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Key Words and the Language Teacher

Key Words and the Language Teacher. Mike Scott, University of Liverpool, U.K. Third International Conference on Foreign Language Teaching Methodology in China Shanghai International Studies University March 28 to March 30, 2008

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Key Words and the Language Teacher

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  1. Key Words and the Language Teacher Mike Scott, University of Liverpool, U.K. Third International Conference on Foreign Language Teaching Methodology in China Shanghai International Studies University March 28 to March 30, 2008 This presentation is at www.lexically.net/downloads/corpus_linguistics

  2. Aims • to consider • the notion of “keyness” • identifying keyness in texts • working with key words and language learners

  3. categories the linguist … forgot

  4. the paragraph (Kaplan 1966)

  5. the section

  6. the topic

  7. the gist

  8. chapter

  9. the key word!

  10. what does it mean word • for a • to be key?

  11. and how can we • find the KWs?

  12. 2 central notions • importance • aboutness

  13. A woodsman from Zheng saw a deer in the field, shot and killed it. Afraid he would be caught, he hid the deer and covered it with banana leaves. He was pleased with himself. • Rightaway he forgot the hiding place, and thought that the whole episode was a dream! On his way home, he kept telling himself that it was only a dream. As he mumbled to himself about his dream, he was overheard by a passerby. • The passerby thought about what he had heard and figured out where the deer was hidden. He found the deer and took it home. He told his roommate, "The woodsman dreamt he killed the deer and forgot where he hid it. I now found the deer; so his dream must be true." • The roommate said, "Was there really a woodsman? Or did you dream the woodsman? Since you now have the deer, doesn't it mean that your dream is true?"

  14. Identifying KWs

  15. human-identified... • woodsman • dream • deer • kill • etc. or machine-identified? • deer • dream • passerby • kill • he • himself • about

  16. The teaching problem to the student everything seems equally important and difficult so...

  17. Using KWs in teaching • focus text content on the gist • focus the learner’s effort on the more important words • ... pronunciation • ... meaning • ... spelling • ... collocates • ... colligation • ... pragmatics • by focussing the learner’s attention away from the other words key words

  18. Conclusions • the KWs are the important words • repeated words • they can be identified by the student, the teacher, or a computer • and we can focus on those KWs in language learning and teaching

  19. See you in Liverpool… Corpus Linguistics Summer Institute 30 June 2008 – 03 July 2008 http://www.lexically.net/courses/corpus_linguistics_summer_2008.htm Corpus Linguistics 2009 University of Liverpool, UK

  20. References • Kaplan, Robert, 1966. "Cultural Thought Patterns in Inter-Cultural Education“. Language Learning, Vol. 16 Nos 1 & 2, pp. 1-20. • Scott, Mike, 2008. WordSmith Tools 5.0. Lexical Analysis Software Ltd. (www.lexically.net) and SFLEP (www.sflep.com.cn) • http://www.chinapage.com/story/deerhunter.html (accessed on 16 March 2008)

  21. the whole story • A Deer Hunter Misplaced the Deer(and thought he dreamt it.) • A woodsman from Zheng saw a deer in the field, shot and killed it. Afraid he would be caught, he hid the deer and covered it with banana leaves. He was pleased with himself. Rightaway he forgot the hiding place, and thought that the whole episode was a dream! On his way home, he kept telling himself that it was only a dream. As he mumbled to himself about his dream, he was overheard by a passerby. • The passerby thought about what he had heard and figured out where the deer was hidden. He found the deer and took it home. He told his roommate, "The woodsman dreamt he killed the deer and forgot where he hid it. I now found the deer; so his dream must be true." The roommate said,"Was there really a woodsman? Or did you dream the woodsman? Since you now have the deer, doesn't it mean that your dream is true?" • The man replied," I now have the deer. It doesn't matter whether his dream or my dream is true." • The woodman went home, and was depressed about his lost deer. That night he had a dream. He dreamt about the passerby who had heard of him talking to himself and then found the hidden deer. Next morning, following his dream, he found the passerby and the deer. So he took him to the Magistrate and sued for the recovery of the deer. • The Magistrate said, "First the woodman killed the deer, but thought it was a dream. Then he dreamt that he killed the deer and believed it was real. He found the passerby with a real deer,so he sues for the deer.The roommate said that the passerby got the deer from another man's dream; so the deer belongs to no one.The deer is here and is real. Let it be divided equally between the two men." • The case was appealed to King Zheng, who jokingly remarked, "Jeez, next thing I will be told that the Magistrate had dreamt about dividing the deer." and sent the case to his Chief Adviser for an opinion. • The Adviser reported, "Sir, whether this case is about dreams or reality I cannot tell. Only (really wise men like) Huang Di or Confucius can differentiate dreams and realities. Since they are both dead, I recommend that we leave the Magistrate's decision be." • -Lie Zi, Han Dynasty

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