Abstract
Every day, thousands of adults gather in classrooms, union halls, church basements, and the like to learn a second language. In addition to the characteristics of the learners and the purposes they have set for their learning, an understanding of how language should be taught colours the way they work. Such understandings or ‘approaches’, reflecting the culture and climate of the time and place, are the main topic of this discussion. Specifying ‘teaching’ in the topic narrows the scope to learning opportunities deliberately provided in formal settings, although many L2 learners do all or most of their learning on their own. This factor implies the influence of educational institutions, governments, or non-governmental organizations and relationships in which certain people are designated as teachers. The importance of specifying second language (L2), as opposed to minority or foreign languages, and adults, as opposed to children, will be discussed below.
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Burnaby, B. (1997). Second Language Teaching Approaches for Adults. In: Tucker, G.R., Corson, D. (eds) Encyclopedia of Language and Education. Encyclopedia of Language and Education, vol 4. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4419-3_10
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