In this article, we present our vision of a transformed second language acquisition and teaching (SLA/T) disciplinary community that approaches second language (L2) education through four pillars. The first pillar is praxeology (i.e., the study of human action) to highlight the sociocontextually emergent nature of L2 competence. It locates the…

Linguistics is conspicuously absent from language teaching in UK schools. A-level cultural topics cover a range of themes such as cyber-society, cultural heritage and multiculturalism, but the approach taken to these topics is not informed by linguistics. In previous work, we have argued that this is an unfortunate omission not only because…

If maximal exposure were the key to success in language learning, then adult learners at the university level would be doomed to fail. Not only are they presumably too old to learn additional languages effectively, but target language (TL) input appears to be insufficient, especially when other languages are allowed in class. Nevertheless,…

The present study examines the language- and culture-learning perceptions of domestic and international students from a Canadian university who participated in an intensive four-week-long Spanish language and cultural immersion program in Spain. The study draws on quantitative and qualitative data to explore the ways in which the participants'…

This dissertation explores Spanish copular verbs, "ser" and "estar" (both 'to be' in English), in pre-adjectival contexts within two Spanish varieties: first-language (L1) Chilean speakers from Santiago (N = 29) and second-language (L2) English-speaking learners studying in Chile (N = 31). Bridging sociolinguistics and second…

This study serves as an initial inquiry regarding the early print knowledge of emergent bilingual preschool-age children living in an Indigenous community in Mexico. In this research, we examine various dimensions of print knowledge with Yucatec Maya-Spanish bilingual children for whom one of their languages (Yucatec Maya) is seldom seen in print…

This study investigates how previous exposure to a foreign language and culture influences student performance in online knowledge-building tasks. As knowledge-building tasks allow students to share and distribute their knowledge; this study examines whether foreign language and culture knowledge is also distributed amongst the group. The study…

Although there is a growing consensus that, in reading acquisition, it is essential to provide children with learning activities that promote the development of reading cognitive schemes, particularly intra-syllabic related patterns, there is no agreement on which kind of syllabic schemes should be worked out in the first place. The main aim of…

The goal of the present study was to examine the efficacy of learning a text structure strategy (TSS) for improving reading comprehension and recall for second language (L2) learners, as well as to test for transfer of the strategy to the native language (L1). University L2 learners of English completed a five-session course on using the TSS to…

This paper describes three case studies, where language learners were invited to use "LingoBee" as a means of supporting their language learning. LingoBee is a mobile app that provides user-generated language content in a cloud-based shared repository. Assuming that today's students are mobile savvy and "Digital Natives" able…

This study investigates second language (L2) development of Spanish verbal morphology, subject omissions, and subject-verb (SV) inversions by learners in two different proficiency levels and learning contexts. Oral narratives from 40 L2 learners at the intermediate and advanced levels, both at home and in a study abroad (SA) program, were examined…

This study was inspired by the literary elements of "cuentos tipicos" (culturally-relevant stories). The book "Prietita y la llorona" ("Prietita and the Ghost Woman") written by Anzaldua (1995) is a good example of a "cuento" that provides information about medicinal herbs and also includes…

Study abroad (SA) is one of the flagship offerings among United States higher education institutions. Approximately 220,000 students studied abroad in the 2005/2006 academic year, 52.8% of whom studied on programs that lasted eight weeks or less. The effect of these short-term programs on second language development has been little investigated,…

In general terms automaticity could be defined as the subconscious condition wherein "we perform a complex series of tasks very quickly and efficiently, without having to think about the various components and subcomponents of action involved" (DeKeyser 2001: 125). For language learning, Segalowitz (2003) characterised automaticity as a…