Eric Hawkins started the movement of language awareness in UK in 1918. It was at the same time in which the communicative competence take place as a way of teaching foreign language . Hawkins believed that education should include the learner's reflection of language . This reflection should be a part of the school curriculum in Hawkins' opinion . " Hawkins’ idea was to underline explicit reflection on language and critical understanding and as a step further he wanted to stimulate an understanding of language by implementing language awareness into the curriculum, through the perspective of the child
" (Soons.2008).
Language awareness can be defined by different ways , one among them is the definition of the Association for Language Awareness :" “explicit
knowledge about language, and conscious perception and sensitivity
in language learning, language teaching and language use” (ALA,
2012) . From this definition we can see the relation between language awareness and education or learning. Many of the language awareness movement's views and opinions came from the education in UK at first place so, it is very important specially to fix the problems in education at that time .
Since language awareness is dealing with the language , how we use it in a conscious way and how we could express meanings and thoughts by being aware of the internal structure of the language ,so it is part of the education and the learning of the second language..
Language awareness is concerned with the language not just the internal structure but also the meaning and thoughts .In other words it concerns with the conscious use of language. This will reflect on the education because it can help the teacher and the learner at the same time."A focus on language awareness is a key aspect of creating student-centered classrooms, and assists the teacher to present material accordingly to student readiness (Bilash and Tulasiewicz, 1995).
By being aware of the language ,students can use the language effectively. There are different ways to increase the students' awareness to a language, such as asking them to make comparison between the structure of their language and the new one. It can help the students to understand differences and similarities between languages. It also helps students to have a good and positive attitude to that language so they become active in the learning process .
By increasing students awareness about the language the education and the learning process will be proved. The student will learn language more and understand it better and then use it effectively. " Within such a programme our aim is to offer an approach to language teaching that will bring teachers together across disciplines and school frontiers to plan and teach it, while helping all pupils, but especially the slower learners, to make sense of what is too often a fragmented and haphazard linguistic apprenticeship" (Hawkins,1984). And as Elizabeth Ellis said about language awareness :"
providing positive feedback on the mother tongue and
cultural stereotypes;
encouraging the learner to pay close attention to words and
their meanings;
building confidence in what Halliday (1975) called the
‘mathetic’ function of language (i.e., using language to
learn about the world). "we can see the important role that language awareness plays in education.
I think language awareness started as a part of education and as a part of the learning of a second language. So, language awareness can be considered as approach of the education in which the main focus is on the conscious use of language .
As I figured from the early beginning of the language awareness movement ,it came as a reaction of different methods and researches of learning in UK at that time. So ,language awareness focused on the field of language teaching and on education and aimed to produce a new and good way of teaching the foreign language for example to bring teachers from different disciplines together and to find a good way of teaching the foreign language . Language awareness is important in education because it focus on the learner at first place and it develops his own skills such as noticing . Students also can learn the importance of language in the human life in general and they can feel the importance of cross-cultural understanding.
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