Comenius’s views on Language education

◆Abstract：The most prominent contribution made by Comenius on foreign language teaching is that pictures began to be introduced into teaching； He is often regarded as the founder of the “language teaching method”.Since then，the language teaching method has become an independent science subject.In this paper，several aspects about language education illustrated by Comenius would be presented as follows： to begin with，its imperative to know the role of mother tongue played，the nature of language as well as the relationship between language and culture.Then comes how to learn language and principles on language teaching such as principle of intuitive learning and periodic principle and so on.In addition，the role of textbook together with the selection，organization and explanation of teaching content is discussed too.Finally，teacher-student interaction and how to treat errors is also referred.

◆Key words：learning language；Comeniuss view；teach language

1 Mother tongue plays the central role

Comenius argues that “To teach a person who has not mastered his own national language to learn a foreign language is to teach a person who has not yet learned to walk learning to ride a horse...Our teaching method has proved the point that its appropriate for a person who is unknown to his native language to learn Latin，and national language mastery play a guided and beneficial role in learning another language.” Therefore，Comenius put forward that mother tongue should be the first one to learn，and its very vital to master another foreign language after mastering that，especially the neighboring language.

2 Nature of Language

Language is divine，as is confirmed by the Bible.Therefore，he advocates Hebrew as the mother of all languages.And language is a tool for defining things and expressing ideas，all languages may be created on the basis of the same grammatical rules，which exists and arises from Hebrew.So he gradually had an idea to create a kind of perfect general language and artificial language- “Panglottie”.

3 The relationship between language and culture

Learning a language is not only connected with ancient culture，but learning the “necessary” language： the mother tongue to deal with domestic office，followed by “neighboring countries language” that is necessary to connect with neighboring countries.” That is to say，the purpose of learning language is to enter the daily culture of another nation，or to enter ancient culture through Latin or Greek.

4 How to learn language

a）Comenius believes that children imitate their mother or nurse family，teachers to learn their mother tongue，and they learn the words by meaning，in turn meaning transfers words to the brain.

b）The way people learn language is not so much by rules as by use.However，the rules should not be ignored either in academic language or in general language.

c）Comenius holds the pinion that “If learning is carried out under the guidance of others，then errors can be corrected immediately and there are many opportunities to speak，at last learners can better master language.”

d）Comenius opposites personalized learning and advocates mutual learning and mutual teaching，in which Students who have good talent and learn well are taught teach poor students in the way of mutual teaching，and students are urged to be divided into 10 groups and one person is nominated as group leader.

5 Principles on language teaching

5.1 Principle based on students ability

He stressed that the level of students physical and mental development should be respected.He pointed out that some of the famous works could not be placed in front of the children，because it was beyond the ability of understanding children. He once said “Teach them to babbling prior to teaching them to speak； Before you make a speech，learn to speak first.”Teaching content must be adapted to the level of students understanding，and it cannot pose difficulties to students in the aspect of understanding.

5.2 Principle of intuitive teaching

He holds the view that teaching and learning words should always be combined with objects，and “words must be interpreted on the basis of the objects it represents.” Besides，language teaching is related with practical things in life，which not only can enable students to master the language but to promote the students cognition of the objective world.

5.3 Periodic principle and Progressive principle

Not all languages should be studied accurately，but the mother tongue and Latin should be thoroughly learned.And to accomplish different teaching tasks at different stages，language learning process should be divided into four stages according to different stages of physical and psychological characteristics of children.Learning difficulty increases gradually in the aspect of listening，speaking，reading and writing，based on the goal of which he designed corresponding textbooks.

6 The Role of textbook

The success of its teaching principles is inseparable from the unique teaching materials used.The teaching material is regarded as a basic element in the teaching activities.It is impossible to teach students in accordance with their aptitude，and cannot complete the teaching activities satisfactorily without it.In addition，he wrote a lot of textbooks such as Janua Linguarum Reserata and Vestibulum.Orbis Sensualium Pictus is the first graphic language textbook we have known so far mainly for toddlers.

7 Selection of teaching content

Editors of the textbook choose teaching content.The cognition of a language need to master basic element of the language including the basic vocabulary，grammatical rules and basic syntactic structure.He applied the principle of parallel relations first between things and words in Orbis Sensualium Pictus by using illustration to express meaning.

8 Organization and explanation of teaching content

Learning is a circular movement.So it is not necessary to teach students new learning contents every time，but the contents of every lesson should be the development of prior knowledge.The explanation of grammar should be examples firstly，followed by rule，and then comes practice or imitation.

9 Teacher-student interaction

Comenius disagree that taking the students ability as a criterion to divide them into different classes.By contrast，he argues that putting top students，average students and poor students in the same class is more beneficial to students learning.In this way，top students can help poor students，and they will lose upward mobility because of the existence of average students.

10 Treat language errors

It is unavoidable for students to make mistakes in the process of learning a foreign language.But the teacher must correct the mistakes of the students immediately and promptly，otherwise those mistakes will form the erroneous habit.Therefore，the teacher should only offer some correct normative examples to let them imitate，do some practices which is appropriate to their level and ability as well as repeating systematically as much as possible.

11 Conclusion

Comenius made great achievements in foreign language teaching.For example，his intuitive teaching cultivates learners capacity for independent thinking，his mutual teaching and mutual learning solves the problem of students capacity and improves learning efficiency，etc.All in all，Comeniuss learning theory and teaching theory are still available for our reference and study.

Bibliography

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作者簡介

朱金裕（1995—），女，漢族，江西萍鄉人，學生，單位：江西師范大學；研究方向：二語習得。