The Role of Teacher-Student Relationships to Cause Synchrony in EFL Shadowing
Reiko Yamamoto1*
1 Department of English Studies for Careers, Kyoto Junior College of Foreign Studies, Kyoto, Japan
*Corresponding Author: re_yamam@kufs.ac.jp
Accepted: 1 March 2020 | Published: 15 March 2020
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Abstract: This paper reports on a joint research project in which a researcher in applied linguistics and elementary school teachers in Japan revealed the role of teacher-student relationships in English as a foreign language (EFL) education. Based on previous research that movement synchrony between children and adults is necessary in acquiring the first language, the experiment was conducted using shadowing practice in a teacher-training course. The results proved that the teachers moved their body most when they had close relationships with a model reader. This study succeeded in convincing the teachers of the importance of synchrony in an EFL class and daily classroom interaction in elementary school.
Keywords: movement synchrony, elementary school education, classroom management _________________________________________________________________________
1. Introduction
In the 1990s, many non-English-speaking countries had assigned English as a subject in elementary school. Japan had fallen behind amid this global trend. Therefore, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology in Japan finally set to work on English as a foreign language (EFL) education reform in two steps: First, English activities were introduced into elementary school in 2011; Second, English will be taught as a subject from 2020 onward. However, the serious problem is that elementary school teachers have neither familiarity with the new subject nor the confidence to teach it. This study aims to devise the effective teacher training.
2. Literature Review
2.1. Shadowing
Children imitate adults’ movements more than older students do. Rizzolatti and Singaglia (2006) focused on the difference between mimicry (simply reproducing another’s movements at the sensory-motor level) and imitation (imitating another’s movements as the result of observing them to understand their meaning). Yamamoto (2009) reported that children are capable of understanding the contents of storytelling in second language by imitating the reader’s movements, including voice, tone, and speed.
Shadowing is an effective method to facilitate second language learners’ imitation (Kadota, 2012). It consists of repeating what a teacher says immediately after hearing it. A student repeating words automatically processes their syntax and semantics. This technique helps students understand linguistic sound and meaning (Marslen-Wilson, 1973), which is why
shadowing is especially popular in EFL education in Japan. As the linguistic sounds of Japanese differ from those of English, shadowing is targeted in this study.
2.2. Synchrony in First Language
Synchronism of speaker and listener has been thought to be a significant aspect of subconscious language learning, especially in first language (L1) acquisition. The interaction of the adult’s utterance and the baby’s movement is called Interaction Loop (Kobayashi &
Sasaki, 1997). When a baby traces an adult’s movement, he or she not only mimics the movement but also resonates with the adult physically (Werner & Kaplan, 1974). It can be called the offspring’s cognitive interactions with the world (Tomasello et al., 2004). The capacity of a child to reproduce adult’s movement suggests a neural basis for an inter- subjective process that begins early in life and is expressed in mutually coordinated activities during which the movement, facial expressions, and voice interactions of child and mother synchronize in time (Reddy et al., 1997). Previous researchers have proved synchrony in child-adult interaction.
Synchrony is observed not only in child-adult interaction, but also in adult-adult interaction.
It is reported that a listener’s body also moves in process units, which are synchronous with the articulate structure of a speaker’s speech (Condon & Sander, 1974). It appears as the precise dance-like sharing of micro-body-motion pattern of change between speaker and listener. With this movement, humans unconsciously understand each other at the physical level. Condon and Sander (1974) named this mutual activity “Communication Dance.” A listener’s body responds to what a listener’s mind understands a speaker to be saying.
2.3. Synchrony in Second Language
Synchrony is not limited to L1. Children unconsciously reflect and imitate adults when they encounter a new language (Broom et al., 1974). Mimicking has effects on making a phonological loop and putting in long-term memory (Baddeley & Gathercole, 1998).
There is a study on a German lesson for university students in the USA (Van Laffler-Engel, 1980). Analysis of the recorded video of the class identified that the students synchronized with the teacher’s gestures and movements. The rhythm of the teacher, who was speaking German, pulsed through the students and influenced their physical movement. The teacher’s movement even influenced the students’ behavior to the extent that the students traced the teacher’s mood. Therefore, an EFL class should aim to cause synchrony between learners and their teacher. Moreover, it is necessary that teachers keep their composure even if they are anxious about their EFL skills. The details on teacher emotions will be surveyed in the next section.
2.4. Teacher-Student Emotions
Teachers often receive little training in the principles of affect and learning, but mood and emotions influence thinking and cognitive problem solving (Pekrun, 2018). If elementary school teachers knew that inspiring passion for the discipline and excitement about learning is as significant as imparting knowledge, apprehension about teaching EFL would be eased.
Displays of emotion conveyed by facial, gestural, and postural expression and the prosodic features of speech, and timbre of voice provide information about an individual’s emotional state (Pekrun, 2018). These signals that a teacher gives off can be automatically mimicked by students to the extent that they experience the same emotion. Emotional contagion plays a major role in daily classroom interaction. Pekrun (2018) observed that emotions are
A cause for teachers’ negative emotions is a lack of familiarity with one’s subject. Pekrun (2018) reported that it is a key source of shame for teachers. On the contrary, classroom management skills are a cause for teachers’ positive emotions. The establishment of good relationships between the teacher and the students surely decreases teachers’ anxiety (Pekrun, 2018). The success of an EFL class depends on the daily classroom interactions. This explains why elementary school teachers have an advantage in teaching EFL. Those in charge of teacher training are challenged to redefine teaching and teacher education in ways that will emphasize the love for learning and teaching our world so desperately wants and needs (Meyer, 2009).
3. Research Questions
It is certain that elementary school teachers who teach all subjects have inferior English competency compared with EFL teachers in junior or senior high schools. However, based on the author’s personal experiences of teaching EFL at elementary school, classroom management skills of elementary school teachers are more superior. Therefore, children were eager to communicate with their teacher—even in the EFL class—more than with the author, an expert in TESOL. In communicative activities, children imitate their teacher’s facial expressions and physical movement. It is the same synchrony as observed in infant-fosterer interaction. Elementary school teachers have great classroom management skills, which lead to good teacher-student relationships. This study is based on the idea that synchrony between students and their teacher is necessary for an EFL lesson; and teacher-student relationships are the key. Teachers have, however, little chance to value their own skills. Thus, it was decided in this study to let teachers experience synchrony in teacher training. The research questions of this study are:
a. What kind of synchrony is observed in teacher training?
b. Do good teacher-student relationships enhance synchrony?
The goal of this study is to answer these research questions.
4. Methodology
4.1. Participants
An elementary school in Kyoto, Japan, was selected for this experiment. It is a general-size metropolitan school. The participants were 20 teachers of the school and one EFL teacher of a junior high school in the neighborhood. The author was invited to the school as an EFL lecturer teaching as a part of the school’s teacher-training program.
4.2. Procedure
First, the lecturer (author) lectured on shadowing as an effective method to teach linguistic sound. An extract from Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is chosen as text for the workshop on shadowing as follows:
O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name.
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.
The novel, written in Middle English (ME), includes many words unused today. The teachers feel uneasy repeating unfamiliar sounds, same as elementary school students repeating text in an EFL class.
In the workshop, every teacher played a role as a student except for two teachers who were assigned the role of a teacher (Figure 1).
Figure 1: The positioning of a teacher and students in shadowing workshop
In all, three people played the role of a teacher in turns:
a. The lecturer reads the text aloud and the teachers repeat it.
b. The junior high school EFL teacher reads the text aloud and the teachers repeat it.
c. One of the elementary school teachers reads the text aloud and the teachers repeat it.
The workshop was recorded with a video camera. Seven teachers were selected as target of analysis from the teachers who played the role of students. In analyzing their physical movement, the method created for analyzing the movement of a neonate listening to adult speech (Condon & Sander, 1974) was referred. Although the neonate’s movement was classified into head, elbow, right wrist, left wrist, right finger, left finger, right thumb, left thumb, eyes, mouth, foot, and hips in the original, movement of the seven teachers were classified into head, right hand, left hand, foot, upper body, and face. This is because the teachers were at the desk listening to the text read aloud, not to impromptu utterances, and under such situation, they were not supposed to move many parts of the body.
4.3. Results
A synchronous organization of the behavior of teachers in shadowing was illustrated in Figure 1, Figure 2, and Figure 3. Definition of notation for all figures is as follows: A to G represents seven teachers who repeated the text; the other capital letters represent the body part each teacher moved: F-face, H-head, U-upper body, R-right hand, and L-left hand.
Figure 2 shows a synchronous organization of the behavior of teachers as they repeated after the lecturer. A synchronous organization of the behavior of teachers as they repeated after the junior high school EFL teacher is shown in Figure 3.
A synchronous organization of the behavior of teachers as they repeated after one of the elementary school teachers is shown in Figure 4.
Figure 2: Synchrony with the lecturer who is reading a text
Figure 3: Synchrony with the junior high school EFL teacher who is reading a text
Figure 4: Synchrony with the elementary school teacher who is reading a text
5. Conclusion
This study sought to answer two research questions. First, what kind of synchrony is observed in teacher training? The teachers did not show major movements like children and mainly moved their head or upper body or face by just smiling. It was observed that all the seven teachers smiled when repeating after their colleague.
Second, do good teacher-student relationships enhance synchrony? The answer drawn from the experience is YES. Comparing Figure 2, Figure 3, and Figure 4 clarified which of the three (the lecturer, the junior high school EFL teacher, and the elementary school teacher) moved the teachers’ bodies most. The winner was the elementary school teacher, their
second. The lecturer was in last place despite reading with perfect rhythm and pronunciation.
In the experiment, after the lecturer read, the junior high school EFL teacher and the elementary school teacher were asked to play the role of teacher. Both teachers had had no idea that they had to read aloud the text written in Middle English in front of the others, and they looked annoyed at first. Their reading was not very good, especially that of the elementary school teacher. The reaction of the other teachers, however, was different for these two teachers. They got excited; it was observed that some smiled, some laughed, some frowned, and some opened their eyes wide and tried not to miss what was happening.
It is meaningful that elementary school teachers who lack confidence in teaching EFL experienced synchrony in teacher training. They surely realized the power of teacher-student relationships. As already referenced, the present study reveals that children move sharing rhythm with the organization of the speech structure of his or her L1 and encompass a multiplicity of interlocking aspects such as rhythmic and syntactic features (Condon &
Sander, 1974). Children might react to L2 in the same way if they feel free to move their bodies as if interacting with their fosterers. Elementary school teachers are crucial in filling a classroom with such mood and emotion, which compensates for the lack of EFL competence.
Elementary school teachers are not experts in EFL in Japan. Under the status quo, teachers should adhere to not being model EFL speakers but model EFL learners who just try to enjoy the unknown aspects, such as the rhythmic and syntactic features of a new language.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (#18K00860) from Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.
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