Nina Voytkevich

Bukovinian State Medical University

Department of Foreign Languages

Chernivtsi, Ukraine

CONTENT AND LANGUAGE INTEGRATED LEARNING IN TEACHING ENGLISH FOR SPECIAL PURPOSE AT HIGHER MEDICAL EDUCATIONAL ESTABLISHMENT

Theoretical and practical approaches to teaching and learning English have been changed greatly for the last twenty years in independent Ukraine. Numerous methods have been tried, books, manuals and dictionaries compiled to meet the needs of both instructors and learners. First, special attention was paid to English for the sake of English as a language of communication during various tours to European countries and American continent. Later, learning English became intended for a particular field of human activities and professions together with the first steps of the new independent state on its way to common European framework.

This is an attempt to sum up our almost 20-year experience of teaching English for University medical students. When a language is taught to students of non-linguistic specialties – so-called Language for Special Purpose (LSP) – this phenomenon should be always taken into account by the authors of language courses covering a range of various occupations. As a rule, LSP manuals or textbooks focus their attention on specific professional vocabulary, comprise training texts on a particular profession, explain grammar and stylistic models peculiar for certain professional speech variety, and include translation exercises of specific professional orientation.

In the XX century numerous methods of teaching and learning languages have been widely used. The use of unconscious reserve abilities to overcome “language barrier”, fear and reticence was suggested by the representatives of Suggestology and Suggestopedy [4]. Psychotherapist by profession, Lozanov G. believed that creation of favourable conditions in the form of a game or even drama would help the learners to master the language by means of mobilization of reserved possibilities promoting better understanding, memorizing and communicating. In Audio-Lingual Method primary and the most important role was given to grammar models, while vocabulary plays an accessory function [2]. Learners should be able to use ready-made structures filling them with corresponding vocabulary and pronounce or imitate them fluently. Mechanical training and exclusion of the element of consciousness were weak spots of audio-lingual method. Since 60-es Communicative Method has been widely used in linguistics [1, 3]. It could hardly be called communicative in most educational establishments both secondary and higher ones. Although some were excellent books, none of them proved to be satisfactory because they simply offered too much material to cover in a one-semester course. They included more than most students in the allied fields needed or could reasonably assimilate in a short period of time. They also presented an exhaustive list of every known word focusing the students to try to memorize and retell what is in essence a dictionary.

To our opinion none of the method followed the main principle of the language relation to the extralinguistic world, which involves three basic sets of elements: language signs, mental concepts and meaning. The language sign is a sequence of sounds in spoken language or symbols (letters) in written language associated with a single concept in the minds of speakers (it is the second signal system determined by I.P.Pavlov). The mental concept of a word and even a phrase usually consists of lexical meaning, connotations, associations and grammatical meaning. Only in this way the general conceptual meaning can be understood. Or, to put it in the frame of teaching medical English and make it fruitful, the following should be achieved: through constant practice, repetition, simplified explanations, medical students can acquire a solid foundation that not only aids retention of the vocabulary learned in the texts, but also facilitates understanding new vocabulary encountered in other course work and work situations, while reading authentic scientific literature, preparing reports for international conferences and participating in them, working in Internet, etc. These goals can be accomplished by assuming extensive knowledge of medical subjects (Anatomy, Physiology, etc.) and comprehensive knowledge of professional medical English.

The end of the XX century was marked by the development of methods which include both communicative and academic objectives. The main principles were moving from the general to separate, integration of the language with other branches of science. In modern methodology these are variants with different names: “Whole Language Content Approach”, “Cognitive Approach”, “Content-Based ESL Program”, “Cognitive Academic Learning Approach”. All these methods/approaches are indicative of a growing interest to learning foreign languages and regulation of their role in modern world.

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) introduced in 1993 by Michael Lewis and innovated in 2004 by Hugh Dellar and Andrew Walkley is likely to provide immediate feedback and progress. CLIL envisages four aspects in learning – grammar, vocabulary, functions and content – in equally correlated ratio with the emphasis on lexical approach. CLIL appears to be quite efficient while teaching and learning medical English, as to our minds medical students are the busiest ones. During the first two years of preclinical studies they have to cover the bases of such fundamental sciences as Anatomy, Biology, Medical Chemistry, Medical Physics, Histology (Microscopic Anatomy), Topographic (Operative) Anatomy etc. along with two languages – Latin and English (German or French as alternatives).

The main task of the teachers in this situation is to create all possible conditions for their learners not to be lost in the flow of information, but to be focused on getting results. CLIL is directed and concentrated on keeping the knowledge in along-term memory despite the well-known Pareto Principle when only 20% out of the information kept in the brain is actively used, while 80% remains passive or simply lost. For keeping the words in a long-term memory constant recycling is needed. It can be achieved by the following educational scheme. We divided vocabulary work into three stages: Preliminary, Cognitive and Creative. Each of them includes certain activities directed on learning, understanding and using the word. It can be presented in the following model:

Reading and hearing in the Preliminary stage are very much connected as two types of memory are switched – visual and auditory. Reading fragments by the teacher or some of the group-mates are very helpful as well as listening to various recordings. These two steps make pronouncing the words, which have become familiar with their sounds, much easier. Unless the students have heard the words many times, they will have difficulty recognizing them. This means that to learn medical terminology, they must learn to pronounce the words correctly. The terms presented in Medical Terminology are not only general terms used in many medical situations. We have made an attempt to include special vocabulary pertinent to medical specialties taught at the University: General Medicine, Pediatrics, Medical Psychology, Dentistry, Pharmacy and Nursing. The most difficult part of pronunciation is knowing which part of the word to emphasize. Usually these roots, prefixes, etc. are shown in boldface type. This is not meant to show syllables as they are given in a dictionary, but only to give the students a clue as to how to pronounce the word. For instance, the words ‘hyperthyroidism’, ‘hypothyroidism’ look difficult, but if you separate the word parts – hyper/thyro/idism, hypo/thyro/idism – and if you know which letters are to be emphasized, they become less formidable. Dictating words for spelling practice (student→student; teacher→student) is a good way to become familiar both with pronouncing and writing terms.

In Cognitive stage of learning the words are translated into the native language only after explanation or definition in English. It makes students think and develop their speech, as they are supposed to learn definitions. When learning vocabulary special attention is paid to how words are used (grammar) and when they are used (context). Students learn to change the form of words and use them in various situations. For instance, the word ‘delivery’: Please pay for goods on delivery (=when you receive them); She had difficult delivery (=the process of giving birth to a baby); the word ‘pupil’: She now teaches only junior pupils (=schoolchildren); The patient’s pupils were dilated (=a small round black area in the centre of the eye). To be able to use vocabulary at a later date, students practice making sentences of their own. For example, the nouns of Latin and Greek origin need special attention as they preserve their plural forms from the languages they are originated from. Their use in modern English may be a little bit confusing: a vertebra-vertebrae, a datum-data, a phenomenon-phenomena, a bronchus-bronchi, a crisis-crises, a species-species, a genus-genera, etc.

During Creative stage the students are supposed to associate the term(s) with other words and combinations, to find idioms if possible. Example: the word ‘tooth/teeth’ – milk tooth, wisdom tooth, false tooth etc.; cut your teeth on sth.; to get your teeth into sth.; in the teeth of sth.; set sb’s teeth on edge etc. While learning any new topic students may be given the task to group the words into groups (eg., synonyms/antonyms); the best students are suggested to investigate the origin of the words/terms, their structure or etiology.

Now, in the first years of the new millennium, Content and Language Integrated Learning breaks previous grounds of teaching, sharpening further learner-centred focus of mastering foreign language. We have learnt a great deal from our experience how teachers and students use CLIL and benefited much from it being able to find the information they need quickly and up to the place, understand it once they have found it, and make use of it in their own speaking and writing.

References:

1. Brumfit Ch. J. Communicative Methodology in Language Teaching. – Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. – 166 p.

2. Lado R. Linguistics across Cultures: Applied Linguistics for Language Teachers. – Michigan, 1990. – 141 p.

3. Littlewood W. Communicative Language Teaching. – Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. – 296 p.

4. Lozanov G. Suggestology and Suggestopedy. Theory and Practice. – Sofia, 1978. – 65 p.