Question

Which language teaching method famously utilizes unique materials such as color-coded sound-syllable charts and Cuisenaire rods to facilitate student discovery of language structures?

• A. Community Language Learning
• B. Suggestopedia
• C. The Silent Way
• D. Natural Approach

Answer 1

Answer:

C. The Silent Way

The Silent Way: A Language Teaching Methodology

• The Silent Way is an innovative language teaching method developed by Caleb Gattegno in the 1970s. It is fundamentally based on the premise that teaching should be subordinate to learning, meaning the teacher's role is to facilitate the student's own discovery and learning process rather than to explicitly spoon-feed information.

• Core Principles:

  • Teacher Silence: The most distinctive feature is the minimal use of teacher talk. The teacher is largely silent, encouraging students to produce language and self-correct their errors. This promotes student autonomy and active participation.
  • Student Discovery: Learning is viewed as a process of exploration and discovery. Students are encouraged to use their cognitive powers to figure out the rules and structures of the target language.
  • Self-Correction: Errors are seen as natural and essential parts of the learning process. Students are guided to discover and correct their own mistakes, fostering a deeper understanding and retention.
  • Awareness: The method aims to develop students' inner criteria for correctness, helping them become aware of how the language works.

• Unique Materials and Tools:

  • Color-coded Sound-Syllable Charts (Fidel Charts): These charts display the sounds of the target language using specific colors for each sound. The colors are consistent across different languages, allowing students to visually associate sounds with their corresponding written forms. This is particularly useful for pronunciation and phonetics.
  • Cuisenaire Rods: These are wooden rods of varying lengths and colors. In the Silent Way, they are used to represent grammatical structures, prepositions, time sequences, and other abstract language concepts visually and manipulatively. For instance, different rod lengths can represent different word lengths, or arrangements of rods can illustrate sentence structures.
  • Wall Charts: Besides Fidel Charts, there are word charts and other visual aids that present vocabulary and grammar in a structured way.

• Teacher's Role:

  • The teacher acts as a facilitator, observer, and problem-solver. They provide minimal prompts, use gestures, and employ the specialized materials to guide students. Feedback is often non-verbal, using gestures or silence to indicate an error, prompting the student to self-correct.

• Student's Role:

  • Students are active participants, problem-solvers, and collaborators. They are responsible for their own learning, engaging in trial-and-error, and working to formulate hypotheses about the language.

• Key Competitive Exam Points:

  • Founder: Caleb Gattegno.
  • Key characteristic: Minimal teacher talk ('teacher silence') and student discovery.
  • Distinctive tools: Fidel Charts (color-coded sound-syllables) and Cuisenaire rods.
  • Learning approach: Primarily inductive learning and problem-solving.
  • It is often contrasted with more teacher-centered or rote-learning methods like Audiolingualism.