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“COMMUNICATION IN THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE CLASSROOM: VERBAL AND NON-VERBAL NON-VERBAL COMMUNICA COMMUNICATI TION. ON. EXTRALING EXTRALINGUIST UISTIC IC STRATE STRATEGIES: GIES: NON VERBAL VERBAL REACTIONS TO MESSAGES IN DIFERENT CONTEXTS”.-
INTRODUCTION.Communicat Communication ion is a key word for us as English teachers. teachers. Not only is it the essence of human interaction, it is the centre of language learning. Chomsky was one of the first language investigators to try to e!lain why a child learns language" he says that the enfant #egins to !roduce language #y a !rocess of dedu deduct ctio ion n usin using g the the in!u in!utt recei receive ved d and and with with natu natura rall resou resource rcess cons constr truc uctt an inte interna rnall grammar. $ut later, later, linguis linguists ts such such as Hyms, noted that a child doesn%t know &ust a set of rules. 'e(she learns how and when to use them, and to whom.'e says that when a native !erson s!eaks, he or she takes into account factors such as)
1. Syst System emic ic pote potent ntia ial. l. *hether something +word, structure... works grammatically or not if it fits into the grammatical system. 2. Appr ppropri priacy acy. *hether a word or structure is suita#le in the contet according factors such as the relative social class of the s!eakers, regional variations, age and status differences, the to!ic #eing discussed and so on. 3. Feasab asabiility. -now -nowin ing g whet whethe herr a cons constr truc ucti tion on is !oss !ossi# i#le le or not. not. It may may #e !ossi#le grammatically #ut seem ridiculous in real use such as the use of six adverbs together. together. 4. Occurence. knowl knowled edge ge of how how ofte often n somet somethi hing ng a!!e a!!ear arss in the the lang langua uage ge +eam!le) fore +eam!le) foreign ign learners of nglish from latin countries often use more latin! sounding "ords than a typical native spea#ers. spea#ers. H!""#$!y considers that language is, indeed, learned in a functional contet of use. To summari/e summari/e all the a#ove, a communicative contet governs language use, and language learning im!lies an ac0uisition of these rules of use. 1rammar is not enough, as we can #e grammatically correct and socioculturally incorrect or with illdesigned strategies. nd so communication #reaks down. C!%!" !%$ S&!#% develo!ed the idea of communicative com!etence, a design taken on #y the 3.E.C. as the #asis for o#&ectives in the curricular design and as a guide for teaching methodology. methodology. This This commun communica icativ tivee com!et com!etence ence consis consists ts of 4 su#com su#com!et !etenc ences) es) gramm grammati atical cal,, discourse, sociolinguistic, strategic and sociocultural. 1533 3T TIC6 IC6 or the the a#il a#ilit ity y to use use the the rule ruless of the the lang langua uage ge syste system. m. - 153 +eam!le) the position of the ad$ective in nglish. nglish . systemic !otential. - 7I8CO958E or the a#ility to use different ty!es of s!eech o writing #ased on the situation and to do it coherently and cohesively. 8OCIO6IN1 IN19I8 9I8TIC TIC or the a#ilit a#ility y to ada!t ada!t uttera utterance ncess to a !articu !articula larr social social - 8OCIO6 contet +socialclass, regional languages, registers. a!!ro!iacy. 8T5T TE1IC E1IC or the the a#il a#ilit ity y to infl influe uenc ncee the the cours coursee of the the commu communic nicat ativ ivee - 8T5 situation +#ody movement, intonation. 5elated to redundancy. The aim is to mantein the channel of communication o!en or to im!rove the rece!tion. - 8OCIOC96T956 : #eing familiar with the social and cultural contet, the #ackground where the language is s!oken.+eam!le)when we say ;mil#man< mil#man< we =
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understand all the contets such as) %ho is the mil#man&' %hen does the mil#man deliver the mil#& and so on. This communicative com!etence and its su#com!etences seeks to hel! children to !rovide o!!ortunities for gaining real language in real use. Communication is the activity or !rocess of giving information to other !eo!le or to other living things, usign signals such as s!eech, #ody movements or radio signals. Communication is then the #asis of a foreign language class from the #asic curricular design and aims to lesson !lans and methodology. In the 2> th Century worl of international travel, commerce, culture, technology and news(information, communication needs to #e o!timun and our !u!ils will want to, or need to have the four skills in language on many occasions for communicative !ur!oses. *e shall now look at what this means in terms of ver#al and non ver#al communication. This is !art of their !re!aration for life in general, and for their develo!ment as !eo!le. ?E5$6 CO339NICTION) This consists of two skills, namely listening and s!eaking. ()S*+)+, !recedes s!eaking. It consists of the decoding of sound according to ac0uired rules.It can #e defined as the !rocess of discriminating the sounds of the English language through a !rocess of hearing and understanding them. 6istening is related to P'ONO6O1@ This science studies the !honemes, the relationshi! #etween units of sounds and differences in meaning. *e need to remem#er that there are differences #etween the 8!anish sounds and the English sounds. *e must allow the children to #e clear on these differences, using accent, rhythm and entonation. ll material used in teaching sounds and meaning should #e #ased on its usefulness in real communicative interaction. There are many ways of !resenting material so that it can #e a means of hel!ing children in oralcom!rehension. *e may use flashcards, real o#&ects, !ictures from maga/ines, gestures, mime, language la#oratory, radio, t.v., fims, ta!erecorder and so on. S-A)+, is the encoding of the ac0uired sounds, deduced #y listening, into signals.The end of this is to communicate something to someone and is related to P'ONETIC8 The study of sounds) how they are !roduced and how they are received. Pu!ils need a lot of !ractise in com!rehension +listening in order to hold a conversation in English. $oth skills +listening and s!eaking are linked in the learning !rocess, since the !eo!le need to a#sor# the elements of a message if they are going to contri#ute to a conversation. This encoding and decoding is not only on a grammatical level, as Chomsky inferred at first, #ut as 1uiraud affirms a !rocess which takes logic from !honology, semantics, etc, #ut also su#&ective e!erience and social rules. 8o, we will #egin talking a#out oralcom!rehension techni0ues. If we want to develo! this a#ility in our children we shall need to o#serve the !rocesses used #y the learner in listening com!rehension. t first, the !u!il hears a series of noises and he(she can%t tell what the difference is #etween them. fter some time, he(she #egins to note that the sounds are in some sort of order, with regularity in the !auses and voice !attern. 2
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s he(she learns some sim!le e!resions, he or she #egins to see that there are recurring sounds, and he(she associates them with meaning. 8o, he or she is starting to recognise familiar elements, #ut doesn%t see all the relationshi!. 'e(she does not really understand. s he or she #ecomes more familiar with the language, he(she recogni/es the different elements, #ut doesn%t remem#er what he(she recogni/ed. This is #ecause he(she is recogni/ing single elements and not the whole message. The mind is eliminating information which it can%t take at first" only a certain amount can #e taken into shortterm memory. The rece!tive system in the #rain then takes these selected elements into longterm storage. $ut only a small !art of the total message will #e remem#ered, this is why !u!ils seem to #e a#le to understand very little at first. They have to concentrate very well to #e a#le to take in not only the sounds, #ut their meaning, the #rain is not a#le to do this too fast, and we must remem#er this. That%s why we hel! our !u!ils #y giving them short se0uences of sounds so that they can get the meaning easily and store it automatically. 8o, 5EPETITION is essential for ac0uiring this !rocess The 6O18E, in its A o#&ectives of the curricular design, reflects the im!ortance of !roficiency in these skills. No child can ever really communicate in English without some a#ility to listen and s!eak. In traditional ;1rammar Translation< these skills were often neglected. The reason for this neglect was that some !eo!le consider s!eaking and listening to #e !rimitive skills. They saw that children ac0uired these a#ilities naturally and so it was felt that ver#al communication was less sofisticated than the written form of the language. 8o, more im!ortance was given to a study of the written language and for many years ver#al communication was nor considered to #e worthy of study. This is reflected in the a!!roaches to teaching of languages wich followed a classical methodology imitating latin and greek a!!roaches which #y their very nature center on reading and writing. In this century however, and thanks to the contri#utions on social anthro!ologists and linguistics we have come to understand that the s!oken form of a language is a valua#le communication tool full of so!histicated rules of use and which is a vehicle for social interaction. *e can think of ?igotsky studies on ethnic grou!s where he demonstrates how com!le the ver#al communication is within societies which some !eo!le consider to #e !rimitive. 8o, s!eaking and listening are com!le skills and even though they are ac0uired in an a!!arently natural way there is a !rocess involved which is intricate. s an eam!le of this we can look at some of the features which are uni0ue to ver#al communication. 1offman highlited some of these. *e could mention that in ver#al communication there are signals which the adresser and adressee recogni/e as o!enclose signals such as the word ;well< or a cough to o!en and there are other nonver#al signalssuch as hand movemet to o!en or close a conversation. *e could also think of the fact that in ver#al communication there is an inmediate and constant res!onse from the adressee which we don%t have in written communication. This leads to the !ossi#ility of the s!eaker using strategies to ensure the message is #eing received. B
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These strategies include #ack signals such as the hearer nodding his(her head or e!ressions such as ;really< or ;umhm<. These demonstrate to the hearer that the message is #eing received. If he or she feels that the adressee is having difficulty in receiving the message #ecause he(she notes a lack of interests,com!rehension, etc, he(she may choose to use strategies such as raising the voice, re!etition or gestures to im!rove attention or understanding. *e can not do this in written communication #ecause the adressee is not usually !resent and we can%t &udge the receiver%s res!onse and then react. urther to this in ver#al communication s!eakers and listeners !ay attention to the norms of what is acce!ta#le in a given contet as regards 0uantity, for eam!le.*e could imagine that a $ritish conversation consists of shorter echanges than in an anaero#ic contet.There are also, of course, com!le rules of what is socially and culturally acce!ta#le in s!ecific contets de!ending on the relative age, social class and regional origin and so on of s!eaker and hearer. or eam!le, the s!eaker is aware of ta#oo words or to!ics and of conventions which are a!!ro!iate in a given situation.It would #e ina!!ro!iate, for eam!le, to use some swearwords in !olite com!any. In written communication the writer does not always know who will read the message and cannot always select suita#le e!!ressions, to!ics and voca#ulary. Taking the a#ove into account we can affirm that when a child #egins to listen with understanding and to s!eak with intelligi#ility he(she is ac0uiring very useful social skills for everyday use. These skills are not !rimitive instruments #ut ela#orate com!etences which society demands and values. *ithin ver#al communication we recogni/e that there are non ver#al elements. *e will now look at these as!ects of s!oken communication. NON ?E5$6 CO339NICTION. In all ver#al communication we are aware that the message is sent through a code that is made u! of sounds travelling trough the air, having #een emitted trough the articulation of the s!eaker%s s!eech organs. $ut this message is communicated #y non ver#al signals too real com!onets of normal communication. The following are ty!ical contetual non ver#al elements. -na!! clasifies the non ver#al as!ects as follows) =. $ody movements) includes gestures, movements of the #ody, lim#s, hands, head, feet, facial e!ressions +smiling, eye #ehaviour such as #linking, direction of sight and also !osture. 2. Physical characteristics) includes !hysical a!!earance, general attraction, #ody scents, height, hair, skin ton +these characteristics are constant. B. Paralanguage) refers to how something is said and not what is said. It uses the non ver#al vocal signs surronding s!eech +tone, 0ualities of the voice, rythm. D. Proemics) is the manner in which man uses s!ace as s!ecific cultural !roduct, the study of use and !erce!tion of social and !ersonal s!ace. The individual determines his own s!ace #ase on social and !ersonal rules +!erce!tion and use of !ersonal and social s!ace. 4. Tactile conduct) kissing, hitting, guiding ...
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. rtifacts) include the mani!ulation of o#&ects, which can act as nonver#al stimuli, with interacting !ersons.These artifacts can #e) !erfume, clothing, li!stick ... F. 8urroundig factors) this category includes those elements that intervine in human relations which are not a direct !art of it) furniture, interio decoration. The !ur!ose of non ver#al communication is to #e !art of the functional as!ect of communication) a to communicate emotions # to regulate communication(conventions. c To inter!ret. d To identify social status, etc. The cultural s!ecificness of these elements should highlited +8!anish and English gestures are different. 3eaningful language includes a knowledge of these as!ects for true communication. The im!ortance of drama, mime, action songs, role!lays, simulation of real life situations to include as many nonver#al elements as !ossi#le cn not #e underestimated. EXTRALINGUISTIC STRATEGIES: NON VERBAL REACTIONS TO MESSAGES IN DIFFERENT CONTEXTS.In this !art of the to!ic we will see how the use of etralinguistic elements is linked not only to achieving grammatical and sociocultural com!etence #ut to strategic com!etence. This is the a#ility to !lan and ada!t communication, so that the desired end is achieved. In different contets different strategies are re0uired. *e should make some !oints here) = 8trategies develo! and are sought when a need is seen. Children look for etralinguistic hel! when they are interested in, or enthusiastic a#out, or are seeing the advantage in communicating. 2 *e shoul !ut children in different situations of ver#al communication and hel! them to develo! non ver#al aids with games and activities which link nonver#al elements with the contet and communication need. B This ac0uisition of language skills and nonver#al strategies re0uires an atmos!here of relaation, with no tension, ridicule, !ressure. D Children should see how language ver#al and non ver#al changes in different contet, ruled #y situation,climate, social class, age, formality and informality and so on. One method which focuses on the aid of nonver#al communication is Total Physical 5es!onse. Every etralinguistic resource its use is develo!ing communication #eginning with the listening skills, where im!eratives are inferred #y movements, actions, etc. Though we may not wish to use a TP5 methodology with all its im!lications, the contri#utions it makes to the teachinglearning !rocess as !art of our methodological !lan in an eclectic a!!roach can #e valua#le. s teachers we will #e aware that elements such as furniture, s!ace, decorations and so on can hel! or hinder communication. There will #e occassions when we will want to rearange desks, chairs, decorations, !osters or other o#&ects, so that they can hel! in a communicative !rocess. or eam!le, if we are !erfoming a !lay we can set u! various o#&ects as scenary so that the children fell contetuali/ed. or instance, in a !lay a#out 4
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1oldilock and the three #ears we could !ut a ta#le in the centre of the classroom with three differentsi/e chairs #eside it.This etralinguistic elements hel! children, who can use them as aids in communication. To give an eam!le of a Total Physical 5es!onse methodology which uses etralinguistic strategies we can consider for instance the game of ;8imon says< where, in the contet of a game, children learn to understand sim!le im!eratives along with associated !arts of the #ody. They o#ey the orders of the teacher only when he or she s!eaks on #ehalf of 8imon. To hel! the children the teacher !erforms the action, which the children initate. Eventually they do not need this etralinguistic #acku!. rom the very first days of learning a foreign language, children #ecome accostumed to deducing meaning from the contet, which is full of etralinguistic clues. *hen we say) ; close the door, !lease< !ointing to the o!en door and miming a closing movement. This is a very sim!le #ut effective T.P.5. activity. Not only do children learn to understand s!oken messages in this way. They #egin to try to communicate using nonver#al and stralinguistic strategies at their dis!osal, from gestures to mime and with the use of other artifacts. CONCLUSION.In this to!ic we have attem!ted to demonstrate the nature of ver#al communication. The s!oken language in each !roductive and rece!tive forms de!ends not only on the understanding of sounds or the creation of these sounds. The contet of this communication includes many elements which are aids in the !rocess and we should #e aware of how we can maimi/ed ver#al and nonver#al items to encouraged children to infer meaning and to use all sorts of etralinguistic strategies to im!rove communication. $y means of meaningful, motivating activities which use as!ects such as #ody movement, gestures, artifacts, the five senses, we can motivate our young learners of English to #elieve that communicating in the English language is within their reach.
