[Corpora-List] Data-Driven Learning materials

Thu Apr 24 11:13:42 UTC 2008

Dear Simon

My summary only looked at the materials & resources suggested, so thanks 
for doing half the work for me!

I think these are all true - or rather, they all contain part of the 
truth. These & many other objections have been voiced in various papers 
that it's sometimes a wonder we carry on at all! But as most research 
focuses on hands-on work, most of the objections relate to that; what 
happens if you try to take the machine out the equation, at least in 
early stages?

I must admit I'm intrigued by the possibility (partly for local reasons, 
ie the difficulty of gaining even occasional access to computer labs for 
groups of 20 students - especially when the computer department has 
rigged them so you can't download anything, or even in some cases access 
the internet at all!). But the problem then is the one you raise: how 
interesting or relevant is it without that hands-on element? How can 
published DDL materials avoid being "dry"? If anyone has an answer to 
that, I'm sure there's a fortune to be made!

Cheers
alex

simon smith a écrit :
> Dear List Members,
> Thanks Alex for summarizing the responses to your post.
>
> I was really impressed by Alex's paper at PALC last year, describing 
> how he got a group of relatively unmotivated students to conduct an 
> analysis of English phrasal verbs using corpus tools. That hasn't 
> really been my experience, though.
>
> I've been re-reading the responses to the extremely interesting 
> question of why there are fewer DDL resources available than one might 
> expect.
>
>    *
>       *Ramesh, Gill and Martin*: individual teachers do use DDL in
>       class to meet specific needs, but don't publish their work or
>       record it in any permanent form. It's not easy to get resources
>       into web-ready format.
>    *
>       *Jakub*: People might not want to publish resources that they
>       see as imperfect in some way.
>    *
>       *Chris T*: DDL is inaccessible to many teachers for lack of
>       know-how or resources.
>    *
>       *Adam*: DDL is inaccessible to many learners, as it presupposes
>       an introspective, reflective approach to study, using difficult
>       technology, by learners who may not be highly motivated. (Adam
>       didn't say all that, but I know he was thinking it)
>    *
>       *Fanny and Chris R*: Even if learners are not directly using
>       corpora, they may be using materials and resources derived from
>       corpora. That counts as DDL too.
>
> Well, there's a category of language learners who will do very well 
> exploring corpora using concordancers and other query tools. They're 
> inquisitive, meticulous, and (normally, I think) highly motivated, and 
> probably love learning about words in their native language too. They 
> probably read "word of the day" columns, and would probably not do too 
> badly learning a language under the Grammar Translation model.
>
> But language learning – especially English learning – is something 
> that everyone pursues these days: not just wordsmiths and book lovers. 
> Some learners have little time, some have little motivation, many 
> would not relish the prospect of an hour a day in front of a 
> concordance. Take my students in a university in Taiwan. I have tried 
> putting concordances up on the screen, sure. But that's teacher talk, 
> right, and I want them to work together on tasks and do interactive 
> things in class time. I have tried setting collocation finding tasks 
> for homework, but homework doesn't really work, because they have 
> video games to play and need their sleep, and anyway they'd just copy 
> each other. I suppose I could hand out paper concordances, and make 
> them look at them in groups, but how dry would that be!
>
> I see a great future for data-driven approaches in generating better 
> dictionary examples, in making wordlists and fill-in-the-blank 
> exercises and other items for test or classroom use. It is wonderful 
> that there are books and offline resources which were produced with 
> the aid of corpora. There are great opportunities to make corpus based 
> activities, maybe with Hot Potatoes graphics or computer animations, 
> for use by those who are dedicated enough to work alone at a computer, 
> or lucky enough to have this provision in class.
>
> But for the ordinary teacher at the chalk face, and ordinary students 
> with teenage acne – it seems hard to find a real role for DDL just yet.
> Simon
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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>   

-- 

*                                                                  Alex 
Boulton*

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Université

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