Week 4 - Norton - Social Identity, investment and language learning

In the article, Social Identity, investment, learning, and language learning by Bonny Norton Pierce, Pierce talked about second language acquisition and how people are affected differently by it. In the beginning of the article, she talks about a dialogue that happened between Eva, an immigrant language learner, and Gail, an Anglophone Canadian that both worked in the same place. Throughout the whole article, Pierce talks about different viewpoints regarding SLA and its social context, while making reference back to the Eva and Gail’s dialogue in the beginning of the article. What I got from the article is that those trying to learn a new language, for whatever reason, have a certain motivation to do it and furthermore learn it and feel more associated with it depending on how they learned it. Some of the researchers that Pierce mentioned throughout the article had different viewpoints compared to others surrounding this topic. For example, Krashen hypothesizes that “comprehensible input in the presence of a low affective filter is the major casual variable in SLA.” Furthermore, “In Krashen's view, this affective filter comprises the learner's motivation, self-confidence, and anxiety state-all of which are variables that pertain to the individual rather than the social context” (Norton 10). On the other hand, Schumann talks about social distance. He says that if the, social distance between them is considered to be minimal it facilitates, “the acculturation of the second language group into the target language group and enhances language learning” (Norton 11). Whereas if there were great social distance between two groups, little acculturation is considered to take place, “and the theory predicts that members of the second language group will not become proficient speakers of the target language” (Norton 11). A few other researchers were also mentioned, however Pierce still searches for theory that is comprehensive to all theorists; one that not only includes social identity but also the language learner, the language context and relation of power in the social world. I believe that when learning a second language, one must practice it a lot to be able to fully understand it and to be able to use it. In that sense, I agree with Spolsky. It is important to be around the target language and to practice it in all sorts of contexts in order to gain second language learning and to become proficient in that language. A time investment in the target language is also an investment in a learner's own social identity.

As a future teacher, I plan to be open minded when it comes to getting to know my students. I will remember that just because they come from a certain culture does not mean I should have a pre conceived notion of who they are, what they act like, what they do, what they like and don’t like, etc. I will try to get to know my students based on their individual likes and dislikes. Basing your ideas of what your students are like off of stereotypical assumptions is wrong and will lead to difficulty in understanding your students. To get to know more about them, I will start off by making my classroom welcoming. Making my students feel comfortable in a fun, educational and welcoming environment will be the first step in getting to know them on a more personal level. By doing this, I hope that my students will feel a sense of comfort when talking about themselves and just being in the classroom in general. Like the article mentioned, I too believe that it is important to practice the target language and be around it as much as possible in order for second language acquisition to occur. However, I also believe that for a person to learn in their L2 they must have a clear knowledge of their L1 s that it is easier for them to understand and comprehend meanings in their new language. I plan on being a bilingual teacher and from previous classes I learned that when trying to teach to students that do not know a lot of English, it is important to start off teaching them in their L1. Once both their Basic interpersonal cognitive skills (BICS) and their cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP) skills are up to par in their L1, then it is ok to introduce them to their L2 because they will already have this knowledge in their first language. Once I start teaching them their second language, I know that it is important invest time for them to use the L2 a lot more so that it sticks with them and so that they can eventually be proficient in their L2.

On another note, I know that when my parents came to live in the United Sates they learned English as quickly as they could. I believe that they had both an instrumental motivation and an integrative motivation. With much practice, they were able to successfully learn and be successful in their targeted language.