Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-2pzkn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-07T23:50:59.564Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - Adapting ways for meaningful action: ZPDs and ZPAs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 November 2023

Get access

Summary

… adaptation is inevitable; it ought therefore to receive more attention and more prestige than it usually does. The other theme is that language study is inevitably a total human experience; writers and teachers ought therefore to act as though it is.

(Stevick 1971: vii)

Introduction

This chapter suggests three beneficial shifts concerning change and adaptation in the classroom. The first is to move from seeing learning in terms of the container metaphor, where knowledge is simply transferred by the teacher into a container (the learner's head) as if it were an entity (a thing), to a view of learning as an incremental process over time involving the participants adjusting to each other, the context and their goals. Second, to intensify engagement more with others in order to improve our techniques of observation and interaction. Third, to increase our contact with diversity so as to stimulate innovation and adaptation for a ‘total human experience’. I conclude that harmonizing, that is, being in rapport with others and enjoying a learning flow, is not a thing but an activity which demands continual adjusting to the various changes inside and between participants in a complex world.

Learning greatly depends on the ability of the people in learning encounters to adapt to each other in multiple ways to create meaningful actions that engage and motivate. It follows that this is not just a cognitive adjustment, but inevitably a total human experience. Earl Stevick wrote much about adapting and emphasized it often in his work. One of his early books was called Adapting and Writing Language Lessons (1971), on which I based my MA thesis, ‘Situationally Motivated Teacher Produced Texts’, where I proposed that teachers create their own texts adapted to local contexts and student needs. Later, I turned to more ‘situationally motivated student produced texts’, advocating that students could have a hand in producing many of the materials which would be even more relevant, at their level and intensely student-centred.

Type
Chapter
Information
Meaningful Action
Earl Stevick's Influence on Language Teaching
, pp. 172 - 189
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×