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Narrativas coletadas por Francisco Quaresma de Figueiredo

 

Nome: Aline Ribeiro Pessôa
Idade: 45
Profissão: Professora universitária
Escolaridade: Mestre em Lingüística Aplicada
Tempo de aprendizagem da língua: a vida inteira  
Narrativa coletada por Francisco Figueiredo
 
The school in which I studied was founded by American Presbyterians, which means that classes were in Portuguese, but English was introduced since our first school days. This means that I began studying Englishwhen I was four years old.
 
My aunts and mom were among the first students of that school. My older brother had also studied there. That is, every single member of the staff knew my family very well. I remember that I had the feeling that I was not at school, but at home. From all my contacts with the English native speakers of my school, I was able to understand and appreciate the American culture. I saw that it was different from my own, yet to be respected.
 
From what I can remember I was totally motivated. I think that the main reason for being motivated was the fact that every time my mother talked to my brother in English, it meant that she did not want me to understand them. Of course, as the youngest of the family and as a curious child, I really wanted to understand them. Another reason for being motivated may be the fact that I loved listening to those old Frank Sinatra’s songs and also the famous pop groups of that time: The Beatles and The Platters. My brother, whom at that time I considered as intelligent as God, listened to them and sang those songs perfectly!.
 
I was growing and learning English and I remember my mother kept on saying that one day the secrets she shared with my brother would not be secrets any longer. I can also remember that every time she said things such as these, I became very proud of myself.
 
The behaviourist learning theory was the dominant psychological theory of that time, the 60s. Thus, I had the opportunity to practice making the correct response to a given stimulus. I imitated models of correct language and received positive reinforcement if they were correct and negative reinforcement if they were incorrect. This made me struggle to be correct as much as possible. 
 
At that time, I had to drill, drill and drill. I remember drilling folk songs - KKK Kate; Twinkle, twinkle little star, and others. That was the method of the time and, in one sense, it is remarkable the fact that I felt sympathy for all my teachers and that I have never considered my classes as a tedious experience.
 
My attempts to make use of my L2 knowledge engaged me in some errors. I remember a written test in which I had to write a composition using the simple past. As soon as I finished counting the words I discovered there were more words than requested. I did not intend to write less than what I had written, so I thought I could use contractions in order to make the composition smaller. So all my “there were” became “there’re” and “there was” became “there’s”. Of course, my grade was poor but it served as a learning lesson: I "found out" there is no contraction for ‘there to be’ in the past.
 
In terms of learning strategies I think I can say that I used behavioural and mentalist strategies. Behavioural strategies because I always repeated new words aloud to help me remember them. Mental strategies were used too, as it was common to use the linguistic or situational context to infer the meaning of a new word. Another strategy I used was phonological avoidance. I remember that every time I wanted to say “I think” because of the difficulty of the ‘th’ English sound I always replaced it by “I consider”. Finally, when all else fails I simply used my native language.
 
I also remember a technique I employed to develop my vocabulary in the target language. There was a church near my house. I cannot remember which one it was but many English native speakers attended church service there. I used to search for them just to talk. While walking back home I tried to memorize the whole utterances from the previous speech. On the following Sunday, I produced the utterances I had memorized.
 
At that time I was a thirteen-year-old girl living in Salvador and every English native speaker I met used to give me compliments on my “beautiful English”. Of course I was very proud of that. Today I understand the reason for so many compliments. Most bahianos who speak English have bahiano’s accent and intonation but I think my accent was not a bahiano's one. In fact, I was just trying to understand all the secrets my brother and mother shared and I was very much motivated. And the more I learned the more motivated I became.
 
During those years there was clear evidence of development taking place, but unfortunately we had to move and it was impossible to get in touch to any English native speaker but the old ones who worked at my school and who insisted in not speaking in a normal speech. That is, they always translated the words they were aware were new to me without giving me time to work out meanings. Also, due to our differences in age, there was not much to talk about, except those predictable utterances: "Oh! How is your mother?" or "Is Irene (one of my aunts) fine?"
 
Time passed by and I was about 17 when I applied for a job at an English course and only there I realized there were some aspects of the target language, which I was far from mastering. There were many English native speakers all around and the only thing I could do was to hide myself from them. At that time, what worried me the most was that my production was severely limited and was quite lacking in speed and spontaneity.
 
During that period, I noticed that when the native speakers were talking to each otherthey spoke informally, using colloquial expressions which I had never been taught. Also, I realized I had fossilized some English sounds which I considered difficult to utter. However, I was sure that I could overcome my problems, so I began studying, all by myself; paying attention to the pronunciation, to the rhythm and to the intonation of those native teachers. I also engaged in private speech trying to repeat mentally every single dialogue I had listened to during the day.
 
As I had noticed how my interlanguagediffered from the target language phonological rules and I was really interested in mastering the language I decided to use some recorded materials which I listened at home. I thought that attitude would be a nice way of improving my accuracy in listening. I also recorded myself producing the same texts I had listened to. Afterwards, I compared my utterances to those from the tapes. My goal was to produce utterances exactly as a native speaker.
 
A year later I quit from that English school because I was too busy studying for my university entrance examination. Then, as my university course was a very difficult one, Chemistry, I had no time at all to think about my English skills. Probably I was happy with myself. I was able to understand my brother and my mother and the songs of the time: Skyline pigeon, Daniel, Lucy in the sky with diamonds, Imagine, If (old good days, good memories!)
 
Two years later, I got married, moved to Brasília and changed my course to Letters -English and Literature - at the University of Brasília. During those years I do not remember facing any problem in communicating to my professors and colleagues. I was ranked among the best students and soon got my diploma.
 
I started working as an English teacher and only ten years later I had the opportunity to  visit New York where I experienced some problems in saying what I wanted to say. In order to overcome those problems I resorted to various kinds of communication strategies. For example, I avoided problematic items such as the passive. If I did not know a word in the target language I knew I could not borrow a word from my native language, so I used another target language word that was approximate in meaning and I also tried to paraphrase meanings. My New Yorker interlocutors indicated when they had not understood me and, in the course of so doing, I was able to model the correct target language forms. Thus, I received relevant input to aspects of pronunciation and intonation which I had not yet fully mastered.
 
Finally, I acquired the ability to survive orally and as a result my confidence boosted.
 
Some years later, I started working at an English as a foreign language course named Independent British Institute -IBI- and there I felt as if I were in a natural setting again. As an IBI teacher ‘incidental learning’ took place when I picked up L2 knowledge through exposure, especially during the rehearsals of the IBI plays.
 
Some months later, Sarah Walker, the headmaster, invited the teachers to participate in a new Cambridge examination paper, directed for teachers (Cambridge Examination in English for Language Teachers). She herself organized a course, as a preparation for this examination. I attended it because I was convinced I could benefit from it. So, among other things I had to write many 500-word compositions whose topics were related to the field of teaching English as a foreign language. The grades of these compositions were awarded for relevant content and how it was organized; range and appropriacy of language as well as the correct use of grammar, vocabulary, spelling and punctuation.
 
Having to write these compositions, I noticed some gaps in my interlanguage. Thus, as I knew how these compositions would be meticulously corrected, I tried out some rules to see whether they would lead to successful communication or whether it would elicit negative feedback.
 
Some of the strategies I used during this period are described below:
·        Repetition: every time Mrs. Walker corrected someone else, saying anything in a correcting tone, I repeated.
·        Answer in unison: during group sessions, every time Mrs. Walker asked anything I responded aloud with others.
·        Talk to self: I used to practice in the target language by engaging in verbal behavior directed to myself.
·        Monitoring: most of the time I was able to recognize and correct my own errors in vocabulary and grammar. I remember a situation in which I said “hung” and hoping Mrs. Walker would not have heard, I immediately corrected to “hanged”.
·        Appeal for assistance: every time I felt insecure, or realized I did not know the correct term or structure, I spontaneously asked a peer or Mrs. Walker herself.
·        Request for clarification: if I could not understand an utterance I just asked the speaker to explain.
 
Since then I have been taking advantages of the services put at my disposal for professional improvement
such as seminars and workshops. I read a lot, participate in professional discussion at meetings and
contribute to language-teaching journals. Sometimes I chat on the Internet to native speakers. I also watch
CNN and I love watching good films with no subtitles.
 
The funny part of the story is that nowadays I help my brother with his English!