Direct method

The direct method, sometimes called the oral method, or the natural method, was developed as reaction to the grammar-translation method. This is true, but in fact people have been learning languages by this method at least as early as Roman times, when young men were provided with Greek tutors to teach them Greek, the cultural language of Europe in those days and an essential part of one’s education.

The simple idea behind the direct method was that we learn languages by hearing them spoken and engaging in conversation: reading and writing can be developed later.

Practitioners of this method immersed their students in a flow of examples of the spoken language, while actively demonstrating the meaning of what they were saying, if possible suiting their actions to the words. At the same time, they would encourage the students to speak, i.e. to cue them, often by asking questions.

Thus, the main principle of the direct method was to immerse students in the target language. The aim seems to have been to give students a rich sample of the forms of the structural or lexical items being taught, to envelop students in a continuous stream of the language. Some questions are appropriate here: 1) How natural is the teacher’s use of language? (Remember, this method is sometimes called the natural method); 2) What percentage of time do you think would be occupied by the teacher’s voice during oral work? 3) Do you think this type of lesson would be easy to teach?

4.1.2. Behaviourism: Audio-lingual method

It could be said that this method consists entirely of drilling in one form or another. Audio-lingual means ‘listening - speaking’. The method consists of presenting an oral model to the student, either on tape or in the teacher’s voice, and carrying out a series of pattern drills based on the model.

The anatomy of a drill

The drillin the language classroom derives directly from behaviourists’ theories of learning. The behaviourist movement, given birth by the famous Russian physiologists Pavlov, Behterevand Sechenovand the psychologists Watsonand Raynor, became extremely influential in the 1950s and behaviourist learning theory was one of their most convincing developments. Mostly this was based on experimental research on animals such as dogs, rabbits, rats, pigeons and even fur coats. In an article published in 1920 by Watson and Raynor the results of the experiments they had carried out with a young baby called Albert were reported. When Albert was 9 months old they discovered that the easiest way to frighten him was to make a loud noise by striking a steel bar with a hammer. At various intervals over the next 3 months they frightened Albert in this way while he was in the presence of various animals (a rat, a rabbit and a dog). The result of these experiments was that after 3 months Albert showed fear when confronted with these animals even when the noise was not made. He even showed unease when a fur coat was put in front of him. The psychologists suggested that they would be able to cure Albert’s fear but were unable to do so because he was no longer available. His parents had withdrawn him from the experiment. Watson and Raynor even discussed the possibility of Albert’s fear of fur coats when he reached the age of 20.

The ethics of this experiment are of course highly questionable but Albert’s experiences are an early example of the idea of conditioning. Watsonand Raynorhad managed to condition Albert to be afraid of the rat, rabbit, dog and fur coat where before he had a neutral emotional reaction to them.

Behaviourism is still strongly associated with the theories of professor B.F. Skinnerof Harvard University and his ‘Verbal Behaviour’ published in 1957. The principles behind behaviourist learning theory are relatively simple and correspond to a common sense view of how we learn to do things. Look at this diagram of a rat in a simple T-shape maze:

Foodä

Door

Rat Cage

It is not hard to see that if food is always placed in the right-hand side of the maze, the rat will learn after a serious of runs, or ‘trials’, to turn right when it is released from its cage. We could say here that a habit is being formed. Habit formation is the basis of behaviourist learning theory.

The process of habit formation, according to the behaviourist, is developed as follows: A habit is formed when a correct response to a stimulus is consistently rewarded. The habit therefore is the result of stimulus, correct response and reward occurring together again and again. The more frequently this happens, the stronger the habit becomes. Once the habit is established, the subject (animal or human) will continue to respond correctly to the stimulus, even if the reward is not present.

For the behaviourist, both reward and punishment can have an effect on habit formation. Reward has a positive effect; punishment has a negative effect. Both were covered by the term reinforcement. Reward was positivereinforcement, punishment was negative reinforcement.

According to Skinner, reward was more effective than punishment in a teaching situation. He concluded that the students’ task should be so arranged that they had a very good chance of getting the answer right, i.e. of responding correctly. In other words, a teaching programme should be split up into a series of very simple steps. Once the student has succeeded in getting one step right, he could go on to the next. This process is called grading.

Thus, the degree of difficulty of operating language input gradually increases. Each step, or drill, conducted in the classroom is designed in a three-phase way:

Stimulus Response Pupil’s correct answer/T. corrects P.

(Teacher Pupil Pupil/Teacher)

If the drill is performed in a language laboratory, then it is of a four-phase character.

Phases of a drill

Drilling in the classroom normally follows a three-phase scheme consisting of stimulus – response – reward, e.g.:

T: Johnny’s in England. France. stimulus (1)

P: Johnny’s in France. student response (2)

T: Good. Teacher approval (reward) (3)

The advent of the tape recorder as a language teaching device, combined with a belief in habit formation as a fundamental process of language learning, led to the development of the language laboratory. Typical language laboratory drills took the form of four-phase drills, e.g.:

Tape: Johnny’s in England. France. – Phase 1. Stimulus

P: Johnny’s in France. – Phase 2. Response

Tape: Johnny’s in France. – Phase 3. Reinforcement

P: Johnny’s in France. – Phase 4. The 2^nd response

In theory if the student repeated correctly in phase (2), when he heard phase (3) and recognised this as being the same as his response (2), he was rewarded by knowing he had got it right. The second repetition (4) makes the habit stronger, or gives the student the second chance if he did not perform well the first time. This drill methodology identified as the audio-lingual method applies the following principles.

First principles

1) Students should first listen; then speak; then read; and finally write the language. In extreme forms of this method, students had to listen for many hours before they were allowed to speak (The Silent Way; Total Physical Response).

2) The ‘grammar’ should be presented in the form of model patterns or dialogues. Drilling consisted of forming new utterances on the basis of the original patterns. This was called Analogous Pattern Drilling. That is, the students formed the new utterances by analogy.

3) Drilling should follow the Stimulus – Response – Reinforcement scheme. Students should always be rewarded when they responded correctly, by seeing that they had got the answer right.

4) Students should proceed by very easy steps, starting with simple repetition and going on to simple substitution drills, then more complex drills (transformation and (re)production). Ideally the possibility of a student making an error should be avoided altogether because positive reinforcement (reward) was considered more effective then negative reinforcement (punishment). This principle was called error prevention.

5) By repeating the stages of stimulus – response – reinforcement, students will develop correct language habits. Once a habit had been formed, a student could produce examples of the pattern effortlessly and without thinking about how to do so. The student was then regarded as being fluent in that pattern.

Critics of the audio-lingual method would focus mainly on the fact that much of the method consists of mechanical drilling. Practice activities tend to be repetitive and boring. More serious is the danger that students might produce analogous patterns without realising what they are saying. However it should be said that audio-lingualism was thought to be highly successful in some contexts – particularly the foreign language training of military personnel during the Second World War (the so-called Army method).