7.4. Importance of mental operations of translating one component of word into its other component

All the components of the significative structure of a word present its dif­ferent properties (or images). They are interconnected and can be translated into each other. Below an example of a situation is given, which really took place: a boy of two years old points at some thing on the table and mumbles something several times trying to pronounce the word which denotes the thing he is pointing at (in Russian the word sounds like "пипитак» ). The boy can't produce the sound-motor image of the word properly and the grown-ups do not understand him. Then he makes a desperate attempt to be understood: he uses another component of the significative structure of the word and ex­presses the contents of the word he can't pronounce at the level of its mean-Ni!■ he pronounces: "горячее". Immediately the grown-ups understood that the boy tried to pronounce the Russian word «кипяток».

If we analyze this real life situation, we can see that the following mental I iperations took place: the boy changed the code through which he was going to express his idea, i.e. the sound— motor code was translated by him into the code of the meaning which was automatically translated into the code of the sense. This resulted in understanding of the word.

In the speech-generating mechanisms of the grown-ups there occurred a instant-aneous and simultaneous translating of the code of the meaning into the code of the sounds [кипяток], and then into the code of the sense, which allowed them to understand the danger of the real situation — they got horri­fied and the boy was understood.

Acts of mutual translating of the components of the significative structure of a word into one another which take place in the flow of natural speech are instantaneous, automatic and simultaneous. While a person studies a foreign language these mental processes in his/her speech in this language are not so fast. That's why for teachers of foreign languages it is important to keep in mind the following:

First - the visual image of a word (or utterance or any other language item) can be consciously or unconsciously raised and seen by a person in his/he mental vision only when the visual image is an answer to the previ­ously accepted sound-and-motor image of the word. If a leaner hears [table], [daughter], [val], instead of [teibl], ['doits], [wo:l], adequate visual images of these items can't appear in his mental vision. The UOC can control speech adequately only if all the components of the significative structure of the word are correct.

Nevertheless, there are numerous cases, which are a result of incorrect studying and poor teaching, when incorrect auditory image are attributed to visual images of the UOC, and the UOC functions with them. However, there can be no doubt that such kind of teaching won't yield positive results.

Second - if while reading a learner is not able to translate the graphic im­age of a word (letters into its sound-motor images), then it will be impossible for him/her to get, the visual image of the word from his/her OUC. It means that learners are to be obligatory taught the skill of translating graphical im­ages of words into their sound-motor images irrespective of the type of speech activity they are taught.

The peculiarities of the significative structure of the word and its compo­nents could persuade a teacher that correct a scientifically grounded teaching should be based on developing in learners operations of simultaneous translat­ing of one component of the word into its other components, because it leads to comprehending the sense of the word, utterance etc.

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