Entry # 6 Learning vs Acquisition

Personally, I believe that I do a lot of things in my classroom that support both the learning and acquisition theory of developing language or a second language.  To show how the learning and acquisition theories look in a classroom here is the completed activity from Essential Linguistics (Freeman and Freeman, 2004):

 The student activities represent a good mix between both theories and most of the activities are beneficial to students.  Activities that are based on rules, studying and direct instruction support the learning theory.  The purpose is to correctly apply the rules and instruction in order to reinforce all of the learning.  Activities that are acquired from experience, practice, and different applications are acquisition activities.  Students focus on using the skills they've learned to apply to the new language.  They key to acquisition is use, use, and use in order to understand!  As observed above, some activities can fit into both categories. 


I believe that teachers should incorporate activities from both theories in order to help students learn the rules, practice them, incorporate them, and authenticate them.