Studies were conducted to help determine criteria for describing the stages through which second language learners pass as they acquire a new language. The ability of 24 beginning adult students of English as a second language to supply ten morphemes in obligatory contexts was predicted on the basis of contrastive analysis between English and each…

The work reported here is part of an ongoing project to develop a language comprehension assessment instrument that: (1) is sensitive enough to pinpoint the particular language phenomena that are causing difficulty or have not been mastered, and (2) is also broad enough in scope to provide a credible and useful description of language proficiency.…

Two English language proficiency tests commonly given by universities and colleges to non-English speaking applicants were administered to 338 students in 5 Toronto high schools. The purpose of the testing was to relate test scores to students' background (language, immigrant status) and to school marks (English marks and others). Both tests…

A multiple-choice test of English vocabulary and grammar was administered to college-bound Swedish-speaking and Finnish-speaking students studying English in Finland. Erroneous responses were analyzed to determine differences in learning strategies between the two groups. Swedish speakers were found to choose incorrect alternatives based on…

This report is a continuation of a research project, begun by B. Spolsky and E. Migliazza in the English as a Foreign Language Program at Indiana University, designed to show that foreign students whose overall integrative motivation is high (+IM) have achieved a higher standard of English proficiency than those whose integrative motivation is low…

This guide to careers requiring knowledge of a foreign language details a wide range of positions. It begins with a general survey of the field of foreign languages--historical background, need for trained personnel, attributes necessary for success, comments of business and professional people. Educational preparation in high school, college, and…

Three methods for second language data collection are compared: free composition, picture description and translation. The comparison is based on percentage of errors in a grammatical category and in a source category. Most results obtained from the free compositions and picture descriptions tended to be similar. Greater variation was found for…

This study focuses on a native speaker of Chinese, in her 40's, who began to learn English in her late 20's when she emigrated to the United States. It was discovered that the subject was able to self-correct nearly every error she made in casual speech when the errors were pointed out to her after their commission. Furthermore, in nearly every…

The errors of 187 bilingual students, aged 10 years, 11 months to 19 years, 8 months were analyzed as they studied English as a third language. Errors were categorized with two major learning strategies in mind: transfer and overgeneralization. Types of errors were related to degree of bilingualism, English proficiency level and age of the…

The purpose of this paper is to present a practical model for determining and depicting language dominance, given the general nature and needs of bilingual education programs in the United States. The author proposes the use of parallel tests of aural ability to indicate initially the language dominance of children who, for example, are otherwise…

This syllabus describes and outlines the first half of an experimental, two-year course leading to the study of a modern foreign language at the University of Washington. In effect, the two-year course, which introduces the student to the nature of language, tests the belief that it is easier to learn a second foreign language, due to linguistic…

The report reviews recent arguments for directing attention to suitability for a linguistic course of study. A first step in that direction, a Verbal Reasoning Test composed and tried out in the 1975 student selection for English, is described, and the results of this experiment, involving 1046 candidates, are given. The Verbal Reasoning Test is…

This study examined the most frequent communicative and linguistic errors made by 24 intermediate ESL students, and determined the effect of direct teacher correction upon these students' writing proficiency. Students were identified as having high or low communicative proficiency and were randomly assigned to one of two error correction…

Forty-eight adult learners from three intermediate-level ESL classes participated in a study investigating the effects that differences in learners' out-of-class contact with the second language might have on proficiency. Results indicated that learners' informal contact interacted with differences in instruction to produce variation in…

Reviews current research on listening comprehension and development of listening tests and considers four issues in detail: 1) the meaning of context in listening testing; 2) the concept of criterion referenced tests; 3) the notion of specific purposes in testing; and 4) the use of technology in listening tests. Issues for future research are…