Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-8bhkd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T20:52:40.676Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Is this enough? A qualitative evaluation of the effectiveness of a teacher-training course on the use of corpora in language education

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2014

Agnieszka Leńko-Szymańska
Agnieszka Leńko-Szymańska*
Affiliation:
University of Warsaw, Poland (email: [email protected])
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The paper describes a teacher-training course on the use of corpora in language education offered to graduate students at the Institute of Applied Linguistics, University of Warsaw. It also presents the results of two questionnaires distributed to the students prior to and after the second edition of the course. The main aims of the course are: to introduce students to the concept of a corpus and its analysis; to familiarize them with a range of available corpora, corpus-based resources and tools; and to demonstrate to them various applications of corpora in language education, with special emphasis placed on the in-house preparation of courses, teaching materials and class activities. In the first part of the paper, the design, the syllabus, the progression and the outcomes of the course are outlined. In the second part, the responses of thirteen students who participated in the second edition of the course are analysed. The analysis indicates that on the whole the students reacted positively to the course and they saw the benefits of corpus-based materials and tools in language teaching. Yet the students also reported that they needed more time to gain full command of the resources and software presented and more guidance on the pedagogical issues related to corpus use. The paper concludes that fourteen sessions, designed as an overview of the whole range of corpus-based resources and applications, is not sufficient to encourage teacher trainees to use corpora in their future work if they have no contact with these resources and tools in other classes. Only extensive exposure to corpora by future teachers coupled with suitable teacher training in the applications of corpora in language education may bring a substantial change in the scope of corpus use in language classrooms in the wide educational context.

Keywords

teacher trainingcorpus-based materialscorpus-based toolsclassroom concordancing
Type
Research Article
Information
ReCALL , Volume 26 , Issue 2: Researching uses of corpora for language teaching and learning , May 2014 , pp. 260 - 278
Copyright
Copyright © European Association for Computer Assisted Language Learning 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aijmer, K. (ed.) (2009) Corpora and language teaching. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Amador Moreno, C. P., O’Riordan, S. and Chambers, A. (2006) Integrating a corpus of classroom discourse in language teacher education: The case of discourse markers. ReCALL, 18(1): 83–104.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anthony, L. (2006) Concordancing with AntConc: An introduction to tools and techniques in corpus linguistics. Proceedings of the JACET 45 thannual convention, 218–219.Google Scholar
Anthony, L. (2013) Developing AntConc for a new generation of corpus linguists. Proceedings of the Corpus Linguistics conference (CL 2013). Lancaster University, 14–16. http://www.antlab.sci.waseda.ac.jp/research/20130722_26_cl_2013/cl_2013_paper_final.pdfGoogle Scholar
Aston, G. (2004) Corpus upon corpus: A bout of indigestion. 6 thinternational conference on Teaching and Language Corpora: TaLC6. Granada, 6–9 July.Google Scholar
Aston, G., Bernardini, S. and Stewart, D. (eds.) (2004) Corpora and language learners. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Aston, G. and Rodi, D. (2012) Speech corpora for language learning. 10 thInternational conference on Teaching and Language Corpora: TaLC10. Warsaw, 11–14 July.Google Scholar
Barlow, M. and Burdine, S. (2005) American phrasal verbs. Houston, TX: Athelstan.Google Scholar
Bennett, G. (2010) Using corpora in the language learning classroom: Corpus linguistics for teachers. Michigan: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S. and Finegan, E. (1999) Longman grammar of spoken and written English. Harlow: Pearson Education.Google Scholar
Boulton, A. (2009) Testing the limits of data-driven learning: Language proficiency and training. ReCALL, 21(1): 37–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boulton, A. (2010) Data-driven learning: Taking the computer out of the equation. Language Learning, 60(3): 534–572.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boulton, A., Carter-Thomas, S. and Rowley-Jolivet, E. (eds.) (2012) Corpus-informed research and learning in ESP: Issues and applications. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Breyer, Y. (2009) Learning and teaching with corpora: Reflections by student teachers. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 22(2): 153–172.Google Scholar
CALPER. (No date) Corpus tutorial. http://calper.la.psu.edu/corpus_portal/tutorial_main.phpGoogle Scholar
Campoy-Cubillo, M. C., Bellés-Fortuño, B. and Gea-Valor, L. (eds.) (2010) Corpus-based approaches to English language teaching. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
Chambers, A. (2005) Integrating corpus consultation in language studies. Language Learning and Technology, 9(2): 111–125.Google Scholar
Charles, M. (2012) ‘Proper vocabulary and juicy collocations’: EAP students evaluate do-it-yourself corpus-building. English for Specific Purposes, 31(1): 93–102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cresswell, A. (2007) Getting to ‘know’ connectors? Evaluating data-driven learning in a writing skills course. In: Hidalgo, E., Quereda, L. and Santana, J. (eds.), Corpora in the foreign language classroom. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 267–287.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farr, F. (2008) Evaluating the use of corpus-based instruction in a language teacher education context: Perspectives from the users. Language Awareness, 17(1): 25–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flowerdew, L. (2012) Corpora and language education. Houndmills. Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Frankenberg-Garcia, A., Flowerdew, L. and Aston, G. (eds.) (2011) New trends in corpora and language learning. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
Ghadessy, M., Henry, A. and Roseberry, R. L. (2001) Small corpus studies and ELT. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Götz, S. and Mukherjee, J. (2006) Evaluation of data-driven learning in university teaching: A project report. In: Braun, S., Kohn, K. and Mukherjee, J. (eds.), Corpus technology and language pedagogy: New resources, new tools, new methods. Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 49–67.Google Scholar
Hidalgo, E., Quereda, L. and Santana, J. (eds.) (2007) Corpora in the foreign language classroom. Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi.Google Scholar
Hüttner, J., Smit, U. and Mehlmauer-Larcher, B. (2009) ESP teacher education at the interface of theory and practice: Introducing a model of mediated corpus-based genre analysis. System, 37: 99–109.Google Scholar
Johns, T. (1991) Should you be persuaded: Two examples of data-driven learning. In: Johns, T. and King, P. (eds.), Classroom concordancing. English Language Research Journal, 4: 1–16.Google Scholar
Kohn, K. (2012) Pedagogic corpora for content and language integrated learning: Insights from the BACKBONE project. Eurocall Review, 20(2): n.p. http://www.eurocall-languages.org/review/20_2/index.htmlCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kübler, N. (ed.) (2011) Corpora, language, teaching, and resources: From theory to practice. Bern: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Lee, D. and Swales, J. (2006) A corpus-based EAP course for NNS doctoral students: Moving from available specialized corpora to self-compiled corpora. English for Specific Purposes, 25(1): 56–75.Google Scholar
Longman dictionary of contemporary English (New edition) (2003). Harlow: Pearson Education.Google Scholar
Mascull, B. (1995) Collins COBUILD key words in the media. London: HarperCollins.Google Scholar
McCarthy, M. (2008) Accessing and interpreting corpus information in the teacher education context. Language Teaching, 41(4): 563–574.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCarthy, M., McCarten, J. and Sandiford, H. (2005) Touchstone Student’s Book 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mukherjee, J. (2004) Bridging the gap between applied corpus linguistics and the reality of English language teaching in Germany. In: Connor, U. and Upton, T. (eds.), Applied corpus linguistics: A multidimensional perspective. Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi, 239–250.Google Scholar
O’Keefe, A. and Farr, F. (2003) Using language corpora in initial teacher education: Pedagogic issues and practical applications. TESOL Quarterly, 37(3): 389–418.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Keeffe, A., McCarthy, M. and Carter, R. (2007) From corpus to classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Pérez-Paredes, P. and Díez Bedmar, B. (2010) Language corpora and the language classroom. Materiales de formación del profesorado de lengua extranjera Inglés. Consejería de Educación y Cultura. CARM, 1–48. http://www.slideshare.net/perezparedes/language-corpora-and-the-language-classroomGoogle Scholar
Reppen, R. (2010) Using corpora in the language classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Römer, U. (2009) Corpus research and practice: What help do teachers need and what can we offer? In: Aijmer, K. (ed.), Corpora and language teaching. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 83–98.Google Scholar
Römer, U. (2010) Using general and specialized corpora in English language teaching: Past, present and future. In: Campoy-Cubillo, M. C., Bellés-Fortuño, B. and Gea-Valor., L. (eds.), Corpus-based approaches to English language teaching. London: Continuum, 18–35.Google Scholar
Sinclair, J. M. (ed.) (2004) How to use corpora in language teaching. Amsterdam / Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Szakos, J. and Glavitsch, U. (2010) Multiple speakers’ indexing through SpeechIndexer and its application to language teaching. 9 thinternational conference on Teaching and Language Corpora: TaLC2010. Brno, 30 June – 3 July.Google Scholar
Thomas, J. and Boulton, A. (eds.) (2012) Input, process and product: Developments in teaching and language corpora. Brno: Masaryk University Press.Google Scholar
Tian, S. (2005) The impact of learning tasks and learner proficiency on the effectiveness of data-driven learning. Journal of Pan-Pacific Association of Applied Linguistics, 9(2): 263–275.Google Scholar
Tribble, C. (2012) Teaching and language corpora: Quo vadis? 10 thInternational conference on Teaching and Language Corpora: TaLC10. Warsaw, 11–14 July.Google Scholar
Tribble, C. and Jones, G. (1997) Concordances in the classroom. A resource book for teachers. Houston, TX: Athelstan.Google Scholar
Yoon, H. (2008) More than a linguistic reference: The influence of corpus technology on L2 academic writing. Language Learning and Technology, 12(1): 31–48.Google Scholar
Yoon, H. and Hirvela, A. (2004) ESL student attitudes toward corpus use in L2. Journal of Second Language Writing, 13(4): 257–283.CrossRefGoogle Scholar