Learning content: relevance and the limits of “engagement”

I’ve been wondering lately about Business English teaching “material”: authentic vs. scripted, generic vs. personalized, business vs. general vs. fun (and to what degree are all these even valid distinctions?). I suppose like everything else it depends on the student and on the teacher, in terms of their unique learning styles, personalities, and the day-to-day situation. And I suppose a mix of the above is usually in order and “the art of the mix” is what we want from a skilled teacher with the autonomy to select material.

But still sometimes I wonder how much neuron-connection learning* actually happens with language that is unrealistic. By unrealistic I mean language that is unlikely to be encountered by a BE learner, because it’s irrelevant to their lives and job. Maybe the limited benefit of grammar drilling is largely because the students’ don’t know Mr. and Mrs. Smith and don’t care whether they go | have went | have gone to the grocery store. How much do the benefits of drilling increase when we personalize the drills to fit the Ss work challenges and interests - a little? A lot? Exponentially? Enough that non-personalized drilling should never happen? Drills are only the easiest example here and the concept would apply to some degree to all classroom language and activities.

I remember my one and only Spanish class when I first arrived in Buenoes Aires, and we were working with estar, and the exercises had the typical language examples, and this one will always stick with me: “The wine casks are on the burros” with a little drawing of a donkey with wine casks on its back. I don’t even remember the word for wine casks - maybe because the likelihood that I will hear, say, read or write that sentence is about zero? (Well, OK, I just did, but that’s meta). Of course with the generative power of language most exact sentences may never be repeated, but still…I couldn’t even imagine needing that language walking around downtown Buenos Aires. Of couse I needed the form…but why not teach it with language that matters? (Answer: Well, it’s a ton of work, for one thing….)

I was reminded of this by a cool grammar video on YouTube (from the always interesting Teacher in Development, via James Matthews at Crisp Reflective Dissaray). It’s a Roadrunner cartoon with some present continuous worked in, and yes I can see it being fun, but how much do adult students actually learn from language like this:

Q: What’s that coyote doing now?
A: He’s making a snow machine!

If it’s fun, then it is engaging, and we do need engagement for learning - but maybe engagement is a necessary but not a sufficient cause, and content needs to be both engaging and relevant for optimal learning to happen.

Some evidence for this “engagement is necessary but not sufficient” theory was in the news recently. Two activities that always “engage” the human brain are (you guessed it) sex and violence. Engagement is defined as “an orienting response, an involuntary directing of focused attention”. Our reptile brain, with its over-riding need to pass on its genes, recognizes that sex and violence** are how this happens. So media (TV, movies, music, etc.) wanting consumers always have a sure bet with sex and violence.

But here’s what’s really interesting: although engaged with images of sex and violence, evidently viewers don’t remember as much while watching. The article was in the New York Times (so, $) but here’s another source (.pdf). The authors summarize:

Results showed better memory for people who saw the ads during a neutral program than for people who saw the ads during a violent or sexual program both immediately after exposure and 24 hr later. Violence and sex impaired memory for males and females of all ages, regardless of whether they liked programs containing violence and sex.

So maybe it depends on what part of our brain is engaged - if it’s the “fight, flight, or romance” old brain area, students will remember less and learn less. If it’s the executive function frontal cortex that is engaged (via content relevant to real life and work) you get engagement plus relevance and without the memory problems inherent in purely old brain engagement.

Not sure where humor fits in…interestingly, the Roadrunner cartoon would score high in both humor and violence. Funny that those two are often connected.

Anyway, before this post careens even further out of control: my thinking is that engagement is not enough, that indeed some kinds of engagment are counter-productive, that relevance is critical, and that material selection/design and activities should follow the “relevant engagement” rule. For adult BE learners (and it’s dangerous to generalize), the relevant engagement rule supports what I think is the holy grail for BE: performance-driven learning, with a performance-driven syllabus, materials, lessons and tasks.

* redundant modifier, granted
** violence passes on genes through male competition/combat by individual and kinship groups

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Intercultural communication, emoticons

Interesting article in Science Daily explaining why culture is key to interpreting facial emotions.

The study reveals that in cultures where emotional control is the standard, such as Japan, focus is placed on the eyes to interpret emotions. Whereas in cultures where emotion is openly expressed, such as the United States, the focus is on the mouth to interpret emotion….Consistent with the research findings, the Japanese emoticons for happiness and sadness vary in terms of how the eyes are depicted, while American emoticons vary with the direction of the mouth. In the United States the emoticons : ) and : - ) denote a happy face, whereas the emoticons or : - ( denote a sad face. However, Japanese tend to use the symbol (^_^) to indicate a happy face, and (;_;) to indicate a sad face.

Readers from Japan: what do you think about this?

Via Andrew Sullivan.

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