Teaching English with Oral Chunk-Based Training

Abstract

Some generative linguists report that in formal settings, learners of English as a foreign language often strive to acquire morphemes such as the third-person singular –s and produce utterances such as *he play. This study reviews generative linguistics, psychology, neuroscience, and biolinguistics, examining how speech and other forms of action involve hierarchically organised groups (chunks) of words or acts that are invariably produced in linear order. Chunks contribute to brain efficiency, facilitating acquisition and enabling brain automaticity. A study was conducted to improve the accuracy rates of sentence segments featuring the third-person singular –s (e.g., “he VERB+s”) by orally rehearsing chunk-based sentences (e.g., [He plays] [a lot]). Sixty-four children from three Spanish schools, learning English as a foreign language and aged 8–11, participated in this study. The participants, divided into a control group and two experimental groups, completed an oral sentence transformation task following a pre-test–post-test design. The Wilcoxon test showed statistically significant results for the experimental groups after the administration of oral chunk-based training. Quartiles and deciles demonstrated improvement in these groups. The findings suggest that oral chunk-based training could foster chunk and morpheme acquisition. This pedagogy might enhance brain efficiency in learning and promote automatic speech.