Getting things done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics and language education

1. Pascual Pérez-Paredes
Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Keynote Roundtable/Mesa Redonda principal
Corpus Linguistics for 21st Century Language Learning

2. Pascual Pérez-Paredes
Keynote Roundtable/Mesa Redonda principal
Corpus Linguistics for 21st Century Language Learning

3. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Background research
Pérez-Paredes, P. (2010). Corpus Linguistics and Language Education in
Perspective: Appropriation and the Possibilities Acenario. In T. Harris
& M. Moreno Jaén (Eds.), Corpus Linguistics in Language Teaching (pp.
53-73). Peter Lang.
Pérez-Paredes, P., Sánchez-Tornel, M., Alcaraz Calero, J., & Aguado, P.
(2011). Tracking learners’ actual uses of corpora: guided vs non-
guided corpus consultation. Computer Assisted Language Learning
Journal.

4. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Top-down
approaches
in direct
Vs. applications
Bottom-up
approaches

5. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Top-down approaches are positive about the use of corpora in FLT.
Research on how corpus-based resources can be integrated in language
pedagogy is substantial as well as speculative in nature on the possibilities
of CL in language education.
Sinclair
Sinclair 1991
2003
Johns
1986
Possibilities scenario

6. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Indirect observation methodologies Sinclair
Sinclair 1991
-learners’ opinions about the benefits of using 2003
Johns
corpora for language learning, their 1986
-self-perceived difficulties in consulting
corpora and feelings as well as Possibilities scenario
-their own evaluation of corpus use during the task
(Lee and Swales, 2006; Yoon and Hirvela, 2004; Cheng,
Warren and Xun-feng, 2003).

7. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Much of the research dealing with the uses of
corpora in the language classroom has not
addressed the users’ actual interaction with the
resources themselves.
Hafner and Candlin (2007:304) have stressed the
lack of studies that provide “direct evidence of
students’ […] use of corpus tools”.
Many researchers have pointed up the importance
of recording active exploitation of corpus tools
(Johns, 1997; Horst et al., 2005; Chambers, 2007;
Hafner & Candlin, 2007).

8. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Lee and Swales (2006:72) carried out an
experiment which the authors labelled
as ‘technology-enhanced rhetorical
consciousness-raising’. Those learners
participating were introduced to professional
researching tools such as WordSmith and used
corpora devised for research purposes.

9. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Due to the high degree of induction demanded
by DDL direct applications, metaphorical
References to learners as researchers
(Mauranen, 2004), detectives (Johns, 1997) or,
travellers (Bernardini, 2000a) are frequent.

10. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
This possibilities scenario takes the research tools and
methodology of the CL research paradigm straightaway to
the language classroom.
The methodological transfer from the CL research area to
the applied ring of language learning and teacher mostly
undergoes no adaptation, and thus learners are presented
with the same tools, corpora and analytical tasks as well-
trained and professional linguists.

11. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Cheng, Warren and Xun-feng (2003) believe that it
is essential that learners incorporate discovery
skills in the development of their communicative
competence, going as far as to equating language
learning with linguistic research.

12. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
The possibilities scenario I have outlined
has proved a promising and innovative
instrument to enrich the learning
experiences of language students, who are
empowered with new skills and input
opportunities. Still, the full integration of
these new skills and input into language
education presents important
challenges.

13. Researching learners use of corpus-based resources
during focus-on-form
1. Context
important challenges

14. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
When examining the research in
corpus applications to language
learning, one discovers that those
learners outside the university
system are mostly ignored. However,
this research approach fails to grasp
the real scope of language learning. .

15. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
2006 figures for education in EU 27 and Spain.

16. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
2006 students in US, UK and Germany

17. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
% tertiary students

18. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Only one out of five learners are pursuing a
degree in tertiary education.
But, most of the research that has been
conducted in the field of CL in language
education addresses this low percentage of the
population.
Boulton (2008b) has shown that only four out of
the fifty studies considering DDL he analysed
reflected language teaching outside the
university.

19. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
No mediation role in the possibilities scenario
Variations of the
initiate
interpret
consolidate
report
Use of professional software
Authenticity issues (Mishan 2004)
Availability of corpora
Nature of the corpora used (Braun 2007)

20. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Challenges of the possibilities scenario in educational
settings
Pérez-Paredes, P., Sánchez-Tornel, M., Alcaraz Calero, J., & Aguado, P. (2011).
Tracking learners’ actual uses of corpora: guided vs non-guided corpus
consultation. Computer Assisted Language Learning Journal.
An introductory activity (Observe), a
hands-on activity using the BNC
(Search the corpus), and a final
activity (Rewrite) where students put
into practice the structures under
consideration.

21. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education

22. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education

23. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education

24. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education

25. Pascual Pérez-Paredes
Results
-Every single learner, irrespective of the research condition,
used some online resource while completing the tasks.
-Different types of learners’ approaches to corpus.
-Learners in the guided-consultation condition searched the
BNC almost three times more than the individuals in the non-
guided consultation. The informants in EG performed a mean of
5.4 BNC searches, while those in the non-guided condition
searched the BNC 3.5 times. According to the Mann–Whitney
test, the number of BNC searches parameter is statistically
significant
Keynote Roundtable/Mesa Redonda principal
Corpus Linguistics for 21st Century Language Learning

26. Pascual Pérez-Paredes
The omnipresence of highly-linguistic loaded interfaces
in principled corpora is not only a trace of the possibilities
scenario, in other words, the use of research-oriented
lexical databases in pedagogic contexts, but also the trace
of the overreliance on stand-alone corpora for
classroom-language learning, which may be
jeopardizing the normalization of these resources in
mainstream education (Boulton, 2009a; Pérez-Paredes,
2010).
Keynote Roundtable/Mesa Redonda principal
Corpus Linguistics for 21st Century Language Learning

27. Pascual Pérez-Paredes
A normalized vision of the uses of corpora contrasts with
problems reported by students and researchers in
numerous studies (Bernardini, 2000b; Chambers, 2005;
Chambers & O’Sullivan, 2004; Cheng et al., 2003;
Kennedy & Miceli, 2001, 2002a; Lavid, 2007; Vannestål
and Lindquist, 2007; Yoon & Hirvela, 2004; Yoon, 2008)
and by the need expressed by Mauranen (2004:99) to
favour an integration of corpus resources which causes no
“extra hassle” in the classroom.
Keynote Roundtable/Mesa Redonda principal
Corpus Linguistics for 21st Century Language Learning

28. Pascual Pérez-Paredes
Contribution of bottom-up
approaches to corpora
use in FLT
Keynote Roundtable/Mesa Redonda principal
Corpus Linguistics for 21st Century Language Learning

29. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Ad hoc corpora Ad hoc tools Applied nature
Context-aware Corpus + pedagogy
Corpora as
products
Tools for corpus Comprehensive
creation framework

30. www.um.es/sacodeyl

31. www.um.es/backbone

36. Getting Things Done at the crossroads of corpus linguistics
and language education
Pascual Pérez-Paredes pascualf@um.es
www.um.es/backbone