Task-based language teaching (TBLT) and instructed second language acquisition (ISLA) have much in common in terms of theory, research, and educational relevance. The distinguishing characteristic between the two is that TBLT adopts communicative tasks as the central unit for instruction and assessment, whereas ISLA comprises a broader range of…

The Department of Linguistics at University of Victoria (UVic) in Canada has a long-standing tradition of empirical approaches to the study of theoretical and applied linguistics. As part of the Faculty of Humanities, the department caters to students with a wide range of backgrounds and interests, and provides crucial language teaching support in…

This article aims to discuss ten beliefs that teachers hold about second language (L2) learning and to relate these to relevant theories and approaches in the field of second language acquisition (SLA). It is especially written for L2 teachers who would like to know more about theoretical approaches that seek to explain L2 learning. Preliminary…

Written corrective feedback, referred to hereafter as "written CF" and also known as "grammar correction" or "error correction", has been a controversial topic in second language studies over the past fifteen years. Inspired by John Truscott's thought-provoking 1996 essay in "Language Learning", many different researchers have undertaken new…

This article presents the preliminary steps to the implementation of detection and correction strategies for the erroneous use of N+N structures in the written productions of French-speaking advanced users of English. This research is carried out as part of the grammar checking project "CorrecTools", in which errors are detected and corrected…

The role of (written) corrective feedback (CF) in the process of acquiring a second language (L2) has been an issue of considerable controversy among theorists and researchers alike. Although CF is a widely applied pedagogical tool and its use finds support in SLA theory, practical and theoretical objections to its usefulness have been raised…

For more than a decade now, a great deal of research has been done on the topic of written corrective feedback (CF) in SLA and second language (L2) writing. Nonetheless, what those research efforts really have shown as well as the possible implications for practice remain in dispute. Although L2 writing and SLA researchers often examine similar…

In the research conducted by Truscott and Hsu (2008), the authors demonstrate that although rewriting corrected drafts results in lower grammar error rates on the rewritten texts, this effect does not carry over to a subsequent new writing task. The authors conclude that the result indicates that there may have been no language improvement from…

This discussion briefly surveys the development of the immersion method of second language teaching, outlining the central program strategies and characteristics using Curtain's and Pesola's descriptions. An overview of recent research focuses on error correction and feedback studies as an example of pedagogical-methodological evolution in this…

This introduction to second language learning is intended to provide language teachers with basic information on relevant principles and processes. After an introductory chapter, the second chapter looks at traditional beliefs about language learning, including those concerning transfer of first-language knowledge to the second language, the role…