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The Pragmatics Action Maze

Tom Salsbury
Tecnológico de Monterrey, Mexico City, Mexico

Level: High intermediate to advanced

Time: 50 minutes

Resources: Preferably one computer for each group of three students

Goals: To learn to navigate requests by identifying pragmatically appropriate language


Description of the Activity
This activity was developed using the authoring software Toolbook. In this activity, called an action maze, students are asked to navigate two requests. The computer functions as a platform from which the situations, participants, and actual wording of the requests is presented. Using the information presented to them, students come to a consensus in small groups as to an appropriate course of action. In other words, students agree on what to do next and then click an icon to take them to the next screen. The action the students take may involve the particular timing of a request, the medium of the request (e-mail, telephone, in person), and the wording used to make the request. Students are helped in navigating the action maze through the advice of the Idea Man, a clickable icon on each page that provides specific politeness strategies in each of the situations that the students encounter.

The protagonist in the pragmatics action maze is an international undergraduate in his first year of studies. Students are told that the protagonist's father is coming to the United States on an unexpected business trip. Unfortunately, the visit coincides with a paper that is due the following Monday, and the protagonist must ask his economics professor for an extension on the paper. Students work in groups to choose both the timing and wording of the request. As illustrated in Figure 1, students may opt-out of the request initially.

Figure 1. Opting-out of a request

A Paper for Dr. Smith

Hey! Click me, The Idea Man, for some help...

Your professor is at her desk reading through her notes. Class starts in a minute or two.

In this particular screen, the Idea Man (the online help) provides minimal guidance, as illustrated in Figure 2.
Figure 2. The Idea Man: Opting-out of a request.

If students opt-out of the request (wait until after class), they discover that, in fact, the professor is busy with other students and that the request must be made either during the professor's office hour or by e-mail. After deciding the medium of the request, students choose the most appropriate wording for the request from a choice of three. Figure 3 illustrates the three choices that the students are presented if they go to the professor's office. The screen also presents the clickable icon for the Idea Man.
Figure 3. Making the request.

Hi, Dr. Smith, are you busy...? Umm, my father called me yesterday to
say that he'd be coming here this weekend on an unexpected business trip
and would like to visit with me. I know that we have our paper due on
Monday, but I was just wondering if it would be okay if I handed it in on
Tuesday instead.

Hi, Dr. Smith, are you busy? I'm going to hand my paper in to you on
Tuesday instead of Monday because my father is visiting me this weekend,
and I'd really like to see him. So is that okay?

I'm sorry to bother you, Dr. Smith. You know the paper that's due on
Monday? Well, do you think I could hand it in on Tuesday? My father
is visiting me this weekend, and since the paper is not really a major
assignment, I thought it wouldn't matter too much if I handed it in a day or
two late.

The Idea Man in this screen provides more explicit advice for choosing the right wording for the request, as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4. The Idea Man: Choosing the right words for a request.

In the second action maze, the protagonist is faced with the task of negotiating a request for a ride to the supermarket from a fellow student. Working in groups, students are presented with alternatives, such as opting out of the request initially or getting to the point right away. The actual language involved in making the request involves prefaces, such as, "Are you busy right now?" or "I was wondering if I could ask for a favor?" Since the fellow classmate is busy studying for a test the following day, students must carefully navigate the timing and wording of the request if they are to get the ride.

Both action mazes are followed by summary activities and questions for homework and discussion. Students are asked to relate the situations presented in the action maze to their own experiences. One homework activity asks students to interview other Americans on how they would make requests under similar circumstances. They are then to summarize their findings for the class.

1. Procedure
   Poll students for situations in which they make requests. Identify those that have the greatest face-threat (Brown & Levinson, 1987) and design situations that illustrate various ways in which the request could be handled (successfully and unsuccessfully). Include a way for students to opt out of the request. The teacher can provide guidance through some sort of online help. The design of the action maze can be as simple as presenting only text to incorporating relevant graphics and sound into the program.
   
   
2. If several computers are available, divide students into groups of three and assign each group to a computer. The program can be loaded onto the computers before class. If only one computer is available, the activity can be done as a whole class.
   
   
3. Tell students to work together to read each situation, clarify any problems that a group member may have with the language, and come to a consensus on what course of action to take. Make it clear that only one student in each group is allowed to use the computer. That person should be explicitly told not to advance to the next screen of the action maze until all members of the group have agreed on a specific course of action.
   
   
4. Suggestions for follow-up activities could include role playing the scenario as it played out in a particular group, discussing what went wrong if the students did not successfully manage the action maze (were not granted the request), or reviewing the entire action maze as a class.

Rationale
A growing body of literature in the area of computer-assisted language learning (CALL) has addressed the notion of using the computer in the language classroom to enhance group activities and communication (Sivert & Egbert, 1995; Seedhouse, 1996). In this activity, the computer acts as a platform from which the instructor can present stimulating situations for students to work on together, thus enhancing the discussion and collaboration typical of the communicative classroom.

The same activity could be prepared, without the use of the computer, using a numbered stack of cards. Students progress through the stack by advancing to a new numbered card (e.g., "If you say, 'No, thank you,' then go to card 33"). However, authoring software and HTML replace the stack of paper cards with a more comprehensive activity in a much more manageable format. Using the computer as a platform allows students to easily retrace a certain course of action or simply start over and interact with the maze a second or third time. Online help with pragmatic language in specific situations can be presented via clickable icons or other links, all of which can be programmed by the instructor.

The classroom should provide language learners with reasons why speakers of the target language select different request forms and information about the content or level of imposition of the request (Bardovi-Harlig, 1996, p. 8).

Pedagogical textbooks often lack such information, making it all the more imperative that students, as part of the communicative classroom experience, have an opportunity to practice careful face work, including indirectness and modifications to their speech in making requests (Ellis, 1992).
An action maze presents opportunities for students to interact using language appropriate to high-imposition requests, and receiving immediate feedback on their efforts. This is accomplished without negative consequences to them, a luxury not normally found in real situations. Online help, such as the Idea Man programmed into this activity, enables students to understand why certain forms are preferred over others in a particular situation and what the level of imposition may be in a given situation (e.g. the complicating factor in the second action maze was that the acquaintance had a test the next day). In sum, the computer aids in the presentation of different contextualized request forms, indicates the level of imposition of the request, and provides immediate feedback on the likely consequences of choosing one linguistic form or course of action over another.

Caveats and reflections
I have been using this activity in my ESL and EFL classes for more than four years and have found it works equally well in both teaching environments. Advances in computer technology and greater access to computers in the classroom have made it easier to administer this type of activity. Fortunately, the version of Toolbook used to program this activity (Toolbook 4.0) functions easily in Windows 98 and Windows 2000.

Web-based action mazes are the best alternative to purchasing and working with authoring software. An action maze can easily be developed using HTML, and with so many options available for designing web pages, an instructor could design a very elaborate action maze incorporating sound and graphics. The interested reader should search for action mazes already in existence on the web.
Teachers should not be dissuaded by the initial time and effort needed to develop an action maze for the computer. The task gets easier as subsequent mazes are developed. Later efforts can use the same links and design concept as the original. In other words, one action maze functions as a template for further development.

References
Bardovi-Harlig, K. (1996). Pragmatics and language teaching: Bringing pragmatics and pedagogy together. In L. F. Bouton (Ed.), Pragmatics and language learning, (Vol. 7, pp. 21-39). University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign: Division of English as an International Language

Brown, P., & Levinson, S. C. (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Ellis, R. (1992). Learning to communicate in the classroom: A study of two language learners' requests. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 14, pp. 1-23.

Seedhouse, P. (1996). Communicative CALL: Focus on the interaction produced by CALL software. On Call, 10:3, pp. 10-17.

Sivert, S., & Egbert, J. (1995). Using a language learning environment framework to build a computer-enhanced classroom. College ESL, 5, pp. 53-66.

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