The role of an experiential component in the analytic classrooms of minority-language students

This study, undertaken in the classrooms of minority-language students in French-language schools in Montréal, aims to test Stern's (1990, 1992) proposal for integrating analytic and experiential teaching strategies in second language pedagogy. A related objective seeks to establish the pedagogical orientation of instructional practices during French language arts as being more analytically--or more experientially--focused and to describe the setting from the perspective of these culturally and linguistically diverse students for whom French is a second language. Research procedures entailed the implementation of an integrated activity--journal writing with differential feedback (form-focused, content-based, and a combination of form-focused and content-based)--in four Grade 5 classrooms (N = 112 in total) for approximately four months of one academic year. Twenty-four classroom observations that included coding with the COLT observation scheme and taking fieldnotes were also carried out, and individual interviews were conducted with students, teachers, and administrators. Throughout the study, the francophone students in the participating classrooms acted as a comparison group. The study demonstrated that minority-language students' home cultures and the potentially positive role of the mother tongue in second language learning were not well understood in this context of submersion. COLT findings and qualitative outcomes triangulated to reveal instructional practices that were more inclined towards an analytic than towards an experiential approach to teaching. For both groups of students, MANOVA results indicated no significant effects for quantity of production, accuracy, and overall effectiveness in the journal writing as a function of differential feedback; behavioural and attitudinal data proved helpful in the interpretation of these statistical outcomes. A qualitative analysis of various aspects of the journals' contents revealed that the activity had been a communicative and experiential one for minority-language and francophone students, irrespective of feedback condition. On this level, the study confirmed the value of integrating an experiential component into existing classroom pedagogy in which the analytic approach dominates, thereby bringing a better overall balance to the curriculum.