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Using textbooks (branched off from another topic)



 
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Using textbooks (branched off from another topic) #1 (permalink) Thu May 31, 2007 1:55 am   Using textbooks (branched off from another topic)
 

Torsten wrote:
Jamie (K) wrote:
It's because their schools use textbooks that teach only those terms and don't include any semantically transparent equivalent. Basically, they've never been taught any clear way to say these things. This was the case with the Cambridge textbooks I had to use overseas.

You are talking about people who don't have access to the Internet, don't watch movies and are not capable of communicating with other people in English. Now, why would want to learn English that way? I mean, how can you expect to learn any language by using textbooks? Even more so when we are talking about a non-phonetic language like English.

Torsten, keep in mind a few things:

One is that many people did most of their learning of a given language (German and French, for me) before fast Internet connections -- or even just the Internet -- were available, and before it was easy to access authentic foreign language content. The textbook was these people's main connection to the language, and even if they now use more media, many of the forms they learned early on are stuck in their heads and hard to change.

Secondly, people can't learn languages very well completely from electronic media. In the first place, most of those media are not very complete. If you want a complete suite that gives you practice in all the foundations and more, you have to get the packages that schools and colleges buy, and those cost a third of an average Westerner's annual income.

A third thing is that people don't learn or read that well from the active computer screen. Some people do make a habit of reading on the Internet (as do I), but it's not the same kind of reading. The eyes jump around more, and it's been proven that people basically don't engage in reading as we know it on the computer very well. Textbooks still have their place in allowing people to focus, both visually and mentally, in a way that is impossible on the computer screen.

Electronic media play a very important role in helping the learner get frequent and prolonged exposure to authentic usage, but people don't do well if they don't have some kind of book to orient them.
Jamie (K)
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Joined: 24 Feb 2006
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Using textbooks (branched off from another topic) #2 (permalink) Fri Jun 01, 2007 8:08 am   Using textbooks (branched off from another topic)
 

Hi Jamie,

You can download electronic documents such as PDF files and print them off so you can read them in the traditional way. I agree with you, textbooks can be an important source for language learners but I would never rely on them as the only source. Also, even before the internet was introduced there had been international pen pal clubs that helped people use the language they were learning. This was possible even in communist countries.

When I was a teenager I learned English by exchanging letters with people from Greece and the US. One thing is more important than the media and means you have at your disposal: Your willingness to learn and your creativity. You might have the best resources available to you but you don't use them properly. Then again, you might not have many resources but you make the best of them or even better: You create your own resources and learning systems only because you want to learn.
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Using textbooks (branched off from another topic) #3 (permalink) Fri Jun 01, 2007 12:32 pm   Using textbooks (branched off from another topic)
 

Right. Then we agree that textbooks have a utility that has not been eclipsed by electronic media (yet).

One of the reasons having penpals works so well is that people wind up writing about their lives, and so they end up learning all the main vocabulary they need to talk about what happens to them day to day. That really improved my language way back when. With the Internet there's a problem, though, mentioned by Amy elsewhere, which is that there's a whole lingo made up of abbreviations and nonstandard forms and spellings. People can get this sort of argot burned into their brains almost permanently, and it causes them a lot of trouble if they have to use English in any other setting.
Jamie (K)
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Joined: 24 Feb 2006
Posts: 5332
Location: Detroit, Michigan, USA

Using textbooks (branched off from another topic) #4 (permalink) Fri Jun 01, 2007 12:57 pm   Using textbooks (branched off from another topic)
 

Hi Jamie,

Everybody is free to pick their penpals in "real life" as well as on the Internet. I don't think the Internet is to blame for the fact that there are people who use "sloppy" or "slangy" expressions or bad grammar. How can you be sure your "real world pen pal" speaks or writes impeccable English? Why is this a problem of the Internet? I think it's the learner's responsibility to make sure they are communicating with people who use correct English.
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Torsten
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Torsten Daerr

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Using textbooks (branched off from another topic) #5 (permalink) Fri Jun 01, 2007 13:02 pm   Using textbooks (branched off from another topic)
 

You're right in one sense, but the reason it's worse on the Internet is that people who are capable of writing in good English actually TRY to write in a type of argot and cultivate it.
Jamie (K)
I'm a Communicator ;-)


Joined: 24 Feb 2006
Posts: 5332
Location: Detroit, Michigan, USA

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