Task of TEFL : Unit 5

 Group Members : Aulia Hakim 

                       Jessy Therinda

                       Rahmani Husna

1.  Is it really good for L2 learners to delay their oral production?

2.  Does the natural approach attend to learners' output? Can comprehensible input alone lead to learners' comprehensible output?

3.  According to your language learning experience with computers, do you think those CALL programs always provide comprehensible input, particularly in listening?

4. Do you think the feedback from the computer is sufficient for language learners to develop their listening skills?

Answer 

1.     

> We think that it is really good (for some reasons) for L2 to delay their oral production At the beginning, when the learners start to learn new language, it’s better for them to just be a listener and focus on the listening comprehension skill. Become a passive learner will actually help them to prepare and steady their comprehension on the basic rules (grammar) which are applied on the essay. Moreover, it enables them to avoid of making mistakes in producing something. For example: elementary school students are usually drilled to comprehend an English essay or an English sound rather than making a comprehensive essay or speech. For us, it is impossible for them (an elementary school student) to speak fluently, while they don’t comprehend enough to acquire the language structure or they may not have listening or reading practice times. In conclusion, it is better to delay an oral production for beginner learner until they become more familiar with the language and ready to produce a sentence.

> However, we think that delaying oral production is not always good for some reasons. First is about learner’s confidence, learner may not brave enough to speak and produce a sentence. That’s because they afraid of making mistakes. Their output may become even rigid and seems awkward, rather than any other learner who precedes speaking and writing skill. The solution is just by letting them producing a sentence, where we automatically teach them how to make a decision without worrying on the risk behind.

-  Besides it, by producing a sentence, learner become familiar and memorizes to the material (e.g. vocabularies) longer.

-   Actually by producing output (a sentence, whether it is written or spoken) learners are automatically drilled to build their self-evaluation, so that they could measure how far their approach in learning language. 

    According to my own experience in my junior high school when I was leaning Arabic , I used to produce what I’ve learned directly  ( about vocabulary at that day ) by writing or speaking a simple sentence. The guider wouldn’t let me go before I could successfully put the new vocabulary in a sentence. However, I didn’t have to worry because she ( the guider ) would help me to arrange the sentence.

    By practicing it, I thought that my confidence was increased and I used to memorize the vocabularies easily. In conclusion, it is also good, if the learner are allowed to producing output while they are start in language learning process.

2.    Yes, The natural approach attends to learners' output
 However, I don’t think that comprehensible input can alone lead to learner’s comprehensible output. It is because the learners are not allowed to produce anything beside they are learning by listening or reading. They may have good understanding on the use of grammar in reading an essay or they may have good comprehension in listening . Shortly, they (the learners) tend to master the language theoretically rather than practically. However, they are not used to spoke and write about L2. By producing a simple sentence, whether it would be spoken or written, the learners are automatically drilled and motivated to produce better output, even though they may make some mistakes in the first learning. I think how come a learner could produce comprehensible output if they are seldom drilled to apply what they have already learned. Then, when the day of producing something like an essay comes, I’m not quite sure that the output would be as comprehensible as the learner who adopts other approaches. I suggest it (natural approach) has to be combined with the other approaches, like communicative approach, where the learners are automatically get feedback from the guider. So, it enables them to make self – evaluation. 

3.    According to our  experience, the CALL programs always provide input that users can easily to uderstand. They usually (but not always) devide input with different levels. Users can choose what levels that suite for them. The higher levels that learner chooses, the more difficult input that available. That also including listening input, if the levels higher, vocabulary that spell from the system are more difficult too.  

4. I think the feedback from the computer is sufficient for language learners to develop their listening skill. It is because the computers don’t limit the learner to use and make some review themselves. The learners are allowed to develop their autonomy by doing some practices on the materials as many times as they wish. By practicing it times, we think that learner’s listening skill enables to increase.

    As what has been mentioned in the text that Computers can provide immediate, nonjudgmental feedback and additional assistance to learners. They correct learners' errors without giving them embarrassment or anxiety. So, the leaner don’t need to worry on the feedback which is given by the computers.

   Although we ( as the language learner ) may have more chance to make review, sometime we may find that we don’t get the comprehensive feedback from the computers. For example: in listening test ( song / news which is played ), we can only get the correct answer without knowing the right pronunciation based on the phonology rules or with comprehensive extra information. So, it enables us to make such mistakes in another chance.