For this week's readings, both chapters had an abundance of information, so for my own sake I am using this blog as a study guide for myself as well as including a few questions I had about both chapters.
Chapter 6-
Chapter 6 begins with what an autonomous learner is along with the psychological foundations associated with learner autonomy.
**A fundamental longing for freedom of thought and action in personal, economic, social, political and other aspects of life. These types of learners are able to think independently and act responsibly.
**Cognitive- Learning is effective when integrating knowledge and personal framework.
**Humanistic-Emphasizes the promotion of learners' self-esteem through personal ownership of learning.
**Educational- Suggests a strong connection between learner autonomy and learner motivation. (I agree with this completely; From my experiences, most students will only WANT to learn when they have interest in the topic which causes motivation, leading to a want of learning the subject matter.)
L2 education is filled with diversity dealing with learner involvement and teacher engagement. A few terms include self-instruction, self-direction, self-access learning, and individualized instruction. Definitions and examples can be found on page 132 in Kuma.
Chapter 6 also discusses two complimentary views of learner autonomy and those are a narrow and broad view.
**Narrow View- This involves enabling learners to learn how to learn which includes equipping students with the necessary tools to learn on their own and training students to use them appropriately. If this is a students first time using tools like the examples suggested on page 133, it can allow for them to discover what type of learner they may be and what works best for them to comprehend and remember information. Through these strategies learners can gain a sense of responsibility for aiding their own learning and develop a degree of sensitivity and understanding toward other learners who may be more or less proficient than they are (140).
**Broad View- I didn't really understand this portion of the text, so a clarification would be wonderful, but what I think I understood was the broad view is a type of rationale as to why the narrow view of learning is necessary as well as an opportunity for students to find their own potential in learning. If anyone could clarify this section for me that would be wonderful!!
The final section of chapter 6 discusses the degrees of autonomy and how it has been a struggle for teachers to determine the degree that is appropriate for their specific learning and teaching context. In order to guide teachers, different researchers have compiled a 3 stage system in which autonomy can be used to teach objectives, tasks, materials, etc. Depending on the classroom, these stages do not have to follow sequential order.
**Initial Stage- Raise learners' awareness of the reasons behind the teacher's choice of goals, tasks, and materials.
**Intermediate Stage- Emphasize allowing the learner to choose from a range of options given by the teacher.
**Final Stage- Learner determination is emphasized on his/her own goals, tasks, and materials.
Basically, learners have to decide, with guidance, the degree of responsibility they are willing and able to take in in specific areas of learning and teaching.
Chapter 7-
This chapter was rather confusing to me as well...I'm not entirely sure why though.
Two main types of language awareness movements were mentioned: The British Movement and The American Movement. The British movement is concerned with developing pedagogic principles and practices with the view to promoting language awareness among school-children. The American movement is concerned with providing a rich language experience for school-children by integrating the 4 language skills of listening, reading, speaking, and writing, and by introducing language related activities in content areas across school curriculum. In other words, no matter the subject being taught, teachers should be trained to consider how the language is used in their own field and create a double agenda (pg. 159). As of right now I am not sure if I fully agree or disagree with this, but I do know that, in my opinion, it may seem pointless to have a double agenda of language and thought, language and culture, etc. in certain content areas such as mathematics or science, or maybe I am interpreting the text wrong too.
The main purpose of this chapter is that language awareness should form an integral part of language education as well as content education.
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