Authentic Materials in the Classroom: Their use to advance communicative competence

Authentic Materials in the Classroom: Their use to advance communicative competence

• Kamoldinova Dilrabo 19.101 D

What is an authentic text?

• Fergana Univesity

• Largely texts designed for an L1 audience (Little et al., 1988)
• Communicative function is prevalent (Swaffer & Stephens, 1981)
• Unedited, unabridged texts (Oxford, 1992)
• Trend of authenticity stretches back to Communicative Language Teaching movement of 1970’s (Day, 2003)
• I will employ a wide definition of text

Why use authentic texts in the K-12 classroom?

• Fergana
• University

• Authentic texts-by definition-are culturally relevant and informative.
• Authentic texts are embedded in target culture—producers and intended consumers share relatively close worldview
• Foreign language texts, by contrast, are unfaithful and deficient in potential information (Fonseca-Greber & Waugh, 2003; Vellenga, 2004).

Why use authentic texts in the K-12 classroom? <part two>

• j

• Satisfy natural curiosity of your students. They did not take your class to complete worksheets and take exams. Appreciate ‘cool’ stuff.
• Real-world use is the eventual goal of any language program. Authentic texts offer the first baby steps for the students along this journey.
• Foster problem-solving inquiry (fill in the blanks).

Few words of warning…

• h

• Must know your students and their potential level of understanding. Unmodified texts or texts without sufficient scaffolding can be extremely frustrating to students who are not ready for the text (Yano, Long & Ross, 1994)
• Choose your battles—can’t expect students to pick up every single bit of information from the text. Be selective and keep instruction focused.

What is communicative competence?

• H

• It’s one thing to know how to say something—slightly more important to know when to say what.
• Consider proverbial man
• Japanese example of responding to compliments
• Dell Hymes introduced the notion in 1966.
• “Linguistic knowledge is not the whole picture.”
• (Dell Hymes, 1966 in Saville-Troike, 1996)