Request Strategies: Learners’ Choice Versus Native Speakers’ Choice

 

 

Nilawati Hadisantosa

 

 

The present study attempts to investigate the following questions: (a) What do teachers need to know when they start teaching 'request strategies' and (b) What do teachers have to attain as the goal of the instruction? The scope of the study is limited to how to help learners of English to be near- native, especially when they handle request strategies. The investigation is based on Blum-Kulka et al’s (1984) framework, consisting of nine request strategies. It aims at finding how the strategies are distributed in different types of interaction, that is, which of the nine choices are predominant across different types of interactions. The objectives of the investigation are two fold. The first is to find out native speakers' choice in the request strategies, and the second is to get a comprehensive picture of the learners' choice. The findings of the first can contribute to help teachers understand what learners intend to attain. The findings of the second can shed lights into giving them some ideas of where to start to help learners achieve near-native competence, especially in making 'requests'.

 

 

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Hadisantosa, N. (2005, April). Request strategies: Learners’ choice versus native speakers’ choice. Paper presented at the RELC International Seminar, Singapore.

 

 

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