Innovation in Language Learning

In this paper, I will share the results of my experimentations with historical linguistics in two types of university courses: linguistic theory and language practice, namely, History of French and Introductory French. In both curricula, these experiments aimed to improve students’ understanding and retention of French pronunciation, reading rules, vocabulary, and morpho-syntactic phenomena. These innovations work in two directions that move toward each other: the first direction is the intellectualization and elevation of our language-practice courses through the strategic integration of linguistic theory, while the second is the revitalisation of our theoretical linguistics courses through task-based teaching that has a perceptible practical outcome. The shift to an action-based approach (ABA) in the 21st-century didactics of language teaching originally spurred these innovations: while ABA clearly offered students some practical gains, it provided neither a structural linguistic framework nor any terminology for further studies. As a result, the teaching of linguistics courses became more difficult. While thus working to render linguistic theory more accessible to a new generation of students reared on ABA, I noticed that these simplified ways of teaching historic linguistic facts could do a lot of good in a language class as well. In my presentation I will therefore  focus on two positive developments: a) the benefits that simplified historic explanations can provide for a deeper and more solid understanding of language form and structure in language acquisition; and b) the revitalisation and greater use-value of theoretical historical linguistics for overall language proficiency when courses have integrated practical and task-based elements. For both types of courses, I will suggest the effective use of ICT for historic material and will give examples of historic explanations that provide both insight and memorable lessons. I will support my claims with survey data, as well as with contemporary didactic research and directions emerging in historical linguistics and language teaching.