Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1989. 19/3. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 19)

Budai, László: Some Basic Assumptions Underlying Foreign Language Teaching Strategies

- 102 beings. Only a new perception of the individual can be expected to create the equilibrium. Many of the foreign language teaching strategies that have recently surfaced are based on a new image of the individual popularized in the 1960s in the field of education by humanistic psycholog

y (Maslow 1966, 1968), opposing both behaviourism and Freudianism as well as cognitivism. Both behaviourism and Freudian psychology reflect a view of the individual as an essentially passive and reactive being, whose emotions, desires and individual experiences are irrelevant, who lives in an environment from which he is, in some way, estranged; cognitive theories of learning emphasize the mind's innate capacity to understand and organize experience meaningfully, sacrificing the affective realm of the indivudual; humanistic psychologists, however, call for

.education of the total individual. Humanistic psychology focuses on such distinctively human qualities as self-awareness, self-actualization, creativity, valuation, choice, responsibility; it views an individual as unique,' self-motivating, voluntry, and active rather than reactive; as n creature and creator of a dynamic interaction with others and the world; as an indivisible entity, a whole person whose body, mirid and emotions are in harmony (Yoshikawa 1982). In Suggestopedia

, the individual is seen as a whole person. In this approach, cognitive, conscious learning is as important as affective, unconscious aguisition. Wlien the individual has brain balance, i. e. when the two halves of his brain, the logical left side and the intuitive, creative right side are brought into harmony, there is a considerable increase in the effectiveness of learning. 'The basic premise embodied in this approach is that each individual is potentially a whole being, but ordinarily the individual views him/herself as less than that, mainly due to individual and cultural differences that reinforce different realms of the human brain. Each individual is capable of restoring individual wholeness through such techniques as breathing and listening to alpha brain wave-inducing music." (Yoshikawa 1982: 393-394) Although there has been considerable controversy over Suggestopedia, numerous are also its advocates in many countries of the world. Now let us look briefly at the introduction of one of the textbooks