Focuses on the relationship between involuntary verbal rehearsal, Piaget's egocentric speech, Vygotsky's inner speech, and the song stuck in my head phenomena. It is hypothesized that song may act as a Language Acquisition Device (LAD) activator or be a strategy of the LAD in the ontogenetic development of language. (28 references) (Author/VWL)

The historical development of strong and weak definitions of applied linguistics is traced. It is argued that weak definitions do not limit themselves to resolution of second-language teaching problems, potentially address all practical language-related problems, and provide the necessary flexibility for realistic theory and practice of applied…

Reviews corpus-based research that draws on theoretical insights from systemics, genre, and discourse analysis for exploration of small-scale specialized corpora of academic writing. (Author/VWL)

Reviews research on the use of the "T-Unit" as a measure of language ability, demonstrating that the measure has limited utility in the case of second language, since it bases itself solely on syntax and does not reward speakers for sophistication in such areas as vocabulary. (Author/CB)

A review of some of the major works in neurolinguistics published during the last decade extrapolates many implications for second and foreign language theory and practice, covering such issues as hemispheric dominance, language processing, and bilingualism. (35 references) (CB)

Views writing instruction as the techniques and approaches used by the teacher, as well as the learner's whole experience in the writing classroom. Drawing on research on writing in both first- and second-languages, an analysis focuses on the different aspects of writing instruction. (61 references) (Author/VWL)

Demonstrates the relevance of second language teaching by discussing the English progressive aspect. Suggestions are made for how the teaching of the progressive to beginners of English could be improved. (Author/VWL)

Addresses two questions: What strategies do good language learners use? What factors affect choice of language learning? A review and synthesis of existing research on language learning strategies, including a number of new and unpublished studies, is used to answer these questions. (53 references) (Author/VWL)

Presents a brief overview of good research design and related statistical concepts in deliberately non-technical language and argues that an awareness of the basic principles of valid research on the part of teachers and researchers is necessary to put the findings of language and education research into proper perspective. (Author/CB)

The findings from research on written and oral summarization are discussed under three headings: summarizers' strategies, improving summarizers' performance, and the assessment of summary quality. Objective measures of summary quality used by researchers are described, and ways these measures could be adapted for use in higher education assessment…

Two studies of elementary, intermediate, and advanced second language learners indicated that involuntary rehearsal of second languages ("Din in the Head") is more frequently experienced by elementary and intermediate students and much less prevalent among advanced students, suggesting that the phenomenon is related to language…