Pedagogy of variation
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Subject classification: this is an education resource. |
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Type classification: this resource is a course. |
Initial activity
[edit | edit source]During a language session on Little Red Riding Hood with a middle section class at a nursery school in La Réunion, a pupil produced :
Le loup va amarrer le Chaperon rouge ‘ (’ The wolf is going to moor Red Riding Hood ‘). (in French: Le loup va attacher le Chaperon rouge).
The next day, the teacher wrote the statement on the language table:
| Créole | Mix | French |
|---|---|---|
| Le loup va amarrer le Chaperon rouge. |
Read this exchange between the pupils and the teacher, who is using the pedagogy of variation. Try to understand what this pedagogy consists of.
Teacher: Since ‘ Le loup va amarrer le Chaperon rouge ’ is a mixture, we're going to see how it's said in French and in Creole. So, how do you say it in Creole?
Student 1: Le loup i sa attacher le chaperon rouge.
Student 2: Well, no, ‘attacher’ is in French. You say ‘Le loup i sa amaré le Chaperon rouge’.
Pupil 3: I say ‘Le loup i sava amar le Chaperon rouge’.
Teacher : Do the others agree?
Pupil 4: No, I prefer ‘Le loup i sa amar le Chaperon rouge’.
Teacher: Does everyone agree with that?
Pupils: Yes!
Teacher: OK, so we'll keep ‘Le loup i sa armar le Chaperon rouge’ in Creole. How do you say it in French?
Pupil 4: That's easy, we say ‘Le loup va attacher le Chaperon rouge’.
Teacher : Does everyone agree?
Pupil 5: Why don't we say ‘The wolf is going to tie up Red Riding Hood’?
Pupil 2: Well, we said it's all mixed up!
Student 5: Oh yes!
Teacher: So we keep ‘Le loup va attacher le Chaperon rouge’ in French.
The teacher completes the language table :
| Creole | Mix | French | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Le lou i sa amar le Chapron rouj. | Le loup va amarrer le Chaperon rouge. | Le loup va attacher le Chaperon rouge. |
Objectives
[edit | edit source]At the end of this section, you should be able to :
- know the characteristics of variation teaching ;
- implement variation teaching in the classroom.
Key words
[edit | edit source]interlect, linguistic variation, contextualisation, school language standard, integrated language teaching
Prerequisites
[edit | edit source]- Knowledge of sociolinguistics, in particular the notions of ‘variation’ and ‘norm’.
Table of contents
[edit | edit source]- Introduction
- History
- Conceptions
- Things to remember
- Self-evaluation (multiple choice with solutions, open questions, etc.)
- Resources for further study
- Bibliography
Introduction
[edit | edit source]Variation pedagogy is used when language teaching and learning approaches are adapted to sociolinguistic contexts where several languages with different statuses coexist (known as ‘diglossic’). Sociolinguistics should be associated with teaching activities, paying particular attention to the realities of language. As part of bilingual teaching or integrated language teaching, the pedagogy of variation involves taking account of pupils' actual language practices, in particular the phenomena of language variation or language mixing, in order to acquire the school language norm. In the course of language activities, pupils are encouraged to analyse their own language productions and to understand how the languages taught or included in the teaching-learning process work. In this way, they develop the skills that are essential for successful language acquisition: linguistic awareness and metalinguistic reflection. On these various points, the pedagogy of variation could be similar to the pedagogy of translanguaging (Garcia & Li Wei, 2014) currently in vogue in the USA, in that they both take account of pupils' plurilingual repertoires. However, the history of these two pedagogical approaches differs.
History
[edit | edit source]In France, the question of the pedagogical treatment of language variation in the context of the teaching-learning of French was raised in the work of Romian, Marcellesi and Treignier (1985), who referred to ‘a pedagogy of variation’ to solve the problems associated with the academic failure of children whose language practices are undermined by the school. ‘This pedagogy, yet to be developed, is based on a dual principle: the linguistic unity of the French language and the plurality of its uses and social discourse’ (Romian and Treignier, 1985, p. 3). Indeed, the implementation of the pedagogy of variation aims at the acquisition of the school linguistic norm when it is in competition with other varieties or regional languages. This pedagogy has proved effective in the Creole-speaking islands of the French West Indies (Martinique, Guadeloupe and Guyana) and the Indian Ocean (Réunion), where the French language coexists with a Creole language (with a French lexical base) and its varieties, sometimes mixing in such a way as to blur linguistic boundaries and give rise to interlectal forms (Prudent, 1983). The concept of interlect, which first appeared in Prudent's (1980) work on the conversational dynamics of the West Indies, refers to ‘the set of utterances that cannot be predicted by a grammar of the acrolect or basilect’ (Prudent, 1981, p.31), which are the grammars specific to so-called standard languages, such as French or Spanish, and Creole languages. Later, the concept of interlect was used to describe the mixed linguistic forms of French and Reunionese Creole (Souprayen-Cavery, 2010).
As soon as Creole was introduced into schools as a language taught as part of Creole-French bilingual education and integrated into French teaching practices in the early 2000s in the Antilles and Réunion, the question of the place of pedagogical treatment of interlectal forms arose. The pedagogy of variation is therefore a pedagogical application of the concept of interlect for the acquisition of French and also Creole. It should be noted that these specificities, relating to the context of the Creole-speaking islands, prevent a potential rapprochement between the pedagogies of variation and translanguaging, even if both take into account the dynamic process in which hybrid forms appear.
Conceptions
[edit | edit source]The pedagogy of variation is mainly implemented in the context of bilingual teaching or integrated language teaching. It therefore comes under the heading of the didactics of plurilingualism and is based on ‘reflective observation of language contact’ (Georger, 2006, p. 57).
The aim is to lead pupils towards the acquisition of school language standards by making them aware of their language use. The aim of this first stage is to make the most of what the pupils have to say, enabling them to express themselves in complete safety. After welcoming these linguistic productions, the teacher leads the pupils to analyse interlectal forms in particular, helping them to understand the distinction between codes as part of a contrastive analysis, which leads to the validation of the normative linguistic form. In this way, pupils develop their metalinguistic reflexes and can acquire the languages taught effectively. As a result, this method of teaching interlectal forms requires teachers to have a command of the target codes. For example, in the context of Reunion Island, the implementation of the integrated didactics of French and Creole in an interlectal context (Souprayen-Cavery, 2014) requires a mastery of French and Creole. It is also on this point that the pedagogies of variation and translanguaging in the version developed by García seem to differ, insofar as, for this second pedagogical approach, mastery of the languages used by the pupils seems not to be a necessary condition for its implementation. Furthermore, it should be emphasised that in translanguaging pedagogy, languages are not separate linguistic realities. The similarities between the two pedagogical approaches mainly relate to the same starting point, that of the pupils' actual hybrid language productions, and to the same end goal of acquiring the languages taught (pedagogical translanguaging, Cenoz & Gorter, 2021).
Take home messages
[edit | edit source]The main objective of the pedagogy of variation is to take into account all the language productions of the pupils for the acquisition of the school linguistic norm.
Self-assessment
[edit | edit source]<quiz>
{In the exchange between the teacher and her pupils in the initial activity, the teacher accepts all the pupils' suggestions without judging them.}
+ True - False
{The pupils analyse their classmates' suggestions.}
+ True - False
{The students validate the correct proposal.} - True + False
{The objective of this teaching method is based on the codic distinction.}
+ True - False
<quiz>
Resources for further reading
[edit | edit source]- Chaudenson, R. (2007). Vers une didactique spécifique du français en milieu créolophone. In R. Chaudenson (Ed.), Français et créoles: du partenariat à des didactiques adaptées (pp. 47-90). L'Harmattan.
- Chaudenson, R. (Ed.) (2008). Didactique du français en milieux créolophones. Outils pédagogiques et formation des maîtres. L'Harmattan.
- Lebon-Eyquem, M. (2014). Comment adapter l'enseignement à la variation linguistique réunionnaise? Contextes et Didactiques, 4, https://doi.org/10.4000/ced.358
- Prudent, L. F., & Mérida, G. J. (1984). An langaj kréyol dimi-panaché... : interlect and conversational dynamics. Langages, 74, 31-45.
- Ronjat, J. (1913). Le développement du langage observé chez un enfant bilingue. Champion.
- Simonin, J. (1995). Questioning social uses of language in a sociolinguistically complex island context. Le cas de l'île de la Réunion. Pour un modèle d'analyse interactionnelle. In J. Richard-Zappella (Ed), Le questionnement social (pp. 335-339). University of Rouen, IRED.
Bibliography
[edit | edit source]Cenoz, J., & Gorter, D. (2021). Pedagogical translanguaging. Cambridge University.
García, O., & Li Wei (2014). Translanguaging: Language, bilingualism and education. Palgrave Macmillan.
Georger, F. (2006). Créole et français: deux langues pour un enseignement, Réflexion à partir d'une classe maternelle bilingue à La Réunion. Editions Tikouti.
Prudent, L.-F. (1981). Diglossie et interlecte.Langages, 61, 13-38.
Prudent, L.-F. (1983). Les Petites Antilles présentent-elles une situation de diglossie? Cahiers de linguistique sociale, 4/5, 24-40.
Prudent, L.-F. (2005). Interlect and pedagogy of variation in Creole countries. In L.-F. Prudent, F. Tupin & S. Wharton (Eds.), Du plurilinguisme à l'école, vers une gestion coordonnée des langues en contextes éducatifs sensibles (pp. 359-378). Peter Lang.
Romian, H., & Treignier J. (1985). Quel(s) traitement(s) pédagogique(s) de la variation et des normes langagières? Repères pour la rénovation de l'enseignement du français, 67, 3-8.
Romian H., Marcellesi C., Treignier J. (1985) Quelques concepts et notions opératoires pour une pédagogie de la variation langagière. Repères pour la rénovation de l'enseignement du français, 67, 23- 32).
Souprayen-Cavery, L. (2010). L'interlecte réunionnais: approche sociolinguistique des pratiques et des représentations, L'Harmattan.
Souprayen-Cavery, L. (2014). Pour une didactique intégrée du français et du créole dans un contexte interlectal. In J.-F. De Pietro & M. Rispail (Eds.), L'enseignement du français à l'heure du plurilinguisme (pp. 99-112), Presses universitaires de Namur.