tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Jan 08 07:59:29 1996
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Re: Repetition
- From: [email protected] (Matt Gomes)
- Subject: Re: Repetition
- Date: Mon, 8 Jan 1996 06:34:49 -0800
qaghItlhneS:
Paul said that I said:
: According to Matt Gomes:
: >Being an instructional designer, I'd disagree with you that repetitive
: >drilling is any kind of instruction. What does that teach you? And how
: >effective is it?
And then replied:
[snip]
: learning. One might understand the attitude, perhaps, if you think of
: repetition as mindlessly repeating phrases, although even that can have its
: salubrious effect. Repetition in language training should be, as with
: Pavarotti singing scales and Babe Ruth in front of the batting machine,
: accompanied by monitoring. You do not merely repeat, you listen to
: yourself and observe what you did wrong and do it better the next time.
: You compare yourself with your model, a native speaker if you can get one,
: (or Okrand's explanations in KLD, whatever you have) and you try to imitate
: that model's intonation, grammar, syntax and diction.
[snip]
I agree with you, Paul. Let me be more specific. Using JUST repetitive
drills for language acquisition is not an effective learning strategy in and
of itself. What you mention here is a model of language instruction that
incorporates a host of other instructional methods. You've taken "repetitive
drilling" and added quite a few other aspect to it.
What I was trying to say is... one of the best ways to learn a language is
to start USING it in a way that's MEANINGFUL to you. Is repetition meaningful
to you? Will you go up to a warrior and start saying, "friend, jup, write,
ghItlh, here-abouts, naDev"? No... you'd start talking to him, make mistakes,
he'll (hopefully) give you constructive feedback and you start the learning
process. Just like you said... immersion-type.
-majIq