REFLECTIONS ON ASSIGNMENT 4

Reflections on Assignment 4

• For the last group assignment, we were given four questions related to corpus linguistics and were asked to select one question for a 5-page written assignment. We chose the second question “What are some of the advantages of using corpora in language teaching?” for the assignment and started our research immediately after we decided the topic.
• We knew, many students would choose this topic since it looked easy to do. Thus, it was challenging for us as we always wanted to come up with different and better ideas than the other groups and strived to get the highest marks.
• When we went through this assignment, we found that this is the most difficult assignment for this course. Maybe it was difficult because corpora consist of such a huge area of language that information about them made us confused.
• We went to the library to find some books suggested by our lecturer about corpus but unfortunately, all good books had been borrowed. So, we turned to the internet. In our case, (perhaps we did not use the right engine to find about corpora in language teaching), we found more information about using corpora in language learning rather than specifically in language teaching.
• In order to solve this problem, we tried to change all the materials about using corpora in language learning to language teaching. Language teaching is related to language learning, isn’t it?
• We found it also difficult to start our work because the sources from the internet are limited and most internet journals do not provide information about the advantages of using corpora. This required us to think independently to relate corpora with language teaching as well as its benefits to teachers and learners.
• We faced other problems such as difficulty in getting the important points relevant to the assignment and trouble to determine the journals that can be used as references. However, after going through the assignment together, we were able to finish it on time.
• Even though this assignment was difficult, through our gathering and reading information processes, we got the opportunity to learn more about corpus linguistics.