Focus on and Focus on s.doc

Focus on Form and Focus on Formsthe main difference between traditional language teaching approaches (i.e. grammar translation, audiolinguilism) and modern teaching approaches (i.e. communicative language teaching, task-based language teaching) is that the former attaches much importance to language grammar, the correct form of language, while the latter primarily focuses on meaning, the real communication.questions arise on how to balance grammar teaching and communicative teaching. some people propose that there should be no interruption in communication; grammar can be taught through corrective feedback (doughty and varela, 1998). the others hold that grammar should be taught separately by teachers and integrated by learners through communicative activities (dekeyser, 1998). the two different views are defined by long (1998) as focus on form (fof) and focus on forms (fofs).according to shortall (2007), he studied teaching methodologies in terms of teaching approach and grammar positions. in teaching, the methodologies can be generally divided into two categories: deductive vs. inductive. in a deductive teaching classroom, the teacher presents the rules of grammar and asks learners to practice through practice and drills. inductive teaching approach inspires learners to acquire rules subconsciously by doing a lot of exercises and practice rather than to give learners the explicit rules. according to this theory, traditional approaches can be considered as deductive while communicative approaches inductive.in terms of grammar positions, long (1998) proposed two types of grammar teaching instructions: focus on form (fof) and focus on forms (fofs). fof refers to drawing students attention to linguistic elements (words, collocations, grammatical structures, pragmatic patterns, and so on), in context, as they arise incidentally in lessons whose overriding focus is on meaning, or communication(long 1991: 45-46). fof is an analytic and student-centered approach. in it, pedagogical tasks are employed to promote learners communicative abilities. in completing tasks, learners are exposed to the language items which are designed to be noticeable. long (1998: 23-25) illustrated how fof helps students to learn a foreign language in three steps: first, learners will encounter the new items when doing tasks. second, teachers may interrupt and correct students errors as they occur in the conversations. the last is called recast, or corrective reformulations that preserve students original meaning (long 1998: 23).in fofs approach, the target language is divided into severalmodels, i.e. collocations, morphemes, sentence patterns and present these grammar items one at a time (long: 1998). learners are given these models by the teacher and have to synthesize the pieces for use in communication (long 1998: 16), which is called synthetic approach (wilkin, 1976). fofs includes three parts: synthetic syllabi (lexical, structural, notional-functional, etc), synthetic method (grammar translation, audiolingual method, silent way etc.) and classroom practices and devices (explicit grammar rules, repetition of models, and memorization of short dialogues) (long, 1998: 16).there are some major problems of fofs. first, this approach cannot satisfy students needs for it ignores learners learning objectives, interest and learning styles. second, based on textbooks, whose language is usually artificial and different from authentic language used in real life, fofs will easily lead to incompetence of communication. third, fofs is a very dry approach because students learn the correct use of language items by doing many exercises and it ignores that sla is not a process of accumulating entities.(long 1998, ch2: 16)sheen (2002) proposed that these two approaches have an essential difference. in both first and second language acquisition processes, people are exposed to comprehensible input arising from natural interaction. (sheen 2002: 303) fof derives from assumed degree of similarity between first and second language acquisition (sheen 2002: 303). fofs derives from the idea that the process of language learning is similar to cognitive process, it should characterize as learning of a skill. sheen also proposed three stages of learning based on this approach: first, to present explicit grammatical rules in various ways. second, to ask learners to practice the given rules through both communicative and non-communicative activities. third, to provide opportunities for students to practice communicative usage of these grammar rules.as a typical approach of fofs, grammar translation (gt) puts much emphasis on grammar teaching, which greatly improves reading and writing. however, sentence translation may not be helpful in real world communications because they are usually meaningless. different from gt, task-based language teaching (tblt) primarily focuses on meaning and shifts its focus on grammar items when questions arise in communications.fof and fofs draw a clear difference between focus on grammar and focus on meaning in foreign language teaching. these two terms can guide teachers to formulate many ways of improving their teaching methods.reference：1dekeyser, r.m. beyond focus on form: cognitive perspectives on learning and practicing second language grammar in cm. doughty and j. williams(eds.).focus on form in classroom sla. cup: cambridge university press，1998.2doughty, c. and e. varela. communicative focus on form in cj. doughty and j. williams (eds.). focus on form in classroom sla. cup: cambridge university press，1998.3long, m.focus on form: a design feature in language teaching methodology in kj. de bot, r. ginsberg, and c. kramsch (eds.).foreign language research in cro