Page 6 - GAME ON e-Book

INTRODUCTION

1.0 Exploring the Four Strands in Language Programme/Course

It is essentially important that the teachers or lecturers help improve the

learners of English as a second (ESL) or foreign language (EFL) by providing

useful things to learn in the best learning conditions as the learners strive to gain a

balance of learning opportunities, hence helping them possibly, at all levels of

proficiency.

Nation (2008) and Nation and Newton, J. (2009) have emphasised that

planning and designing listening, speaking, writing, and reading programmes or

courses for learners should be well balanced to make sure that every learner is

capable to develop all the four language skills successfully. The guide and practice

behind the principles embedded in such programmes should be able to provide

plenty of useful learning opportunities for the learners.

The basis of a well-balanced programme for developing listening, speaking,

writing, and reading skills should be organised around the framework of FOUR (4)

strands and because these strands run through the whole course/programme,

each of the four strands should also have roughly equal amounts of time. Nation

and Newton (2009) highlighted that;

These four strands are called meaning-focused input, meaning-focused output,

language-focused learning, and fluency development. A well-planned language

course has an appropriate balance of these four strands. It is through these four

strands that learners achieve the learning goals of a language course, namely

fluent control of the sounds, spelling, vocabulary, grammar and discourse features

of the language, so that they can be used to communicate effectively. The

opportunities for learning language are called strands because they can be seen

as long continuous sets of learning conditions that run through the whole language

course. Every activity in a language course fits into one of these strands (p.2).

Nation (2008) and Nation and Newton, J. (2009) further described that the first

strand requires the learners to learn through meaning-focused input. This strand

involves them to learn and acquire input through listening and reading activities.

Understanding of the ideas and messages expressed by the language is the

learners’ focus. In fact, the activities will only incorporate a small amount of

language features which are unfamiliar to the learners. The strand is then

considered present if almost 95%-98% of the words used in the activities are

known to the learners, and within their prior knowledge. The first strand is all about

using the language receptively.

GAME ON!

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