Journal Article Review

Revitalizing the Language Laboratory

by Helen Huntley, West Virginia University

Synopsis of article:

Helen Huntley has tried to address a growing concern, how to make language laboratories make best for students. She begins with her observation that many laboratories are not being used for several reasons: lack of teacher training and lack of materials. She states that most labs are being used currently for simple activities for individual as opposed to pair, group, or whole class. Huntley believes that a language lab can be of great use for students and teachers if the teacher is properly trained and if he/she has the right materials. However, she then ends her introduction by saying that all a teacher really needs is an audio-tape recorder which negates the language lab.

She presents the history of language laboratories that began in the 1960s and 1970s. She cites a survey by Judith Tanka which was published in the TESOL Journal in 1993 that resulted in the knowledge that about 68 % of Intensive English programs were using language labs. However of those labs some were up-to-date and others were out-of-date. Those surveyed also stated that they used the labs for mostly listening activities. The students/takers of the survey also responded that the teachers needed better training and the activities needed to be more communicative in nature.

In the next part of the article Huntley presents some advantages for teachers and students in using a language lab. She believes that students would be more willing to speak and listen in it was at their pace; thus, reducing nervousness and increasing the willingness to try new things, like the speaking of a new language. For teachers, she felt that instruction could be more individualized for the students. In certain labs, each individual student could be monitored or spoken with without drawing the whole class’s attention to that student.

Lastly, she presents a list of possible activities to try with students that are not focused simply on aural skills but also oral skills. This list mostly involved an audio-tape recorder. Each activity involved one student speaking about a certain topic/situation and then another student listening to that tape to complete an activity. For example, one student speaks the directions from one place on a map to another. Another student then listens to the tape and uses the map to find the way from one place to the other and names the final destination. She presented ten activities of this nature.

Reaction to article:

As a college professor with access to a state-of-the-art language laboratory, I chose this article with the hopes of finding other ways to utilize the lab besides the textbook series lab manual activities. However, what I found was disappointing in many ways. For Huntley to reduce the technology to an audio-tape recorder was ridiculous in my opinion. As a society, most products are CD-ROM or students use CD-RW. Many students also use the thumbdrive or portable memory chips (as do I when moving from class to class with Power Points or typed notes for the students). Ms. Huntley needed to find ways to incorporate the ‘new’ technologies of today. Finding cassettes to actually tape the activities she presented will be a problem in itself. I personally have only seen cassettes at dollar stores lately, and those are of poor quality resulting in problem with the recordings of student’s voices.

I agree with her citation from Richards and Rodgers (1986), that the primary function of language is for interaction and communication. However, I feel that there are better ways to use a language laboratory besides having an audio-tape recorder. For example, just the fact that I give directions to the students on what to do in lab in Spanish and their asking questions during the process are interactive and communicative in nature. For example, I usually provide the ‘tree’ on the whiteboard and give the directions orally in Spanish (ex. Explorer>Blackboard>Log In> Spanish 111> External Links> Spanish Grammar Exercises- Colby> Preterite> Irregulars.) I will talk them through the whole process in Spanish and answer any questions (in Spanish) during the process. I have used some of the lab manual activities. However, I tend to pick and choose certain activities. I always choose mapping activities so they have to follow a set of directions. However, I haven’t had a student record the directions, rather I use the CD for the lab manual.

The hopes of finding new ways to use our language laboratory were dashed upon finishing this article. The only thing I learned was to go find my old tape recorder and start hording the cassettes at the dollar store. I will continue my search to find meaningful activities for our laboratory. I will also continue to train on the system we have to learn how to record ‘WAVE’ clips from students. I will continue my quest to make the laboratory a useful tool for my students and their learning.

References:

Huntley, H. (1998). Revitalizing the Language Laboratory. WVESL Journal. Retrieved June 7, 2006, from The Educator’s Reference Desk.

Web site: http://members.tripod.com/~WVESL/huntley/huntley.htm

Richards, J.C. and T.S. Rodgers. (1986) Approaches and methods in language teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tanka, J. (1993) Teaching listening in the language lab: One program’s experience. ‘results of a survey on the role of listening in the Intensive English Program curriculum.’ TESOL Journal, Autumn 1993. 15-17.