Recent developments and means to promote competence and flexibility in preservice training of foreign language teachers are examined. Five issues the profession faces in preparing qualified candidates are: redefining the role of foreign language teachers in general and of the generalist and specialist in particular; selecting the candidates;…

A report is presented of a survey conducted in the fall of 1977 among 185 representative foreign language supervisors, teachers on all levels, and teacher trainers. The purpose of the survey was to determine what projects and research in the area of curriculum, instruction, and classroom management were most needed and should therefore be…

The greatest single opportunity for influencing public opinion concerning foreign language study is through the teacher-student encounter. There is some indication that student motivation for foreign language study may be related to general cultural interests and travel facility rather than to research or career requirements. Flexibility in pace…

These 16 papers in French and English deal with questions related to the purpose of learning a language, one's native language as well as a second one. Specifically, the presentations deal with the following topics: (1) consideration of learners' needs; (2) the usefulness of learning English in Quebec; (3) the tension between knowledge and…

This study investigates the role of inferencing in cloze test performance and the factors that facilitate that inferencing. Four groups of high school students learning French as a second language completed sets of cloze passages under four treatment conditions. Three conditions provided a potential cue to inferencing, while the fourth was a…

A general model for second language learning is proposed in this paper. First, this model aims to describe different components (input, intake, integration, output) of the learning process in terms of the information (explicit/implicit, linguistic/sociolinguistic) to which the learner is exposed. Secondly, the model serves to identify the stages,…

Most instructional materials developed in the past 10-15 years do not provide for sufficient activities to allow the student to become involved in anything other than drill and memorization. Furthermore, in those situations where "communication activities" do occur, they are designed to teach the sentence as a structural, grammatical…

This second newsletter publication of the Bureau of Indian Affairs follows the format of the first issue. (See related document AL 001 671.) The first article, "Language Drill and Young Children," is by Muriel Saville of Texas A & M University. The author's experience has convinced her that in a classroom situation, a language is not…

Second language study in the Soviet Union's General Education School (compulsory public education) is described in detail with briefer explanations of teacher training institutes and inservice teacher education. Both positive and negative aspects of Russia's language programs are presented, with primacy given to teaching methods, objectives,…

This review of research in foreign language instruction summarizes and interprets selected studies produced during the period 1963-66. Topics covered include the psychology of learning, comparisons o f methods, language skills, visual-auditory relationships, vocabulary, grammar, and FLES, as well as programed instruction, technological media,…

This paper demonstrates how a diagram of a Safeway supermarket can be the vehicle for a language lesson based on Lawrence's cognitive categories (classification, definition, spatial order, chronological order, generalizations and specifics, and cause and effect). A wide variety of decision-making activities based on this diagram are described.…

An experimental approach to reading a foreign language is described, in which the assigned text was taped by the instructor. These tapes were then supplemented by worksheets which included content questions on the author and vocabulary and grammar exercises based on the text. The tapes were made available to the students in the language…

Suggestopaedia seems to be the only pedagogical approach using music as an integral part or essential component of the teaching process, in spite of the fact that the contribution of music to pedagogy and successful learning has been recognized for some time. In a suggestopaedic course, music plays a large part in creating a pleasant suggestive…

In second language learning, it is often the case that a discrepancy exists between the language of the pedagogical materials and that of the media or of the native speaker. This article discusses the advantages and problems involved in using authentic, non-didactic materials in post-introductory second language instruction, as found in an…

Games, simulations and related techniques as an extension of the language teacher's repertory are receiving renewed attention. The value of goal-directed pair or group activities in teaching for communicative competence is obvious. Less value is attached to the sort of "language games" which consist of juggling verbal formulae of little or no…