Focus of classroom activities

Language teachers asserted that they would need more collaboration with other teachers working under similar conditions to discuss problems, possibly organized as an in-service course. Discussions and consultations could provide information not only for teachers but also for stakeholders as

“in-service training and development for teachers provides an essential opportunity for teachers to critique their position in the education society, identify points of opportunity and mechanisms to influence education planning, including assessment, and to find ways to contribute to positive change” (Hamp-Lyons, 2007, p. 492).

They would also participate in methodological training on how to deal with special needs children in language classes (especially dyslexic children).

To sum up, teachers’ comments highlight that they did not get sufficient preparation for teaching disadvantaged children. The reasons include excessive academic training, insufficient information on the characteristics of disadvantaged children and the methodology of teaching them, and inappropriate inadequate teaching practice.

several cultures” (Council of Europe, 2001, p. 168). The Educational framework and programme curriculum developing foreign language competence for learners aged 6-13 (Faragó, Kuti and Szepesi, 2008) defines the objectives even more clearly: the main goal of foreign language education is “the foundation and development of the learners’

foreign language communicative competence” (p. 15). In addition, it is important to promote a positive attitude towards language learning and to encourage the use of effective language learning strategies to help autonomous learning. Consequently, classroom activities should be selected in a way which promotes acquiring foreign language communication effective in everyday communication.

Classroom observations seemed to disagree with these goals of language education as teachers put significantly more emphasis on the teaching of grammar than on the teaching of communicative competences. Several elements of the grammar-translation teaching method could be observed during the classes, in addition, these kinds of activities were listed by the children as the most frequent activities.

In Hungary, the Russian language had been taught mainly by the grammar-translation method. In the 1980s and 1990s, the communicative approach substituted the grammar-translation method in foreign language learning and new methodological elements such as group and pair work, learning to learn, meaningful learning, authentic materials and student-centred classes became more widespread (Medgyes and Miklósy, 2000). With the advent of the communicative approach, the national syllabus was changed. The four skills were then emphasized in order to help students to communicate in English.

Teachers in the interviews did not emphasize that the prevailing teaching methods in the majority of the language classes were still based on the grammar-translation methodology, which was found by the classroom observations and children’s

interviews. Table 9 summarizes the most frequent activities in the language classes according to the children. It is clear that activities related were reading and grammar were the most frequent activities according to the children.

Table 9

Most Frequent Activities of Language Classes Perceived by Children

the number of children who mentioned it as most frequent activity

copying 9

grammar exercises 7

translating from Hungarian to English 5

translating from English to Hungarian 4

answering to teachers questions 4

reading 4

doing course book exercises 4

dictation 3

vocabulary exercises 3

listening 3

writing tests 2

conversation 1

The following activities described by Krashen (1982, p. 127-128.) as typical features of the grammar-translation approach were often used during the observed classes:

• long explanations of grammar offered with example sentences in a deductive manner in the mother tongue

• vocabulary presented in the form of a bilingual list, memorizing vocabulary without meaningful context (usually given as homework)

• practice on grammar rules, drills

• rote learning

• frequent error correction

• achievement tests with a focus on translation, pattern drills and structures.

Larsen-Freeman (2000) adds other characteristics of the grammar-translation method which were typical during the observed classes. The principal skills to be developed

were reading and writing. The use of mother tongue was widespread in the classes, which included frequent translation exercises, looking for similarities between the foreign language and the native language, and word-by-word translation of texts, dialogues, or even songs. In terms of communication, most of the interactions in the classroom were from the teacher to the children. The most frequent form of speaking exercises was reading aloud. Conversation exercises were often restricted to reciting dialogues and texts. Frontal class work and the excessive use of Hungarian were significant, which were usually explained by the low proficiency of children.

These findings are in line with the results of an explorative research study by Nikolov (2008) which investigated the content and processes of Hungarian lower-primary language classes. She concludes that most of the activities based on the grammar-translation approach are not appropriate for the cognitive level of young learners, the exercises cannot engage the children, and as a result, children often become undisciplined. Moreover, she argues that in terms of motivation, inappropriate methodology can do so much harm that children would have benefited more if they had not participated in language education at all in the lower-primary classes.

Classroom observation proved that already in Grade 5 grammatical categories were used by language teachers (for instance S4TG1) even if children seemingly did not seem to understand what the terms subject and predicate meant. Then the teacher started to explain these terms in Hungarian with Hungarian examples which should be the goal of Hungarian grammar classes. It must be noted that not every teacher used long grammatical explanations in their classes, one of them argued:

Even a non-disadvantaged child in Grade 5 or 6 doesn’t really know much about grammatical categories in Hungarian, they still don’t know what a verb is. [S1TE2]

Repetition as a language learning activity is a regularly employed technique with young learners. Teacher S1TG1 warned that abundant and mechanical repetitions may lead to overlearning and might become boring for children therefore she tried to use games (especially spelling games) and flashcards to practice in a motivating way:

Monotonous tasks don’t work. They can’t bear doing the same thing, or writing the same for a long time. I should bring something new all the time. [S1TG1]

Classroom observations revealed that not only the children, but in some cases also the teachers seemingly got bored and tired because of constant repetitions. Choir activities, i.e. repeating all at the same time were found to be very useful by Teacher S2TG2 as it created a secure language learning environment also for more reserved children. Furthermore, the high proportion of dyslexic children in the language group may account for frequent repetitions, as they need reinforcement repetition and overlearning to finally leading to automaticity (Nijakowska, 2010).

When talking about favourite classroom activities, children interviews revealed that activities related to grammar (N=8) (for instance long grammatical explanations, making sentences, conjugation exercises, exercises with words) and translation (N=6) were the least popular activities. Besides these tasks, copying (N=4), tests (N=3), homework (N=3) and oral reporting (N=2) were mentioned as least popular activities of foreign language classes. One of the children said bluntly: “I don’t like English classes.

We should learn less grammar, and more words. We should rather talk” [S4CH3].

One lesson was observed when the whole lesson was spent doing grammatical exercises. In this class of Grade 7, only six disadvantaged children participated in the German lesson as the others had been taken to a concert. These six children were doing multiple choice tests in German together with the teacher, however, the level of the

children was well below the level of the tests. It turned out that the children did not even understand basic vocabulary, one of them asked in Hungarian “What does gehen mean?” pronouncing the verb gehen (=to go) in a wrong way. The children seemed bored and uninterested during the whole lesson. The language teacher explained after the lesson that these children were incredibly weak at grammar that is why she had to practice it again and again. However, choosing inappropriate tasks and inappropriate methodology did not seem to contribute to developing children’s grammatical competence.

Considering findings of perceived difficulties of disadvantaged learners might indicate that methods of the grammar-translation approach do not lead to significant results. It supports the findings of Nikolov (2003) that traditional language teaching is more favourable for children with better language aptitude and cognitive skills.

Furthermore, this methodological approach is not in line with recommendations for young learners which involve less emphasis on reading and writing and more emphasis on communication, and improving oral-aural skills should be preferred to developing literacy skills (Nikolov and Curtain, 2000). Using overwhelmingly activities of the grammar-translation method may contribute to the lagging achievement among disadvantaged children and children with special needs.