and study abroad. The work on lingua franca and multicompetence has
hopefully contributed to making language users and FL teachers less guilty
(and obsessed) about not sounding like native speakers.Chuming Wang is careful in his assessment of the contribution of
research to education practices:
In general,findings from AL research have contributed to our under-
standing of the L2 learning process and those factors relating to language
teaching. And this understanding can inform L2 teaching practice to
some extent. For example, the interaction-based research has deepened
our understanding of the L2 learning process andfindings in this area
have improved classroom instruction.Jim Lantolf and Norbert Schmitt feel that the impact of AL on teaching
should go through teacher education and they are not too positive about
this. In their view, too much time is spent onfluency and pedagogy rather
than on the development of a deep insight into the target language. Most
of the informants agree that major changes through newly educated and begin-
ning teachers are unlikely: theyfirst have to survive in classes and are typically
“domesticated”by their colleagues, who see no reason to change. Referring to
the situation in Spain, María del Pilar García Mayo mentions that there are
relevant researchfindings on interaction and task-based approaches, but they
have little impact because teachers are not aware of them. She sees it as the
applied linguists’ task tofill the gap between research and teaching by
reaching out to the teacher community. She also sees possibilities for gen-
erativist linguistics to contribute to educational issues, as recent research on
this topic has shown.
Howard Nicholas sees a positive development in this respect:“There is
also an acknowledgement that the practice in teaching is not just a matter of
implementing researchfindings, because the teaching profession has its own
complexities that need to be engaged with.”Carmen Munoz is careful in her
assessment of the impact of communicative language teaching:
To a certain extent, communicative language teaching principles have
been adopted in syllabi of educational systems in many countries,
though this has not always led to an improvement of language education.
Task-based language teaching, though still with limited implementation,
seems promising, as seems aptitude treatment interaction.The impact on teaching takes place through textbooks, according to Nor-
bert Schmitt. Most teachers faithfully follow the textbook and there could
be a washback effect by improving the textbooks on the basis of research
findings. Still, even then William Grabe’s point remains: how is that
renewed textbook used in different types of classrooms?
The impact of AL research 127