Self-Access Language Learning in Hong Kong

Self-Access Language Learning 1996

Newsletter of the Hong Kong Association for Self-Access Learning & Development.

Self-Access & Collaborative Learning

Hong Kong has the highest concentration of self-access language learning facilities in the world. Within this concentration, there is diversity in whether facilities cater to individual or collaborative work. The individual-group dimension of self-access aligns with some preoccupations in language learning theory, namely: individualization and collaborative learning, empowerment, cultural preferences, and the technologization of learning.

Individualization and Collaborative Learning

Self-access is often accused of promoting individualistic approaches to language learning. This is a result of the historical association between self-access, autonomy, and the idea of individualization in learning. It is easier to implement individualization in a self-access center than in a classroom. In the 1990s, the methodological pendulum has swung away from individualization towards ideas of collaborative learning. At the root of this is the notion that language learning is a social process of meaning construction. Although learners may create meanings individually, these only become “meaningful” in social interaction. Collaboration is seen by many as a natural way to learn languages. Collaborative learning has been considered the natural way for learners to become more autonomous. One example of an approach where collaborative learning is justified by the goal of autonomy is “experiential learning”. The implementation of collaborative work is a major challenge to self-access.

Empowerment

There has been renewed interest in the distribution of power among learners, teachers, and educational institutions, and its effects on learning. There is also concern about the extent to which learners control, or are controlled by, the languages they learn. The empowerment of learners is becoming a widely accepted goal of language education.

Does self-access empower or disempower learners? Group learning helps learners to establish distance both from the learning process and from the object of learning. Groups of learners are able, through reflection, to develop critical and independent attitudes toward learning processes and outcomes. For individuals working alone, language and language learning are more likely to remain fixed objects to which they can only accommodate themselves. In order to contribute to the goal of empowerment, self-access needs to do more than provide individual learners with a range of learning options. It also needs to provide the means for learners to choose among those options collaboratively.

Self-Access and Culture

Self-access facilities should be adapted to the learning cultures in which they are located. One element that has been identified as a feature of such cultures is a preference for either individual or group activities.

Technologization of Learning

It is described as the tendency for education to become more subject to methods and technologies of various kinds. It also suggests a belief that we learn languages better when we apply such methods and technologies. Language learning is simply a question of applying technique to an objectively-given body of skills and knowledge. In the past, there was a close connection between technology and individualization (the replacement of human teachers with electronic teachers).

Evaluating Self-Access Facilities

Self-access centers need to take up the challenge of collaborative learning at the present time. In order to take up this challenge, a useful beginning might be to evaluate our self-access work along the individual-group continuum.