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Suggestopedia Methodin Learning Language

Suggestopedia

Suggestopedia is an educational method developed by the Bulgarian psychotherapist Georgi Lozanov. It is based on the idea that people learn more effectively when they are relaxed and receptive, often utilizing music, visual aids, and a positive atmosphere to enhance learning.

This method emphasizes the importance of a relaxed and positive learning environment. It aims to tap into the hidden potential of the human mind by using techniques that reduce stress and increase receptiveness. This approach often involves the use of classical music, comfortable seating, and engaging visual materials to create a conducive atmosphere for learning. Suggestopedia is particularly popular in language learning, where it helps students absorb new information more naturally and effortlessly. The method is based on the belief that the mind can retain and recall information more efficiently when it is in a state of relaxation and open to suggestion.

The Principles of Suggestopedia

According to Larsen, et.al. (2001), the principles of Suggestopedia method are summarised as follows:

1.	The goal

The term 'Suggestopedia', derived from suggestion and pedagogy, is often used loosely to refer to similar accelerated learning. The goal is to accelerate the process of language learning. In order to achieve this goal, the students’ psychological barriers must be minimized. And the students’ mental power must be maximized. Learners have commonly set a limit on their abilities. For instance, students may say, "Oh, it's too late for me, I am too old," or "How can I remember that amount? Nobody can!" Lozanov says that by using this method one can teach/ learn languages approximately three to five times as quickly as conventional methods

2.	The role of the teacher and the students

The relationship between the teacher and the students is like parents and children. The teacher is the authority in the classroom. He is sources having great authority. The students will retain information better from someone in whom they have confidence. Once, the students trust the teacher, they can feel more secure, they can be more spontaneous and less inhibited.

3.	Characteristics of the teaching/ learning process

The teaching- learning process of suggestopedia instruction is "learner-centred". The learning climate is established that is free from anxiety and cooperation within the group is perceived as supportive. The consciously designed learning environment, consisting, for example, of a bright, cheerfully decorated room, flowers, and a seating order which allows eye-contact among learners as well as maximum freedom of mobility is designed to increase the joy of learning and to create a positive learning environment. The learner is able to practise the material in a playful manner in order to be able to apply it freely and creatively in new contexts.

These exercises are designed to promote learning through life-like contexts.

4.	The nature of student-teacher, student-student interaction

The teacher initiates interactions with the whole group of students and with individuals from the beginning of the course. Later, the students initiate interaction themselves.

5.	The feelings of the students

Students are encouraged to be as “childlike” as possible, yielding all authority to the teacher. Students thus become “suggestible” (Brown, 2001: 27). A great deal attention is given to students’ feelings. One of the fundamental principles of the method is enhancing the students’ feelings of relax and confidence.

6.	The language skills that are emphasized

Speaking communicatively is emphasized. Lozanov states that the suggestopedic course directs the students to act communications.

7.	The role of the students’ native language

Native-language translation is used to make the meaning of the dialog clear. The teacher also uses the native language in the classroom when necessary. As the course proceeds, the teacher uses the native language less and less.

8.	The way the evaluation is accomplished

Evaluation is usually conducted on students’ normal in-class performance and not through formal tests, which would threaten the relaxed atmosphere considered essential for accelerated learning

9.	The way the teacher responds to student errors.

Errors are corrected gently, with the teacher using soft voice and smiley face.

The Procedure of Suggestopedic Instruction

Lozanov stated that learning is a matter of attitude, not aptitude. Some of the key elements of Suggestopedia include a rich sensory learning environment (pictures, colour, music, etc.), a positive expectation of success and the use of a varied range of methods: dramatised texts, music, active participation in songs and games, etc. Suggestopedia uses the following four stages:

1.	Presentation

It is a preparatory stage in which students are helped to relax and move into a positive frame of mind, with the feeling that the learning is going to be easy and fun. Physical exercises, mostly muscle tensing and relaxing, mind calming with music are done. Students are relaxed and immerse themselves in soft classical music while they visualize themselves first in a safe, calm place away from the classroom, then see themselves learning lesson material quickly and easily. After three or four minutes of this activity, the students return to their usual attentive state of awareness.

2.	First Concert - "Active Concert"

The instructional setting will be look like a living room, using a central round table and ordinary arm chairs surrounding the table. The classroom is bright and colourful. There are several posters on the wall. Some of them contain grammatical and vocabulary information. The teacher is lively, dynamic, confident, yet sensitive. All learners choose a new name and nationality; after which they are given a fictional autobiography.

This involves the active presentation of the material to be learnt. The teacher introduced the new dialogue for the week, reading the material aloud in a dramatic manner, pausing to translate new vocabulary as necessary. He reads the text at a normal speed, sometimes intoning some words, and the students follow. Then, it is followed by various kinds of activities: group or choral reading of the parts of the script, role play, singing, playing games. It uses lively pieces of classical music. Suggestopedia uses the power of pieces of classical music because of its artistically harmonized colourful melody, rhythm, and emotion that stimulates all levels of mind as it changes from time to time.

3.	Second Concert - "Passive Concert"

In this step, a state of relax is created. The students put down the script, close their eyes. The students are now invited to relax and listen to some Baroque music, with the text being read by the teacher very quietly in the background. The music is specially selected to bring the students into the optimum mental state for the effortless acquisition of the material. Suggestopedia uses baroque music pieces in the second or "passive" concert session, it never uses a "slow baroque" or a music piece written as "adagio".

4.	Practice

In this stage, the students finish off what they have learned with dramas, songs, games, puzzles, etc. to review and consolidate the learning. The students sing classical songs and play games, etc. while “the teacher acts more like a consultant.” The students spontaneously speak and interact in the target language without interruption or correction.

Effects of Suggestopedic Instruction

According to Gabriele Beitinger, the design of suggestopedic instruction has positive cognitive, motivational, emotional, and social effects. Individual differences between learners are taken into consideration as well, since the goal of suggestopedia is to give special help to those learners with somewhat more negative approach to learning, such as a high degree of anxiety.

1.	Cognitive effects: development of knowledge.

As explained above, suggestopedic instruction provides learners with learning environments which are comfortable. This is to increase learning resistance, to stimulate learning readiness, to make the learners feel relaxed, to foster hope and trust in their own power, to help the learners overcome the barriers to learning, to facilitate the learners to change input into intake. The students are exposed to situational exercises as well as to the complex, authentic system of the target language. It can be expected that this exposure has an especially positive effect on the development of listening comprehension and the ability to communicate in a foreign language in everyday situations.

2.	Motivational effects.

According to the motivational approach, the experience of enjoyment (intrinsic motivation) and competence in learning is the decisive factor in the development of long-term learning motivation. The playful design of many exercises in suggestopedic instruction is likely to produce such kind of experience, e.g. a joy of learning and curiosity. Therefore, we might expect an increase of intrinsic motivation during the course of suggestopedic instruction. As suggestopedic instruction offers frequent opportunities to select the activities according to personal interests or intent to apply the learning, learners should quite often experience the feeling of autonomy and self-determination. The manner in which different forms of practice are embedded in rich situational contexts helps the learner understand rather complex remarks even with a limited vocabulary. Experiences of success such as those are likely to frequently let learners experience a feeling of competence. Thus, overall, suggestopedic instruction can be expected to have positive motivational effects.

3.	Emotional effects: Anxiety.

In regard to emotional effects, one important way to facilitate the learning process of the learners is to reduce their nervousness and anxious tension. Suggestopedic instruction responds to this emotional need through the frequent use of relaxation exercises as well as through reducing nervousness in movement- oriented exercises. We can therefore assume that suggestopedic instruction has a positive effect on the emotional dimension of the learning process.

4.	Social effects.

By motivating independent groups of learners to work on a certain subject matter even after a corresponding course has ended ("groups of practice"), self-autonomous development of knowledge, especially on a long term basis, is promoted. A positive view of the shared process of learning is vital for the formation of such groups. Suggestopedic instruction frequently uses exercises which provide a high degree of social interaction and authentic communication. It is seen as very important that learners become acquainted with each other. Therefore, we can expect that students in a suggestopedic course will experience cooperation with other students as well as with the instructor in a positive way.

In practice

Physical surroundings and atmosphere in classroom are the vital factors to make sure that "the students feel comfortable and confident". Various techniques, including art and music, are used by the trained teachers. The lesson of Suggestopedia consisted of three phases at first: deciphering, concert session (memorization séance), and elaboration.

1.	Deciphering: The teacher introduces the grammar and lexis of the content. In most materials, the foreign language text is on the left half of the page with a translation on the right half, i.e. meanings are conveyed via the mother tongue not unlike the bilingual method.

2.	Concert session (active and passive): In the active session, the teacher reads the text at a normal speed, sometimes intoning some words, and the students follow. In the passive session, the students relax and listen to the teacher reading the text calmly. Music (" baroque”) is played in the background.

3.	Elaboration: The students finish off what they have learned with dramas, songs, and games. Then it has developed into four phases as lots of experiments were done: introduction, concert session, elaboration, and production.

a.	Introduction: The teacher teaches the material in “a playful manner” instead of analysing lexis and grammar of the text in a directive manner.

b.	Concert session (active and passive): In the active session, the teacher reads with intoning as selected music is played. Occasionally, the students read the text together with the teacher, and listen only to the music as the teacher pauses in particular moments. The passive session is done more calmly.

c.	Elaboration: The students sing classical songs and play games while “the teacher acts more like a consultant”

d.	Production: The students spontaneously speak and interact in the target language without interruption or correction.

Teachers

Teachers should not act in a directive way, although this method is teacher-controlled and not student-controlled. For example, they should act as a real partner to the students, participating in the activities such as games and songs “naturally” and “genuinely.”  In the concert session, they should fully include classical art in their behaviours. Although there are many techniques that the teachers use, factors such as “communication in the spirit of love, respect for man as a human being, the specific humanitarian way of applying their ‘techniques’” etc. are crucial. The teachers not only need to know the techniques and to acquire the practical methodology completely, but also to fully understand the theory, because, if they implement those techniques without complete understanding, they will not be able to lead their learners to successful results, or they could even cause a negative impact on their learning. Therefore, the teacher has to be trained in a course taught by certified trainers.

Here are the most important factors for teachers to acquire, as described by Lozanov:

1.	Covering a huge bulk of learning material.

2.	Structuring the material in the suggestopaedic way: global-partial – partial-global, and global in the part – part in the global, related to the golden proportion.

3.	As a professional, on one hand, and a personality, on the other hand, the teacher should be a highly-regarded professional, reliable and credible.

4.	The teacher should have, not play, a hundred percent expectation of positive results (because the teacher is already experienced even from the time of the teacher training course).

5.	The teacher should love his/her students (of course, not sentimentally but as human beings) and teach them with personal participation through games, songs, classical arts, and pleasure.

Journal of Education Humanities and Social Sciences

What are Suggestopedia method advantages and disadvantages?

When we talk about Suggestopedia, we are talking about a very peculiar learning and teaching methodology.

Advantages:

The first and biggest advantage is about the results. In fact, Suggestopedia speeds the acquisition process up by at least 6 times (up to 10 times, in many cases). This means people learn much faster and the acquisition is deeper compared to the acquisition process taking place with other methods.

1.	The amount of input students absorb during a suggestopedic course is much bigger compared to what they would acquire through other methods. This means people acquire more, in less time. The programme is dense. Suggestopedic teachers take beginner level students to the intermediate level in 72 hours.

2.	From the learners’ point of view, the acquisition process is a flow of enjoyable and playful activities, such as language games, music-based activities, dances and drama. Although the students are exposed to a huge amount of stimuli, they never feel under pressure, stressed or frustrated by this. The key point is that, in a suggestopedic lesson, students learn as smoothly as they did when they were little kids.

3.	No homework needed. This is another interesting feature. The acquisition process takes place during the classes only. The students don’t need to revise the lessons at home or to do homework.

4.	The method takes the students to absorb the target language and to become able to produce the target language in a creative and spontaneous way. During a classical, 72-hour, suggestopedic language course people absorb about 2,500 lexical units and can creatively put into use about 1,800 lexical units.

5.	It’s a good boost of self-confidence for the students! The whole learning experience is pleasant and enjoyable for the students involved. They learn a lot without effort and with joy. They link the learning of the target language with pleasant emotions and a joyful experience.

6.	It’s very creative and enjoyable to deliver! This comes from a teacher’s point of view.

Disadvantages:

1.	The overall framework is intense and requires the teacher to necessarily stick to it. One of the main reasons why many suggestopedic teachers are not delivering so many courses is down to the fact they need to respect the original framework, which means delivering about 3.5 hours of lesson a day over a month. The main difficulty many teachers encounter is related to the students’ actual availability. In fact, the students are supposed to attend the classes 5 days a week (on average) for 3.5 hours a day over a month. That’s pretty intense and not everybody can give such availability nowadays.

2.	The teacher must take a specific training and get certified in Suggestopedia. In other words, this is not the kind of method you learn about from books.

3.	The quantity of materials a suggestopedic teacher needs to prepare .It takes time to prepare everything : props, toys, exercises, activities, playlists, and so on.

4.	The training room should be a classroom specifically dedicated to the suggestopedic course. Also, it should be always the same during the whole course – no change of room whatsoever. Furthermore, it would be recommended to choose a welcoming room, looking more like a domestic living room, rather than a school classroom.

Conclusion

From the above discussion, some conclusions can be drawn. The goal of Suggestopedia is to accelerate the process of language learning. The relationship between the teacher and the students in suggestopedic instruction is like parents and children. The teaching- learning process is "learner-centred". The teacher initiates interactions with the whole group of students and with individuals from the beginning of the course. Later, the students initiate interaction themselves. One of the fundamental principles of the method is enhancing the students’ feelings of relax and confidence. The student errors are corrected gently, with the teacher using soft voice. Suggestopedia uses four main stages as follows: presentation, active concert, passive concert, and practice. Suggestopedic instruction has positive cognitive, motivational, emotional, and social effects on the learners.

References

Ahmed,R.(2024).Teaching methodology lecture:Suggestopedia. Sabratha University.

Brown, H. D. (2001). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy.

Fast Learning School. (n.d.). Fast Learning School. Retrieved from http://fastlearningschool.com.