Compose your own English. Theoretical foundations and practical aspects of a personalized speaking-oriented EFL approach

https://doi.org/10.20339/PhS.2-17.037

Daszkiewicz Michał,

PhD

University of Gdańsk, Poland

e-mail: pedmd@univ.gda.pl

 Presented is new approach to teaching and learning of English referred as Compose Your Own English. With the (markedly interdisciplinary) theoretical foundations presented in the first section delineating the room for learners’ language composition, the approach is then executed by means of eight steps made in construction of respective practical method (OneTouching). By demonstrating and studying relationship between language and personality, the paper draws on initial research conducted with (Polish) language learners and shows how, due to it’s flexibility to different cultures and nationalities, the approach is capable of superseding the now-essentially-invalid communicative approach. The observance of social context constitutes one of the greatest merits of the approach, also driven by pedagogical, psychological and purely linguistic findings. The paper encourages research across nations pertaining to differences in acquisition of what it refers to as “foundations” and “additions” and in how different nations and individuals (personally) experience the learning of English. This experience proves to be determined by how language learners compose their own English, i.e. by their personal choices, preferences and novel topical and lexical combinations achieved.

Keywords: new approach to teaching and learning, learners’ language composition, practical method.

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