Nome: Gerson G. dos Santos
Idade: 30 anos
Escolaridade: superior incompleto - Letras
Tempo de aprendizagem: Três anos
My first contact with English began when I was 10 yeas old. At that tme most of the musics that I liked to listen were in English such as Peter Frampton, ABBA, KISS, Phill Collins, and so on. Thus, for listening so many musics in English I started to get interested in knowing what most of these singers were singing. Then, as I had not opportunity to attend any English course, I decided by myself to read the song lyrics and translate them. However, it was only when I entered in the College that I ‘learned’ to develop my English learning. It was from a professor’s criticism that I realised that I could develop one of my difficult skill I had that time, listening. This professor critized me and my classmates for not dedicating enough our studies. She also said that when she studied English in the College she also had to work full day, but she took advantage of any her time to study English listening. At the beginning I got very angry for her having critized us. However, after reflecting about she had said, I realised that she was right, and she was not only critising negatively; and all she said could be seen as advices or ‘tips’. So, I decided to do what she had said: I copied many English tapes, from beginners to advanced, and spent any time I had listening them. Over the time I acquired the habit to make transcription of anything in English that I heard (from English listening activities to SpeakUp’s), and this thing is my favorite hobby.
Regarding my speaking I just could practise it during the classes and with my classmates; the same thing has been with my reading skill in which I have used many practise readings of poetry, linguistic issue, and so on from Internet. My experience in English has not changed so much since I entered into University, although I always think that I still need to improve my skills in English.
Analise
Considering that my first experience in English learning was translation of music, I would say that this one would fit in the Acquisition Theory of Krashe’s one. In this theory, as Krashe argues, the learning is based on receiving ‘comprehensible input’. So, by making use of translation, I was acquiring a new stage of linguistic information whereas I was passing from one level to another difficult one through help of context and current level that I had already acquired before. This strategy can also be seen as way to develop my sociolinguistic competence whereas I was trying to use and interpret social meaning involved in my learning in English through translations
Regarding my second experience, perhaps one of the most important to development and growth of my learning, was the learning listening by tapes. This one could be fit in two types of Acquisition Theories. The first one would be the behaviorist model. So, this listening learning would have provided me opportunity to acquire automatic habits through imitation by repetitions (drills). In other words, through this strategy, I could acquire and develop linguistic aspects of the language such as pronunciation, discourse patterns, structures, intonation, and so on, by imitating them over and over again. This development of language would only be possible due to second Acquisition Theory, that is, the development would only have been occurred through authentic, continuous and oral Inputs (Krashe’s one) in which the listening were advanced from one stage of the language to another difficult one – passing from basic level to intermediate one, and so forth. Taking Hymes’s theory of communicative competence into account, I would say that this learning of listening may be seen as functional competence in which I developed during my learning process of English language for having a purpose (function) with the language such as ‘managing conversations’, developing patterns of ‘arguing’, ‘interacting with other people’, ‘self-expressive’ through listening learning. As well as functional competence, cultural one can also be identified with this learning process for providing cultural aspects such as particular social structure as values and beliefs of people involved in the listening tasks or activities.
Another theory which may be connected to my learning experience is Swain’s one. So, through the College’s classroom environment, I would have produced output of the language learning that I had acquired by audio Inputs and drills. In this case, all the linguistic knowledge that I had developed through listening strategy has been tried on through speaking interaction inside classrooms. In Hymes’s view, this learning process would be seen as way to develop my interactional competence. In classroom environment it is at least required that the learners manage their conversations and negotiate meaning with their classmates as well as use all sorts of strategies such as body language, eye contact, and so forth, in order to interact with other people in different communication situations. It is important to mention that this classroom learning process is also part of development of sociollinguistic competence. Using and interpreting the language appropriately in a specific social context has been also relevant aspect of an effective communication.
In summary, whatever has been the learning experiences used in the language learning, it is important to bear in mind that all of them were driven by my motivation – in this case by the wish of being able to comprehend what were spoken in listening such as, music, face-to-face conversation, movies, and so on. So, I have used Input (authentic and continuous oral communications) and Automatism (sounds, standard discourse patterns, intonation) through repetitions and assimilations in order to compensate for my lack of contact with native speakers and not having traveled or lived in a foreign country. Moreover, the Social-Historical Context of the College has provided a natural environment to develop an Output through Interaction classes and e-mails with my classmates.
However, as Vera Menezes has pointed in her article Fractal Model of Language Acquisition, the process of language acquisition does not fit in only one model, but in many types of them. So, although we tend to focus on one model than other ones, we are always applying different types of models of language acquisition in our learning strategies; mostly by the growing necessity of developing and increasing our learning of the language.
References
PAIVA, V.L.M.O. Fractal Model of Language Acquisition.
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http://www.sil.org/lingualinks/LANGUAGELEARNING/OtherResources/GudlnsFrALnggAndCltrLrnngPrgrm/PragmaticAspectsOfCommunicativ.htm
http://www.viavale.com.br/english/sk-krash.htm