Name: Video 2: Angel and Devil Debate: Grammar Translation
Uploaded: 2015-12-07T02:17:57.963Z
Duration: 3 min 51 s

[MUSIC]

Welcome back from your visit to 1880.

Did you enjoy the grammar translation approach and that dear old professor?

Have any of you had this kind of instruction?

Maybe not, but perhaps you recognize him a bit in teachers you have known.

As you could tell from our visit, the teachers in the grammar translation

approach valued the historical and cultural aspects of languages.

And that being able to read and translate language opened up new

worlds of literature they wouldn't normally have access to.

>> [LAUGH] Culture, my eye.

Boring, boring.

I wanted to poke my eyes out, or at least poke someone's eyes out.

[SOUND] >> Of course you would find it boring,

you lazy sack of do-nothing.

The grammar translation approach holds students to high standards.

Not only standards of conduct, such as proper etiquette, but

high standards of commitment and a belief that there is something to learn from

other cultures that we can and should understand.

It isn't just about language, it is about becoming something worthwhile,

which is something, let's admit, you would never understand.

We aren't just learning about words, we are letting these words guide

our behavior, and give us an understanding of human nature.

>> Who, what, huh?

Oh, were you talking?

[LAUGH] Were you actually agreeing to be a student in a class like that?

It doesn't change anyone's behavior reading old dusty books

that no one relates to anymore.

And the very idea of learning a language that is dead is ridiculous.

Dead.

The language is dead, and the ideas are dead.

And oh my, I am asleep.

>> [APPLAUSE] Bravo, bravo.

Quite the performance.

You are pretending to be passionate, but

what you really are is exactly the opposite.

You don't believe that literature and art can really move people.

And you don't really believe that learning a language,

even a dead language can be a way to be moved.

You are a slug.

>> Pretty boy.

>> Hater.

[SOUND] >> Teacher's pet.

[SOUND] >> Regardless of your view,

the grammar translation approach presents an opportunity for

you to think about language in terms of a historical lens.

Not only is it an older approach, but

the approach itself demonstrates to the learner a way to look back in history and

see what historical treasures can be found.

By looking at language through the lens of literature, grammar, and

culture, we get a sense of what truly mattered to our dear old professor.

In the next video, we'll take a look at some of the things language

teachers have learned from the grammar translation approach.

Believe it or not, there are things we still do today

that have been handed down to us by those wonderful teachers of yesteryear.

See you then.

[MUSIC]

Video 2: Angel and Devil Debate: Grammar Translation

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