Archive for 2013

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9. Instruction and L2 Acquisition


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Some researchers have studied what impact teaching has on L2 learning. There are three branches of this research. The first concerns whether teaching learners grammar has any effect on their interlanguage development. The second draws on the research into individual learner differences. The third branch looks at strategy training.

Form-focused instruction
Traditionally, language pedagogy has emphasized form-focused instruction. More recently, however, language pedagogy has emphasized the need to provide learners with real communicative experiences. Communicative Language Teaching is premised on the assumption that learners do not need to be taught grammar before they can communicate but will acquire it naturally as part of the process of learning to communicate. In some versions of CLT, then, there is no place at all for the direct teaching grammar.

1.    Does form-focused instruction work?

One way in which we might investigate whether formal instruction has any effect on interlanguage is to compare the development of untutored and tutored learners. Teresa Pica found that instruction had had little overall effect on acquisition. She suggests that the effects of the instruction may depend on the target structure that is being taught. If the structure is formally simple and manifest a straightforward form-function relationship instruction may lead to improve accuracy. If the structure is formally simple and silent but is functionally fairly complex instruction may help learners to learn the form but not its use so learners end up making a lot of errors.  If a structure lacks saliency and is functionally very complex instruction has no effect at all. Instruction then may be effective in teaching items but not effective in teaching systems, particularly when these are complex. There are strong theoretical grounds for believing that instruction will not have any long lasting effect on the way in which learners construct their interlanguage systems. This claim can be tested by comparing untutored and tutored learners. The result suggested that the instruction had had no effect on the processing strategies involved in the acquisition of these word-order rules. However, the tutored learners proceeded through the syllabus rapidly than the untutored learners, and were more likely to reach the final stage
2. Teachability hypothesis: This hypothesis predicts that instruction can only promote language acquisition if the interlanguage is close to the point when the structure to be taught is acquired in the natural setting. There is no ample evidence that the effects of form focused instruction are not restricted to careful language use but are also evident in free communication.
3.    What kind of form-focused instruction works best?
An experimental study carried out by Phill Van Patten and Teresa Cadierno suggests that form-focused instruction that emphasizes input processing may be very effective. It also supports theories of L2 acquisition that emphasize the role of conscious noticing in input, input based instruction may work because it induces noticing in learners. The second issue, concerns consciousness-raising—attempts to make learners aware of the existence of specific linguistic features in the target language. This can be done by supplying the learner with positive evidence or negative evidence. Martha Trahey and Lydia White’s study also suggests that positive evidence is not sufficient to reset a parameter and, perhaps, that Universal Grammar is not available to L2 adult-learners.
Learner-instruction matching
A distinct possibility, however, is that the same instructional option is not equally effective for all L2 learners. Individual differences to do with such factors as learning style and language aptitude are likely to influence which options work best. It is obviously important to take individual differences into account when investigating the effects of instruction. For example, even if it is eventually shown that input-based instruction works better overall than production-based instruction, it does not follow that this will be true for all learners.
Strategy training
Teaching learners specific grammatical structures constitutes an attempt to intervene directly in interlanguage development. An alternative approach is to intervene more indirectly by identifying strategies that are likely to promote acquisition and providing training in them. The idea of strategy training is attractive because it provides a way of helping learners to become autonomous. The main problem is that not enough is known about which strategies and which combinations of strategies work best for L2 acquisition.
 Questions:
  1. Why do some instruction have effects for long lasting but the others are durable?   
  2. Please could you explain more clearly; what do you know about teachability hypothesis byPienemann?


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8. Individual Differences in L2 Acquisition


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SLA acknowledges that there are individual differences in L2 acquisition. Social factors to do with the context of learning have an effect of how successful individual L2 learners are, and possibly on how interlanguage developed as well. Affective factors and learners’ preferred ways of learning are the example of psychological dimensions of difference. Now, we will focus on two of the major dimensions—language aptitude and motivation—and also explore how differences in learning strategies can affect development.

Language Aptitude
Language aptitude is a natural ability that is possessed by learners for learning an L2. Learners who score highly on language aptitude tests typically learn rapidly and achieve higher levels of L2 proficiency than learners who obtain low scores. According John Carroll, there are four components of language aptitude:
  1. Phonemic coding ability: the ability to identify the sounds of a foreign language and to handle sound-symbol relationship. (i.e. to identify the sound which ‘th’ stands for).
  2. Grammatical sensitivity: the ability to recognize the grammatical functions of words in sentences (i.e. to recognize the subject, predicator, or object of sentence)
  3. Inductive language learning ability: the ability to identify patterns of correspondence and relations between form and meaning (i.e. to recognize the relation between word “to” and the meaning as “direction”, and “at” which means “location”)
  4. Rote learning ability: the ability to form and remember associations between stimuli. This is believed to be important in vocabulary learning.
Motivation
Motivation involves the attitude and affective states that influence the degree of effort that learners make to learn an L2. It can result from learning as well as cause it. Moreover, it is dynamic in nature, and it is not something that varies from one moment to the next depending on the learning context or task. There are various kinds of motivation. Those are:
  1. Instrumental motivation: Learners may make efforts to learn an L2 for some functional reasons: to pass an examination, to get a better job, or to get a place at university.
  2. Integrative motivation: Learners learn L2 because they are interested in the  people and culture represented by the target language group.
  3. Resultative motivation: Learners may learn L2 because they motivate from the success of other people. So, motivation is the cause of L2 achievement.
  4. Intrinsic motivation: The motivation involves the arousal and maintenance of curiosity and can ebb and flow as a result of such factors as learners’ particular interests and the extent to which they feel personally involved in learning activities.
Learning Strategies
Learning strategies are the particular approaches or techniques that learners employ to try to learn an L2. They can be behavioral (i.e. repeating new word to remember it), or they can be mental (i.e. using the linguistic or situational context to infer the meaning of a new word).
There are different kinds of learning strategies which have been identified. Those are:
  1. Cognitive strategies: These strategies are involved in the analysis, synthesis, or transformation of learning materials. An example is recombination.
  2. Metacognitive strategies: These strategies are involved in planning, monitoring, and evaluating learning. An example is selective attention.
  3. Social/affective strategies: These strategies concern the ways in which learners choose to interact with other speakers. An example is questioning for clarification.
Some studies show that successful learners use more strategies than unsuccessful learners. They have also shown that different strategies are related to different aspects of L2 learning. Thus, strategies that involve formal practice contribute to the development of linguistic competence whereas strategies involving functional practice aid to development of communication skill.

Questions:
  1. Please could you suggest other learning strategies that can be used for L2 learners?
  2. Why does an instrumental motivation seem to be the major force determining success in L2 learning?


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7. Linguistic Aspects of Interlanguage


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Typological universals: relative clauses
Languages vary in whether they have relative clause structures. Some languages have them, while other languages do not. The linguistic difference influences the ease with which learners are able to learn relative clauses. Learners whose L1 includes relative clauses find them easier to learn than learners whose L1 does not, and they are less likely to avoid learning them. A hierarchy of relativization, known as the accessibility hierarchy serves an example of how SLA and linguistics can assist each other. On the one hand, linguistic facts can be used to explain and even predict acquisition. On the other hand, the result of empirical studies of L2 acquisition can be used to refine our understanding of linguistic facts.

Universal Grammar
Noam Chomsky’s theory of Universal Grammar argues that language is governed by a set of highly abstract principles that provide parameters which are given particular settings in different languages. The question of whether learners whose L1 permits both local and long-distance binding of reflexives can learn that a language like English permits only local binding may seem a rather trivial matter. In fact, though it concerns an issue of considerable theoretical importance-the extent to which a language other than our mother tongue is fully learnable.

Learnability
Chomsky has claimed that children learning their L1 must rely innate knowledge of language because otherwise the task facing them is an impossible one. His argument is that the input to which children are exposed is insufficient to enable them to discover the rules of the language they are trying to learn (poverty of the stimulus). The input consists not only positive evidence (it provides information only about what is grammatical in the language), because learners can never be sure they will not hear sentence where the adverb is between the verb and direct object, but also negative evidence (input that provides direct evidence of what is ungrammatical in a language) that would make it possible for children to find out that sentences like the one above are ungrammatical.

The Critical Period Hypothesis
The critical period hypothesis states that there is a period during which language acquisition is easy and complete (native-speaker ability is achieved) and beyond which it is difficult and typically incomplete. It was grounded in research which showed that people who lost their linguistic capabilities, for example as a result of an accident, were able to regain them before puberty but were unable to do so afterwards.

Access to UG
  1. Complete access: It is argued that learners begin with the parameter settings of their L1 but subsequently learn to switch to the L2 parameter settings.
  2. No access: It is argued that Universal Grammar is not available to adult L2 learners. They rely on general learning strategies.
  3. Partial access: It is argued that learners have access to parts of Universal Grammar but not others. L2 acquisition is partly regulated by Universal Grammar and partly by general learning strategies.
  4. Dual access: It is argued that adult L2 learners make use of both Universal Grammar and general learning strategies (blocking the operation of Universal Grammar, causing learners to produce ‘impossible’ errors and failing to achieve full competence).    

Markedness
Markedness refers to the general idea that some structures are more ‘natural’ or ‘basic’ than other structures. In typological linguistics, unmarked structures are those that are common in the world’s languages. In Chomskyan linguistics, unmarked structures are those that are governed by Universal Grammar and which, therefore require only minimal evidence for acquisition. Marked structures are those that lie outside Universal Grammar.

Cognitive Versus Linguistic Explanation

The answer whether linguistic universals and markedness are seen as exerting a direct effect on L2 acquisition or whether they are seen as having only an indirect effect, mediated by psycholinguistic mechanism of the kind considered earlier. In short, there is no consensus on whether L2 acquisition is to be explained in terms of a distinct and innate language faculty or in terms of general cognitive abilities issue. It should be noted however that Universal Grammar does not claim to account for the whole of a language or even the whole of the grammar of a language.

Questions:
  1. What can you infer from this statement ‘The accessibility hierarchy serves as an example of how SLA and linguistics can assist each other’?
  2. What is substantively meant by markedness?


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6. Psycholinguistic Aspects of Interlanguage


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Psycholinguistics is the study of the mental structures and processes involved in the acquisition and use of language.
 
L1 Transfer
L1 transfer refers to the influence that the learner’s L1 exerts over the acquisition of an L2. This influence is apparent in a number of ways. First, the learner’s L1 is one of the sources of error in learner language, negative transfer. However, in some cases, the learner’s L1 can facilitate L2 acquisition, positive transfer. L1 transfer can also result in avoidance (learners make fewer errors in relative clauses). Finally, L1 transfer may be reflected in the overuse of some forms. Behaviourist theories cannot account for L2 acquisition. This led to two developments. The first development sought to play down the role of L1 transfer. The second development was to reconceptualize transfer within a cognitive framework (This was begun by Larry Selinker). The learner’s stage of development has also been found to influence L1 transfer. This is clearly evident in the way learners acquire speech acts like request, apologies, and refusals. When language transfer takes place there is usually no loss of L1 knowledge. A better term for referring to the effects of the L1 might be ‘cross-linguistic influence’.

The Role of Consciousness in L2 Acquisition
There are two opposing positions on the role of consciousness in L2 acquisition. First, Stephen Krashen has argued the need to distinguish ‘acquired’ L2 knowledge and ‘learned’ L2 language. He claims that the former is developed subconsciously through comprehending input while communicating, while the latter is developed consciously through deliberate of the L2. Second, Richard Schmidt has pointed out that the term ‘consciousness’ is often used very loosely in SLA and argues that there is a need to standardize the concepts that underlie its use. For example, he distinguishes between consciousness as ‘intentionally’ (learner makes a conscious and deliberate decision to learn some L2 knowledge) and consciousness as ‘attention’. Schmidt argues that learning cannot take place without noticing (the process of attending consciously to linguistic features in the input). Explicit knowledge may aid learners in developing implicit knowledge in a number of ways. First, a direct interface may occur. Second, explicit knowledge may facilitate the process by which learners attend to features in the input. Third, explicit knowledge may help learners to move from intake to acquisition by helping them to notice the gap between what they have observed in the input ant the current state of their interlanguage as manifested in their own input.

Processing Operations

1.  Operating Principles
Dan Slobin has argued about operating principles, the identification of a number of general strategies which children use to extract and segment linguistic information from the language they hear. Operating principles provide a simple and attractive way of accounting for the properties of interlanguage.
2. Processing Constrains
Multidimensional model proposed that some grammatical features can be acquired at any stage of development. Thus, it distinguishes a developmental and a variational axis. Progress along one axis is independent of progress along the other axis. To account for progress along it,a number of processing constrains have been proposed. It is possible for a learner to move from one stage to another. 

Communication strategies
If learners do not know a word in the target language they may ‘borrow’ a word from their L1 or use another target-language word that is approximate in meaning, or try to paraphrase the meaning of the word, or even construct an entire new word. As Selinker has pointed out, communication strategies constitute one of the processes responsible for learner errors. We might expect that the choice of communication strategies will reflect the learner’s stage of development.

The Role of Consciousness in L2 Acquisition
There are two radically different types of apparatus have been proposed.
1. Serial Processing
Information is processed in a series of sequential steps and results in the representation         of  what has been learned as some kind of ‘rule’ or ‘strategy’.
2. Parallel Distributed Processing
This credits the learner with the ability to perform a number of mental tasks at the same time. Models based on it reject the whole notion of ‘rule’.

Questions:
  1. What can you explain about ‘cross-linguistic influence’?
  2. What is the difference between implicit knowledge and explicit knowledge?


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5. Discourse Aspects of Interlanguage


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Click Here (PPT).

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4. Social Aspects of Interlanguage


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The prevailing perspective on interlanguage is psycholinguistic, as reflected in the metaphor of the computer. That is, researchers have been primarily concerned with identifying the internal mechanisms that are responsible for interlanguage development. SLA has also acknowledged the importance of social factors. There are three different approaches to incorporate social factors on the study of L2 acquisition. The first views interlanguages as consisting of different ‘styles’ which learners call upon under different conditions of language use. The second, concerns how social factors determine the input that learners use to construct their interlanguage. The third, considers how the social identities that learners negotiate in their interactions with native speakers shape their opprtunities to speak and, thereby, to learn an L2.

Interlanguage as a stylistic continuum
1.   Elaine Tarone
Elaine Tarone has proposed that interlanguage involves a stylistic continuum. She argues that learners develop a capability for using the L2 and that this underlies ‘all regular language behaviour’. This capability, which constitutes ‘an abstract linguistic system’, is comprised of a number of different ‘style’ which learner access in accordance with a variety of factors. At the end of the continuum is the careful style, evident when learners are conciously attending to their choice of linguistic forms, as when they feel need to be ‘correct’. At the other end of the continuum is the vernacular style, evident when learners are making spontaneous choices of linguistic form, as is likely in free conversation.
Tarone’s idea of interlanguage as a stylistic continuum is attractive in a number of ways. It explains why learner language is variable. It suggests that an interlanguage grammar, although different from a native speaker’s grammar, is constructed according to the same principles, for native speakers have been shown to posses a similar range of styles. It relates language use to language learning. However, Tarone’s model has a number of problems. First, later research has shown that learners are not always most accurate in their careful style and least accurate in their vernacular style. Second, is that the role of social factors remains unclear.
2.   Howard Giles
Another theory is Howard Giles’s accomodation theory. This seeks to explain how a learner’s social group influences the course of L2 acquisition. For Giles the key idea is that of ‘social accomodation’. He suggests that when people interact with each other they either try to make their speech similar to that of their addressee in order to emphasize social cohesiveness (a process of convergence) or to make it different in order to emphasize their social distinctiveness (a process of divergence). It has been suggested that L2 acquisition involves ‘long-term convergence’. According to the Giles’s theory, then, social factors influence interlanguage development via the impact they have on the attitudes that determine the kind of language use learners engage in. Accomodation theory suggests that social factors, mediated through the interactions that learners take part in, influence both how quickly they learn and that actual route that they follow.


The acculturation model of L2 acquisition
A similar perspective on the role of social factors in L2 acquisition can be found in john Schumann’s acculturation model. Schuman proposed that pidginization in L2 acquisition results when learners fail to acculturate to the target language group because of their inability or unwillingness to adapt to a new culture. The main reason for learners failing to acculturate is social distance. Thus, a ‘good’ learning situation is one where there is little social distance because the target language group and the L2 group view each other as socially equal. As presented by Schumann, social factors determine the amount of contact with the L2 individual learners experience and thereby how successful they are in learning.

Social identity and investment in L2 learning
Bonny Pierce argues that language learners have complex social identity that can only be understand in terms of power relations that shape social structures.  A learner’s social identity is multiple and contradictory’. Learning is successful when learners are able to summon up or construct an identity that enables them to impose their right to be heard and thus become the subject of discourse. This requires investment, something learners will only make if they believe their effort s will increase the value of their cultural capital. Learners use language to locate themselves in their community and also in L2 environment. Successful learners are those who reflect critically on how they engage with native speakers and who are prepared to challenge the accepted social order by constructing and asserting social identities of their own choice.

Questions:
  1. What explanation can you give for the second language learner groups who are in bad learning situations but they can be successful?
  2. Please could you explain how to handle the learning situations well?

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3. Interlanguage


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Earlier we noted that some researchers consider that the systematic development of learner language reflects a mental system of L2 knowledge. This system is often referred to as Interlanguage. To understand what is meant by interlanguage we need to briefly consider behaviourist learning theory and mentalist view of language learning.

Behaviourist learning theory
According to this theory, language learning is like any other kind of learning in that involves habit formation. Habits are formed when learners response to stimuli in the environment and subsequently have their responses reinforced so that they are remembered. Thus, a habit is a stimulus-response connection. Learning took place when learners had the opportunity to practice making the correct response to a give stimulus. Learners imitated models of correct language and receive positive reinforcement if they were correct and negative reinforcement if they were incorrect. It should be clear that behaviorist accounts of L2 acquisition emphasize only what can be directly observed and ignore what goes on in the ‘black box’ of the learner’s mind. However, behaviourism cannot adequately account for L2 acquisition because learning is not just a response to external stimuli.

A mentalist theory of language learning
From a preoccupation with the role of ‘nurture’ (i.e. how environmental factors shape learning), researchers switched their attention to ‘nature’ (i.e. how the innate properties of the human mind shape learning). This new paradigm was, therefore, mentalist (or ‘nativist’) in orientation. The concept of interlanguage drew directly on these mentalist views of L1 acquisition. 

  1. Only human beings are capable of learning language.
  2. The human mind is equipped with a faculty for learning language, referred to as a Language Acquisitio Device. This is separate from the faculties responsible for other kinds of cognitive activity (for example, logical reasoning).
  3. This faculty is the primary determinant of language acquisition.
  4. Input is needed, but only to ‘trigger’ the operation of the language acquisition device.
What is ‘interlanguage’?
The term ‘interlanguage’ was coined by the American linguist, Larry Selinker. A learner’s interlanguage is a unique linguistic system as L2 learners construct a linguistic system that draws, in part, on the learner’s L1 but is also different from it and also from the target language. The concept of interlanguage itself involves the following premises about L2 acquisition:

  1. The learner constructs a system of abstract linguistic rules.
  2. The learner’s grammar is permeable.
  3. The learner’s grammar is transitional.
  4. Some researchers have claimed that the system learners construct contain variable rules.
  5.  Learners employ various learning strategies to develop their interlanguage.
  6. The learner’s grammar is likely to fossilize.
This concept of interlanguage offers a general account of how L2 acquisition takes place. It incorporates elements from mentalist theories of linguistics and elements from cognitive psychology.

A computational model of L2 acquisition
The concept of interlanguage can be viewed as a metaphor of how L2 acquisition takes place. It implies that the human mind functions like a computer. This figure represents the basic computational metaphor that has grown out of ‘interlanguage’ and that informs much of SLA.

The learner is exposed to input, which is processed in two stages. First, parts of it are attended to and taken into short-term memory. These are referred to as intake. Second, some of the intake is stored in long-term memory as L2 knowledge. The processes responsible for creating intake and L2 knowledge occur within the ‘black box’ of the learner’s mind where the learner’s interlanguage is constructed. Finally, L2 knowledge is used by the learner to produce spoken and written output. The basic model of SLA can be elaborated in some ways, such as adding some additional information to give more specific process inside the brain, like the environment in between ‘input’ and ‘intake’ to explain that the environment has a part in giving input.

Questions:

  1. Related to the third point of premises about L2 acquisition, that is “the learner’s grammar is transitional”, how do the learners change their grammar from one time to another by restructuring the whole system?
  2. Based on your opinion, how do the teachers encourage interlanguage development of second language acquisition in her class?

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2. The Nature of Learner Language


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Errors and error analysis
1.  Identifying errors
To identify errors we have to compare the sentences learners produce with what seem to be the correct sentences in the target language which correspond with them. Errors reflect gaps in a learner’s knowledge; they occur because learner doesn’t know what is correct. Whereas, mistakes reflect occasional lapses in performance; they occur because, in a particular instance, the learner is unable to perform what he or she knows.
2.  Describing errors
There are several ways of describing errors. One way is to classify errors into grammatical categories by gathering all the errors relating to verbs and identifying the different kinds of verb errors in our sample. Also, we can try to identify general ways in which the learners’ utterances differ from the reconstructed target-language utterances, including ‘omission‘(i.e. leaving out an item that is required for an utterance to be considered grammatical), ‘misinformation‘(i.e. using one grammatical form instead of another grammatical form), and ‘misordering‘(i.e. putting the words in an utterance in the wrong order).
3.  Explaining errors
Errors can have different sources. Some errors seem to be universal, reflecting learners’ attempts to make the task of learning and using the L2 simpler. Learners commit errors of omission. They also overgeneralize forms that they find easy to learn and process. Overgeneralization means the oversuppliance of an interlanguage feature in contexts in which it does not occur in target language. Other errors known as transfer errors reflect learners’ attempts to make use of their L1 knowledge.
4.  Error evaluation
Where the purpose of the error analysis is to help learners learn an L2, there is a need to evaluate errors. Some errors, known as global errors, affect overall structure of a sentence, so it will be difficult to process. Whereas, local errors, affect only a single constituent in the sentence and are, perhaps, less likely to create any processing problems.

Developmental patterns
1.  The early stages of L2 acquisition
In a silent period, learners make no attempt to say anything to begin with. They may learn language just through listening to or reading it. When learners do begin to speak in the L2 their speech is likely to manifest two particular characteristics. One is the kind of formulaic chunks. Fixed expressions like ‘I don’t know‘ figure very prominently in early L2 learning. The second characteristic of early L2 speech is propositional simplification. Here, learners find it difficult to speak in full sentences so they frequently leave words out.
2.  The order of acquisition
Do learners acquire the grammatical structures of an L2 in a definite order? To investigate the order of acquisition, researchers choose number of grammatical structure to study. Then, they collect samples of learner language and identify how accurately each feature is used by different learners. This enables them to arrive at an accuracy order.
3.  Sequence of acquisition
Do learners learn such structures in a single step or do they proceed a number of interim stages before they master the target structure? When learners acquire a grammatical structure they do so gradually, moving through a series of stages en route to acquiring the native-speaker rule. The acquisition of a particular grammatical structure must be seen as a process involving transitional constructions.
4.  Some implication
The work on developmental patterns is crucial. Linguistic features are inherently easier to learn than others. Learners naturally learn one feature before another they must necessarily do so. Moreover, sequence of acquisition can be altered through formal instruction.

Variability in learner language

 We have seen that learner language, that is variable, is systematic. Thus, we may be able to explain, and even to predict when learners use one form and when another. Learners vary in their use of the L2 according to linguistic context; vary the linguistic forms they use in accordance with the situational context. Another important factor that accounts for systematic nature of variability is the psycholinguistic context—whether learners have opportunity to plan their production. 


Questions:

  1. Please could you explain; is there any difference in the error evaluation made by native speaker and non-native speaker? How do they make the error evaluation for their class?
  2. Please could you explain; what criteria do judges use in evaluating learners’ errors?




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1. Introduction: Describing and Explaining L2 Acquisition


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What is ‘second language acquisition’?
In fact, the meaning of the term ‘second language acquisition’ requires careful explanation. In this context ‘second’ can refer to any language that is learned subsequent to the mother tongue. Also, ‘second’ is not intended to contrast with ‘foreign’. ‘L2 acquisition, then, can be defined as the way in which people learn a language other than their mother tongue, inside or outside of a classroom, and ‘Second Language acquisition’ (SLA) as the study of this.

What are the goals of SLA?
One of the goals of SLA is the description of L2 acquisition. Another is explanation; identifying external and internal factors that account for why learners acquire an L2 in the way they do.

Two case studies
A case study is a detailed and usually longitudinal study of a learner’s acquisition of an L2, involving the collection of samples of the learner’s speech or writing over period of time.
1.  A case study of an adult learner
A researcher named Richard Schmidt studied Wes’s language development over three years from the first time he started visiting Hawaii until he eventually took up residence there. Wes (a thirty three-year-old Japanese artist) learned English in a natural context. He had little or no knowledge in first of most of the grammatical structures. Moreover, he was still far short of native-speaker accuracy three years later. Although he did not learn much grammar, he did develop in other ways, such as using fixed expression like ‘Hi! How’s it?’. Schmidt noted that Wes was adept at identifying these fixed phrases, and that he practiced them consciously. Then, he helped Wes develop fluency in using English. Eventually, Wes achieved considerable success as a communicator.
2.  A case study of two child learners
J (a ten-year-old Portuguese boy) and R (an eleven-year-old Pakistani boy) learned English in a classroom context which enabled them to develop a basic ability to perform requests using target language forms. J and R were capable of successfully performing simple requests that seemed formulaic in nature, using fixed expression like ‘Can I have a ___?’, and manifesting development in their ability to perform those.  However, the study by Schmidt found that they failed to acquire a full range of request types and forms. Also, they developed only a limited ability to vary their choice of request strategy in accordance with situational factors. Thus, the developmental process was not complete.

Methodological issues
One issue has to do with what it is that needs to be described. Another issue concerns what it means to say that a learner has ‘acquired’ a feature of the target language. Moreover, there is another problem in determining whether learners have ‘acquired’ a particular feature. Learners may manifest target-like use of a feature in a formula without having acquired the ability to use the feature productively. A third problem in trying to measure whether ‘acquisition’ has taken place concerns learners’ overuse of linguistics forms. ‘Overuse’ means the overuse of some feature where some feature is in target-language use, and it may or may not result in errors (referred to deviations in usage which result from gaps in learners’ knowledge of the target language).

Issues in the description of learner language
Both of these studies set out how to describe how learners’ use of L2 changes over time and what this shows about the nature of their knowledge of the L2. One finding is that learners make errors of different kinds. Moreover, L2 learners acquire a large number of formulaic chunks, which they use to perform communicative functions that are important to them and which contribute to the fluency of their unplanned speech. One of the most interesting issues raised by these case studies is whether learners acquire the language systematically.

Issues in the explanation of L2 acquisition
An explanation of L2 acquisition must account for both item learning—learners internalize chunks of language structure and system learning—they acquire rules, and also how the two interrelate. Why was acquisition in the two case studies so incomplete? Perhaps, they simply needed more time to learn, or they are only motivated to learn an L2 to the extent that they are able to satisfy their communicative needs. Why is it not necessary to learn the full grammar of a language in order to get one’s meanings across? All three learners might not wish to belong to the community of native speaker they had contact with, then, kept a linguistic ‘distance’ in between. Perhaps, it is only possible to acquire native-speaker competence if they start very young when their brains open to language. L2 learners might be able to acquire difficult linguistic features only when they receive direct instruction in them.

 Questions:

  1. From that given case study of two child learners, based on your opinion, what can the teacher do in her classroom to facilitate the process of second language acquisition in order to make the lesson comprehensible for her students?
  2. Why is it crucial for teachers or even caregivers to provide a strong language model in second language learning processes to their learner’s acquisition of L2?




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