Language flows through us and around us all the time.
This can make it challenging to separate from learning. Whatever we’re doing - experimentation, imitation, reflection, explanation - we use language.
In schools, we try to control this language. We pin it down to stop it from wriggling away. There’s a certain pragmatism to stripping away a lot of the vibrant, colourful, creative everyday-ness of language. We are obliged to make choices about what is correct and incorrect in order to assess students’ language use, for example.
Of course, it can then be challenging for students who are not so familiar with a particular language of instruction to think and express what they really want to express using that language.
It’s no secret that students’ more extended linguistic knowledge can be a great tool for their learning.
This is true of students who have grown up with a particular language of instruction (English, for example), as well as emergent bi/multilingual students who haven’t. Teachers invite more informal (English) language use from students all the time in order to show how this connects to more academic language. Take science, or any subject where students need to be guided towards particular - and often quite strict - norms around representing their knowledge. In different content areas, they are learning how to display their knowledge correctly as much as they are learning about the subjects themselves.
Planning for learning opportunities that draw on students’ existing language knowledge when it comes from different languages can also be beneficial. This is different from controlling language.
Planned language use in this case refers to the creation of spaces where students have the opportunity to use language that links to their experience in meaningful ways and to achieve different kinds of learning objectives. This might mean more than academic English, and also more than English for students who speak other languages.
Language use doesn’t need to be correct because the goal is to further students’ learning. The learning space is planned but the language can be spontaneous.
Controlled language use, on the other hand, is when students practise particular forms of language. The teacher might model what the students are expected to produce. For example, sentence starters (In this essay, I will argue that…) or sentence frames (I like…..because…..). It’s relevant to all sorts of classes when teachers want to see particular kinds of language from their students. Students see this a lot when learning how to write more academically. It’s not confined to language classrooms.
Controlled language use is obviously planned by someone, either the teacher or the textbook writer. But it’s useful to draw a distinction between the controlled and planned use in order to show that you can plan for language without always needing to control it.
Teacher modelling can actually be a good way for teachers to begin to experiment with the idea of planned language use in the classroom. For example, a teacher might translate sentences from different languages students speak at home (using an AI translation tool) and put the translation side-by-side with English on the board to discuss with the class.
This helps students to learn how language works and also normalises other languages for learning. This can then lead to the planning of more uncontrolled language spaces, where students choose the language they use, either in discussions or compositions.
In a school setting, an important aspect of planning is clarity around how language use will help meet teaching and learning objectives, including language objectives, and the way this is conveyed to interested parties, such as parents and school leaders.
But, in general, it’s good to remember that our everyday language has an important role in the classroom, and does not need to be confined only to English.