Teaching Language through Content, Learning Takes Place in Social Interaction,

• Teaching Language through Content.

Researchers say that children learn language through language, this means that classes can be taught through academic content. As teachers, we should give examples of content-based instruction for English learners.

This content theory comes from Krashen's second language acquistition theory. He argues that students acquire language when they receive comprehensible input that contains items slighlty beyond their present level of proficiency. The input can come from reading or from listening.

Teaching English is not something new. As Brinton points out, most early language learning came when travelers or scholars recognized the need to learn a new language to meet daily needs or to engage in studies of texts written in foreign languages.

Another example of teaching language through content comes from immersion education, for example, teachers focus on academic content and use a number of techniques to make the content accessible to students who have limited proficiency in the language of instruction.

• Learning Takes Place in Social Interaction.

Second and foreing language educators have debated the role social interaction plays in language development. Krashen presented a model that describes how individuals acquired when students receive comprehensible input (messages they understand) that contains language structures that are slighlty in advance of their present ability level.

Although Krashen acknowledges the role of social interaction in the development of thinking.

Social interaction benefits:

1. Group work increases language practice opportunities.
2. Group work improves the quality of student talk.
3. Group work helps individualize instruction.
4. Group work promotes a possitive affective climate.
5. Group work motivates learners, and they take risks.

• Faith in the Learner Expands Students Potential.

As teachers, we have to believe in our students potential abilities to improve themselves. We have to be mentors, who have faith in him and believe in them.

Teachers need to continue to engage their students in meaningful activities. If we show our students that they can learn and that there are things in school worth learning, there is no limit to their potential. We may insist that they work harder, and they may imply that the students are either lazy or not smart enough.