Behaviorism in

Education and
Structuralism in ELT
 Our Team

Wa Ode Zulhidjah Endah Purwanti Tri Maryanti

0203521045 0203521046 0203521044
CONTENTS

1.1 Behaviorism in Education

1.2 Behaviorism and Structuralism

in English Language Teaching

1.3 English Language Teaching Against

Behaviorism and Structuralism
 Behaviorism in Education
01
Important people to Behaviourism: - Edward Thorndike - B.F. Skinner

- Ivan Pavlov - John Watson

Behaviorism is a theory of learning that believes

learning occurs through teachers’ rewards and
punishments that lead to changes in behavior
Ben-Yami, Hanoch (2005).

https://helpfulprofessor.com/behaviorism/
Behaviorist learning theory derived from Skinner’s
(1968) claims that learning was evaluated as
change in a learner’s behavior with emphasis on
modification of the learner behavior.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/using-

Behaviourist learning theory, contended Greeno, Collins, & behavioral-learning-theory-to-create-a-learning-

environment.html

Resnick (1996), forms the basis of the traditional learning

environment geared for the efficient transmission of the
information and basic skills to learners in a neatly organized
manner.
The essence of learning was developed in terms of stimulus-
response association through habit formation, operant
conditioning, and reinforcement with an emphasis on successful
error-free learning in small and prepared steps and stages.
 In the classroom, the behavioural learning theory is key in
understanding how to motivate and help students. Information is
transferred from teachers to learners from a response to the right
stimulus. Students are a passive participant in behavioural
learning-teachers are giving them the information as an element of
stimulus-response. Teachers use behaviourism to show students
how they should react and respond to certain stimuli.

https://www.wgu.edu/blog/what-behavioral-learning-theory2005.html#close
Behaviourism is an area of psychological study
that focuses on observing and analysing how
controlled environmental changes affect
behaviour. The goal of behaviouristic teaching
methods is to manipulate the environment of a
subject — a human or an animal — in an effort
to change the subject’s observable behaviour.
From a behaviourist perspective, learning is
defined entirely by this change in the subject’s
observable behaviour.

https://www.wgu.edu/blog/what-behavioral-learning-theory2005.html#close
 Behaviorism and Structuralism in English
02 Language Teaching
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The research on language teaching and

learning in the 20th century was a history of
succession of trials, errors, correction, and
advancement (Cheng, 2006; Ni, 2009), in
which behaviorist learning theories prevailed
in the field of ELT.
Behaviorist theories of learning claim that
children learn their first language by simple
imitation, listening to, and repeating what
adults say. Children imitate sounds and
patterns they hear and receive positive
reinforcement with awards and approvals
for doing so. They continue to imitate and
drill practice linguistic sounds and grammar
patterns till the habit of correct usage of the
language is formed and further
strengthened.
From the behaviorist perspective, the quantity of language that children
hear and the consistency of reinforcement that they receive are determinant
to the success of language acquisition, simplified to imitation, repetition,
and habit formation.

Within the framework of behaviorist learning, the errors that children make
in acquiring their first language are evidence of the result of imperfect
acquisition; and this acquisition process works for learning a second or
foreign language.
Teaching and learning methods
The British situational language
teaching and American audio-lingual
methods were introduced as they
share similar structuralism views of
the nature of language and
behaviorist views of language study.
British linguists Firth and Halliday
studied the relationship between the
language structure and the context
. problems
and situation in which language is
used.
. role of minimizing possibilities for
English language teaching (ELT),
accordingly, displays pedagogical
features in-class activities such as
oral instructions in the target
language as the medium with
dialogues and drills forming the
basis. A structuralism ELT teacher
gains an “insight into the linguistic
problems involved that cannot
easily be achieved otherwise”
(Lado, 1961, p. 2); he knows real
. that his students might
have regarding their first and
target languages, and entails the
mistakes to provide better
teaching
 English Language Teaching Against

03 Behaviorism and Structuralism

 Behaviorism ELT reached its peak in the 1960 to
the teaching of foreign languages in US and S/FL
in UK. (Richards & Rogers, 2001)
https://static8.depositphotos.com/1000816/926/i/950/
depositphotos_9262433-stock-photo-loving-family-looking-
at-a.jpg
Some American & British language researchers
questioned the soundness of the theoretical
foundation and practically of prior assumptions
about the language structure and meaning.
 According to Dai & Chen (2007);
Richards & Rodgers (2001),
Researchers noticed that the practical
result from behaviorist approach fell
short of the expectation of students
unable to transfer skill through method
to real communication outside the
classroom.
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xhqEWl8bb6c/WHzSSbtB7kI/

https://www.hiig.de/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/revolution-
30590_1280-1200x675.png
In 1957 and 1965, Chomsky agued
that language acquisition should not
be reduced to developing an inventory
of responses to stimuli. The
Chomskian revolution undermines the
behaviorism and structuralism, making
embryo of the innovation and
experimentation on the ELT derivied
from contemporary theories of
language and SLA.
 Hymes’ theory incorporates
communication, culture, and
communicative competence,
featuring what a language learner
should be informed to be
“communicatively competent”.
(Richards & Rodgers, 2001, p.159)

https://scholarsenglish.id/wp-content/uploads/
Haliday (1970) argued that
2020/08/shutterstock_124546999.png linguistics is concerned with the
description of speech act or text.
Journal
 References
Ben-Yami, Hanoch (2005). Behaviorism and psychologism: Why block's argument against
behaviorism is unsound. Philosophical Psychology, 18(2), 179
186. doi:10.1080/09515080500169470 
C. Calfee (Eds.), Handbook of educational psychology (pp. 27–29). New York, NY: Simon &
Schuster MacMillian
Cheng, X. (2006). Foreign language pedagogy in the post-method era. Journal of Tianjin Foreign
Studies University, 13(4), 63–68.
Chomsky, N. (1957). Syntactic structures. The Hague: Mouton.
Chomsky, N. (1965). Aspects of a theory of syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
Dai, J., & Chen, Z. (2007). Contemporary English language teaching: Theory and practice. Hefei:

University of Science and Technology of China Press.

Greeno, J. G., Collins, A. M., & Resnick, L. B. (1996). Cognition and learning. In D. C. Berliner & R..
Halliday, M. A. K. (1970). Language structure and language function. In J. Lyons (Ed.), New
horizons
in linguistics (pp. 140–165). Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Lado, R. (1961). Language testing. London: Longman
Ni, X. (2009). Macro-strategy framework of “post-method” and some inspirations on foreign
language teaching. Jilin Normal University Journal (Humanities & Social Science Edition),
37(2),
94-96
Richards, J., & Rodgers, T. (2001). Approaches and methods in language teaching. Cambridge:
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