1. LANGUAGE AS COMMUNICATION: ORAL AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE.

FACTORS DEFINING A COMMUNICATIVE SITUATINO: ENCODER,

DECODER, FUNCTIONALITY AND CONTEXT

1. INTRODUCTION

Teaching a foreign language aims to provide the sts with c.c. in that language, which
goes beyond the mere teaching of the rules of language, as the use of English must be
contemplated as well. In this line, recent tendencies in FLT focus their attention on a crucial
aspect: language as a means to transmit certain meaning to others, rather than a theoretical
acquisition of linguistic and grammatical rules and items. FLT then, must be contemplated with
reality: with the reality as it takes place outside the classroom, and with the reality of the
learners outside and inside the classroom.

A linguistic theme could be worked perfectly in P.E. since we are providing sts with
activities which try to improve their linguistic production. The possibility of communicating
properly in order to understand and be understood is the most important aim of the Key
competences proposed by the CEFRL. Thus, the Linguistic Competence reinforces this, and will
be always present in the learning of the language. Besides, the Learning to Learn competence is
also decisive since it deals with having the right strategies to approach the language production
in the four skills. All these elements of the Curriculum are clearly shown in the current
Educational law, LOMLOE, and mainly in the Canarian Decree 89 /2014, August 1 st, which
makes specific reference to the English subject.

As linguistics makes reference to the acquisition of the language, any activity related
with both oral and written registers of English will be appropriate to work on: reading
comprehension activities are a must to apply reading and writing skills, listening comprehension
is also decisive to put sts in contact with real accents and oral registers, a speaking corner is also
one of the most representative activities which can be carried out through a brainstorming or
any other which tries to encourage sts to speak in English. Finally, a mistake correction activity
will always try sts to improve their oral and written productions, and the composition technique
has the aim to facilitate proper strategies to provide better sentences, paragraphs, or essays.

Along this theme, we shall start by focusing on the language as communication: we, as
human beings, need to communicate, and we live in a society in which we normally apply oral
and written language to transmit or receive information.

Finally, we shall concentrate on the factors that intervene in a communicative situation,

such as who is sending the message, who is receiving it, the role of context or the function of
language, that is to say, the sender’s aim when a message is emitted. We will also see how
language is used depending on some sociological variables; for example, how we adapt
language depending on the situation, on our interlocutors or on our communicative aims.
2. LANGUAGE AS COMMUNICATION MEANS: ORAL VERSUS WRITTEN
LANGUAGE

The current legal framework is concerned with the teaching of a FL as a tool to

communicate, socialize, solve problems, etc. This perspective is directly related to the
guidelines defined in the CEFRL, which intends to establish a common basis for the design and
development of content blocks and methodological guidelines for an adequate treatment of FLT.
In this light, as RD 126/2014 28th February establishing the Basic CV for PE states, the
progressive globalisation of the world entails the need to provide with useful instruments to
develop the necessary competences to get by in this global and technological society.

In addition, our regional cv, D89/2014, 1st August establishes the general aspects to be
taken into consideration as for the FL teaching process, as well as the specific methodological
orientations. In this light we may define the main goal of FL teaching in the following terms: to
get the sts reach progressively a satisfactory level of c.c.

Let us analyse some essential factors in both oral and written language: the two means
used by natural languages as vehicles of communication cover the whole range of human
communication, if we leave apart systems so specialised and restricted such as the sign language
of the deaf and dumb or the heliograph.

Nowadays, most writing systems use characters which somehow directly represent the
phonetic composition of the spoken forms, making possible a writing code with only a few
characters, more or less with the same number of phonemes as the spoken language. These
systems are called alphabet. In the alphabets, the consonants and vowels are separately indicated
with individual letters.

Some linguistics have identified language solely with speech its oral form, but most
authors treat language as including both an oral and a written form. Language has an important
characteristic: it can be expressed and transmitted by different means, oral or written, and we
can always transfer it from one to another. Anyway, it is generally accepted that oral language is
more basic than written. Nevertheless, we use oral language for a much wider range of tasks,
and except in a few cases(literature, legal convenience,…) the written language is usually made
use of in substitution for the oral form, due to different reasons, such as the receiver is not
physically present.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN ORAL AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE

From the point of view of either productive or receptive skills, it is obvious that spoken
and written language make different demands on the interlocutors. This aspect and the
characteristics themselves that differ from one to another form of language, constitute the topic
of this point.

The first obvious contrast depends on their physical form: speech uses phonic substance
whilst writing’s support is graphic. The support determines the durability of the messages,
ephemeral in the case of speech, and quasi-permanent for written texts.

A second way to study oral and written language is regarding the communicative
situation in bot cases: in written interaction, the interlocutors are not simultaneously present, so
they miss an important part of the context. On the other hand, the importance of context to
determine meaning in oral intercourse is crucial: its provide much information.

We can notice some structural differences, in most cases as a consequence of the above-
mentioned characteristics. These traits give writing its quality of having a more formal style,
that we can define according to: its high density of information, filler (mmm, you know), are
rarer, the passive voice is common, subordination occurs more often, it has more connectors
(however, besides,…), in general, vocabulary is richer,…

Finally, we can mention a most important difference between oral and written language:
it deals with the functions they cover, an aspect already mentioned.

3. FACTORS DEFINING A COMMUNICATIVE SITUATION: ENCODER,

DECODER, FUNCTIONALITY AND CONTEXT
There are plenty of factors defining a communicative situation. On the one hand, oral
communication involves more complexity and difficulties than written communication because
of certain constraints, including the following: time pressure (limited time to understand: buying
a ticket) and utterances are not often well structured or linked. Yet, are also certain helpers
which facilitate this type of exchange of information: paralinguistic codes (non-verbal elements:
in topic 2 we will explain it) and prosodic features (stress, rhythm and intonation).
On the other hand, regarding written communication, it can be understood as a two-way
verbal process between an encoder and a decoder using both productive (writing) and receptive
(reading) skills. An encoder sends the message in a given code (English in this case) in a
specific context, through a channel (written) to a given decoder (reader).

However, certain complexity may be realized when dealing with written

communication. These can be classified under three categories: psychological, cognitive and
linguistics. Psychological because of the fact that it is usually an activity which involves
‘solitude’; cognitive because it demands a somewhat different organisation of ideas since the
encoder is not present and hardly anything can be taken for granted; and regarding linguistic
aspects, in oral communication, by using different prosodic features, meaning will vary,
whereas this does not apply in written communication.
ELEMENTS OF COMMUNICATION, FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE AND THE
CONTEXT
As we know, communication is a two-side phenomenon which involves both an
exchange of meaning on the part of the participants, and also a means of social interaction.
When we face a communicative act, therefore, it is important to bear in mind the fact that
communication is carried out when a given soured (encoder or sender) sends a message to the
destination (decoder or receiver) through a commonly known code and in certain context and
channel.
In the case of verbal communication, the code is the language being used, the message
is the meaning being transmitted from an encoder to one or more decoders, the situation of the
communicative act will be the context of communication (the classroom, a shop,…) and finally
the channel may be either written or oral.
In relation to the functions of language, Jakobs refers to the expressive function when
the focus is on the speaker; conative f. when attention is paid to the decoder; phatic f. is
observed when the purpose has to do with establishing, interrupting or extend communication,
metalinguistic f. when attention is paid to the code; poetic f., focused on the message; and
finally the referential function, the one the message is oriented to.
The prominent role of the context is acknowledged in the D89/2014, August 1 st,
concerning methodological orientations. In this sense, contextualizing learning is seen as an
attempt to recreate real-life situations which facilitate the learner’s comprehension of the
learner. This contextualization of learning implies that the teacher should assume the role of
‘creator of scenarios’. In this light, one of the most remarkable approaches is PBL.
Likewise, we must bear in mind the new digital contexts our learners are so familiar
with and also so fond of. After all, the technological revolution has already created ‘digital
natives’, and also a vast amount of possibilities for the contextualization of learning in engaging
and appealing possibilities.
To a greater extent, an essential element of communication in the FL classroom is that
of feedback, as it provides our sts with knowledge about how successful their performance has
been.
4. CONCLUSION

The role of the teacher, apart from the one mentioned above, will be that of a mediator
and will try to make sts aware of the importance of communicating in tother language to
confront the reality out of the class an also will make them recognise the different approaches
there are to learn a language and which methods will be closer to the sts.

Throughout this presentation, we have dealt with communication. The learners need to
acquire not only a repertoire of linguistic items, but also a repertoire of strategies for using them
in concrete situations and thus develop their c.c. By encouraging the sts to make real and
purposeful use of the FL, we shall be leading them to take risks and speak naturally.

After all, by getting sts to discover the FL, we shall be contributing to the development
of our learner’s c.c., which is the main aim of FLT in PE, as it is stated in D89/2014.

In a nutshell, we as teachers need to invest time and energy in entertaining the sts by
making use of multimedia sources to promote the oral and written language.