Page 170 - Beyond Methods

158 Fostering language awareness The American Movement
As the LA movement was spreading in Britain, a similar effort was undertaken in the United States under the label Whole Language movement. It was aimed at providing rich language experience for school-children by integrating the four language skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing, and by introducing language re- lated activities in content areas across the school curriculum. Sup- porters of the movement argued that various components of lan- guage such as sounds, words, phrases, and sentences should be taught holistically using authentic materials and meaningful activ- ities that resonate with learners and their daily life.
In addition, the Whole Language movement wanted to recognize the diverse linguistic resources that learners bring to the class— resources that include dialectal variations in L1 as well as L2. As Ken Goodman (1986, p. 27), one of the leading supporters of the Whole Language movement, observed: “Whole language is whole. It does not exclude some languages, some dialects, or some registers because their speakers lack status in a particular society. Every lan- guage form constitutes a precious linguistic resource for its users. This does not mean that whole language teachers are not aware of the social values assigned to different language varieties and how these affect people who use them. But they can put these social val- ues in proper perspective.”
Reflective task 7.2
If the educational institution you are associated with has an official policy of promoting a “standard” variety as opposed to a “nonstandard” variety of a language, what are the ways in which you can be sensitive to those students who may speak a “nonstandard” variety at home? How can you make use of the linguistic resources such learners bring to your class?
A common theme stressed by both American and British educa- tors relates to the integration of language experience across the curriculum at elementary as well as secondary school levels. Since elementary school teachers deal with all the subjects taught at their level, they already are considered to conceive of their task in terms of integrated rather than subject-oriented teaching. That is not the