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A Critique Of Language Learning And Theory In The Audio-Lingual Method Of Teaching English As A Foreign Language, Stephen Gregory Hanchey

MA TESOL Collection

In this paper I investigate the claims on which many present ESL methods are based and examine them in view of recent developments in both learning theory and linguistics. There are reasons to think that the audio-lingual method is grounded in inadequate theories of learning and linguistics; if so, this warrants experiments in new methods and re-examination of such currently acceptable teaching methods as repetition, imitation, and pattern practice. In particular, I examine the practices of the audiolingual method which are based on behaviorist and structural linguistic theories, especially those practices which are extensions of theories about child language acquisition, …