LANGUAGE TEACHING HAS BEEN GOING ON FOR AS LONG AS THERE HAS BEEN CONTACT among people using different languages, even if formal, theoretically or empirically based approaches to the teaching and learning process are a more recent phenomenon. Every time anyone has ever taught another person a language, or for that matter, whenever someone has undertaken autodidactic language learning, there has been a pedagogy underlying it, whether the assumptions and characteristics of that pedagogy were explicit or merely subconsciously guided by the teacher's or the learner's worldviews. In this book, language pedagogy is defined as those epistemologies and theories about language and learning/development that orient or guide one's thinking about teaching, learning, and language use; approaches and principles guiding curriculum design; tenets or guidelines for syllabus design, lesson planning, and classroom practice; and of course, the creation and selection of instructional materials of all sorts. Though I describe specific activities in these pages, I note that pedagogy does not include classroom practice itself. Classroom practice is a social and semiotic activity, and as such is a response to pedagogy, just as learning is a response to teaching. Yet pedagogy is more than a blueprint. Language pedagogy can be considered a crucial element in fostering communication and learning in the educational setting, as well as a dialogical participant in the ecological context for teaching and learning, because pedagogy affects teaching practice, and teaching practice recursively affects pedagogy. Therefore, it is the aim of this monograph to give a coherent overview of what I call a ‘human ecological language pedagogy.’

Why ‘human ecological’ rather than just language pedagogy? In the simplest terms, it is because the model presented here flows from an ecological understanding of human communication, language development, and educational practice. It is ecological as well because it is a response to several momentous trends of recent years. The first is what has been variously labeled the social, sociocultural, multilingual, or critical turn in applied linguistics, which is a welcome seismic shift in the field. Work in this direction has thus far focused primarily on identifying theoretical models of language and language development and engaging in empirical research of additional language learning in a range of settings. Many colleagues, on whose work I draw in this monograph, have critically examined the pedagogy on which classroom practice today is based, showing that much of it is rooted in outdated assumptions of what language and human communication are, how learning happens, and importantly, who the learner of the new language is or could be. Human ecological is thus a useful umbrella term—though not a meta‐theory—if not for unifying the various constructivist perspectives, or as Dwight Atkinson (2011) calls them, alternative approaches—then at least giving each of these ‘turns’ a voice in synthesizing what should be a helpful model for language pedagogy itself.

The second trend to which this monograph responds is the unprecedented scope and scale of human migration in the young 21st century. This is happening through peaceful flows of people for transnational commerce, international study, and tourism, as well as the involuntary migrations of millions due to violence and other human as well as environmental catastrophes. It has meant that more people around the world are learning new languages, in more instructional settings and for more reasons, than at any other time in human history. In terms of the sheer number and complexity of language learning contexts around the world, then, the time is right to critically examine our pedagogies, and to offer guidance for teaching languages in ways that respond in ecologically sound ways, both to local, situated needs of learners and teachers, and to macro level institutional circumstances and challenges.

Third, this book offers what I hope is a necessary modification or expansion on standards frameworks developed in recent decades, most notably the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages World‐Readiness Standards for Learning Languages (National Standards Collaborative Board, 2015), as well as the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR; Council of Europe, 2018). These frameworks are welcome advances in the field, but I suggest that they are insufficient to deal with the complexities of global translingual practice and language education today. To be clear, while a purely ideological treatment of language pedagogy might seek to debunk any large‐scale institutional standards as fundamentally at odds with a poststructuralist perspective of language teaching and learning, I consider those two standards frameworks in particular—with the massive influence they have had and continue to have on policy, the textbook industry, curriculum design at the local level, and teaching practice—to be a key component of the complex system that is instructed language learning today, at the very least in the United States and Europe, but also in many other parts of the world. Put another way, a human ecological approach can help reconcile the apparent tension between poststructuralist perspectives and standards frameworks. Therefore, the structure and orientation of the monograph is both a response to but also an affirmation of those standards as useful articulations of language teaching. But as I aim to show, both frameworks would benefit from the addition of the critical dimension that a human ecological approach requires. It means not rejecting but rather reorienting those frameworks toward being optimally responsive to the realities of language teaching in today's world.

Regarding the settings of instructed language learning of this monograph, while the ideas presented here would apply to many different instructional situations, the main focus is on adolescent and adult instructed language learning, and primarily on the learning of languages other than English. I focus on adolescent and adult learners because the overall aims of such instruction tend to be the acquisition of particular benchmarks, such as the ACTFL Standards, the levels on the ACTFL proficiency scale, or the CEFR descriptors and scale. The focus in this book is also the teaching of languages other than English in large measure because this is my own area of interest and expertise, though I believe that the model presented and the arguments made apply just as well to the teaching of English in a range of settings.

The intended audience of this monograph includes readers of The Modern Language Journal, which means language professionals of all sorts. This encompasses researchers as well as language teachers, students in language education programs, and anyone else interested in instructed language learning. Much of the discussion is theoretical, in that it aims to provide a conceptual framework for thinking about language learning and teaching, but it is also practical, by way of offering guidelines for language pedagogy.

The usual disclaimer applies that my proposals for a human ecological language pedagogy are not intended as a last word on the subject, though as will become clear from the ways I present and synthesize the ideas of prominent scholars, this is by no means the first word. A lot of outstanding scholarship has been produced on ecological approaches to language and language learning, and so I hope that the present work represents a useful next contribution in this ongoing project.

语言教学已经在使用不同语言的人们中保持着长期联系，即使在教学，学习过程中基于正式，理论或经验的方法是一种较新的现象。每当有人教过其他人的语言时，或者就此而言，只要有人进行了自动教学法的学习，就会出现教学法在此基础之上，该教学法的假设和特征是明确的，还是仅由教师或学习者的世界观在潜意识中指导的。在这本书中，语言教学法被定义为那些关于语言和学习/发展的认识论和理论，这些取向和理论指导或指导人们有关教学，学习和语言使用的思想。指导课程设计的方法和原则；教学大纲设计，课程计划和课堂练习的原则或准则；当然，还要创建和选择各种教学材料。尽管我在这些页面中描述了具体的活动，但我注意到教学法并不包括课堂练习本身。课堂练习是一种社交和符号活动，因此是对教学法的回应，就像学习是对教学的回应一样。然而，教学法不仅仅是一个蓝图。语言教学法可以被认为是在教育环境中促进交流和学习的关键要素，并且可以被认为是生态环境下教学的对话参与者，因为教学法影响教学实践，而教学实践则递归地影响教学法。因此，本专着的目的是对我所谓的“人类生态语言教学法”进行连贯的概述。

为什么选择“人类生态学”，而不仅仅是语言教学法？用最简单的话来说，这是因为这里介绍的模型源于对人类交流，语言发展和教育实践的生态理解。它也是生态的，因为它是对近年来若干重大趋势的回应。首先是被应用语言学广泛地称为社会，社会文化，多语言或批判性转变的标记，这是该领域中令人欢迎的地震变化。迄今为止，这个方向的工作主要集中在确定语言和语言发展的理论模型上，并在一系列环境中从事其他语言学习的实证研究。我在本专着中所依据的许多同事，都对当今课堂实践所基于的教学法进行了严格的考察，表明它的大部分根源在于对语言和人类交流是什么，学习如何发生以及重要的是，新语言的学习者是谁或可能是谁的过时假设。因此，人类生态学是一个有用的总括性术语，尽管不是元理论，但如果不是为了统一各种建构主义观点，或者如Dwight Atkinson（2011）所说的那样，是替代方法，那么至少要使这些“转折点”各具发言权综合什么是语言教学本身的有用模型。

本专着回应的第二个趋势是21世纪年轻的人类迁徙的空前规模和规模。这是通过和平进行跨国贸易，国际研究和旅游的人流，以及由于暴力和其他人类以及环境灾难而导致的数百万人的非自愿移民而发生的。这意味着与人类历史上的任何其他时间相比，在更多的教学环境和更多的原因下，全世界有更多的人正在学习新的语言。因此，就世界各地的语言学习上下文的数量和复杂性而言，现在是时候批判性地检查我们的教学法，并为以既可以本地化又适合本地化的方式以生态上合理的方式做出响应的语言教学提供指导学习者和老师

第三，本书希望对近几十年来制定的标准框架进行必要的修改或扩展，其中最著名的是美国外语教学理事会世界学习语言准备标准（国家标准协作委员会，2015年），以及欧洲通用语言参考框架（CEFR;欧洲理事会，2018年）。这些框架是该领域可喜的进步，但是我建议它们不足以应对当今全球跨语言实践和语言教育的复杂性。需要明确的是，尽管对语言教学法的纯粹意识形态的处理可能试图揭穿任何大规模的机构标准，而根本上与后结构主义的语言教学和学习观点背道而驰，但我认为这两个标准框架尤其具有巨大的影响力在政策，教科书行业，地方一级的课程设计和教学实践方面，已经并将继续拥有这些知识，这已成为当今复杂的系统的重要组成部分，如今，至少在美国和欧洲，这些系统已成为语言学习的指导，而且在世界其他许多地方也是如此。换一种方式，人类生态学方法可以帮助调和后结构主义观点与标准框架之间的明显张力。因此，专着的结构和方向既是对这些标准的回应，也是对这些标准作为语言教学的有益表达的肯定。但是，正如我要说明的那样，这两个框架都将受益于人类生态方法所需的关键维度的增加。这意味着不是拒绝而是要重新定位那些框架，使其对当今世界的语言教学现实做出最佳响应。专着的结构和方向既是对这些标准的回应，也是对这些标准的肯定，这些标准是语言教学的有益表达。但是，正如我要说明的那样，这两个框架都将受益于人类生态方法所需的关键维度的增加。这意味着不是拒绝而是要重新定位那些框架，使其对当今世界的语言教学现状做出最佳响应。专着的结构和方向既是对这些标准的回应，也是对这些标准的肯定，这些标准是语言教学的有益表达。但是，正如我要说明的那样，这两个框架都将受益于人类生态方法所需的关键维度的增加。这意味着不是拒绝而是要重新定位那些框架，使其对当今世界的语言教学现状做出最佳响应。

关于本专题的指导语言学习的设置，尽管此处介绍的思想将适用于许多不同的指导情况，但主要重点是青少年和成人指导语言学习，并且主要侧重于英语以外的语言的学习。我专注于青少年和成人学习者，因为此类指导的总体目标往往是获取特定基准，例如ACTFL标准，ACTFL熟练程度等级或CEFR描述者和等级。本书的重点还在于很大程度上讲英语以外的其他语言的教学，因为这是我自己的兴趣和专业领域，尽管我相信所介绍的模型和提出的论点也同样适用于英语教学。设置范围。

该专着的目标读者包括《现代语言杂志》的读者，该杂志是指各种语言专业人士。这包括研究人员以及语言老师，语言教育计划的学生以及对指导语言学习感兴趣的其他人。大部分讨论都是理论性的，目的是为思考语言的学习和教学提供一个概念性框架，但通过提供语言教学法的指导方针，它也是实用的。

通常的免责声明适用于我关于人类生态语言教学法的建议并非旨在作为该主题的最后一句话，尽管从我介绍和综合杰出学者的思想的方式中可以明显看出，这绝不是第一个单词。关于语言和语言学习的生态方法，已经产生了许多杰出的奖学金，因此，我希望目前的工作可以为正在进行的该项目做出有益的下一步贡献。