Suggestopedia

Suggestopedia is a language teaching method originated in the 1970s by Bulgarian

psychologist Georgi Lozanov. The name combines the terms "suggestion" and "pedagogy",
the main idea being that accelerated learning can take place when accompanied by de-
suggestion of psychological barriers and positive suggestion. To this end lessons take place
against a background of soothing music in an emotionally comforting environment, with the
teacher actively planting and unplanting thoughts in and from the learners' minds.

Typical features of a Suggestopedia lesson:

• target language/mother tongue

• teacher-centred
• bright, cheerful classrooms with comfortable chairs
• soothing background music
• positive suggestion and negative "de-suggestion" by teacher
• new identities for learners with TL names and new occupations
• printed TL dialogues with MT translation, vocabulary and grammar notes
• reading of dialogues by teacher, rhythm and intonation matched to music
• reading of dialogues by learners just before sleeping and on rising (homework)
• classroom activities based on dialogues, including Q&A, games and song

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Desuggest
Desuggest is the opposite of suggest. This method is used to overcome some learning problems
as it puts importance on desuggesting limitations on learning. Desuggestopedia has been called
an affective-humanistic approach because there is respect for students’ feelings. Students do not
use their full powers of learning and they have some limitations in learning. These limitations
have to be desuggested using some specific teaching techniques which stimulate them to use
their reserved capacity of learning. An affective-humanistic approach is derived from
Suggestology. Suggestology is a science concerned with the systematic study of the nonconscious
influences that human beings are constantly responding to; involving loading the
memory banks with desired ideas and facilitating memories. In this method, the suggestive
atmosphere takes place with soft lights, baroque music, cheerful room decorations, comfortable
seating and dramatic techniques used by the teacher in the presentation of material.

Keywords: Desuggestion, peripheral learning, classroom set-up, primary activation and

creativity

Principles of Desuggestopedia
There are five main principles that govern Desuggestopedia:

1. Learning should be characterized by the joy and the absence of tension and it is
facilitated in a cheerful environment.
2. Humans operate on a conscious and paraconscious level. A student can learn from what
is present in the environment even if his attention is not directed to it.
3. Suggestion is the means to use the normally unused mental reserves for learning.
4. The teacher should recognize that learners bring certain psychological barriers with them
to the learning situation, and she should attempt to desuggest them.
5. If students are relaxed and confident, they will not need to try hard to learn the language.
It will just come naturally and easily.

There are seven major concepts of Desuggestopedia according to Lozanov and Gatave (1988).
They are as follows:
1. Mental Reserve Capacities (MRC): Human beings uses 5-10% of brain capacity at the
most. In order to make better use of this reserve capacity, the limitations, obstacles and
barriers to learning should be desuggested. Desuggestopedia helps students to eliminate
the feeling that they cannot be successful.
2. Psychological Set-Up: The response to every stimulus is very complex, involving many
unconscious processes which have become automatic responses. Only when a teacher is
able to penetrate the set-up, engaging it in a way which allows it to be accepted and open
to extensions and transformation, will the real potential of a student begin to open up.

3. Suggestion: There are two basic kinds of suggestion: direct and indirect. Direct
suggestions are directed to students’ consciousness. In the learning experience, direct
suggestions can be made in printed announcements, orally by the teacher, and by text
materials (i.e. A teacher tells students that they are going to be successful). Direct
suggestion should be used sparingly, for it is most vulnerable to resistance from the setup.
Indirect suggestion appeals to the students’ subconscious and is actually the more
powerful of the two.

4. Successful classroom atmosphere: The challenge for a teacher is to create a classroom

environment that is bright and cheerful. A positive environment must be created.
Classroom atmosphere is focused on three aspects. a) Psychological: A nurturing,
supportive atmosphere in which the student feels free to try out the new information, be
inventive with it, make mistakes without being put down, and, in general, enjoy the learning
experience. b) Educational: The material should be presented in a structured
fashion, combining the big picture, analysis and synthesis. Every moment should be a
didactic experience even when the learning process is not that apparent. c) Artistic: The
classroom should not be cluttered with too many posters and unnecessary objects
otherwise the students don’t see them. Good quality pictures should be displayed and
changed every few days.
5. Peripheral Learning: This concept is based on the idea that we perceive much more in our
environment that we consciously notice. It is claimed that by putting posters containing
grammatical information about the target language on the classroom walls, students will
absorb the necessary facts effortlessly. The teacher may or may not call attention to the
posters. They are changed from time to time to provide grammatical information that is
appropriate to what the students are studying.

6. Anti-Suggestive Barriers: These anti-suggestive barriers are a filter between the

environmental stimuli and the unconscious mental activity. They are inter-related and
mutually reinforcing, and a positive suggestive effect can only be accomplished if these
barriers are kept in mind. The overcoming of barriers means compliance with them;
otherwise suggestion would be doomed to failure. The suggestive process is always a
combination of suggestion and desuggestion and is always at an unconscious or slightly
conscious level.

7. Music: Music can be a powerful facilitator of holistic full-brain learning and it is a

suggestive, relaxing medium. Music is ideal for creating a mentally relaxed state.
Lozanov (1992) researched a wide variety of means for presenting material to be learned
with background music which would facilitate the mentally relaxed, receptive state of
mind that he found to be optimal for learning. Lozanov concluded that music stimulates,
invites alertness, and its harmony and order evoke ease and relaxation.

The Teacher’s Role

The teacher’s main role is to desuggest psychological barriers that learners bring with
them to the learning situation. She speaks confidently and gives the students the impression
that learning the target language will be easy and enjoyable. Once the students trust the
teacher, they can feel more secure. They can be more spontaneous and less inhibited. The
students will retain information. The major goal of the teacher is to help students eliminate and
overcome the barriers to learning and to help the students to develop communicative ability.

Teachers do not act in a directive way although this method is teacher controlled and not
student controlled. Teachers act as a real partner with the students, participating in the
activities such as games and songs naturally and genuinely. The teachers not only need to know
the techniques and the methodology completely, but they must also fully understand the
theory. If they implement the techniques without understanding, they will not be able to lead
their learners to successful results or they could even cause a negative impact on learning.

In order for teachers to be successful with these methods, Lozanov (1992) suggested that
several factors must be present:
1. Covering a huge bulk of learning material should not be the priority.
2. Structuring the material in the Suggestopaedic way: global-partial – partial-global, and
global in the part – part in the global, related to the golden proportion.
3. As a professional, on one hand, and a personality, on the other hand, the teacher should
be a highly-regarded professional, reliable and credible.
4. The teacher should have, not play, a hundred percent expectation of positive results
(because the teacher is already experienced even from the time of the teacher training
course).
5. The teacher should love his or her students (of course, not sentimentally but as human
beings) and teach them with personal participation through games, songs, classical arts,
and pleasure.

The teacher uses various activities like dialog, question and answer, repetition and
translation. The teacher integrates indirect and direct positive suggestions. To bring a positive
expectation of success, he or she should use a varied range of methods like dramatized texts,
music, active participation in songs and games, etc.
A great deal of attention is given to students’ feelings in this method. The teacher uses
various techniques in this method. She makes the classroom environment bright and cheerful.
The walls are decorated with scenes related to their communicative language. The classroom
contains grammatical information about the target language on classroom walls. The teacher
provides as positive environment as possible.
Peripheral learning is another technique used in this method. It is based on the idea that we
perceive much more in our environment than we consciously notice. It is claimed that students
will absorb the necessary facts effortlessly by seeing the information in the classroom walls as
posters and hangings. The teacher may or may not call attention to the posters. They are
changed from time to time to provide grammatical information that is appropriate to what the
students are studying at that time.

In the Positive Suggestion technique, the teacher’s responsibility is to orchestrate the

suggestive factors in a learning situation, thereby helping students break down the barriers to
learning that they bring with them. A teacher tells students that they are going to be successful.
This type of suggestion is called Direct Suggestion and it directly appeals to the students’
consciousness. The Indirect Suggestion appeals to the students’ subconscious which is the more
powerful of the two. Choosing a New Identity is a wonderful technique used in this method. The
students choose a target language name and occupation. As it continues, the students have an
opportunity to develop a whole biography about their fictional selves. Role play can also be
used as a technique here. Students are asked to pretend temporarily that they are someone
else and to perform in the target language as if they were really that person.

In the technique of First Concert, the teacher introduces a story as related in the dialogue
and calls her students’ attention to some particular grammatical points. The students have
copies of the dialogue in the target language and their native language and refer to it as the
teacher is reading. The teacher reads with intoning as selected music is played. Occasionally the
students read the text together with the teacher, and listen only to the music as the teacher
pauses in particular moments. This is called an Active Concert. In the Passive Concert, the
students are asked to put their scripts aside. They simply listen as the teacher reads the
dialogue at normal speed. Here also the teacher reads with musical accomplishment and the
passive session is, consequently, occurs more calmly as the students listen only.
In the Primary Activation technique, the students playfully reread the target language dialog
out loud, individually or in groups. The teacher divides the students into three groups and each
group of students reads the parts of the dialogue in a particular manner, the first group sadly,
the second group angrily and the last cheerfully.

In Creative Adaptation technique, students engage in various activities. Activities include

singing, dancing, dramatizations and games. This technique is used to accelerate the process of
learning a foreign language for every day communication. In each technique, errors are
corrected gently and indirectly. The teacher gives the students the impression that learning is
easy and enjoyable. Teachers help the students activate the material to which they have been
exposed and integrate indirect positive suggestions into the
learning situation.

Disadvantages of Suggestopedia
Apriyana and Islamiyah (2011) stated that Suggestopedia also has limitation since there is
no single teaching method that is categorized as the best based on considerations such as
curriculum, student motivation, financial limitation, number of students, etc. The main
disadvantages of Suggestopedia are:
1. Environment limitation: Most schools in developing countries have large classes. Each class
can consist of 70 to 80 students. One of the problems faced in utilizing this method is that it can
be difficult to accommodate the number of students in the class.

2. The use of hypnosis: Some people claim that Suggestopedia uses hypnosis which they feel is
detrimental. However, Lazanov (1991) strongly denied it.

3. Infantilization of learning: Suggestopedia can have the appearance of treating students in a

childish way. There are some students who might reject the approach despite its effectiveness.
Conclusion
Desuggestopedia is a method that aims to mitigate the psychological barriers of the
student. The psychological barriers in language acquisition that manifest with negative feelings
include lack of vocabulary, poor grammar, poor fluency, and mispronunciation. To help the
students overcome these barriers, the teacher will find different techniques of teaching and
learning processes. The teacher should be creative and smart in choosing and using different
methods in teaching different skills of language. These methods must be effective for the students
to communicate using foreign language. Teachers can use Suggestopedia as a teaching method.
It provides some valuable insights into the power of cognition and creates techniques that make
students feel comfortable, relaxed and suggestible to the material being learned. The teacher can
easily apply this method in class because it is an effective method to make students feel joyful
about learning English. During the process of teaching, Desuggestopedia appropriately uses
environment suggestion, figure suggestion, activity suggestion and selfsuggestion to enhance
English teaching. The process is usually accompanied with music or some games or drama to
achieve the success of learning.

References
Apriana, A. & Islamiyah, M. (2011) A teaching method: Suggestopedia. Indonesia: Sriwijaya
University.
Chastain, K. (1988). Developing school language skill: Theory and practice. Florida: Harcourt
Brace Jovanovich.
Lozanov, G. & Gateva, E. (1988). The foreign language teacher’s Suggestopedic Manual. New
York: Gordon and Breach Science Publishers.
Lozanov, G. (1991). Suggestological realization and development of the global approach in
foreign language teaching. The Journal of the Society for Accelerative Learning and
Teaching, 16 (2),151 – 156.
Lozanov,G. (1992). Suggestology and outlines of Suggestopedy. (7th ed.). New York: Gordon
and Breach Science Publishers.
Lica, G. 2008. Suggestopedia: A wonder approach to learning foreign languages. Asian EFL
Journal: English Language Teaching and Research.
Larsen, D. (2000). Techniques and principles in language teaching. London: Oxford University
Press.
Schuster D. & Gritton C. (1986). Suggestive accelerative learning t