Studies that measure the effectiveness of language-training program for children's language development do not clearly identify in adult-child interaction which characteristics of educators' language are most effective, particularly for children over 4 years of age who need to develop complex syntactic skills. Our study aimed to analyze the…

This paper addresses the gaps between language documentation and language revitalization. It is intended for several audiences, including field linguists interested in supporting endangered language sustainability efforts and participants of all kinds in language revitalization courses, programs, and infrastructure. The authors contend that…

The Guidelines for Good Practice of the European Association for Language Testing and Assessment (EALTA) stress the importance of collaboration between all parties involved in the process of developing instruments, activities and programmes for testing and assessment. Collaboration is considered to be as important as validity and reliability,…

The Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL) is a private, nonprofit organization with over 50 years' experience in the application of research on language and culture to educational and societal concerns. CAL carries out its mission to improve communication through better understanding of language and culture by engaging in a variety of projects in…

The primary focus of this article is the investigation of how current applied linguistic research into the nature of call centre communication breakdown in business processing outsourcing (BPO) sites such as India and the Philippines, can impact English communications training program content and design for this industry. It is argued that a…

Recent years have brought increasing attention to studies of language acquisition in a country where the language is spoken, as opposed to formal language study in classrooms. Research on language learners in immersion contexts is important, as the question of whether study abroad is valuable is still somewhat controversial among researchers…

This article argues that a native-speaker baseline is a neglected dimension of studies into second language (L2) performance. If we investigate how learners perform language tasks, we should distinguish what performance features are due to their processing an L2 and which are due to their performing a particular task. Having defined what we mean…

The present study investigates the degree to which social, experiential and usage-related factors correlate with Spanish linguistic competence among adult Hispanic Heritage Language (HL) speakers in the United States. Two online survey instruments were developed in furtherance of this research aim: a Likert-scale survey measuring five areas of…

This article reports on a case study of negotiation that occurred in peer group oral interactions under assessment conditions. Discourse analysis was used to illustrate how participants negotiated and co-constructed the assessment format itself as well as meaning exchange sequences. Analyses of the data point to the advantage of using peer group…

This study sets out to examine the pragmatic competence of Cantonese adult learners of English possessing different levels of proficiency when performing the speech act of requesting for a formal purpose in writing. Pragmatic judgment--one of the two aspects of pragmatic competence--was examined by studying the most proficient group (i.e., native…

Language laboratory effectiveness in secondary schools and related research are discussed. Criteria for five elements determining the laboratory's effectiveness are described: (1) the teacher, (2) the teaching materials, (3) the testing and grading programs, (4) the student practice sessions, and (5) the equipment. Some general remarks are made…

Philippine students in grades K-6, representing different socioeconomic classes, participated in individual elicitation sessions. Using Pilipino (Tagalog) as the language of elicitation, experimenters used pictorial stimuli to elicit specific structures of English grammar, in order to discover if the subjects had mastered these structures. Only…

Recent language testing research investigates factors other than language proficiency that may be responsible for systematic variance in language test performance. One such factor is the test takers' cognitive styles. The present study was carried out with the aim of finding the probable effects of Iranian EFL learners' cognitive styles on their…

This study arose from the recently published report of the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) in Britain, "Primary French in the Balance" (1974). The study consists principally of a series of discussions between the project leader, Ontario Ministry of Education officials, the principal investigator, and other invited…

This study of two student groups enrolled in secondary school foreign language programs evaluates comparative achievement covering a four-year sequence of study. The control group results, reflecting previous foreign language elementary school (FLES) instruction, provide strong contrasts favoring the continuation and further development of FLES…