Week 12 ----the useful guidelines for doing research

Every time, when I read Hall’s book I will find some new ideas. This time I come across the ideology “sociocultural perspective” of research which is viewed as a natural component of all applied linguists’ activity. I found an interesting idea “good research is dependent not on one’s professional role- that is k whether one is, say, a university professor or classroom teacher. Rather, it depends on one’s degree of research expertise.” (P139)

The ninth chapter from Hall book is really helpful. The six steps of research circle show me a clear way of how to organize my own research. The actions include identifying concerns and pose questions, identifying appropriate approach and sources of data, collecting data, analyzing data, reflecting on the findings and share findings and take action.
Before I read this chapter, I read the report from William Labov about the “what is a reading error?” From his report, I realize that the question or the issues the author concerns are really concrete and accurate. The participants should be spotted and all the research aspects need to be narrow down into sentence, words even phonetic symbols. So from the very beginning of the research, after the researchers entails identifying particular concerns or issues arising from one’s professional life as an applied linguist.,(P160) the researchers can be priorities according to their importance or significance to the researcher, and for this ranked list a specific topic for investigation can be identified. (161) There is one thing that I never thought important before was when we are concerning about the questions the researchers should consider whether they are reasonable in light of any constraints he or she may have in terms of time, and availability of resources. (P161) However, the final goal of the research was to present the feedback to the readers or to be used into the practice situation. The final step is sharing the result with others where appropriate, taking action.

Chapter ten is talking about the contexts of research. Instead of teaching how to do a research, this chapter is talking about how we might identify topics and questions that are appropriate for empirical investigations. The examples form this chapter is really helpful for me, a newcomer to the field who has no idea of sociocultural perspectives to get some idea of the range of possibilities for exploration.

Week 11 Response to Dave’s ESL Cafe

Last week, we read and discussed the ad from Dave’s ESL Cafe in the classroom. The main two requirements almost appearing in every ad we found are “native speaker” and “working experience”. These really terrified me. The major I chose for bachelor and master are both focusing on English teaching. It is obviously that I will probably be an English teacher after graduation. From the ads and the overviews of the teaching fields, I found no chance to teach in expanding or outer countries at all, except my own country. It doesn’t matter where I am going to live or work, but I felt, to some extent, we NNESTS being ignored and denied by some sort of concepts, some unknown scholars and some notion. Does it mean that all these years what I learnt and expected are meaningless?

First of all, I am not a native speaker, but I am innocent, since I cannot choose my parents and their nationality. Or when I gain the chance to choose I cannot abandon my parents due to the language they speaking. I can try my best to be a native-like English users but no chance to change my accent and the living experience along with me. If I insist to be a teacher, then I need to change me major to Chinese teaching, then I become the first-choice among my entire colleague. Second, I cannot find the door or even a single window for the new teachers to enter the gate of teaching field by the barriers of “working experience.” So I really wonder how I can begin from an experienced teacher from the very beginning. I cannot forget those happy times that I spend with my assistant teacher who is young and just graduated from school. Those new ideas and attractive activities impressed us; since we can never gain from our previous teacher by his regular schedule. But it seems that I will never have the chance to share my learning experiences with my students.

Week 9 ---- Who worth more? ---- NS or NNS

These days, we talked a lot about the NS and NNS which I didn’t quite think about it before. For me, I think it is obviously that the NSs gain the predominance place on English teaching and will be more efficient than NNSs do, since they achieved a high degree of proficiency. For those native speakers, I think, no matter how worse their English is will be better than I do. But after I read my articles my point of view begins to change. I found it is true that sometimes NNSs are more suitable and more proper than NSs in English teaching.

I like the points the author sited in the passage. Only non-NESTs can serve as imitable models of the successful learner of English. Non-NESTs can teach learning strategies more effectively. Non-NESTs can provide learners with more information about eh English language. Non- NESTs are more able to anticipate language difficulties. Non-NESTs can be more empathetic to the needs and problems of their learners. Only Non-NESTs can benefit from sharing eh learners’ mother tongue. (P346) All of these advantages show me a clear way how to be a qualified teacher and who to balance the deficiency with NSs in English teaching.

In recent class, the topic reminds me thinking about my own experiences when I was in middle school. We have different foreign teachers for each academic year or only for a semester. We get along well with both the NESTs and Non-NESTS. I think they have a very clear division of their focus on teaching. For the text book which mainly talked about the vocabulary and grammar, we depended on the local teacher. They can give us a more accurate explanation and show us good examples; also sometimes we can negotiate in Chinese a little bit. The Chinese teachers can provide us more efficient materials and even some rules about how to understand it. The most important thing is that we can use all of these in our exams. That’s the point! The foreign teachers will become the most popular teachers when we have some speech competitions or if we need to perform a kind of shows. They really help most of the time, correcting of the pronunciation and intonation, helping us to be heard like native-like speakers. They help us find some plot which appropriate to be performed. Especially when we come across some cultural issues, the foreign teachers play unique and important roles. In this case, they acted perfect, but from the bottom of my heart, I don't trust or depend on my foreign teachers compare with my Chinese teachers. That does will make me feel freer and more willing to work with my Chinese teachers. The Chinese teachers will definitely be the first choice for the students even though the students know that the NSs may gain a higher proficiency in English. That’s funny! We have been doing this with the concept of NSs would be a better choice.

To be honest, this makes me feel more confident to be an English teacher when I go back to China. And now I know what an ideal non-NEST is according to the author. This will really helps in my future career.