Eric concludes his analysis of Michael Long’s work with some quotes:
In the article, Long strongly criticizes a grammar and vocabulary syllabus and commercially published textbooks. I’ve pulled out those beautiful quotes below:
Long, M. (2011). Methodological Principles for Language Teaching. In Doughty, C. & Long, M., The Handbook of Language Teaching (pp.373-394). Blackwell.
synthetic = “focusing on the target language itself, presenting small pieces . . . one at a time, and requiring learners to synthesize them for communication. . . Research findings . . . are inconsistent with synthetic approaches.” (Long, 2011)
“Some [textbooks] are based on years of classroom experience, precious few on theory or research findings in SLA or education, and many on little more than chutzpah and the pundit’s or publisher’s desire for a healthier bank balance.” (Long, 2011, p. 374)
“Students do not – in fact, cannot – learn (as opposed to learn about) target forms and structures on demand, when and how a teacher or a textbook decree that they should, but only when they are developmentally ready to do so.” (Long, 2011, p. 378)
“Even when presented with, and drilled in, exclusively target-language forms and structures, and even when errors are routinely ‘corrected,’ instructed learners’ acquisition of a ‘structure of the day’ is rarely either sudden and categorical or complete, as is assumed by most synthetic materials and methodology.” (Long, 2011, p. 380)
“No matter the L1 or the order or manner in which target-language structures are presented to them by teachers or textbook writers, learners analyze the input and come up with their own interim grammars, the product broadly conforming to developmental sequences observed in naturalistic settings.” (Long, 2011, p. 380)
“The findings . . . dispel any notions that learners learn what teachers teach when they teach it, yet whether recognized or not, this is an implicit assumption underlying synthetic approaches to LT.” (Long, 2011, p. 381)
“a synthetic syllabus and the pedagogic materials that embody it will almost always have been written without reference to students’ preset or future communicative needs . . . and so are inefficient. They risk teaching more – skills, vocabulary, genres, etc. – than students can use, but also less, through not teaching language abilities they do or will need. They will also almost always have been prepared in ignorance of any particular group of students’ current developmental stages, especially if enshrined in industrial strength, commercially published textbook materials.” (Long, 2011, p. 382)
“The research clearly shows that attempting to impose a pre-set series of linguistic forms (pronunciation contrasts, grammatical structures, notions, functions, lexical items, collocations, etc.) is largely futile and counter-productive.” (Long, 2011, p. 382)
“So-called spiral, or cyclical, grammatical syllabi, which systematically revisit previously presented forms increase the chances of ‘hits,’ but are still inefficient because they attempt to work independently of the internal learner syllabus.” (Long, 2011, p. 382)
“It is worth noting that not just traditional linguistically based syllabi, but also most thematic, topic-based, and content-based approaches sit uneasily with the same research findings. With a few notable exceptions . . . most content-based teaching, for example, is largely synthetic. . . much of the linguistic content will inevitably be developmentally inappropriate input for the current interlanguage stage of all but the most advanced group of students . . . moreover the texts tend to become found objects, to be analyzed for their linguistic content (structures, vocabulary) using the same focus on forms methodology employed with overtly synthetic syllabi.” (Long, 2011, p. 382-383)
“In contrast, with focus on forms, the teacher or the textbook, not the student, has selected a form for treatment. The learner is less likely to feel a need to acquire the new item, so will likely be less motivated, and less attentive. If the form is new, moreover, so, typically will be its meaning and use, requiring the learner to process all three simultaneously.” (Long, 2011, p. 384-385)