) theories have contributed significantly to classroom management. Middle school educators can take several directions from those theories. Some of which are understanding group dynamics where one 6th-grade teacher established a rule that students must raise their hands to answer a question.

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The Positive and Negative of Operant Conditioning and The Most Effective Method There are many ways we can come about in behavior. An American psychologist, B.F. Skinner, introduced the theory of operant conditioning. Operant conditioning is known as associative learning and a learning process. The theory is made up of two factors in which behavior is modified through either reinforcement and or punishment.

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1265 Words | 6 Pages

Ivan Pavlov and Burrhus Frederic Skinner are the behaviourist theorists I studied. Pavlov’s theory of classical conditioning became well known, his work encouraged others like Skinner to study and develop his own theory of operant conditioning. The “A,B,C” behaviour model of positive reinforcement is used in many early childhood settings. Skinner believed the best way to understand the behaviour is to look at the cause of the action and its consequence. I observed the ECCE setting for practical examples of numeracy and literacy.

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1. B.F. Skinner: Behaviour modification Positive and negative reinforcements or rewards and punishments are used to modify or shape learner’s behaviour. B. F. Skinner’s entire system is based on operant conditioning. The organism is in the process of "operating" on the environment, which in ordinary terms means it is bouncing around its world, doing what it does. During this "operating," the organism encounters a special kind of stimulus, called a reinforcing stimulus, or simply a reinforcer.

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1903 Words | 8 Pages

Behaviourism: Behaviourism assumes that a learner is fundamentally flaccid, replying to environmental incentives. Behaviour theorists states learning as nothing more than the attainment of new behaviour. In this theory Language acquisition is the result of stimulus-response activities where factors that facilitate are imitation, replication, reward and reinforcement. Cognitivism Cognitivists are related with ‘cognition’ and how it marks individual ‘learning’.

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726 Words | 3 Pages

Classroom Observations Mrs. Canada is the first grade teacher that I observed, and the subject that she was teaching was reading. She had planned well-organized power points and crafting materials in advance, so she was prepared for the lesson. The two times I observed, the lesson that was being taught at both times was reading. Children in the classroom used a lot of previous knowledge for the lesson.

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977 Words | 4 Pages

These theories include: the behaviorist theory, the innatist theory, the constructivist theory, and the social interaction theory. First, B.F Skinner, a psychologist, developed the behaviorist theory of oral language development. “Behaviorist theory of language development states that infants learn oral language from other human role models through a process involving stimulation/modeling, imitation, rewards, punishment, and practice” (Reutzel, 2015, pp.38). Skinner believed that children learned by operate conditioning, which is rewards for accomplishing a goal. In the case of oral language Skinner believed that children, specifically infants learned oral language by getting rewards such as smiles or praise for imitating words adults wanted them to speak.

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1341 Words | 6 Pages

The Learning perspective argues that children imitate what they see and hear,and that children learn from punishment and reinforcement.(Shaffer,Wood,& Willoughby,2002). The main theorist associated with the learning perspective is B.F. Skinner. Skinner argued that adults shape the speech of children by reinforcing the babbling of infants that sound most like words. (Skinner,1957,as cited in Shaffer,et.al,2002). This theory explains that the language starts on what they see or hear, the children will imitate what they see on their parents or the people around them.

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1620 Words | 7 Pages

Language is an abstract concept which needed by people to communicate. Language has an intrinsic meaning which represents an image and it is also symbolic however not only symbolic. Language is also a complex system and it is creative and productive meaning that you can product many words. Language does not only include objects but also includes all the images and concepts of the world. There is an abstraction of a real world.

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