Ludger Schiffler

Ludger Schiffler (born February 11, 1937 in Frankfurt am Main ) is a German didactic and Romance studies .

Life

After completing his studies in Romance studies and classical philology in Frankfurt am Main and Paris , Schiffler taught French and Latin in Mühlheim am Main (1963–1971). At the same time, he took the subjects of educational science and educational psychology at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt. His doctorate took place in 1969 with an empirical study on the effectiveness of audio-visual French teaching. From 1969 to 1971 he trained French trainee lawyers as Director of Studies and Head of Department.

In 1971 he was offered the AH6 professorship for didactics of French language and literature at the Berlin University of Education . This was followed by visiting professorships at the University of Paris Saint-Denis (1983) and the University of Paris-Nanterre (1989). Since the integration of the Berlin University of Education into the Free University of Berlin in 1980, Schiffler held the chair for didactics of French language and literature and from 1989 the chair for didactics of Romance languages ​​and literatures. In 2002 he retired, but continues to teach today (2020).

The "Ludger Schiffler Prize for Foreign Language Didactics" was awarded from 2002 to 2013.

Scientific focus

In his dissertation in 1969, Schiffler showed that audiovisual foreign language teaching achieved excellent results in listening comprehension and oral expression, but not in the written area. In his book Introduction to Audio-Visual Foreign Language Teaching , he discusses ways of avoiding these disadvantages. He examined the communication between teachers and students in class and presented interactive forms of foreign language teaching in his book Interactive Foreign Language Teaching. The book was a standard work in teacher training for over a decade and has been translated into French and Basque. These topics were continued in his book Learning by doing in foreign language teaching.

In the 1980s, “Superlearning” with relaxing baroque music was a great commercial success for the editors of language learning material. This method without a teacher was based on the 1978 book by the Bulgarian Georgi Losanov Suggestology and Outlines of Suggestopedia , which consisted of a wealth of empirical studies, with the teacher playing a crucial role in relaxation. Schiffler replicated this investigation in various forms of teaching and was able to refute it. He was only able to determine a superiority in the intensive course of four hours a day in the oral area. With regard to long-term retention, there was no ascertainable advantage, but only if the repetitions were accompanied by exercise. The results were published in Suggestopädie und Superlearning-empirically tested , 1989.

Schiffler discovered learning with movement through the brain examinations of the deaf with electroencephalography EEG. These proved that the sign language activated the supposedly fallow left-hemispheric language areas. Schiffler concluded from this that the use of semantically congruent gestures could encourage retention in a foreign language. In several empirical studies, he was able to demonstrate the effectiveness of movement learning for short-term memory , which is the prerequisite for retention in long-term memory . He summarized these studies in his book Teaching and Learning Foreign Languages ​​More Effectively. Both halves of the brain activate together.

In the same year Giacomo Rizzolatti made the discovery of mirror neurons , which showed that movements observed in someone else are reflected in the Broca's language area in A 44 and 45 of the observer. This was a confirmation of Schiffler's hypothesis that movement activates the language learned in the left hemisphere. The hypothesis that both halves of the brain were activated was thus dropped. In his last book, Effective Foreign Language Teaching. Movement - visualization - relaxation he built on. The foreign language text is learned with movement and with all possible learning aids for all types of learners with peripheral translation and orthography. Then it is repeated in relaxation with mental visualization and finally through helping partner work. After the publication of his book, Schiffler came up with the term “triple coding” for this. In an empirical long-term study, he checked “Triple Coding” in an English class 10. 54 words identified as unknown were learned in context and repeated with parts of “Triple Coding” and with three mind maps. After ten months, the students were still able to translate 74% of what they had learned from German into English.

His suggestion of “omnium contact”, namely to bring grammatical structures into long-term memory by practicing them in dialogue form with music and movement with changing partners realistically and spontaneously, has meanwhile found its way into the curricula.

Awards

• 1990: Order of the "Palmes Académiques" du Ministre de L'Education Nationale for visiting professorships in Paris
• 2009: Merit Medal of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany for the passing of the "Non-Smoking Protection Laws" as President of the "Non-Smoking Initiative Germany" (NID)

Publications (selection)

• Introduction to audio-visual foreign language teaching. Verlag Quelle and Meyer, Heidelberg 1973, 2nd expanded edition 1976, ISBN 978-3-494-00760-1

• Interactive foreign language lessons . Klett Verlag, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 978-3-12-926931-2
• Suggestopedia and superlearning, empirically tested . Diesterweg Verlag, 1989, ISBN 978-3425044460
• Learning by doeing in foreign language teaching . Max Hueber Verlag, 1998, ISBN 978-3190066285

• Effective foreign language teaching . Narr Verlag, Tübingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-8233-6680-5
• Teach and learn foreign languages ​​more effectively. Activate both halves of the brain. Auer Verlag, Donauwörth 2002, ISBN 978-3-403-03681-4
• How do I help myself with learning a foreign language? Urania Verlag, 2003

Web links

• Literature by and about Ludger Schiffler in the catalog of the German National Library
• Literature by and about Ludger Schiffler in the bibliographic database WorldCat
• Ludger Schiffler's homepage on the website of the Free University of Berlin

Individual evidence

1. ↑ On the person and work of Ludger Schiffler in: Franz-Josef Meißner (Ed.) Interactive foreign language instruction. Ways to authentic communication , p. Vii, Gunter Narr Verlag Tübingen, 1977. ISBN 3-8233-5177-X
2. ↑ Ludger Schiffler Prize for Foreign Language Didactics , website of the Free University of Berlin , accessed on April 23, 2020
3. ↑ "Interactive Foreign Language Lessons", Frankfurt am Main 1980
4. ^ "Enseignement interactif des langes étangères", Paris 1991
5. ↑ “Hizkuntza arrotzak elkarreraginean irakasteko”, San Sebastian 1992
6. ↑ Learning by doing in foreign language teaching - action and partner-oriented foreign language teaching with and without textbook, Ismaning 1998
7. ↑ La suggestopédie et le superlearning, mise à l'épreuve statistique, Paris 1991, Suggestopedic Methods and Applications, New York 1992
8. ↑ "Effective Foreign Language Teaching. Movement - Visualization - Relaxation ", Tübingen 2014
9. ^ Against Forgetting There is No Cure - However, "Triple Coding". Study for Long-Term Retention of Vocabulary (10 months) in a Class 10 (Gymnasium). In: Science Journal of Sociology and Anthropology. ISSN  2276-6359 .
10. ↑ Omnium contact - after each introduction. A new interactive phase of language processing, in: Praxis, 3/1993, pp. 238–243
11. ↑ Press release of December 3, 2009: Press invitation: Prof. Dr. Schiffler honored for his commitment to the protection of non-smokers , the Governing Mayor, Senate Chancellery,
12. ↑ Non-smokers' initiative Germany. Retrieved April 23, 2020 . 
13. ↑ Free University of Berlin: Prof. Dr. Ludger Schiffler. Recent publications. Retrieved April 23, 2020 .