Peripheral Learning

Peripheral Learning is perhaps the Cinderella among the many ways thanks to which you can learn a language. There is the perception that PL is only a supporting tool of Language Acquisition and not another way of learning, but this may not be necessarily true.

 Isaac Asimov, who was born in the time when Russia was becoming the U.S.S.R., came to the U.S. when he was only three. Eager to learn (he taught himself to read), he was constantly looking for sources that couild help him improve his learning. In one of his many books he mentioned that on his way back home he used to see the same street ad over and over until one day he just understood what the message in the ad was. In other words, Asimov was helped by Peripheral Learning. It is not that  he learnt English that way but it was one part of his learning process. 

Whenever a teacher creates material like the poster in the picture that accompanies this article or uses visual material of other kinds he or she is using PL and  perhaps increasing his/her students' learning opportunities.  Ideally this material should have a common theme and be graded according to the demographic reality of each group (e.g. adults or teens). To be even more effective it should also be changed depending on the lesson or unit being covered in class at the moment. 

It sounds like a lot of work and it is. That's why and it is wise to integrate other people and the ideal candidates for that are none other than our students.