This was how I felt when I attended my first ALG Thai class at AUA in Bangkok.

Here was my first experience of a formal language learning environment that was completely non threatening, non manipulative and that used authentic language, the type of language people use in everyday life, not some sanitized version similar to what we find in most ESL teaching texts.

This is not to say that the experience was not confusing.  I found myself in an environment where I was bombarded with so much language that my mind swam in circles trying grasp what was going on. How was I ever going to have a chance at to remember or understand the lessons and the language in them? The narrow boundaries of second language teaching drummed into me on the obligatory 120 hour observed teaching, industry standard teaching course, had been severely stretched.

Immediately after the experience, I rushed to the office of David Long one of the administrators of the AUA Thai program to try and find out what lay behind this before unheard of way of learning language.

Before I mention what I found out about ALG, let me recount my initial learning experiences in the following days.  At first my mind was awash with so much input that it took a while to settle into the rhythm of the lessons. After about the fourth visit I managed to relax into the routine of the class, learned to not worry about not understanding each and every word, and started to listen for the overall meaning of what was going on. I estimated at this stage that I only understood about 2-5% of the content. Gradually the whole learning process became more natural and letting the intellect go I started to use the same skills I use in my mother tongue when I don’t understand something, I started to guess and infer the meaning from the context. As I relaxed into the rhythm of the lessons and put my intellect in park, the enjoyment started to grow.

Any of you involved in teaching second language at intermediate to advanced levels will be well aware that the skills of guessing from context and understanding inference are generally pretty weak, and that these natural innate qualities of first language acquisition have to be consciously developed for second language learners to advance.

Firstly, to satisfy the academics amongst us who would like a formal definition of what ALG is, here it is.

ALG (Automatic Language Growth) is an approach to language acquisition developed to replicate normal, first language development.  Based on Stephen Krashen’s Input Hypothesis, the central conceptual difference in practice between ALG and other natural programmers is in the application of the belief that speaking occurs naturally given enough input.  Therefore, ALG focuses almost entirely on offering understandable experience (happenings being the building blocks of language).  ALG does not focus on speaking, and encourages students NOT to speak, until words occur on their own.

The ALG approach to language learning was developed in Thailand, by an American linguist, Dr. Marvin Brown, a long time resident of Thailand.  It is surprising that a successful approach like ALG has remained virtually unknown for so long. I say it is successful because the program produces speakers with incredibly high degrees of native speaker like fluency and furthermore, ALG has enjoyed a strong following from the paying public for more than 20 years and run at a profit.  It‘s origins may be the reason for it’s obscurity, as all the recognized methodologies and approaches have their origins in England or America.

What is it that makes ALG so radically different from any other language learning approaches?

There are some notable aspects of ALG that contrast dramatically with common methods of language learning and teaching.  These often take time for teaching professionals to come to terms with, because they do not sit well with current teaching practices.  These are as follows:

1. the less a learner tries, the better the level of acquisition
2. no tests
3. no planned memorization
4. no homework
5. no text books are used until the start of the reading and writing program
6. no grammar instruction,
7. no modeling of individual words
8. no practice phase
9. no reading or writing by learners until they can converse freely in the target language

While these differences contrast dramatically to most language learning approaches, they do mean that learners enjoy stress free learning, and beginners can tolerate many more hours of learning than in traditional learning environments.  It is common for complete beginners at the AUA Thai program to sit through 6-8 hours of instruction in one day.

One of the underlying tenets of ALG is that adults can acquire language like a child does.  The main reason adults do not learn like children is that in traditional classroom based learning situations they think, use effort in trying to acquire a language, practice speaking and are further encouraged by teachers to do just this.  The ALG approach attempts to create a situation where adults learn like children, and structures its approach around creating a learning environment that encourages this.  Learners are encouraged not to focus on individual meanings of words, and not to analyze the language, but rather to listen for the overall meaning of what is being said, never thinking about the language, just like children.

The rejection of the ‘critical period hypothesis’ is central to understanding how ALG works.  Proponents of ALG would comment that if you want adults to acquire language like children you have to replicate the way in which children naturally learn.

AUA Thai classes run for 50 minutes on the hour with ten minutes set aside for teacher rotation and a break.  The two Thai teachers work as pair at the front of the class and interact with each other, while at the same time engaging the students.

The students listen and try to comprehend the overall meaning of the conversations, rather than focusing on individual words and their meanings.  The teachers talk on a variety of subjects including, food, news, Thai folk tales, travel, family, and Thai culture etc.

The stories are entertaining and are authentic (they are not scripted or taken from books), and the comprehension is aided by the use of non-verbal props, such as realia, actions, drawings, etc.  As learners’ progress to higher levels and their understanding improves the use of props, actions and drawings, etc. is reduced to accommodate the higher levels of understanding.

Ideally, the learners are so absorbed by the stories being presented to them that they are oblivious to the language being used i.e. they do not think about the language.

When discussing ALG with teachers and academics, one of the aspects of ALG that causes them the most concern is that it is effortless, and requires no conscious study to master language.  Consciously studying using the ALG approach actually limits your final level of fluency, which can reach 90 % plus native speaker like fluency.

I find this quite perplexing. Why shouldn’t learning language be effortless and passive, why not leave the struggle and suffering aside and enjoy language?  That to me is real learner centered education. So often I hear this phrase learner centered education applied to learning environments controlled and manipulated at every stage by teachers still rigidly in control of the whole process.

Ah! I hear you say, where’s the research to back up these preposterous claims?

Well there is is none. This is another reaction I find quite predictable and understandable. There is need for research and this is where the academic community can help, rather than using the lack of research to reject the approach outright.   I also notice that there is not exactly a wealth of research on acquisition backing up the way we currently teach language either, but I do not see people screaming out for it before they enter the classroom.

A Closed Feedback Loop for Language

In Control Theory with regard to langauge, there are three basic parts to the negative feedback loop. The brain, the mouth, and the ears. We all understand that these three are related. It’s also important to understand how they relate as well. The diagram to the right shows the basic parts. If things were as simple as this, language couldn’t work very well. There are some parts we need to understand better.  They are aspects of brain function but we should understand them separately.  There is the Reference, and a Comparator.  The Reference, or what we call a MIF, (mental image flash), is vital if our language is going to work at all. This reference is the equivalent of the thermostat setting on an air-conditioning unit.  Without a reference that is constant, there is no way for the system to work properly.  The ambient temperature is compared (see the small blue square) to the reference setting and the difference tells the Controller what to do.

So how does this relate to language acquisition?  Traditional language teaching has focused on the System Output, or Speech primarily.  The reason that it is ineffective is due to the fact that it’s all working on output  which has not effect on input unless there is no MIF to begin with.  Without changing the input, the output will never change significantly. But the output originates from the MIF – Just as it’s impossible to walk like a bonzo, so you cannot say a word you don’t have a MIF for.

Let’s apply this to a couple of issues that we see in language education currently.

People often say that their students are shy, and don’t want to speak. But when left on their own with  friends, they’ll talk non-stop, just not in the language the teacher is trying to help them use.  What’s happening?  They act shy because they have no clear MIF from which to say anything.  Once those MIFs exist, they demonstrate the same willingness to speak as in their native language.

Practicing pronunciation and drills are a common technique used by teachers. In an effort to help their students say if correctly, the teacher may lead their student to practice saying it correctly 10 times.  Most people can do this, however after a few days, the students resort back to the same pronunciation they had before.  What the teacher needs to realize is that MIFs cannot be altered by speaking.  Speaking offers output for the ears to hear, and then compared with the MIF, corrections will be make on the other side – not the speaking side.  The problem must be solved before the MIF is created.  Once a faulty MIF is in place, it may not be possible to correct it.

When people begin to acquire a new language, they often listen to us explain our program and then imagine that when they begin speaking they will speak perfectly. This is not the case. There are aspects of language that can only develop after speech begin. Language operates in a feedback loop and without speaking the loop doesn’t exist. But the reference point must be stable before the mouth starts working on it. The key is not that it’s supposed to come out correctly at a certain point, but that the language must rest clearly in one’s mind, before speaking can naturally begin.  Once the MIFs exist for a language’s phonemes, vocabulary and grammar, sentences can be improvised and we are able to speak.



The Source of ‘Real Language’

What is a MIF?

If someone said to you, “Walk like a duck.” What would you do (provided you were willing to walk like a duck)? In your mind, you’d ‘flash’ a ‘mental image’ of a duck walking, and simply imitate it.  Had you never seen a duck walking, this would be impossible. For example, if I said, “Walk like a bonzo.” What mental image flashes? There isn’t one.

This flashing of a mental image or mif is what guides all we say and do. Though generally not conscious of the fact, we flash mental images all the time and at an incredible rate! All natural speech first begins with a mif. Without it, we can’t really know where to begin or even what to say! The substance of this mif is no secret, nor is there any substitute for it.

As you accumulate experiences, understanding of many things begins gradually to form in your mind. A single experience holds information relating to things as diverse as weather, time, culture, emotions, language, philosophy, and anything else in the world around us! By experiences, our world is defined and it is the cumulative total of our experiences that gives us understanding of that world.

Taking language as an example, consider what happens when you hear a word. It triggers a mif and you understand. If you don’t understand, it’s simply means that you don’t yet have the experiences relating to that word that can provide you with a mif. (Translation can only provide inaccurate substitutes for mifs because the mifs they rely on are all from another culture and language.) When the ‘volume’ of a person’s experience becomes enough to provide for understanding of about 60 to 70 percent of a language, a person begins to speak. Thus speech is guided by the mifs a person has gained throughout their lifetime.

How does a MIF guide our speech?

Just as a child of two begins speaking though incorrectly, the speech is constantly compared with the mif and adjusted to match the mif. Any other control or guide is unnatural, clumsy and difficult to utilize. Unfortunately, the teaching methods that have been developed over the years, seem to support everything – except real language development. That’s where ALG World comes in!

The MIF and PRACTICE

Adults love the idea that ‘practice makes perfect’! We somehow, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary, think that by practicing speech, we’ll become great speakers. Not only is this not true with language, it’s probably not true in any area of life.

Practice is never the key! Take Tiger Woods for example. Certainly he practices all the time. You might ask, “Isn’t that evidence that in order to be great, practice is the key?” Not at all. Before Tiger Woods ever began to practice, he had the reference to follow. Let’s call this reference, a mental image flash or ‘mif’. Without a good mif no one ever becomes the best. Where does someone like Tiger get the mifs for golf? From watching, as early as the age of 6 months old, his dad and others, swinging and playing. He learned what was right through watching what was right, and he received the mifs during this period of life, before his ‘career’ ever began! There was no practice involved! He knew what to do before he ever did it. ‘How do you hold the club?’ ‘How do you stand?’ ‘How do you raise the club into position?’ ‘Where does your elbow belong?’ ‘How do you follow through?’ All of the things that are conscious for someone trying to follow the instructions, are automatic for anyone who is acting based upon mifs.

This same thing is also true with children as they acquire their native language. Through everyday life, they gain experiences, and thereby build their understanding. This creates in their minds, the mifs necessary to produce their language. The mifs includes such things as grammar, syntax, and vocabulary without the child even being aware that these things exist! Once an adequate amount of mifs are collected, children begin to speak. Practice is not even remotely involved!

But isn’t some Practice necessary?

Certainly, after the mif is in place, practice can help, right? Regarding language, there is not much evidence that it does. The things a person might practice in a speech for example, rarely if ever carry over into their everyday ability to communicate. Just because a pianist plays a great performance, doesn’t mean that he or she can improvise at all. Speaking is improvising, and those who practice seem no better off than those who don’t. And the fact remains that most of us never practice our native language!

There is ample evidence that practice doesn’t help. In fact, evidence exists to indicate that it actually creates irreversible damage! Yet we continue to practice – Why? Perhaps because we don’t know what else to do. ALG World offers a true alternative. Now you have the opportunity to gain a second language just as you gained your native language. Don’t ruin it with practice. The whole world offers proof that practice won’t help!

The MIF and Memorization

How far can we expect our memories to serve us? It is amazing to consider all the things we try to remember – and yet forget! ‘What was that person’s name?’ ‘What was that telephone number?’ ‘When was that date and time we were to meet?’ While our memories are useful, there are very few of us who do very well tying to recall what we have memorized. Unfortunately, much of what we call education seems to be determined to force us to ‘memorize’ certain facts and then grades us on our ability to ‘recall’ these items. Of course few of us do very well at this. In fact, what most of us get out of it is a sincere dislike for certain ‘subjects’ – subjects that might otherwise be very interesting to us.

If we look at the computer as an example we are able to observe much about the way people learn. When children or adults are given ‘Computer’ as a class, with a curriculum, an instructor, a textbook, and tests, very few students do well and perhaps fewer actually learn anything of value. On the other hand, when a computer is viewed as either a toy or a tool, and is played with rather than studied, invariably learning takes place and one gains abilities he or she is not even aware of!

The difference lies in the concept of the ‘mif’. Mifs don’t consist of a list of facts or figures – they are a part of what we are. When I acquire knowledge it stays with me for life because it has become a part of my store of mifs. But when I memorize something it only stays with me until the next test, hopefully. If I’m lucky, I can recall it for the final exam and earn a passing grade!

Do facts and figures, or in the case of language, words and grammar, ever become ‘real knowledge’ or part of the mifs? Seldom, if ever. In fact, the knowledge we gain and use in life seems to be totally disassociated from those facts and figures we spent our school days learning. To be sure, once we’ve taken the test, many even do just about everything they can to never think about that stuff again!

As we’ve already said, it is the accumulation of experience that allows mifs to develop. Through experience – not memorization! Memorization at best, will only block us from gaining the full benefit of experiences. Think of it – memorization can actually inhibit real learning!

The MIF and Testing

Sometimes we act as if we thought that if it can’t be tested then we can’t know anything at all! Often, I hear of parents who want to make sure that their children are ‘getting’ the second language. They try to get their kids to ‘speak’ or tell them what new words they learned today. Parents want to know if their children will get the grade so that they can move to the next level. How strange that we don’t think of testing our one or two year old child’s ability in their native language. How many parents of two-year old children do you know who take their kids anywhere for language tests? At first it might seem that there would be nothing to test – but all evidence points to the fact that two year old children, even though they don’t yet speak much, can understand much of what is being said around them.

How is this possible? They’ve never been tested! ‘Perhaps we’ve got to encourage our 18 month old child to begin memorizing 5 words a day. If not, the neighbors child might gain an advantage and get ahead of our own child!’ Placed in this context, the idea of testing seems absurd. Never the less our educational system would lead us to think that comparison with those around us is all that matters. The way success is guaged is by comparing students wiih students.

In the ALG Program, if you want to know how well you’re doing, you must compare yourself to the native speaker. No other comparison matters. And if you really want to compare yourself with the native speaker, then it is wise to gain the new language in the same way that the native speaker does. Otherwise, you will try all you want but never come close. No native speaker ever gained their language by study and testing.

How does a person acquire their native language? Through gaining experiences. That’s all. Nothing else. And all of them became fluent! No tests were ever given or required. No homework or review was ever necessary. No practice or memorizing took place. And they all became fluent! Did it matter who spoke faster? No. Did it matter who spoke the most? No. Did it matter who was the most attentive? No. Did it matter who was the most motivated? No.

The only thing that mattered was that experiences were gained – experience upon experience – and from those experiences our mif collection was formed correctly. Trying to manufacture mifs through memorization can only give us unusable, memorized things. Furthermore, testing those things can never provide us with a picture of how well this person is going to be able to use the language.

In a recent English contest, It was my honor to sit on the panel of judges. The areas that students were given points were in such things as grammar, pronunciation, appearance, gestures, etc. At the end of the speech there was one final part; it was the only thing that a student couldn’t really prepare for. The judges were to ask the contestant something about the speech they had given. I remember one particular contestant. Her speech was delivered very well and I asked her a simple question. When she didn’t understand the question, I asked it again, and again, and again, changing the way I asked it just slightly making it easier and easier each time. Finally, I turned it over to another judge who asked the question in his own way. After he tried about 3 times and the contestant still didn’t understand, we just gave up. The contestant had no idea what we were saying! That particular part of the speech received the fewest points, but it was the only part where real communication was taking place. All of the work that the contestant did on her speech didn’t help her a bit in a real life situation. Though she ‘tested’ well, she couldn’t communicate!

All over the world there are very educated people who have studied a foreign language but don’t know what to say and can’t answer when they’re spoken to. Why? No amount of study ever produces the ability to use a language. The ability to use a language naturally only comes through gaining experie – everything else gets in the way.

At ALG World, we recognize that testing a child or adult will never tell you where he or she is in ability. The only way to tell if a person is able to communicate in any given language is to communicate with him – and that’s what ALG World is all about. Every hour of class time allows the student to gain new experiences as his guides communicate with him in real-life situations!

http://www.literature.freeservers.com/image_polat/ccfsla.html

McCandless, P. and Winitz, H. 1986. Test of pronunication following one year of comprehension instruction in college German. Modern Language Journal 70 (4): 335-362.

Four groups of ten subjects were tested. The test: imitate five sentences spoken by native speakers of German, e.g.
“Die Erde wird zu Schlamm.” (The ground will become muddy.)
Subjects’ imitations (for all sentences) rated by native speakers of German on a one to five scale, where 1 = poor (mangelhaft), and 5 = excellent (ausgezeichnet).

Group N: Native speakers of German. Score = 1.28 (sd = .02).
Group CO: Controls, no previous study of German. Score = 4.40 (sd = .32).
Group CE:  Took an intensive eight unit Comprehension Approach German course during the summer, about 210 hours of classroom instruction and 30 hours listening to language tapes (The Learnables) = 240 hours total. “Their primary responsibility was to learn to listen and to understand German. They were not required to speak at any time, but they were also not told not to speak” (p. 359).
Of interest: “… instructors were told never to perform a spontaneous activity, such as erasing the blackboard, or moving a table. Instead they were to ask a student to perform the activity” (p. 359). If students did speak, errors were not corrected. Reading introduced near the end of the course.
Score = 2.50 (sd = .53).
Group T: Traditional two semester German classs, 128 hours in class, one hour per week in lab, two hours homework/week = total of 224 hours. Taught by non-native speakers. Grammar, oral drills. Most from community college.
Score = 3.10 (sd = .46).
All four groups significantly different.

Supports hypothesis that speaking not necessary, might be harmful, but
(1)     T group got less input.  It could have been the input that counted, not the fact that CE students did not speak much.
(2)     T group had non-native teachers.
(3)     Male model used for imitation test for CE, controls, but for only one T subject: female substituted because male not available.
(4)     All models were instructors in the CE class.

But results still consistent with strong delayed speaking hypothesis, even though other explanations possible.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/lang/eng/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html