Making the Language Laboratory Effective

Author(s): Norma A. Garnett

Source: Hispania, Vol. 50, No. 2 (May, 1967), pp. 319-322
Published by: American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese
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319

SHOP-TALK

(8) Our culture makes a fetish of

"organization."And it cannot be denied
that a course which is well organized is
more likely to be effective than one which
is disorganized. Students tend to be impressed with a course which shows careful
preparationand organization, and feel less
kindly disposed toward a course which
lacks organization. However, it is quite
possible for inadequate materialsto be well
organized by an uninspiring teacher. The
question, then, is not "organization,"in
and of itself, but the organization of what
by whom, to what end and with what
fairly discernible results.
(9) The importance of intellectual and
cultural content in text materials even in
a beginning language course cannot be
overestimated,especially when dealing with
adolescents and young adults. Language
teachersmust rememberthat a student who
is exposed to literary values, philosophical
problems, scientific concepts, historical
traditions, and political revolutions in his

MAKING

THE LANGUAGE

other courses is entitled to some intellectual

stimulation even in an elementary language course, and this can be accomplished
despite the necessity of a lot of time to
be spent on the acquisition of language
skills.

As a postscript, we might add that the

success of our intensive program with the
first edition of Modern Spanish in the
summer of 1965 encouraged us to have
another summerprogramin 1966, this time
with the second edition of Modern Spanish, and organized along lines similar to
those of last summer. One of the two
teaching assistants in 1966 taught in the
1965 program, the other was new to the
programbut had the necessary competence
and training to do an effective job. And
the role of director and teacher in the
program, which I had in 1965, was filled
in 1966 by Prof. Joan Ciruti.

LABORATORY

EFFECTIVE

NORMA A. GARNETT

Warwick Veterans Memorial High School, Warwick, Rhode Island

The expensive language laboratoryequipment, area, material, staff-now very
much in vogue for the teaching of foreign
languages is a constant subject for discussion, disagreement and questioning. Such
a debate is healthy and it shows the excitement and interest among foreign language
teachers today. The now famous Keating
Report came to a negative conclusion as
to the effectiveness of the language laboratory. This was repudiated by the Lorge
Report and various qualified authors speaking in defense of the language laboratory.
In the arguments pro the language laboratory, certain criteria have appeared as constants. These six points are fundamental
in an effective application of the language
laboratoryfor the teaching of foreign languages.
(1) Skill of teacher as critic, model,
guide.

(2) Enthusiasm and energy of teacher;

teacher motivation.
(3) Excellence of program materials,
closely related to classroom materials.
(4) An efficient, valid testing and grading program.
(5) Frequent and regular practice sessions, preferably two twenty-minute
sessions each week.
(6) Efficient and quality machinerythat
is adjustable to needs and aims of
individual school programs.
As a teacher of Spanish in a public
secondary school, I have often been asked
by teachers in other schools, "Do you use
the language laboratory?""What do you
do there?" "Don't you feel you're wasting
valuable time?" "What programs are you
using?" "Do your students pay attention

320

HISPANIA

or 'fool around'?"and so forth. These are

all real, practical questions to which language teachers using laboratories should
have the answers. I would like to share
with you some of my experiences, giving
real, practicalanswers concerning the prolem of making the language laboratory
effective.
With our textbooks we have correlated
tapes for Year I and II (for Spanish III
we have correlated tapes for our readers
only). Each chapter is covered by two
programs, including review work, basic
pattern construction, drill changes, listening-comprehension,and so forth. The student may use his text as a reference in
the language laboratoryif he desires, and
most students prefer to do so. Review
tapes are also included. The programsfor
Spanish II offer a bit more variety but less
oral participation.
We have regularly scheduled periods in
the laboratory.Each class of language study
is scheduled for one 20-25 minute period
each week. This means that we meet seven
times as much per week in the classroom
as in the language laboratory.This, I feel,
is a judicious proportion. If we were to
increase the time in either situation I
would prefer increasing the language laboratory period, not at the expense of the
classroom but as a supplementary period
to be taken from study hall or after-school
time, and with the lab work done on an
individual basis. Since language laboratory
work is mainly reinforcement of class
study, repetition would always be beneficial. The fact that each class attends a
regularly scheduled 1a b o r a t or y period
rather than practice on a hit-or-missschedule is effective in itself, indicating to the
student the value placed on the laboratory
by the faculty.
However one grades laboratory work,
whether by oral or written response, grading also gives status to the laboratoryexperience, indicating to the student that
practical aural-oral work is an important
part in the learning of a foreign language.
In the classroom only one student at a
time may participateorally. In the language
laboratoryeveryone may participate.A comparison of progressis obviously more possi-

ble here for the teacher (by the process of

monitoring) than in the classroom.When
the teacher regularly grades oral production, by any individual means convenient
or agreeable, the student realizes that the
teacher is stressing the value of practical
communication of a foreign language. A
tangible motivating factor in secondary
schools is grades. Students understand the
status of grades;they know that grades are
means to an end. Disappointing as this
might be to us as teachers,we must realize
that few students come to us with an
innate search for knowledge, a natural
motivation. If we can achieve motivation
by using the stimulus of grades, I feel we
are forced to do so. Grading for each period
in the language laboratory has given
"motivation"to my students and I do not
find many of them "fooling around."The
accumulated grades (I grade "very good"
(+), "average"(-), "poor"(0)) for each
quarter is the equivalent to one hour
exam in weight value. For first-year students I do not grade until second quarter.
One important problem in laboratory
work is the boredom owing to a lack of
variety in programs. The correlated textbook-tape programsare essential, but they
can lose their effect if they are the only
program used in the laboratory.The pattern as well as the voices is the same for
the whole year. This could mean that the
students using the same procedure approximately 36 times each year would
listen to and answer the same voices. And
consider the teacher who has this same
number of laboratoryperiods multiplied by
each of her classes! Needless to say, everyone would enjoy a change, some variation,
not to speak of the benefits and positive
effects gained through such a change.
Boredom does not spare the learning procedure in either the language laboratory
or in the classroom!
I have enjoyed experimenting with new
formats, programs, and procedures in the
language laboratory, and I think my students have enjoyed it also. Certainly both
students and teacher have benefited by it.
I deliberately change the programsfor my
classes so that they do not know what we
are doing that period until the class is

SHOP-TALK

started. The majority of the laboratory

periods consist of the correlated text-tapes.
My experimental programs consist of:
(1) Written comprehension questions.
(2) Slides with accompanying tape.
(3) Cultural tapes.
(4) Dictation.
For Spanish I and II classes we have
review tapes correlated to the text after
units 5, 10, 15, and 20. These consist of
short monologues, nine or twelve in each
review, spoken by both male and female
voices. I prepare on mimeographed sheets
questions in Spanish for each monologue
to be answered in writing in English or
Spanish, but not in complete sentences.
I combine review tapes for Units 1-10 and
as well the review tapes for Units 11-20.
Each combination makes for what I call
"ComprehensionReview I" and "Comprehension Review II,' both of which are
represented by three sheets of questions
stapled together. I gave, to cite an experience, "Comprehension Review I" in a
laboratoryperiod to my Spanish II classes
during the second quarter.The text which
they use for the second year is part of a
series, using similar vocabulary, etc., so I
considered that even though these review
monologues were from Book I, they had
validity for Spanish II. I also felt it was
a good "shock treatment" for students in
Spanish II not to know some of the vocabulary of Spanish I (an indirect method for
motivation?)
This "Comprehension Review I" was
given a second time during the same quarter with the better grade of the two for
permanent record.In the third quarterthey
were given "Comprehension Review II"
in the same manner.
Spanish I heard "Comprehension Review I" during third quarter.It was played
twice with the better score permanently
recorded.
For "Comprehension Review I" three
questions were asked for each monologue.
The students had a difficult time understanding the question, finding the answer
and writing it down all within the allotted
time. The monologues are spoken at a
normal rate, but even in the native tongue

321

some difficulty would be encountered. I

adjusted "Comprehension Review II" by
asking only two questions per monologue.
There was more ease in comprehending
this time, and the fear of time, which
hinders comprehension, was eliminated.
The total time involved for each Review
tape was approximately twenty minutes.
The students themselves appearedto enjoy
taking these "Comprehensives"especially
since the majority saw a tremendous improvement in the second experience. This
also gave me some "ammunition" to
to strengthen vocabulary. There was a
direct relationship of comprehension with
vocabulary.
It was my feeling that the visual aspect
of learning was being neglected in the
language laboratory.So I produced, with a
great deal of enjoyment, and with the
assistanceof our Audio-VisualDepartment,
four series of colored slides with the accompanying "cuentitos," on tape. The
story in Spanish is heard twice as the eight
or ten slides are shown twice. The third
time my students see the slides they hear
ten questions of comprehension, each repeated once. They are required to write
down the answer in English or Spanish,
but again not in complete sentences. The
class participated with rapt attention in
this exercise. At this writing I plan to use
one of the four series of slides in each
quarter for Spanish II and for Spanish III.
These stories are geared to the Spanish II
level, and my Spanish III students really
do too well with them.
This same series would be too difficult
for Spanish I until the fourth quarter. I
expect to do another series of slides and
tapes, mainly using a simple question and
answer formatwhich I shall gear to Spanish
I level. As vocabulary and verb conjugations are still on a shaky plane, I must be
careful to produce a successful experience
that would encourage students rather than
have them experience the discouragement
of failure. Success at practical comprehension of a foreign language after only a few
months of study does more for motivation
for some students than do grades.
I would also like to do a more complex
series stressing subjunctives, relatives and

322

HISPANIA

idioms for Spanish III, but time and energy

are the only problems!
Tapes purely for cultural supplement
are suitable programs to use for variation.
Special music for holidays, historical accounts, regional music, the everydaysounds
"al mercado," "a la corrida," "al campo,"
"a la ciudad," interviews of important and
interesting people, selections of literature
and interpretation can all be used. Some
of this material with questions on comprehension can be prepared by the teacher
himself. Possibilities are endless. It is well
worth the money, time and energy involved
to obtain or prepare such material (unfortunately the language laboratoryis still
young and we do suffer from a lack of
appropriateprograms such as these.) Student enthusiasm and interest, perhapseven
motivation, increase as a result. Now the
language laboratory offers the frosting on
the cake, by treating pupils to informative,
descriptive subject matter where the learning process is disguised under the veil of
entertainment.

This practical application

of foreign language learning makes sense

to American students.
For Spanish III I have used dictation
tapes to vary the laboratoryprogram.These
are spoken by native speakers and consist
of typical passages from Spanish authors.
I prefer the nineteenth-century realist
novelists and try to avoid Romanticistsand
critics whose vocabularywould be too difficult and unfamiliar to them. Each dictation, a paragraph in length, is repeated

three times. The first time the speaker

narrates at a normal rate of speech. The
second time he speaks very slowly and in
short phrases. The third time he narrates
almost up to a normal rate giving the student an opportunity to correct his paragraph. Two dictations are given in a single
laboratoryperiod.
In our language laboratory library we
have a variety of pattern drill tapes available. For Spanish III I generally program
a tape to reinforce the classroom subject
matter: radical changing verbs, ordinals,
idioms with tener, hacer, haber, direct
object pronouns and so forth. This effectively reestablishesthe principles used and
explained previously in the classroom,only
this time some other voice is doing the
pattern drill.
Briefly then, I feel that the question
concerning the effectivenessof the language
laboratory is outdated. The real question
now is how to best utilize the potential of
the language laboratoryin the teaching of
a foreign language. By sharing with you
some of my experiences, some of my experiments, and some of my ideas as a teacher
of Spanish on the secondarylevel, perhaps
I will have stimulatedothers to experiment
with new and different language laboratory
programs.I would, in my turn, appreciate
learning how other teachers of foreign
language are attempting to make an effective application of the language laboratory
in their courses of study.

THE "SE ME" CONSTRUCTION: SOME COMMENTS

J. CARY DAVIS

Southern Illinois University

One of the sentences listed by Professor
Schmitz in his excellent article in SHOP
TALK (Hispania, Sept. 19661), as an example of direct object-preceding-indirect
object, is highly questionable: No me le
calientes la oreja a la muchacha. This is
obviously a case of two indirect objects,
one a "dative of interest," the other a
"dative of possession."This example, like

several others, is drawn from Gallego's

Cantaclaro, and certainly does not represent so-called "standard"speech. The other
type-sentences (No te me indisciplines...,
etc.) are authentic examples of te/me,
te/le order of direct plus indirect object.
Ramsey-Spauldinghas this to say about
the matter: "Among the untaught, however, me se and te se are frequently used