THE DIRECT METHOD
Direct Method: Sometimes also called natural method, is a method for teaching foreign languages that refrains from using the learners'''' native language and just uses the target language. It was established in Germany and France around 1900. Characteristic features of the direct method are
· teaching vocabulary through pantomiming, realia and other visuals
· teaching grammar by using an inductive approach ·
centrality of spoken language (including a native-like pronunciation)
· focus on question- answer patterns
· Teacher-centeredness
Principles
1) Classroom instructions are conducted exclusively in the target language.
2) Only EVERYDAY VOCABULARY and sentences are taught. (The language is made real)
3) Oral communication skills are built up in a carefully graded progression organized around question- and-answer exchanges between teachers and students in small, intensive classes.
4) Grammar is taught INDUCTIVELY.
5) New teaching points are introduced orally.
6) Concrete vocabulary is taught through demonstration, objects, and pictures; abstract vocabulary is taught by association of ideas.
7) Both SPEECH and LISTENING comprehensions are taught.
8) Correct pronunciation and grammar are emphasized.
Historical context
The direct method was an answer to the dissatisfaction with the older grammar translation method, which teaches students grammar and vocabulary through direct translations and thus focuses on the written language.
There was an attempt to set up conditions that imitate mother tongue acquisition, which is why the beginnings of these attempts were called the natural method. At the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, Sauveur and Franke proposed that language teaching should be undertaken within the target-language system, which was the first stimulus for the rise of the direct method.
The audio-lingual method was developed in an attempt to address some of the perceived weaknesses of the direct method.
Disadvantages of Direct Method
1 Major fallacy of Direct Method was belief that second language should be learned in way in which first language was acquired - by total immersion technique. But obviously far less time and opportunity in schools, compared with small child learning his mother tongue.
2 Is first language learning process really applicable to second foreign language learning at later stage
First language learning is essential part of child's total growth of awareness of world around him. He starts off with blank sheet, then starts collecting/selecting organising the experience of a totally new world, perceived through his senses, by formulating a variety of pre-verbal concepts.
Subsequently part of the process of learning how to live is the acquisition of skills to verbalise his desires and aversions and to label his concepts, so as to make living more sufficient and secure.
Effectiveness of these verbalising skills depends on maturation level of the child / on type of environment on intelligence.
Language is part of an intrinsic process through which child learns to recognise/ deal with new situations.
3 Compare learning of second language
· At 11 years of age, child is not interested in recognition of new living situations, child has normally learned the basic concepts and can handle situations for ordinary living purposes. So as far as 'learning to live' is concerned, no similarities between two processes of learning. (not the case for immigrant children - they need to learn English for survival purposes - therefore motivating force is totally different).
· Older child has already at his disposal a first language, which is securely fixed to the universe of things; (s)he is equipped with this advantage; first language learner does not have this.
· Older child is more mature and it would seem nonsensical to imitate first language learning processes totally for learning additional language. (think of contact hours needed) this is argument for using MT (anti Direct Method).
· What does foreign language learner wish to know first?
to know the FL equivalent of MT sentences/ words used in hitherto familiar situations.
· To learn how to handle certain known/ recurring situations through the medium of the FL. He doesn't wish to handle completely new situations in FL terms.
4 The Direct Method rejects use of the printed word - but this objection is illogical since second language learner has already mastered his reading skills.
Does printed word interfere with FL pronunciation? -In fact experiments show that the printed word is of real help to consolidate the FL and actually reinforces retention (ef 'Je ma pel') - leaves mental imprint, image of shape of word.
5 Later disciples of Direct Method took it to extremes and refused to speak a single word of English in lessons. To avoid translating new words, they searched for an association between new words and the idea it stood for: 'Voilà un livre, voici une craie'. Extreme Direct Methodists had cupboards full of realia. Explanations became cumbersome and time-consuming. (Definition type explanations UN meunier est UN homme qui travaille dans UN moulin' / 'court est le contraire de long'). Teachers would be jumping over desks flapping fins, rather than say that the English for 'saumon' is 'salmon'. Concepts like cependant'/ 'néanmoins' - obviously need immediate translation!
6 Successful teacher of the Direct Method needed competence in his language / stamina/ energy/ imagination/ ability and time to create own materials and courses - beyond capacity of all but gifted few.
"The method by its very nature presupposes a teacher of immense vitality, of robust health, one endowed with real fluency in the modern language he teaches. He must be resourceful in the way of gesture and tricks of facial expression, able to sketch rapidly on the board and in the language teaching day, he must be proof against linguistic fatigue".
7 Also Direct Methodists failed to grade and structure their materials adequately - no selection, grading or controlled presentation of vocabulary and structures. Plunged pupils into flood of living language - quite bewildering for pupils.
However, many teachers did modify the Direct Method to meet practical requirements of own schools, implemented main principles, i.e teaching through oral practice and banning all translation into target language. Obviously compromise was needed.
Direct method did pave the way for more communicative, oral based approach, and as such represented an important step forward in the history of language teaching.
Comparison of first and second-language learning processes (Language Teaching and the Bilingual Method, CJ Dodson, Pitman Publishing 1967,ISBN 0 273 31665 6)
If first and second-language learning processes are compared, the following pattern emerges-
| First-language learner 1. He has no command of another language before learning the target language 2 He is neurologically immature, thus his mother tongue is not fixed 3. He learns to recognise and cope with reality through the target language 4. He requires a high contact-frequency with the target language to learn that all things have names 5 He requires a high contact-frequency with the target language to recognise the meaning of sounds representing the names of things, because he is neurologically immature because his range of experience with the outside world is limited and as he has no knowledge of the equivalent meaning of sounds from another language for the same things 6. He requires a high contact-frequency to establish integration of mother-tongue sounds with things | | Second-language learner 1. He has command of another language before learning the target language 2. He is neurologically mature,thus his mother tongue is fixed
4. He already knows that all things have names
6 He has already established integration of mother-tongue sounds with things, but requires high contact-frequency to establish new integration of target-language sounds with the same things |
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