FSFI Conference

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PRESENTATION FSFI Conference 12th May 2011
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Awareness - rather than perfection in oral
production

• Grammar for reflection on communicative acts,
  rather than neurosis about grammatical nicety.
• Need for pilots/ATCs to be aware of the language
  they are using.
• Current EFL pedagogy does not favour explicit
  metalinguistic instruction

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Standard ESP pedagogy

• needs-based language competency training with
  more learner-centred pedagogical approaches

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Refined Pedagogy
Enhancing pilots' metalinguistic awareness and
especially for pilots whose L1 differs from
English as much as does Russian
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No understanding of relevant grammatical
structures
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Miscommunication
miscommunication at least 11 of fatal airplane
crashes worldwide in the period of 1982-1991
(Ritter, 1996, p. 7A)
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Tenerife
Date March 1977
Fatalities 583
Injuries 61
Cause Miscommunication
Code switching in a grammatical/syntax level
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Kazakhstan Airlines? Ilyushin 76 Kazakhstan Airlines? Ilyushin 76
Date December 1972
Fatalities 351
Injuries 0
Cause Miscommunication
General lack of English Language Operational
Proficiency
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Urumqi, China Urumqi, China
Date November 1993
Fatalities 351
Injuries 0
Cause Lack of English
English Phrasal verb not understood What does
Pull up, pull up? means?
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AVIANCA Flight 52 AVIANCA Flight 52
Date January 1990
Fatalities 72
Injuries multiple
Cause Miscommunication
Use of ambiguous expressions/Problem with nuance
in English landing priority, , fuel
priority, , I think we need priority,
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High Stakes Communication Training
Requires more than just that task specific
competency.
Requires an enhanced metalinguistic awareness.
Requires explicit emphasis on grammatical
structures
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Metalinguistic Awareness
Increases pilots awareness of potentiality for
miscommunication
Provides pilots with ability to interactively
eliminate possible miscommunication
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Metalinguistic Awareness and Instruction
Currently EFL pedagogy dominated by Implicit
instructional types
Explicit Instruction requiring rule explanation
increases metalinguistic awareness
Explicit instruction should not be
decontextualized from Target Language Situation
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Metalinguistic Awareness and Pilots / ATCs
Explicit Instruction requiring rule explanation
increases metalinguistic awareness
Increased metalinguistic awareness increases
noticing ability
noticing ability is one of the crucial mechanisms
in the negotiation process.
metalinguistic skills enable us to talk about
language, analyze it, think about it, separate it
from context, and judge it.
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The Future
Will a new approach increase safety?