But how can we encourage ‘noticing’...?
As above, some people just don’t ‘notice’. Perhaps students do not pay enough attention, or they are not looking for differences in what is said and what they might say because they feel that they already have enough knowledge to communicate. Whatever the reason I, as a teacher, feel it is important to encourage ‘noticing’ and always recommend language learners to look out for or listen out for language they have learnt in real-life situations, preferably in authentic use, be it in a newspaper, a podcast, on social media. Noticing what they have already learnt can, as above, not only consolidate knowledge but also have a big impact on motivation.
One way we can introduce our students to the idea of noticing is by helping them become aware of the possible reasons they don’t notice, be it, as above, lack of attention, lack of understanding or lack of desire. Knowing this can help get them into the habit of doing it. In addition to this, using a combination of error correction, providing the target language in authentic contexts and exposing them to lots of examples of the language in use can evolve their noticing ability. If we build this skill in the classroom hopefully it can become second nature outside of the classroom.
