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Using Native Speakers as Teaching Assistants
Author(s) -
Giauque Gerald S.
Publication year - 1975
Publication title -
foreign language annals
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.258
H-Index - 49
eISSN - 1944-9720
pISSN - 0015-718X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1944-9720.1975.tb01532.x
Subject(s) - feeling , foreign language , grassroots , goodwill , grammar , psychology , first language , pedagogy , mathematics education , isolation (microbiology) , linguistics , political science , social psychology , philosophy , microbiology and biotechnology , finance , politics , law , economics , biology
This is a report of a college‐level program in which foreign students serve as animateurs with small groups of English‐speaking students on a weekly basis. The underlying philosophy of the program and the role of the foreign language teacher in such a program are explained. The classroom becomes a workshop in which the American students are faced with authentic challenges to communicate in the target language with one of their peers who speaks that language natively. The teacher becomes a learning manager who builds bridges between learner and native speakers and provides explanations of grammar and usage as the American student may require it. In the traditional classroom, on the other hand, the teacher has had to assume a dual role, that of interlocuter and prompter, and students, feeling the lack of authenticity of this situation, are not motivated to use the language. An additional benefit of this program is the involvement and acceptance of the foreign student, which leads to the development of international goodwill at the grassroots level as well as to an appreciation of the culture and people of other countries through direct contact with them.